”The smallest act of kindness is worth more than the grandest intention.” Oscar Wilde
Previously at the Volcano Base, I was crocheting a parachute as I hurtled towards the ground. Then I hit it, hard. This week I’ve been really grateful for some help from friends.
Mission Briefing
The small business advantage
How did Tana summarise the last week?
“The week’s activities underscore a dynamic blend of technical exploration, client engagement, and personal development, setting a robust foundation for future endeavours.”
Not a bad achievement, given the Business Concussion from falling from a great height last week. I’m still limping around due to a nasty Hope Fracture too. See that “client engagement” element? There wasn’t much of that the week before. That notable change is all down to having asked for help.
Thank you
There’s nothing concrete, as in signed and sealed, but I’m so grateful to all the people that contacted me, or introduced me, or recommended me to people in the last week. My spirits are lifted. I can smell the potential now. If you’re interested, potential smells a little like liquorice. I know, strange right?
What do you do?
Something that came up a few times while talking to people offering help, was “how can I sum up what you’re doing?” It’s a fair point. It’s week 5 of Volcano Base and I’d spent a lot of that time researching and making. So I needed to do some explaining.
I quickly created a handy webpage about what I’m offering, but the gist is two things:
- Products. These are packaged systems for small businesses in the UK. Plug one-or-more in and off you go. All use AI and automation behind the scenes but you don’t need to worry about the technology.
- Services. A more bespoke offer. For businesses needing more hand-holding when it comes to AI and automation. Or with unique needs not served by the plug-and-play systems above.
Why small businesses?
Why small businesses though? Two main reasons:
1 - when it comes to AI and automation they have an advantage over larger organisations. They can make decisions faster. They have less complicated legacy systems. But the main reason is they’ll get disproportionately large benefits from upgrading their operations.
2 - I predict there will be a lot more of them over the next 5 years. Job security is a myth and I’ve seen so many senior, talented people leaving large companies over the last couple of years to start their own thing. It’s hard work, but no less secure than having a job these days. Just add some synthetic staff to your team and away you go.
Thanks again
So thank you, sincerely, to everyone that’s tried to help me this week. I don’t forget this sort of thing. I’m nowhere near out of the woods yet, trailing my crocheted parachute behind me as I limp towards the grasslands. So if you have any ideas, please shout. When this happens to you, let me know and I’ll be there.
Classified Intel
Some interesting stuff I discovered on my adventures.
Ask ChatGPT to execute a task on a future date, or on a recurring schedule. So, run a competitor analysis on my business every quarter. Or, summarise Reddit discussions about my business and email it to me every Friday at 9am. Go nuts.
From Stanford University, in the former United States of America. It’s a research prototype that supports “interactive knowledge curation”. Yeah, they need to work on that description. Enter your topic area and get a wikipedia-like report on it. Great tool if you want something a bit more in-depth than, say, ChatGPT.
Pop in a long video and get a bunch of vertical “shorts” automatically - captioned and ready to go. Then publish them off to your favourite, soon-to-be-illegal, video social network of choice.
UK aims to become world leader in AI
The UK govt is going all-in on AI with billions of investment over the next 5 years. Like it or not, AI’s going to be a large part of the future economy of the country. Might as well get stuck in, yeah? Let’s talk.
