AI-Using SMEs Grow 2.8x Faster. 72% Aren't Training Anyone.

MYOB’s platform data makes it concrete: Australian SMEs using AI products are growing 2.8 times faster than those that aren’t. That’s not from a sentiment survey. MYOB measured median income growth across hundreds of thousands of businesses, comparing transaction, bank-feed, and payroll data for AI users against a matched group of non-users over equivalent periods.

Forty per cent of SMEs now use AI, according to MYOB’s Bi-Annual Business Monitor of more than 1,000 businesses surveyed in April 2026. That’s up from 29 per cent in November 2025 — an eleven-point jump in five months. We noted that earlier figure when covering the Xero and MYOB AI partnership deals. The adoption curve has steepened since.

The more telling number is on the other side: 46 per cent of SMEs say they’re not using AI and have no plans to start within the next 12 months. Nearly half the market is watching the other half pull ahead at almost three times the rate.

Among the 40 per cent using AI, the growth is real. But the investment in skills to sustain it is not.

Seventy-two per cent of SMEs have no plans to offer AI training. Two-thirds of employers aren’t seeking AI experience when hiring. The businesses getting value from AI are largely getting it by chance — individuals figuring out tools on their own, without structured guidance or deliberate capability-building. Among AI users, 54 per cent report saving time and 34 per cent say it has improved productivity. Those are real gains. But they’re being generated without any systematic approach to developing the skills that produce them.

We wrote recently about the AI literacy gap costing the Australian economy $18.9 billion, drawing on RMIT and Deloitte data showing 54 per cent of workers are beginner-level AI users. The MYOB findings add the other half of that picture. Even among businesses where AI is delivering measurable growth, almost none are investing in moving their people past the beginner stage. The 2.8x advantage is real but fragile if nobody in the building understands why it’s working.

For a trades business, the growth differential likely compounds through speed and recovery. AI-generated estimates mean responding to quote requests in hours rather than days — and in competitive bid situations, speed is often the deciding factor. Automated scheduling fills tomorrow’s gaps that manual dispatch would have missed. Smart invoice reminders — the kind MYOB now ships as standard — recover cash that would otherwise sit in a debtor’s account for weeks. None of these require a data scientist. They require someone to switch the feature on.

For a professional services firm, the leverage is different. AI-assisted document review, automated transaction categorisation, and intelligent time capture don’t just save hours — they shift the ratio of billable to non-billable work. In a firm where the constraint is always capacity, even a modest shift in that ratio flows directly to the top line.

MYOB’s separate mid-market survey of more than 500 decision-makers reinforces the pattern at the next tier up: 81 per cent say AI has positively impacted productivity, rising to 93 per cent among the most advanced businesses. The more deeply AI is embedded in operations, the bigger the returns.

Start training. The federal government’s free AI skills program — one million places through the National AI Centre and TAFE NSW — gives your team a shared baseline in a day. Seventy-two per cent of SMEs have no training plans. Be in the other 28 per cent.

Audit what’s already switched on. If you use MYOB, check whether Smart Reconciliation, AI BAS support, or AI Business Insights are active in your account. If you use Xero, check JAX. These features ship with existing subscriptions. The 2.8x gap doesn’t start with expensive new tools — it starts with using what you already pay for.

Make AI experience part of hiring. Two-thirds of SME employers don’t ask about it. Given that AI-literate workers earn $7,000 to $11,000 more per year — reflecting real productivity differences, per RMIT and Deloitte — the cost of not asking gets higher every round.

Key takeaways

Want to know where the 2.8x applies in your business?

A short call can identify which AI tools you’re already paying for but not using — and where the growth opportunity sits in your operations. Book a call.