Subscribe
Share
Share
Embed
Do Good Work is not a label but a way of living.
It is the constant and diligent effort to achieve a new level of excellence in one’s own life.
It is the hidden inner beauty behind the struggle to achieve excellence.
It is not perfect but imperfect.
It is the effort, discipline and focus that often goes unnoticed.
The goal of this podcast is to highlight that drive.
The guests I have on this show emulate this drive in their own special way. You’ll be able to apply new ideas into your own life by learning from them.
We will also have 1on1 episodes with me where we’ll dive into my own experiences with entrepreneurship and leadership.
Every episode is designed to provide you with ideas that you can apply and grow in excellence in all areas of your life, business and career.
Do Good Work,
Raul
INTRO
Today on the podcast I
have Thaddius Ruszkowski.
He's a C two O at fdi and
he's been building software
platforms for over a decade now.
From a 25 person internal workflow
systems to consumer facing platforms
with millions of users worldwide.
He's also one of the few people
that I've talked to who isn't
theorizing about AI agents.
He's running his own fleet
in parallel every single day
across different projects.
And the most interesting part of this
conversation, for me at least, is when
we dive into what happens to value,
to intellectual property and to labor
when production costs get this cheap.
Because efficiency is literally
just a starting round.
And if you just stop there,
you're gonna miss out the real
competitive advantage of ai.
When it comes to ai, he
also got in early as well.
Within a week of the APIs being
available, he built a chatbot system
built and trained all the way from
the ground up on the writings of St.
Thomas Aquinas, in the convo we get
into running parallel agents without
losing your mind, the hardware comeback,
why on-prem or local is going to
matter a lot more than people think.
And why your intellectual property
is actually more valuable now.
Precisely because there's
so much slop being produced.
Now let's get into it.
PODCAST
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: Well, I
mean, everybody's saying it's the
APIs that you build everything
around and most people are there.
Raul: mm-hmm.
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: I would
make the argument that no, we, we
gotta get local on it for security
purposes, for just being able to
retain my information there is.
You know, it used to be that you
had to percolate over things.
It was a lot of work before you could
share what you were talking about
or what you were thinking about.
Now, I don't even have to type
Claude Code, just added voice mode
by default through my terminal.
All right.
Now I can just talk to it.
Well, that may be good.
May also be crazy.
Raul: Yeah.
Well, I appreciate being
able to talk to my computer.
I speak much faster and it allows
me to really think through what
I'm trying to articulate, but I
also want it to speak back to me.
I think there's a big argument about
on-prem or on cloud, and I think,
I personally think that hardware
is gonna make a huge comeback.
Like
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: Yeah.
Raul: it last night that I feel
like I'm back in 2008 or 2007.
I'm looking at.
in my file system.
I'm opening up a local drives.
I am looking at upgrading my computer for
more ram like in the past, I didn't care
about Ram 'cause it was all in cloud.
I just needed a fast like
processor to hit, hit Chrome.
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: Right.
Raul: like I feel like I'm back
on back in the chain, I'm like,
I should just start Linux again.
Like I should just go, oh,
completely open source.
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: I don't think
you need to go that far, buddy.
It's
Raul: hey, I, I love my
own Bluetooths though.
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: Oh, I, I
tell you what, I just I love
the machines I have right now.
You know, there was a period of time
where I had a MacBook Pro probably about,
I don't know, four or five years ago,
and you could barely type on it now,
like that made doing work difficult.
Now, my golly, I am all about this thing,
and the things I'm able to do with the
AI is just, it's, it's unbelievable.
It's opened up an opportunity for me
to get ideas out of my head much faster
than just having to make sure that
I'm writing the proper case statement.
Raul: I feel like the work for me
is now at the speed of my thoughts.
I can work as quickly as I can think.
can have now a couple
agents running for me.
And as they're pondering and
tinkering, I'm onto the next thought
for this other thing, onto the
next thought for this other thing.
And it takes a little bit of, of
learning to, to figure out that muscle.
'cause it does create like
mental fatigue if you're doing
too much content switching.
But now it's like, it's a.
feel like in flow, it feels like a
flow now, but I, one of the things
that I'm noticing, and obviously
for knowledge workers or for techies
or for technologists and leading
developers like I think I'm in between,
like, I'm like a techie, like I
want to be a developer, but I'm not.
But I'm definitely not, like
not afraid of the terminal.
I'm still astounded of how the number
of people that aren't actually playing
with this stuff actually learning.
And I feel like there is a.
chasm to cross.
Once you open your eyes, you're
like, oh crap, this what's possible?
Help me walk through.
Like I'm trying to
encourage people to start.
Playing with this stuff to
building and figuring out there
are some realistic obstacles.
Maybe price could be it,
hard work could be it.
There's also some ideological obstacles,
but help me walk through like that chasm.
And now how has your work evolved
and how are you seeing it?
Like tangibly, and I think this is
gonna be important to share like a real
story of like how has your work shifted
over the last six to eight weeks?
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: Sure.
