Hire the task, not the tool

Running your own business can now mean paying for several AI tools while still doing the same weekly jobs. The question is which tasks those subscriptions have taken off your desk.

More tools can leave you doing the same work

A tool leaves you doing the task when you still have to direct each part of the work. Adding another subscription is easy enough. Finding room to use it is a different matter, especially when the existing tools already need your attention.

Suppose you're preparing a proposal with AI. You supply the details, ask for wording and move the useful bits into the document. Then you notice that the client asked about delivery, so you go back for another paragraph. The proposal gets written. You've been there throughout.

Help with wording can be worth paying for when writing is the part you find difficult. But buying that help hasn't given the proposal to somebody else. You still have a proposal to prepare whenever a prospective client asks for one.

That matters if you expected the purchase to free you for other work. A quicker paragraph can help without changing who finishes the document. With another tool involved, you still need to choose the next action before the proposal can move on.

A task has an end you can recognise

A recurring task is specific enough to hand over when you can describe its end and recognise a correct result. The useful starting point is the work due again: invoices to issue, appointment details to send, requested documents to get to a client.

I would go so far as to say you're paying for the task to be completed, however the software bill describes the purchase. That gives the spending a purpose you can judge. “Help me with clients” is too broad to tell you whether the money helped.

Take a hypothetical request for information about a service. Sending the current service description to the person who asked is a task with a definite end. You can check that the right document reached the right person. Whether the person becomes a customer is a later question.

Someone else can send the service description while you continue dealing with the prospective customer's questions about the service. Whoever sends the document needs to know which version is current. You may still need to tell the sender which version to use on each occasion.

A handover needs a brief, an agreed check, approval and a record, even for an ordinary repeat job. Those requirements help you decide whether the task is ready to leave your desk. If you have to explain the intended result each time, that explanation is still part of the job.

Choosing who does each task

You can keep a task yourself, give the work to an agent you run, or buy the finished result from someone else. The choice belongs to each task.

Tasks that depend on your relationship with the client or your judgement about the business are ones to keep yourself. Setting a price belongs here, as does deciding what to say in your name during a disagreement. You have to mean the answer.

Suppose a client is unhappy with a proposal and wants different terms. You know whether you want the work on those terms. Writing the reply yourself gives you room to decide what you're prepared to agree to. Help with phrasing can be welcome without handing over that decision.

A routine task with a clear result can go to an AI agent you run, with your instructions and a check you can perform. An AI agent is software equipped to act through other tools. Imagine the task is sending the details of an agreed appointment. Assume the agent has the connections and permission needed to read the booking and email the customer.

An earlier edition of the Solo, Properly newsletter argued for attaching the rules to individual tasks. You still have to provide the instructions when you run the agent. In the appointment example, the agreed booking gives the agent something definite to work from. The appointment is already agreed, so the agent has no need to choose a time.

Buying it done means paying someone for completed work and proof of completion, such as a bookkeeper reconciling the month's transactions.

An accountant who handed you a login and left you to file the return would still owe you the job.

The cost includes your remaining work

The cost worth comparing is getting the task done and checked, including your remaining part in it. A subscription bill leaves out the time you spend turning answers into finished work.

For the hypothetical proposal, better wording may justify paying for help even though you still prepare the document. Keeping that job yourself can be deliberate. You want to work through the offer before putting it to the client. A useful tool can make that work easier.

The appointment task has a different purpose. You want the agreed details sent without having to assemble the message yourself. Copying the booking into a prompt for every appointment would still leave you preparing each message. The purchase has to be judged with that effort included.

The appointment task also needs instructions before the first message goes out. Writing instructions for a recurring task can take effort before any work leaves your desk. Repeating that explanation each time is a continuing cost. The next repeat job will show whether the instructions saved you another explanation.

At the next renewal, the recurring task you expected the purchase to cover may still be unfinished. Who will finish it next time is part of the decision to pay again.