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Ever feel like your solo business is running you into the ground? Solopreneurs don’t have the luxury of handing off tasks to a team. Everything lands on your plate, and there’s never enough time. AI won’t run your business for you (despite what some of the big AI companies would have you believe). But it can give you back hours every week. Some tools are AI-first, meaning their primary job is to perform an AI-driven task. You can also look at adding AI features inside tools youre already using. I rely heavily on AI in my solo business. I can get more done in less time, without sacrificing quality in any of my work. Here are a few AI tools that can make a huge difference in a solo business. {"blockType":"mv-promo-block","data":{"imageDesktopUrl":"https:\/\/images.fastcompany.com\/image\/upload\/f_webp,q_auto,c_fit\/wp-cms-2\/2025\/11\/work-better-1.png","imageMobileUrl":"https:\/\/images.fastcompany.com\/image\/upload\/f_webp,q_auto,c_fit\/wp-cms-2\/2025\/11\/work-better-mobile-1.png","eyebrow":"","headline":"\u003Cstrong\u003ESubscribe to Work Better\u003C\/strong\u003E","dek":"Thoughts on the future of work, career pivots, and why work shouldn\u0027t suck, by Anna Burgess Yang. To learn more, visit \u003Ca href=\u0022https:\/\/www.workbetter.media\/\u0022\u003Eworkbetter.media\u003C\/a\u003E.","subhed":"","description":"","ctaText":"SIGN UP","ctaUrl":"https:\/\/www.workbetter.media","theme":{"bg":"#f5f5f5","text":"#000000","eyebrow":"#9aa2aa","subhed":"#ffffff","buttonBg":"#000000","buttonHoverBg":"#3b3f46","buttonText":"#ffffff"},"imageDesktopId":91457605,"imageMobileId":91457608,"shareable":false,"slug":""}} Meeting notetakers An AI notetaker was the first AI-first tool I added to my business. My notetaker auto-joins my calls, records the conversations, transcribes everything, and sends me a recap with action items. Instead of scrambling to remember what a client said three months ago, I have a searchable archive of every meeting. This solves a real problem: You can be fully present during the conversation rather than taking notes by hand. You also dont risk missing something important, which can happen with manual note-taking. Tools: Otter, Fireflies, Fathom Knowledge systems Over time, solopreneurs accumulate a mountain of valuable material: proposals, client emails, blog drafts, research notes, and random thoughts. Most of it gets buried in folders (or notebooks), which makes it hard to track through your thinking or find related ideas. A personal knowledge system changes that. It creates a searchable “second brain”like your own Wikipedia. Add AI into the mix, and you can chat with your own content instead of digging through your notes and files. Think of AI as a personal research assistant who has read everything you’ve ever written. Tools: Google NotebookLM, Tana, Notion AI, Reflect Standard operating procedures Even if you work alone now, you might eventually bring on help (like a virtual assistant, a subcontractor, or a specialist for a specific project). When that happens, you’ll need documented processes. The problem is that writing step-by-step instructions for everything you do is tedious. Most solopreneurs never get around to it. AI tools solve this by recording your screen as you complete a task and automatically generating written documentation. You walk through a process once, and the tool creates a standard operating procedure (SOP), complete with screenshots and written instructionswithout any extra effort on your part. SOP tools are uncannily good. I usually only need to make small tweaks to the written version, and sometimes dont need to make any edits at all. I store them on my Google Drive so I can easily share them if needed. Tools: Loom AI, Scribe, Tango A business coach One of the hardest parts of working solo is not having colleagues to bounce ideas off of. You make decisions about pricing, clients, marketing, etc., without a gut check from anyone else. AI chatbots can serve as an on-demand sounding board. They won’t replace your judgment, since they cant understand the nuance of the real world and human relationships. But they’re useful for thinking through options, drafting difficult emails, or walking you through the different angles of an idea you might have. In Claude, Ive created a Business Coach project. Ive uploaded a lot of files so Claude has context, including information about who I am, the work I do, my brand, and the potential clients Im targeting. When Im trying to think through something, Claude asks me questions. By responding, I clarify my own thinking. The key is prompting well. The more context you give about your business, your situation, and any constraints (like your time or finances), the more useful the output. Tools: ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini AI features embedded in existing tools Every company has been rushing to add AI features to its products. Some are good. Some are included with your existing subscription, while others treat AI as an add-on. For example, I rely on Airtable to run the back-end portion of my business. AI-powered field agents have been able to accomplish a lot of tasks I used to do manually. A few other ideas: AI-powered transaction matching in accounting software like QuickBooks or Kick can categorize your expenses and spot anomalies. AI scheduling assistants in tools like Motion or Reclaim can help you plan your day and protect your calendar from too many meetings. AI email features in apps like Superhuman or Spark can draft replies or prioritize your inbox. The tools you already pay for are getting better. If AI has been added since you originally signed up, the features are worth exploring. Start with one new tool AI fluency is becoming a baseline skill, like knowing how to use a spreadsheet. And its becoming ubiquitous: Apps will keep adding AI features to make work easier and faster. But you don’t need to master everything at once. Pick the tool that solves an obvious problem or can complete a tas that drains a lot of time from your day. Figure out how to get the most out of it before adding the next thing. {"blockType":"mv-promo-block","data":{"imageDesktopUrl":"https:\/\/images.fastcompany.com\/image\/upload\/f_webp,q_auto,c_fit\/wp-cms-2\/2025\/11\/work-better-1.png","imageMobileUrl":"https:\/\/images.fastcompany.com\/image\/upload\/f_webp,q_auto,c_fit\/wp-cms-2\/2025\/11\/work-better-mobile-1.png","eyebrow":"","headline":"\u003Cstrong\u003ESubscribe to Work Better\u003C\/strong\u003E","dek":"Thoughts on the future of work, career pivots, and why work shouldn\u0027t suck, by Anna Burgess Yang. To learn more, visit \u003Ca href=\u0022https:\/\/www.workbetter.media\/\u0022\u003Eworkbetter.media\u003C\/a\u003E.","subhed":"","description":"","ctaText":"SIGN UP","ctaUrl":"https:\/\/www.workbetter.media","theme":{"bg":"#f5f5f5","text":"#000000","eyebrow":"#9aa2aa","subhed":"#ffffff","buttonBg":"#000000","buttonHoverBg":"#3b3f46","buttonText":"#ffffff"},"imageDesktopId":91457605,"imageMobileId":91457608,"shareable":false,"slug":""}}
