Thursday morning. I open Amazon.fr, type "Mac mini", add to cart, pay. Receipt arrives. Eight minutes later, cancellation email.
Try again Friday. Same address, same card, slightly different configuration with a new card. Pay. Cancelled.
Third attempt, also Friday. Cancelled, but not right away, after I get a tracking message saying the item was en route. Then, upon reading the tracking message it says order cancelled by customer.
What? I didn't cancel this, my amazon account must have a problem. AI ops for solo founders is mostly hat-swapping like this until the second client lands. Today the hat I cannot take off is procurement. I despise these tasks.
I search amazon.fr for a contact link. There isn't one. The help page sends me into a bot loop with three options that all return to the same FAQ. I hunt for a phone number. There isn't one in France. The chatbot tells me to email an address. The email auto-replies with the FAQ. Even more, my French has stalled between the B1 and B2 level for about 2 years, so I know calling the agent to speak in French is going to be a challenge. I can converse with someone face to face, but move that convo to the phone and it gets much trickier.
Two hours gone over two days. It is Saturday now.
I open WhatsApp and message my enterprise client's COO. "Sorry, can you order this for me? My French Amazon will not let me through and there is no human to call." Four minutes later, ordered. Arrives Sunday.
Embarrassing.
Why the Mac mini
The Mac mini is for a dedicated work space for this one client. Their managed service provider blocks SharePoint from mounting on any device outside their authorised list. The fastest fix is one dedicated machine in my office that the MSP authorises once and trusts. I had delayed the order for two weeks because I thought the MSP would loosen the rule. Two weeks ago I gave up and accepted the build would not move until SharePoint mounted on a machine the MSP trusts.
So Thursday I ordered, then twice more on Friday morning, and the COO placed the order that landed.
What I have not done this week
- The API pricing feasibility study a senior partner asked me for on Wednesday. He travels back Monday and expects an answer. Two senior investing-research data sources. The cost determines whether we can build the dataset or have to look elsewhere.
- The test plan for the mirror-week rehearsal that starts Monday morning. Five practice runs scheduled across the week. Monday is a Swiss and French holiday but the rehearsal calendar does not care.
- A single prospecting call. The reason I am the only one running this build is that I do not have the second enterprise engagement yet to bring my CTO on full time. Every hour I lose to procurement is an hour the build does not move, or that prospecting is not done.
The cost is not the embarrassment. It is not the lost Saturday. It is the displaced work the next-billable hour was supposed to do.
Sunday is gone too
The Mac mini arrives Sunday afternoon and someone has to sign for it. That someone is me. The waves and beachtime in Hossegor will have to go on without me.
One move makes this come right
Land the second enterprise engagement. The second engagement funds Jan, my CTO, to come off part-time and into the build five days a week instead of one. Procurement and authorisation still need doing. They just do not eat my Saturday. And the API pricing research lands when the senior partner asks for it, not three days late.
So once the Mac is on the desk, I am opening Apollo and starting the prospecting that should have happened Wednesday. The AI employee shipping next week will book the first cold calls. Until then, I am the AI employee.
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Monthly Revenues $11,800 | Clients 2 | Prospects (AI marketing employee live next week) | Team: Me + Jan (CTO)