14.ai Dispatch #30
The weird week between Christmas and New Year’s where time is fake and no one knows what’s happening.
We’re in that limbo where everyone’s pretending to work, living off leftovers, and questioning life choices. But hey, the chatbots are still running.
We wrote about AI-native BPOs 🤖
We published a whole thing about why AI-native BPOs are going to eat traditional outsourcing alive.
We also put it in terms of lemonade stands on Michael’s LinkedIn:
Imagine you wanted to open 10 lemonade stands but you can’t be at all of them at once.
You hire someone to run a stand for you. They’re nice, but they have to call you about EVERYTHING.
“A customer wants extra ice!”
“Someone asked for pink lemonade!”
“What do I do if they only have a $20 bill?”
It works, but you’re on the phone all day.
So you replace them with a robot. Super fast! But then:
Customer: “My daughter is allergic to lemons, what else do you have?”
Robot: ERROR ERROR 🤖
No common sense. Can only follow strict instruction.
So you give your employee a smart AI helper.
Regular customer wants lemonade? AI handles it instantly: takes the order, makes change, done.
But then someone asks: “Can you make strawberry lemonade even though it’s not on the menu?”
Robot doesn’t know. The human thinks for a second and says, “Sure! Let me mix some strawberries in.”
The AI watched that happen.
Tomorrow when someone else asks for strawberry lemonade? The AI already knows how to do it. Your employee doesn’t even need to think about it anymore.
After a month, the AI handles 95% of orders by itself.
Your employee only jumps in for the weird stuff (”Can I pay in Pokémon cards?”)
Every weird thing makes the system smarter.
This is how I explained AI-native BPOs to my six-year-old nephew who wanted to do a lemonade stand one weekend.
His response? “I don’t know what you’re saying, can you fill this with water?”
Fair enough, kid. Fair enough. Read our full article in the comments.
Seek pain
Replit sends job candidates a document titled “Why NOT to work here” before interviews.
One of their core values is “seek pain”
You know that feeling when something’s wrong and you know you need to deal with it, but you keep telling yourself it might just resolve itself?
Yeah, we all do that. And we all know it’s bullshit.
Every time you avoid the hard thing, you’re just letting it compound with interest.
Anxiety is a signal. Discomfort is showing you exactly where the work needs to happen.
That email you’ve been avoiding? Open it and respond now.
That conversation with a team member you’ve been putting off? Have it today.
That decision you’ve been delaying? Make the call.
When you train yourself to treat discomfort like a trigger for immediate action, it pays off in multiples.
Growth is never comfortable. The pain is coming either way; you can either meet it on your terms or wait until you have no choice.
As Amjad Masad says: seek pain!!!
Live about live Shopping 🛍️💰
Jason spent his days at TikTok helping live sellers rack up GMV.
Now he’s out here helping brands do the same with over $14M in Live GMV and counting.
He’s done it all: creator, influencer program manager, TikTok insider. The man has a 360° view.
We’re covering on Jan 7 at 9 am PT:
What converts during a live
How creators and brands work together without wanting to kill each other
Pre-live prep and post-live workflows
If you’re a founder, brand operator, creator, or growth person trying to figure out TikTok Live Shopping, this one’s for you.
How content actually works
We started posting on LinkedIn almost every day.
Will Phillips saw our posts and made a video about us.
Someone else saw that video and reached out.
They just became a customer.
This is how content actually works. You never see the full chain, and you never know which post will be the one.
Most people quit because they’re looking for immediate ROI on every post. They want to see: Post = Lead = Close = $
Content compounds through layers you’ll never measure. Like a prospect who’s been reading for 6 months before they DM you, or the hire who’s been following you and finally applies.
The content flywheel allows other people to start doing your marketing for you. It creates a gravitational field that pulls opportunities toward you.
Stop measuring every post. Start building momentum through consistency.
Did your chatbot buy you an iTunes giftcard?
We’ll refund it.
https://calendly.com/14ai/15minchat
Read or watch this now
Marie: Helping founders go direct, Lulu Cheng Meservey
Michael: An Economy of AI Agents, Gillian K Hadfield and Andrew Koh
Ugo: Good vs great animations, Emil Kowalski
Until next time. May your Q4 close strong and your New Year’s resolutions survive past January 3rd.