So I have, I have shifted significantly
in being able to rely on agents.
Now, this being said.
WI think there's an important caveat that
this is changing so fast that two weeks
from now there could be something else
that one of the frontier models rolls
out that makes a statement irrelevant.
But from the concept, starting with the
chat bot, when AI came out and chat, GPT
came up coworker and I decided we'd put
together a chat bot using RAG that would.
Mimic being somebody, right?
So it took a personality,
it took the writings of St.
Thomas Aquinas and we made Aquinas chat
within a week of the API being available.
And we thought, okay, there's some real
opportunities here, but we write code.
So we knew that this was, this
was something, and people were,
people were excited about it.
They were, they were moved by it.
There wasn't a whole lot of movement.
I would say for a while a lot
of things changed, but it was
happening behind the scenes.
We used chatbots to brainstorm
ideas or try and solve things.
Right?
And, and I, what's the, what
level of nerd should I embrace
here for this conversation?
If I say something like CLI, right?
Command line interface
through the terminal.
Raul: define, yeah.
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: Sure.
So so I sit there and work in
ides or code terminals, right
where you sit and write code.
It runs different options
in the background.
You can see what's going on.
This is specific to writing
code building software.
As context over the last decade,
I've built platforms from using, you
know, 25 people with very specific
workflows to platforms that have 1.6
million user accounts in it
that are widely used across
the United States and Canada.
Those platforms all have taken
a significant amount of time.
So your question of how has this evolved,
those, those platforms, we would go in and
we'd work on, on the code, troubleshooting
problems, doing all the things we
would normally do as AI has evolved.
And because code is so logical, right?
Start at this place and it's just
gonna follow through all the steps.
We can now use it to go in and
troubleshoot problems and get ideas.
And so that was the first that was the
first use that we really jumped into,
point me at the problem, and I'll fix it.
Because there was the problem with
hallucination in the code, right?
We couldn't rely on it giving
us a consistent good answer.
We knew it could get to a place
real quick and it could scan
multiple scenarios very fast.
So that was our first role into
using it to troubleshoot code.
Now we go in and say
brainstorm solutions with us.
So I am teaching my team how to use this
software to use artificial intelligence.
To solve problems, to identify where
the the issue is, and then use our own
critical thinking to say, knowing the
entire software code base, all of the
other functionality, all of the items that
rely on this, this is the right solution.
Now, Claude or Codex go
make this change for me.
So we are still driving
the development of it,
Raul: You're
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: but.
We're orchestrating.
Exactly.
And so at times, if you were to look
at my setup, I may have four different
projects going on to your point from
earlier, and I'm jumping from this
project to that project while the
API, while the AI is churning through.
What is this thing doing?
What's that?
Where's the problem here?
Raul: Yeah, I, it's pretty.
And I was gonna ask you how many
agents you got running up so far,
like behind the scenes right now?
Like
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: Right now.
Right now I shut it all down because I was
nervous about making sure we could record.
But prior to this I had 1, 2, 3, 4.
I had five agents running
on five different projects.
Raul: Oh my gosh, I only had three.
So
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: I, hey.
Raul: time.
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: No, you know what?
I was having a conversation with a
developer today, and I, I, I'm trying
to bring my team along on this,
and he wasn't real comfortable in
terminal doing the work, and I had
him in Codex right, in this scenario.
But there's simple little things
that, that by giving him the tools
he was, he felt more comfortable
taking the, taking the chance.
And,
Raul: Yeah.
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: the practical
example, two terminal windows open, both
look the same with code flying by on 'em.
Like something out of the matrix, right?
You know, the stickies app on the Mac.
Raul: Yeah.
Yeah.
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: I just said put a
sticky above each one of these windows
so you know which project this is
or what you're trying to do, right?
Raul: great.
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: So put.
Seriously, why solve, why
try and solve something?
Yes.
And there's a default one in the
Mac, and he didn't know it was there.
So I got to open up and go
like true old school on it.
Raul: you open up, did you open
up chess while you were at it?
Two.
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: Did I?
What?
Raul: Did you open up chess,
the chess game from the
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: No, no, no, no, no,
Raul: I.
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: no.
Be because I'd have the, I'd have anyway.
Raul: all bringing me back to
these apps that we were using.
Like again, it feels like eons ago,
but no, you're completely right.
One of the things that, that I think is
interesting to also talk about here is
you're not just looking at efficiencies.
I think a lot of people who aren't
building, like I like, had a call with
a brilliant dude, brilliant guy, just
before this smart dude isn't building,
and I'm like, why are you not building?
Why are you not actually using
this stuff and you're trying to
influence other people around this?
You don't even know.
Like, you know it's possible,
but you haven't actually done it.
It's like, oh, I, I
know about efficiencies.
I think efficiencies is like
the starting point that's like,
that's not even level one.
That's like, okay, you're
more efficient and.
Because of your experience actually doing
the code by hand, actually reviewing
things and knowing the, the limitations
of where AI was maybe 18 months ago or
12 months ago with the hallucinations.
