Build tools with AI

With AI you can build small, tailor-made tools: a spreadsheet that sorts orders, a little program that renames and files invoices, a form that categorises emails or an assistant that answers from your documents. For the simple ones you don't need to be a programmer; you need to know exactly which repetitive task you want to get off your plate.

They tend to fall into three groups. Automations connect apps you already use (when an email like this arrives, save the attachment over there). Scripts are small programs that do a single task and that the AI writes for you. And custom assistants, which the AI chats themselves offer, are an assistant with your instructions and your documents that always answers in the same context. What usually goes wrong at the start is aiming too high: wanting to "automate the business" instead of that ten-minute task you do every day and hate. Small tools get finished; big ones get left half done.

There are no articles published on this topic yet, so here's a practical recommendation: for a week, write down the tasks you repeat. Pick the smallest and most boring one, and describe to the AI what goes in, what should come out and what steps you follow by hand. Test it with dummy data before using the real thing, and save the version that works before asking for improvements.