Arty McLabin

Founder: , | Business Engineer | Turning chaos into systems | Perspective on Context Engineering, automation, and startups.

[Arty McLabin @Arty_McLabin]

AI Subagents
vs
Skills

=

Humans
vs
Tools

#contextengineering
(see next)

[Arty McLabin @Arty_McLabin]

3/ if you need a clear deliverable for a defined problem, a consultant is the right call.
(corpos love ^)
⠀
if the terrain is moving and you need someone recalculating at each junction as it comes - that's an advisor.
(startups love ^)

[Arty McLabin @Arty_McLabin]

people confuse consultants and advisors constantly - i want to clear it up.

a consultant is a ~static map: thorough, detailed, built for the terrain. that's genuinely valuable when the roads are stable.

see next:

[Arty McLabin @Arty_McLabin]

2/ an advisor is a live GPS - same destination, but they stay in the car and recalculate with you as conditions shift.
⠀
neither role is better. they solve different problems.
⠀
see next:

[Arty McLabin @Arty_McLabin]

I felt anxiety from calling people, for many years
(introvert)

It's super easy for me now.

how so:

I noticed that when people were calling me, I've always had good performance in the calls.
the anxiety was from overthinking how to start the call.

just ring.

+ mileage.

[Arty McLabin @Arty_McLabin]

i do feel improvement since my upgrade from opus4.7 to fable5.

(administrative tasks only, 24h of heavy use)

less stupidity, and more "humanlike" in it's actions.

just feels like it is more aware of the context engineering provided.

idk if its the fable5 itself or just upgraded claude code itself. but yes i TOTALLY feel the diff.

[Arty McLabin @Arty_McLabin]

i'm so excited as next month my 10 years ban on StackOverflow expires! i will finally use it to...

do nothing with it.

[Arty McLabin @Arty_McLabin]

Many years ago (long before AI) one good friend made this illustration of me.

i didn't value it enough back then.

glad that i found this pic in the archive.

Marcus Aurelius is still a king of mine.

[Arty McLabin @Arty_McLabin]

it's absolutely fine to consult it to learn how to improve your skills but

if you let it do it instead of you, you become an NPC.

^ i'm speaking about personal brand copywriting only.

[Arty McLabin @Arty_McLabin]

one major benefit in tweeting is

that you force yourself to articulate your thoughts and ideas better.

you spend time compressing your idea and it makes you into a better communicator in both text and in-person meetings

[Arty McLabin @Arty_McLabin]

i strongly discourage writing posts by AI from scratch

(you lose authenticity)

even worse is telling your ai your thoughts and letting it write the post for you.

it's absolutely fine to:

[Arty McLabin @Arty_McLabin]

you are a pro <craftsman>,
you're out of office, you get served by other <craftsman>

live through the rare experience of you being the customer.

switch the shoes.

that's how you understand what truly matters in your craft, and what's just noise?

[Arty McLabin @Arty_McLabin]

AI makes it easier to "can"
+
makes it harder to "should"

[Arty McLabin @Arty_McLabin]

you're a first-time CEO only once in your life

(c) @fredwilson

p.s.
can replace CEO with any other word to be honest.

[Arty McLabin @Arty_McLabin]

@sshramona i run a podcast (RawCEO) and my agency charges 500$ per bundle of 28shorts + editing a 1h long episode + copywriting & tags for all the videos (adapted per platform) and cross promotion posts.

all included.

you can see the output on my youtube channel https://t.co/FUTR886MGi

[Arty McLabin @Arty_McLabin]

@sadana_ashutosh i run a podcast (RawCEO) and my agency charges 500$ per bundle of 28shorts + editing a 1h long episode + copywriting & tags for all the videos (adapted per platform) and cross promotion posts.

all included.

you can see the output on my youtube channel https://t.co/FUTR886MGi

[Arty McLabin @Arty_McLabin]

Playing games is more fun,
Developing games is more satisfying.

Dopamine diff.

[Arty McLabin @Arty_McLabin]

Bulk meetings on day1, then act on day2?

or mix both in the same day?

[Arty McLabin @Arty_McLabin]

@LingLiAI i never run paid, i give the service for free and encourage them to become design partners, or I give some other value for them, which is actually beneficial for them. should be some kind of transaction. better if it's not monetary

[Arty McLabin @Arty_McLabin]

Your free validation interviews are lying to you (if you do B2B).
⠀
Not because people are dishonest. Because of who shows up.
⠀
When you send cold LinkedIn outreach - "I'd love 20 minutes of your time to get your expert perspective" - you are running an unintentional selection experiment. The people who say yes are the ones with time. And the people with time are, on average, not your ICP.
⠀
Your actual ICP - busy operators, successful founders, real buyers - does not have spare hours to help a stranger brainstorm a product roadmap for free. They are running companies. They are in back-to-back meetings. They are not scrolling LinkedIn looking for ways to be altruistic toward cold outreach.
⠀
🔍 So you collect data from a cohort that looks like your ICP on paper - same job title, same industry, same LinkedIn description - but isn't. And every decision you make from that data is built on a poisoned sample.
⠀
There's an important nuance here: this problem is specific to cold outreach. In a community you already belong to, helping each other carries a networking-effect payoff - there's a relationship return on the time invested. Cold LinkedIn has weak-to-zero networking effect. No relationship upside means only the time-rich respond.
⠀
💡 The fix is not better questions or a shorter call. The fix is what you offer.
⠀
Give a real chunk of your product as compensation. Six months free. A meaningful discount. Early access to whatever you're building. Something with actual value to the person you're asking.
⠀
This does three things at once:
⠀
→ Conversion goes up - real value lands differently than "I'd love to pick your brain"
→ The ask shifts from altruism to transaction - without triggering the cash-insult problem (people refuse $1, accept $0 or $1000)
→ Product-as-comp acts as an ICP self-filter
⠀
🎯 That third one is the part most people miss.
⠀
Only people who actually want your product will accept product-as-comp as payment. Someone who has no use for your SaaS will not sit through an interview to get six free months of it. Someone who does want it - who has the problem you're solving - will. So the cohort that shows up is pre-validated. You are collecting data and validating the source simultaneously.
⠀
Free interviews don't filter for ICP. Product-as-comp does.
⠀
#StartupStrategy #CustomerDiscovery #RawCEO