I mean, it still hallucinates,
but you can have guardrails now.
we can talk about that in just a second.
Even for my, my line of work is
thinking, strategy, thinking, and
then just I think and process.
So anytime I, like, I wrote books
because I need to document my process.
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: Sure.
Raul: I'm starting to train and I
created skill sets off of that, but
now it's following my thinking to a
T where it can go deeper in things
that would take me maybe extra days
or hours to to endpoint quicker.
But then now I can go
deeper and actually think.
Deeply about the scenarios without
having to roll up 30, 40, 50
hours to get to that outcome.
So I think efficiencies is
the first starting point.
And I'd like to ask you like, because
you're working with a team, 'cause
you're thinking about this from a
business model standpoint with with
an agency, how are you looking at
human capital and efficiencies?
And we will get to the next level
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: Sure.
Raul: but I think that this is
across everyone's mind right now.
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: Yeah.
You know.
Raul: capital.
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: There's
a, there's a huge conversation
around this, obviously, right?
Because I think those individuals
that are not actually building
are, are theorizing over.
What is this gonna do for
somebody that's gonna do the work?
Is everybody gonna be out of a job?
And the reality is, and and I've had
a lot of conversations about this with
some really smart people that, to your
point, have not actually used it, but
are weighing in on what it's gonna do.
And so with my team, I'm trying to
bring them along and give these tools
and, and like you, I spend a lot of
time thinking about these things.
The, when we got a computer and Steve Jobs
said, it's like a bicycle for the mind.
Right.
It allows us to do things faster.
This is really capitalizing on that,
and it's not that it's saying, oh,
we're putting a motor on the bicycle.
It's saying, you know what?
We've got a completely different
vehicle for getting our ideas
and thoughts manifested the
we don't have to worry.
You know, everybody makes it as
a comparison to the Gutenberg.
Right, the press, okay, now all of a
sudden we've mechanized something and we
can do things at scale more so that is
on a production level and change things.
We look at the industrial revolution that
changed things, scaled things, right?
The internet came along, scaled things.
I can sit in my studio, work on
what I'm working on, and immediately
make it available to the world.
Raul: Yeah.
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: ai, it's not
just me with one thought anymore.
To your point, it's not
just one process anymore.
So what are we doing as an agency?
We are trying to increase
our efficiency to your point.
But what does that look like?
That means I'm still solving
problems, but if you know, I've got
four kids, they're into superheroes.
The superheroes have, have.
Superpowers, right?
And so AI allows us to amplify
those things that we're doing and
create those opportunities to go.
So I'm trying to identify what are
the strengths in each of my team
members and find the ways that,
that the AI can amplify that.
That changes the dynamic
of the team, right?
Because somebody that's a, an analyst
that can easily troubleshoot things.
Now what I can do is I can
say, alright, you're gonna
become my troubleshooting guy.
And the context for the project
doesn't is not as important.
It's still important.
Let me be clear about that,
Raul: No,
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: but be,
Raul: you're, you're leveraging his
skillset for that particular key
piece, and you're amplifying that.
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: Yes.
And so as an agency we're, we're able to
say, okay, my all star for troubleshooting
things doesn't have to figure out
what the project's doing because the
AI can scan through the whole thing.
We have we have files in the
system or in the code base that
specifically define these things
so that we can be more efficient.
And then some of the, some of the busy
work we're just taking off the table.
So.
Example of that is we use systems to
identify bugs or errors that happen in
the code base in real time, Rollbar,
sentry app signal, all kinds of different
services depending on the project.
We're connecting those to an AI that
creates pull requests automatically for us
that we're then reviewing so that we don't
have to have my expert troubleshooter.
Spend a bunch of time trying to
solve something that's a, a null,
coalesce, coalescing piece, right?
Just because we didn't account for a
null value in a certain scenario, okay?
That can be resolved quickly and easily.
Raul: I like that you're putting the
human as a center too, and I think that
is a better explanation of what I was
saying when, I'm doing some of the, the
work that I do, it helps me go deeper
and give superpowers and to your point.
I'm now able to do with other
agencies, like obviously not to
the same extent, 'cause there's
other things that they could do,
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: Right.
Raul: I'm able to do things
that other agencies would charge
like five, eight grand a month.
And now I can do that because I've,
I know exactly what needs to happen.
Plus I've, I've seen behind the scenes
and build some of those agencies.
So I, I know what needs to happen,
how to execute it, and now I can have
the agents help proliferate that.
So I can focus on the number one key thing
that matters, which is implementation,
strategy, relationship, and trust.
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: Yeah.
You know, I, I would ask you this it's
a thought that I've been, I've been
working through or noodling through in
my head that there is the concern I have
right now is we hear about slop, right?
What is slop?
Slop is just AI stuff that people
are just cranking out there.
And
Raul: that.
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: yeah, please,
Raul: I like Seth Godin.
Slop existed before ai.
If
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: yes.
Raul: I mean, people still
produce slop before ai.
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: Yes.
Raul: of your input.
