Guides
How to roll out desktop AI with your IdP and MDM
David Buxton · · 2 min read
Rolling out AI to a whole company sounds like a big project. It doesn’t have to be. If you already manage identity and devices centrally, you have everything you need — most teams go from decision to fully provisioned in a single afternoon.
This is the four-step rollout we recommend with Harriet Endpoint AI.
Step 1: Decide who gets what
Before touching any tooling, map your teams to model tiers. Engineering might need frontier models; most teams do brilliantly on faster, cheaper ones. Doing this first turns a vague “AI rollout” into a concrete provisioning plan — and keeps the first invoice predictable. (More on that in keeping AI spend predictable.)
Step 2: Connect your identity provider
Connect your IdP — Okta, Microsoft Entra, or Google Workspace — so group membership drives access. The rules you already maintain (departments, seniority, contractors) become AI access policy with zero extra admin. Joiners get access on day one; leavers lose it the moment they’re deprovisioned.
Step 3: Push the app through MDM
Distribute the desktop app the way you ship every other managed app: Jamf or Kandji for macOS, Intune for Windows. Employees open their laptop, the assistant is there, and it already knows who they are — no installs to chase, no API keys to hand out.
Step 4: Watch the first two weeks
The first fortnight tells you everything. Look for teams with unusually low adoption (they may need a nudge or a use-case demo) and teams with unusually high spend (they may need a different model mix). Adjust per team, not per company — the admin panel lets you change a team’s models or budget without redeploying anything.
The result
No installs to chase, no API keys in spreadsheets, no shadow accounts. Just AI on every endpoint, governed like the rest of your stack — and routed through approved regions so compliance stays intact.
Want a hand planning your rollout? Book a call and we’ll map it to your IdP and MDM.
Common questions
Do I need new infrastructure to roll out desktop AI?
No. If you already run an IdP (Okta, Entra, or Google Workspace) and an MDM (Jamf, Kandji, or Intune), you have everything required. Access follows your existing groups and the app ships like any other managed application.
How do I stop the rollout from creating a support burden?
Provision through identity and distribute through MDM, so there are no manual installs or API keys to chase. Then watch the first two weeks and adjust models or budgets per team from the admin panel — no redeployment needed.
What happens when someone leaves the company?
Because access is tied to your IdP, deprovisioning a user removes their AI access automatically — the same moment they lose email and everything else.