How to Survive the 0-1 Journey as an AI Strategist, Solution Architect, and Fractional Product Manager

• Passion for Solving User Problems: Approach challenges with authenticity and genuine perseverance. Always keep the end-user at the heart of your solutions.
• Conviction to Stand by Your Roadmap: Have the courage to defend your vision and stick to the plan despite challenges.
• Confidence While Working with Ambiguity: Draw inspiration from your past experiences to navigate uncertain situations effectively.
• Business, Domain, and Technical Skills: Cultivate a balance of these skills and always think from the customer’s perspective.
• Passion for Working Through the Details: True progress happens on the ground level. High-level ideas at 30,000 feet won’t get products shipped; you need to dig in and make them a reality. This is where consulting versus startup mindsets can diverge significantly.
• Ability to Collaborate with Remote and Distributed Teams: Adaptability and strong communication skills are crucial when working across diverse and distributed teams.
• Master Reading, Writing, and Speaking: These three skills are essential for success. Embrace them as your lifelong allies.
• Read Extensively and Curate Ideas: Read a variety of materials, and leverage quality ideas from your bookmarks or saved resources.
• Don’t Reinvent the Wheel, but Do Invent Something: Build upon existing solutions when appropriate, but strive to create unique innovations where needed.

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Product Pitch Discussions - What Customers Look for in GenAI Products

Based on my observations from participating in client product pitch calls:

Client counterparts, such as the CTO or Head of Data Science, are often technically knowledgeable and savvy about the product and solution. Beyond understanding the product, discussions often delve into detailed questions like the number of models used. While they typically grasp the overall approach and flow, questions about specific models and data usage demand careful and precise responses. Here’s what to keep in mind:

Be Transparent About Shortcomings: It's vital to be upfront about any shortcomings in existing solutions. While most of us are technically proficient and familiar with tools and workflows, clients highly value honesty and clarity.

Custom Benchmarks Are Key: Preparing domain-specific benchmarks is crucial. This demonstrates how your solution aligns with and addresses specific business needs.

Addressing Issues and Challenges: Highlight the number of issues or challenges you've successfully resolved. This underscores the robustness and reliability of your approach.

Focus on Metrics: Consistency, accuracy, and relevance are the key metrics to emphasize. These reflect the reliability, pertinence, and latency of the solution. Convey that no single model can solve every domain use case; solutions must be holistic and tailored to the domain.

Incorporate Real Domain Experience: Embedding domain expertise into the product makes it easier to outperform competitors and deliver exceptional value.

LLM Benchmark Dashboard: Having a custom dashboard ready is transformative. It should highlight functionality, responsibility, adoption, and usage, giving clients an immediate view of the solution's capabilities.

Stay Ahead with Features and Workflows: Ensure your product offers features and workflows that provide real, tangible value to the client.

Hands-On Work and Proven Benchmarks: Demonstrating hands-on work and showcasing proven benchmarks are always more persuasive to clients. They prefer tested, reliable solutions that save time and effort while aligning with their goals.

This experience is very identical to my experience with the CTO of a US-based specialty Retailer

I presented a ReimaginedWorkflow for: Customers, Support analysts, Procurement teams, Digital Asset Management

GenAI-powered workflows for

• New engagement models
• Innovative interactions
• Blending creative solutions

Proven approach / Quick time to market / Iterative experiments are they key aspects that people trust your approach.

Having participated in the 0-to-1 journey, I've learned that authenticity and transparency are the foundations of success. Efforts aligned with a clear vision will always pay off.

GenAI and cybersecurity for leaders: We are launching a quick one-hour course. In a way, we would love to give it away for free for the first 100 users. If you are interested, please share your feedback.

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Thank You and Looking Ahead to 2025!

To all our customers, clients, and friends—thank you for your tremendous support throughout 2024.

As we step into 2025, I’d like to share my wishlist for GenAI Product Development and Responsible AI Adoption:

Promoting Positive AI Impact:

• Ensuring fair compensation for creators whose content is used in training AI models.
• Leveraging AI to bridge gaps in education and healthcare access.
• Accelerating infrastructure development through AI-driven innovations.
• Enhancing employability by creating AI-driven solutions to upskill individuals.
• Fostering the next generation of knowledge workers and problem solvers.

Establishing Regular Fair Use and Audit Policies:

• Implementing focused regulations for monitoring and auditing GenAI adoption to ensure long-term societal benefits.
• Prioritizing ethical considerations and purposeful implementations over profit motives, with clear timelines.
• Establish strict controls to prevent unethical usage and hold model creators accountable for adverse AI impacts.
• Addressing concerns around AI companionship and mitigating risks of digital addiction.

A Personal Milestone

2024, we reached an exciting milestone—50 students enrolled in my course! It was such a proud moment to receive an appraisal from my ex-boss about the course.

A heartfelt thank you to everyone who enrolled and provided valuable feedback. My network is my greatest support, and I deeply appreciate all the conversations with customers and potential clients.

Since its launch, students have collectively viewed 4,175.33 minutes of lecture content—an incredible achievement that motivates me to keep improving.

Wishing Everyone a Successful, Safe, and Happy 2025!

Here’s to a year of success, safety, productivity, and joy!

Self-driving fridge, hit by self-driving Waymo, recorded by self-driving Tesla

 

 

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