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: Right,
Raul: offensive, but like, like if
you're listening to this and your
output isn't at the highest quality
that, you know, if you used ai, you
didn't, you're producing slop just now.
Like I think you mentioned this
earlier, if you wanna be lazy, AI
is just gonna make you more laer.
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: right.
Or if you're just looking to,
you know, and look, there's,
there's a place for making a buck.
If it's just about churning the
dollar, AI's gonna give you all
kinds of opportunities for that.
Hop on YouTube, hop on x, hop on
any of the platforms, and you'll
see people selling all those.
You know, here's a quick
way to do something.
I get it.
What I would encourage people, and
I would encourage your listeners,
is there are, there are things that
you're doing that you can do better.
With the use of ai, if you
understand what that really means.
Right.
But But the thinking aspect, right.
You've mentioned it a couple times.
We have to embrace the novel ideas.
That we come up with because AI
is is not at a place yet where
it's coming up with novel ideas.
It's synthesizing everything that has
existed and because they're throwing
massive compute at it, it allows
it to make a few more connections.
But that new idea, that inspired
idea, that's still very human.
Raul: Yeah, I'm gonna go
a little to mystic here.
And it's like it's like the level,
so stages, I dunno if we call 'em
consciousness or levels of being
like like plant being just exists and
there's animal being that, I know people
may argue that they are super highly
conscious, but I also know that we might
be perceiving that then there's animal,
like human like consciousness and how we
perceive this, how we can think outside.
And because, and this is like a
physical thing, AI is still in bits.
Like we literally created it.
We literally coded it.
It's.
It's learning to upon itself
because we coded it that way,
it's still contained in bits.
It's not atoms.
Like while we are
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: Right.
Raul: and we can think in bits, so
we can actually extrapolate things
outside and it's, it'll be, it's
like what we talked about earlier.
If you're not building it, you could,
the theorize what could happen and
AI can theorize what's potential,
but it won't know until it's
actually there and it's not there.
So
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: It
can, it can model things.
There's a really interesting book
max Techmark out of MIT life.
3.0
I think it is the, the, it's
max tag mark life, 3 million.
He wrote it years ago.
He's an AI guy outta outta MIT.
But he walks you through machine
learning into ai and then how
it could turn into creating a
whole new being long, thick book.
But the idea that as Elon's looking at.
Robots, right?
His optimist, he wants to make fleets
and just hundreds of thousands of them.
I think we have to look at all of,
all of the people that are selling
these services and say, what's
the motivation behind doing it?
Right?
I think we can see some clear
delineations on how they're looking to go.
And, and to that point, each of
these AI tools differentiates in
what it, what it's really good at.
Right, what it's focused on,
what it's built for, right?
A Phillips head screwdriver
versus a flathead screwdriver.
Each of these tools are,
are out there to use,
Raul: And they have an ethos and ethos
and, and ideology is defining the game.
Like if you, I'm not gonna
bring up the news, but just at
the news in the last 90 days.
I think to move, to move
forward to net new value.
So we talked about efficiencies
and helping your team
become, it gets super powers.
So there there
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: Yes.
I.
Raul: efficiency where you're able to do
things faster, but then now you're kind
of reming into net new value creation
value that wasn't easily accessible
or physically possible In the past.
And then now with
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: Mm-hmm.
Raul: how are you thinking about net
new value in your organization as well
as like you playing around with the
tools and what's what you've seen?
The frontier.
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: Yeah, so here
this is, I, I think it's twofold.
One is the, is the obvious as as
my team gets more efficient, I'm
able to do more in less time.
So we start looking at, okay, we're
solving the problem and we have to figure
out how to price things that is about the
solution, not just about how many hours
does it take to get something done right?
Because there are other expenses
associated with being more efficient.
But it's not, you know,
it's not a one-to-one.
So there is that aspect of, okay, if
it takes me 50% of the time it used to
take me, that means I can take on 50%
more client with the same personnel.
Same, same team, which is awesome.
Or what we are doing is we're also
looking at, okay, if I now have.
50% of time, I'm just using a, a
random number for demonstration here.
Right?
So 50% more time, I'm splitting that up.
25% of that time.
I'm trying to bring in new business to
do work with it, right, with the team,
but then I'm encouraging, I'm taking a a
page out of Google's playbook and saying,
with that other 25%, let's come up with
those ideas that we've been kicking
around, that as an agency we can own.
Right, because as an agency we're so often
tied to the decisions of the clients.
And you know, that's great, right?
Their organizations that are there.
But we have collective learnings
from that that we'd like to
be able to capitalize on.
So building new applications, building
new software, building resources for
people to use that they can capitalize on.
And then there's the other side of it.
And Raul, you know, we've known
each other for a long time.
Some of it's just plain.
Right.
Some of it is just have
a good time with it.
See what you figure out,
because you know nobody, okay?
Not nobody.
Many people that get into working
with computers and, and, and doing
this line of work that I do, do it
because there was just a lot of fun.
Doing it.
And you know what?
