Scott Buchholz is the CTO of Deloitte Consulting LLP's Government and Public Services practice. There have been significant research advancements in quantum computing in recent years, and a bridge exists between those developments and how the technology can benefit organizations today. Business leaders need to be aware that the bridge exists to start preparing for the quantum future (whichever form or forms it takes), but should not plan to sprint across that bridge. In a recent report my team and I published, we discussed how leaders can balance quantum computing investment timing to avoid spending too early without ROI or delaying it so long that they fall behind. Leaders should balance business outcomes and accountability with novel intellectual property development in their organizations’ quantum computing journeys. Why Leaders Should Consider Using Quantum-Inspired Techniques I previously wrote about three quantum-inspired techniques that can run on current classical hardware: quantum-inspired feature engineering for machine learning, quantum-inspired simulated annealing and quantum-inspired Monte Carlo alternatives. These quantum-inspired techniques give leaders an opportunity to improve outcomes without the risks of waiting for quantum computing to mature commercially or making investments in technology that may not yield short-term results. For instance, teams can use quantum-inspired feature engineering to improve existing machine learning pipelines for anomaly and fraud detection. They can leverage quantum-inspired simulated annealing to tackle complex optimization problems, such as inventory management and supply chain logistics. As for quantum-inspired Monte Carlo alternatives, leaders can use them to make more accurate valuations and risk assessments, such as derivative pricing and estimates of catastrophic but rare events. Which techniques an organization should explore depends on its industry and the use cases it wants to solve. A bank may benefit from quantum-inspired feature engineering for fraud detection, whereas a manufacturer would see more value in quantum-inspired simulated annealing