2026-06-28

#25 Build With Intention | I Wrote The Founder's AI Playbook

Hello Reader

In my last newsletter, I wrote about how building feels safe, and shipping feels exposed.

This week, I actually shipped something instead of starting the next thing.

Intention

A founder I know came to me last month. Their product was doing well. Real users, real revenue, the thing was working.

Then they told me they needed to add AI.

I asked why. They were honest about it. Their investors kept asking. Their competitors had announced features. They felt like they were getting left behind.

So they built it.

Six months later, they had an AI feature almost nobody used.

And the hard part to sit with is that it wasn't built badly. It was good work. Their users just didn't need AI to do the thing they were already happy paying for.

I've watched this happen more than once. It's never the engineering that fails. It's the decision underneath it.

Insight

The question they started with was "Should we add AI?"

I understand why people ask it that way. But it's the wrong question, because the answer is nearly always yes, eventually, to something.

The better question is quieter. What problem would this actually solve that we couldn't solve more simply? Would anyone change how they work to use it? And what happens on the day it gets something wrong?

Most founders never get asked those questions. So they build first and find out later.

The ones I admire most are the ones who can say "not yet." Who sits with the pressure and doesn't move until there's a real reason to.

That's all "build with intention" has ever meant to me. Not moving first. Moving when you actually know why.

Action

If there's an AI decision on your desk right now, sit with one question before anything else:

Am I doing this because a user needs it ~ or because I'm scared of falling behind?

If you can't say the problem out loud in one plain sentence, you're not ready to build it.

And there's no shame in that. Knowing is the work.

A Note: Founder's AI Playbook

I made The Founder's AI Playbook. It's the concepts I use personally ~ when to invest, when to wait, when to leave it alone.

A few frameworks, a build-vs-buy matrix, a one-page decision tree, and a template you can fill in before you build anything.

No code. No jargon. Just the thinking.

If this is the kind of decision you're sitting with ~ when should I introduce AI in my product? - It might help.

Get The Founder's AI Playbook

Hope this helps and gets you the answer you are looking for. Let me know your feedback. Keep building with intention.