We can create opportunities
and, and have that fun.
And so to be able to build
something new, right?
To be able to create something.
I think we all feel the desire to,
to create something new, to make
something, whether that's intellectual,
whether that is, you know, a chair
or a a house or what that is.
We have created this
pallet with the internet.
It's a whole nother place to build, and
AI allows us to do that until you know,
or, or it's limited to the internet
or limited to computer until we then
apply it into robots and Roombas and,
Raul: space.
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: yeah.
Raul: Yeah, physical space.
No, and I, and I like that call
to play and I know, I think
that's more important now.
And again, I think we're
going back to roots just.
I know that some people buy the computer
and they're like, okay, how can I
get this thing to print money for me?
Like I get it.
Like I get that, but I've been,
I've been there, trust me.
But I think the key thing now is
like, okay, what is the net new
thing that you can do and create?
And I think through that fund,
through that, just exploration.
You're like, oh wow.
Here's what's possible.
Oh, let me solve this other problem.
Which gets to what we were talking
here and really the major point that I
want to discuss, because you're talking
about creating new software, creating
new apps, working with people too.
know, create Wall wasn't there before.
And selling it and selling it.
Either licensing or another
way or orchestration layer.
One of the key things that I've
been thinking about, and I think
you'll be jamming about this
offline, is on decoupling value
or labor from to decouple that.
And I think this is a new idea that
we're just going to be, isn't new in,
in terms of like you can create an
asset and that asset sells itself.
in the past, those assets were software
information courses and that's okay.
Courses and information, it's
effectively dead, in my humble opinion.
'cause information's like a at the
fingertips with the internet, and now
with ai, like you can literally just.
this thing, learn it for me.
Software I think has, its, tell me.
I think like it has a
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: Sure.
Raul: Just pure, a pure software play.
I think there's gonna be like an
orchestration layer for, to create
agents to work with the software
so that you can still get jobs
done and software's not going away.
It's just gonna change.
In terms of being an API play in
a software outcome-based thing.
But I'm curious to get your thoughts
on decoupling, like how can we through
play, net new value creation, focus
on decoupling our labor from net
productivity or productivity gains of
the marketplace, AKA value creation and
monetary reward of that value creation?
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: Sure.
Raul: about this in this new,
hopefully I'm framing it correctly.
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: I, I think, I
think you're framing your question
exactly as you need to frame it.
And here's what, here's, there are
a lot of thoughts that I have to it.
One, right when we look at.
The way that we have valued anything
oftentimes it's related to the effort
associated historically, right?
You pay a plumber to come in and fix it.
You're paying them for the time that
it's gonna take them to fix it, and
if somebody else can do it in less
time or a less hourly rate, you're
likely gonna go with them, right?
Raul: Yeah.
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: Software, massive
valuations that are out there, but
those still relied on the effort
associated with building, solving
those problems, doing all that work.
It was just, there were massive
fleets of, of people that
would build those things out.
So now I can sit down in my studio and I
can have four, I can have a whole team.
And so there's a perception shift, right?
But there's also a revaluation, and
this is what I think you're going to
in decoupling an hourly rate from what
I'm gonna charge somebody to do, and I.
Raul: Or even just that, even going
further, not just from hourly rate,
but I'm gonna do this thing for
someone else, decoupling that where
you create an asset and that asset
does the thing for someone else.
And all your focus is in improving
the quality of that asset.
Either an agent or a fleet of agents
or orchestration, like I think
that's the next level before 'cause
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: Yeah, I'm gonna,
I'm gonna push back on that just a
little bit from the standpoint of, we've
always, we've always had that, right?
Because you go to, when you used
to go to, say, Barnes and Noble
and you'd pay 'em for a book.
Right.
I wasn't paying, I'm not paying you for
the, the effort that went in the book.
I'm paying for that book.
Right.
I'm paying for that outcome.
So I don't think it's as far, I
think the, the rub that we're all
having to face right now is that
it's, it's not tangible necessarily.
Right, that the service that the agents
are creating or that I'm creating
through the agents or the software
that I'm creating is not tangible.
And so the value shift has to change.
And so leaning into the definition of
the value proposition is where it is.
I think we step away from.
We step away from how it's produced.
You and I are, are so, are locked in.
How do I produce this?
How do I get more efficient?
How do I distribute my thoughts,
ideas, the software, everything else,
distribute those out so that as many
people can benefit from that as possible.
And we look to to have the money
to be able to pay for kids to go to
school and all this stuff, right?
So decoupling is, is really more
about re reeducating people in a
real value of something that's there.
Does that make sense?
I know it's not a direct answer.
Raul: Yeah.
I know where you're leading to where
it, it is a perception shift and I think
we're going through that perception shift.
I think it, you, you, you might have
glossed over it for the listeners
or maybe I'm just wanting to
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: No, go ahead.
Raul: this, but the valuation, like
you said, something super important
about the valuation of SaaS companies.
Like they are gonna be rebalanced and I
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: Yes.
Raul: because of the headcount to that.
And that doesn't mean that
software is gonna crash.
And I think I agree with Jamie Diimmel
when he mentions like, this is an
overreaction, but it's nonetheless Mr.
Market is irrational.
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: Right.
Raul: way, there is gonna be rebalance
where the multiples aren't gonna be
as high simply because of the, the
production layer is going to be more
efficient, cost efficient, et cetera.
software in itself, it's
still gonna be important.
But I think to your point, if I'm
understanding it correctly, I,
and I alluded to this earlier,
we still had books, we still had
info products without a coaching.
Maybe I wanna reframe the
question of what is that?
Asset that we create of
the future look like.
'cause if in the past I could create
a book and that, that book, I could
put 20 years of wisdom and 200 pages
and charge you 25 bucks for it.
or a course like that's, that's,
those are still viable avenues.
But what does that asset look
like in the future based on what
you're seeing and what you're
building now, is it still software?
Is it still information?
Is there a new class?
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: Okay, let's, let's
start with the, the easiest is yes, bill.
There is a transition period here, right?
We are in a time of transition that.
Nobody really knows what it's gonna be
like in three or four years, but the
acceleration rate right now is massive.
Right.
Raul: Yeah.
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: And the stuff
that you and I are talking about
would've been crazy even, you know,
anybody 10 years older than me, right.
They're thinking no way.
There are people are around our same,
that just aren't in it and understand.
I think it was, it was, may have been
you that sent me the there's like 2% of
the population or less than that, that
have ever even really worked with ai.
Right.
Raul: It's like around three
that pay for it actively.
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: So, so trying to
understand what it is that we produce.
If, if we go back to my working theory
that it's, it's, it's giving superpowers
to the individuals that are there, right?
I think there is a scenario
where we're still paying for the
same things we're paying for.
It's just
a different execution, right?
That that maybe.
We we're still producing the books.
I was talking to a, a buddy of mine
and he's like, I've always wanted
to write a book, but I've never
been able to sit down and do it.
And he's like, I'm gonna do it with ai.
Right.
And he started into it and he started
what everybody does, write me a book.
Okay.
Raul: Yeah.
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: Right.
That's not going to, there's gonna
be zero value in that because
anybody can sit down to do that.
The value creation is when we
can take the, the individual,
what we would produce.
And, and do that in a way that somebody
else sees value in The beauty of the
internet was you could create gumby socks
and you could find a market for it because
you could reach everybody in the world.
Right.
So what we're able to do is we're
able to launch even more out there.
So what I would encourage with the
listeners, as you're looking at the
business that you're in, there's a
lot of gloom and doom, right, right
now, and there's a lot of over hype.
Raul: Yeah.
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: The the stayed
course with an eye toward the
future that says, what, what can
I amplify using digital products?
Digital services, that's where
I need to be looking right now.
Right?
Because the vast majority of 'em
are not gonna be saying, okay, I'm
gonna take this and build robots
that go and do the whole thing.
If there are individuals
listening to this that are your
listeners, please reach out to me.
I'd love to be involved.
But the vast majority of us are gonna
continue doing what we're doing.
We're just gonna be able
to do it more heightened.
More extreme.
Does I, I don't think
I'm really answering.
I don't think I'm really answering the
question because I, I would love to say.
Raul: gave you like a really hard, I I
gave you a really hard question, which is
an essay that I have to like, tinker on.
It's like, what is the form factor of the
new digital services and digital products?
And maybe my answer is no.
Maybe there is no new form factor.
It's just like what you were saying,
the same things that already existed
because they were the, the categories that
always existed just in an amplified way.
But I'm gonna, I'm gonna noodle
on that and that that might
be a separate article for,
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: Because, 'cause
there are three, three scenarios here.
Three scenarios.
The first one is what I just said.
Okay, we're gonna go out and we're gonna
essentially do what we're doing, but
we're gonna be able to do it better.
People are gonna have more time to
be able to do the things they've
wanted to do and take chances, play
on things, put stuff out there.
It's just we're, we're using
different tools, we're using
different items to solve.
The other is a singularity
where all of a sudden.
AI is take over and they're
doing everything and we're all
sitting back and going, okay,
Raul: Where's my
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: it.
Raul: check?
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: Right?
Where is it?
Just send me some money.
I'll sit around and eat whatever.
I don't think we're wired that way
as humans to let that play out.
I think we have to create, I, I
just think innately we are here
to create and, and that's that.
The other is AI takes over.
The whole thing goes
south and we're all gone.
Like,
Raul: that's, that's
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: but
Raul: chance
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: a non-zero situation.
But right now what I would say
is that because no one knows.
That thing and things are
accelerating and changing so rapidly.
There's hot takes are king, right?
I'm gonna, I'm gonna say the world's
going great, or the world's falling apart.
And that's the conversation around ai.
And I think the practical conversation
of how can I use it to your
point, how can I really use it and
build something and do something?
That's what's gonna define
that thing in the future.
Raul: Yeah.
And I think, I think to, to close
that loop is the future isn't written.
So you, if you're listening to this and
you're activated by it, just go build it.
Like literally go build it and what you
can in your sphere of the world with who
you, who you have a relationship with,
who you can amplify in the work that
you can do in your skills and talent.
So I think that's a good, that's a
good close to that big discussion.
Do you wanna do like a quick bullet
hot seat round, like quick questions?
Gotta
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: Sure.
Hit me.
Let's see if I can even be quick.
I, I have a tendency to ramble.
Raul: Well, I, I got like
three that are like quick hits.
They may
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: Yeah.
Yeah.
Raul: but also just quick hits
of and then we'll close with
with where people can find you.
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: Mm-hmm.
Raul: the first quick hit is how do
you think about quality assurance
in terms of making sure that what
your agents are producing you
have quality assurance standards.
Is that a skillset that you set up?
Is that a markdown that they have
per, per Claude code instance?
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: It's both.
Because, because everything that we,
the beauty of software development
is it either works or it doesn't.
When you write something,
you launch it, it works or it
doesn't quality control on that.
Yes, we have code review that goes through
the agents, but because my guys are
learning this now, just like everybody
else, I don't let anything go into a
code base that they can't explain to me.
So we sit down.
They go through on our daily standup.
Here's the work I did yesterday.
This is what we're produced.
These are the items.
I'm confident that what I'm putting
in here is going to work and not
cause problems with our clients.
Raul: Yeah, and it for my, on my end, I, I
make it a, a skill set that is mandatory.
It is a pretty cumbersome QA protocol,
but I run it every time no matter
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: Yeah.
Raul: Next one.
How do you think about ip?
Is IP important?
How do you protect ip?
Maybe we don't know that answer fully yet.
But is IP important today and will it
continue to be important in the future?
Or is differentiation
more important than ip?
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: I think
IP is even more important
now from a value standpoint.
And what do I mean by that?
Anybody can sit there with a
smartphone and pop off with an idea.
Some are good, some are
great, some are terrible.
But they're all out there.
And as, as you as we've discussed, there's
gonna be plenty of stuff out there.
The good ideas, the good IP is
noodled on is thought through.
It takes more effort to
really generate good ip.
Then it has in the past because
there will be so much garbage
that is just floated everywhere.
So I would say IP is even more
valuable and yeah, that's what I'd say.
Yeah,
Raul: I think it's hard to defend
IP now, and I don't know if
we, if we really will own it.
I think IP
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: sure.
Raul: Like the the processes that I'm able
to do the thing, it's because I've thought
about it and IP is literally everything.
Now, is it defensible in the future?
Is it gonna be easily swiped?
I'm not sure.
So I would marry that
IP plus distribution.
Is critical distribution, either through
ideas or distribution through selling.
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: I'm gonna come back.
I know it's a hot take and I
was, I was thinking, or sorry.
A quick take and I was thinking
it was one response and go,
but I need to respond to that.
I think there's a scenario where
we're gonna see movement back to
on-prem with processing so that
we can come up with the ideas own.
The IP in-house and just distribute
the pieces that we want out there.
So who I am, what I do stays here, right?
Raul: And on your phone eventually.
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: Whether it's
the phone, but I would, I would go.
I'd go further and say,
we'll see the client.
You know, apple just released the MacBook
Neo, and, and it's a $600 laptop for
kids, but there's this idea of thick
clients and thin, thin clients and super
computers that are out there right now.
One could make a, a real analogy.
That we're all working on these
supercomputers and you can use an iPad,
an iPhone, or whatever, using the chat
box, creating and generating anything
Raul: Oh, so that's
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: I
Raul: hq.
And then these are like the
peripheral devices, the child
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: Right.
And so
Raul: was the next question, is
how do we think about hardware?
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: I think we're
gonna come back to, you know, I've
been looking, there's the whole open
claw Mac mini, everybody rushing out
to buy one because of the whole thing.
I've been looking at, okay, what hardware
do I wanna put in at house so that I
can do things like install a local LLM
that I'm not tied to the cost of the
APIs, and there are sacrifices you have
to make in performance, so be it right.
Raul: They're, they're so nominal that
you can't, you can't tell apparently.
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: but, but that
could change if all of a sudden you say,
okay, I've hit something right there.
You go to the app store right now and
look at any of these wrapper apps.
And I don't mean that in the Tupac and
Biggie, I mean that in the it's just a,
it's a software wrapped around API calls.
And you'll see they're all based
on subscription because they know
they're gonna be pinging the APIs.
They know that they're gonna churn
because the value will be a quick hit.
They're the sugar apps I call
'em, and there's no sustenance
to 'em ongoing, right?
You use 'em for a little
while, then they're gone.
And it's all based on API usage.
I think what we can do for, for people
like us that are building things,
getting something that generates and
does specific tools and sets in hardware
local, freeing us from having to be tied
to API usage for the majority of our tasks
Raul: Yeah,
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: is gonna
be the future of this thing.
Raul: you just talked
me into the Mac Studio.
Thank you.
Tha
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: Hey, just wait.
We gotta see.
We gotta see what they're gonna do.
There are rumors that
there's a new one coming.
Yeah.
Raul: Yeah.
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: Yeah
Raul: final, final hit is how do you
disclose like AI policies with clientele?
Like there could be a divide depending
on the industry that you're in.
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: sure.
Raul: disclose that as a policy?
Is it on your privacy terms?
Is it on your contract?
This is an opinion, this
is not legal advice.
Just like what are you look
thinking and how are you doing it?
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: Yeah.
I, the way that we're handling it,
because it's new and as you alluded
to, there can be very divisive.
We're using it in places where we know
that the impact is large, internal,
and small, external to begin with.
Raul: Mm.
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: Right.
Raul: Got it.
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: inside I'm using
it on all kinds of building and doing
things, but we always tell the clients,
Hey, we did use AI associated with this.
If you'd like us to
stop, just let us know.
Right.
In all of our contracts,
Raul: Is there really a stop button ever?
Do you really think that
we're gonna be able to be, so
gonna do everything by paper.
Do you think that's possible?
Because like even g, like my Gmail,
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: it's not paper.
Raul: emails.
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: It's not paper,
Raul: you know, I'm alluding to
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: but, but it's
like, it's, it's editing a photo with
AI versus adding a photo in Photoshop.
Like that's the, that's the difference.
Now I know Photoshop has, you
know, it has stuff mixed in.
Right, but that's where the
differentiation comes at this
point, from our agency, right?
Doing digital marketing, building
software, building websites, doing
all these things, we can, we can
set, we could set up AI to replace
a significant portion of this stuff.
The problem with that is
there are taste makers.
There are, quality review.
There are those elements that have to
be in place that really provide the
value, the human value of the situation.
So getting back to your question,
we are, we are optimistic.
What the abilities that it gives us to do.
But at no point would, would we look at
something and say, you know what they
want us to make an image, so we just go to
chat, GBT, make me an image of this, and
then just let it spit it out and use it.
Right?
We're still involved in it.
Raul: Yeah.
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: Because people
aren't, and I think bring it full circle
here, because people aren't playing in
these things and coming up with seeing
what it can do and what it can't do.
There is the conversation of it's
just gonna take everything over.
Raul: Yeah.
But
Thaddeus Ruszkowski:
gonna take over a ton.
Right.
But.
There's, there's some incentives for
people to stand up and say, we're
gonna take over the world with this
technology, invest more in our company.
Right.
So,
Raul: so there's different
narratives out there and I think
to, to answer with that is.
Yeah, because the term is so ubiquitous
and it's out there when you say ai, when
I say ai, when my AI PhD friend says ai,
and the dude off the street says, Hey,
we're talking about different things
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: yeah.
Raul: talking about.
So I think that's one of the
key things of, of education.
Well, Thad, where can people
want thank you for being on
and two, reach out to you.
Like which, which what socials
do you actually hang out in?
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: I don't actually
hang out in a lot of socials, but,
Raul: Yeah.
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: but.
Raul: what's the best place?
Thaddeus Ruszkowski:
Email me thaddeus@fu.com.
That's a great one.
I am on LinkedIn, Thaddeus Ruszkowski.
I don't know how that shows up on
LinkedIn, but you can send me a message.
Just know I'm not in there every day.
And yeah, reach out by email.
Go to fu.com,
F-U-Z-A-T i.com
and you'll see me, you'll
see me and my team there.
Raul: There you go, Thad.
Thanks for being on man.
Thaddeus Ruszkowski: You got it, man.
It's always great talking with you.
Thank you for listening to the podcast.
If you'd like to get more of
these podcasts, please go ahead
and subscribe to wherever you're
watching or listening to the pod.
If you have any suggestions or questions
that you want me to answer on the
pod, or you have a guest that you want
me to interview, please go ahead and
email me all of your suggestions and
questions at podcast at do good work.
io that's podcast at do good work.
io.
If you'd like to give me public
feedback, you can go on Apple
Podcasts, and from there, you
can leave up to a 5 star review.
I would greatly appreciate that.
If you'd like more free resources where
you can get my best strategies to help you
increase your company's performance and
scale profitably, where you can get hand
picked articles to propel your growth, and
you can get trainings and discussions that
I give freely online, as well as low cost
resources, Such as my books and guides.
You can get all of that
by going to dogoodwork.
io forward slash resources 90 percent
of all these resources are not behind
any email opt ins you can get instant
access by going to dogoodwork.
io forward slash resources Now, if
you'd like to accelerate your progress
and shorten the gap between information
and action and start seeing results
in your business, let's work together
to increase your company's performance
and scale profitably and serve
more clients without the overwhelm.
You can request a free clarity call
to see how we can best support you to
reach your goals by going to DoGoodWork.
io forward slash apply.
Again, that's DoGoodWork.
io forward slash apply.
As always, it's an honor to be
a small part in your journey.
This is Raul Hernandez.
Do good work.