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E-Commerce
A little over a year after TikTok temporarily went dark in the United States and users were greeted with a message explaining that a law banning TikTok has been enacted, those same U.S. users opened the app to find a pop-up message requiring them to agree to new terms before they could continue scrolling. The new terms of service and privacy policy went into effect on January 22, 2026, following the apps sale from ByteDance to TikTok USDS Joint Venture LLC, a majority American-owned company that reportedly will control U.S. users data and content and the apps recommendation algorithm. People see this kind of pop-up all the time, and according to research, the biggest lie on the internet is that people ever read anything before clicking agree. But given many users unease about the ownership changeincluding fears of swapping Chinese surveillance for U.S. surveillanceit is unsurprising that this time, people paid attention. Screenshots of legal language spread quickly online, accompanied by warnings about sweeping new data collection. Im both a TikTok content creator and a tech ethics and policy researcher who has studied website terms and conditions, especially whether people read them (they dont) and how well they understand them (they also dont). When I saw the outrage on social media, I immediately dove down a terms of service and privacy policy rabbit hole that had me tumbling into the wayback machine and also looking at similar policies on other apps and TikToks policies in other countries. In the end, I discovered that in the most widely shared examples, the language that sounded most alarming had either hardly changed at all or described practices that are fairly standard across social media. Some changes arent really changes Consider the list of sensitive personal information in TikToks new privacy policy, which includes items like sexual orientation and immigration status. Many users interpreted this list as evidence that TikTok had begun collecting more personal data. However, this exact same list appeared in the previous version of TikToks U.S. privacy policy, which was last updated in August 2024. And in both cases, the language focuses on information you disclosefor example, in your content or in responses to user surveys. This language is in place presumably to comply with state privacy laws such as Californias Consumer Privacy Act, which includes requirements for disclosure of the collection of certain categories of information. TikToks new policy specifically cited the California law. Metas privacy policy lists very similar categories, and this language overall tends to signal regulatory compliance by disclosing existing data collection rather than additional surveillance. Location tracking also prompted concerns. The new policy states that TikTok may collect precise location data, depending on your settings. This is a change, but its also common practice for the major social media apps. The change also brings the companys U.S. policy in line with TikTok policies in other countries. For example, the companys European Economic Area privacy policy has very similar language, and users in the U.K. have to grant precise location access to use a Nearby Feed for finding events and businesses near them. Though apps have other ways to approximate location, such as IP address, a user will have to grant permission through their phones location services in order for TikTok to access precise location via GPSpermission that TikTok has not yet requested from U.S. users. However, the new policy opens the door for users having the option to grant that permission in the future. This CBC report describes the aftermath of the TikTok sale and why many users are deleting the app. No news does not equal good news None of this is to say that users are wrong to be cautious. Even if TikToks legal language around data privacy is standard for the industry, who controls your data and your feed is still very relevant. Uninstalls for the app spiked 130% in the days following the change, with many users expressing concern about the ties that the new owners have to President Donald Trumpnotably Oracle, the company led by Trump supporter Larry Ellison. It also didnt help that TikToks first week under American ownership was a complete disaster. Severe technical problemslater attributed by TikTok to a data center power failurehappened to coincide with the new ownership announcement, fueling widespread concerns about censorship of content critical of the U.S. government. Perhaps some users remembered that Trump once joked about making the platform 100% MAGA. But regardless of what actually happened, at this point, distrusting tech companies isnt exactly irrational. Clarity and trust Conflating very real structural risks with unfamiliar sentences in legal documents, however, can obscure what is actually changing and what isnt. The misleading information about TikToks policy changes that spread across social media is also vidence of a well-known design failure: Most tech policies arent made to be read. My own work revealed that these documents are often written at a college or even graduate school reading level. Another analysis once calculated that if every American read the privacy policy for each website they visit for just a year, it would cost $785 billion in lost leisure and productivity time. So the discussion about TikToks policies is a case study in the deep mismatch between how tech companies communicate and how people interpret risk, particularly in an era of exceptionally low trust in both Big Tech and government. Right now, ambiguity doesnt feel neutral. It feels threatening. Instead of dismissing these reactions as overblown, I believe that companies should recognize that if a huge portion of their user base assumes the worst, thats not a reading comprehension problem; its a trust problem. So writing data privacy policies more legibly is a start, but rebuilding any kind of inherent trust in the stewardship of that data is probably the more important challenge. Casey Fiesler is an associate professor of information science at the University of Colorado Boulder. This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
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E-Commerce
Below, Maya Shankar shares five key insights from her new book, The Other Side of Change: Who We Become When Life Makes Other Plans. Shankar is a cognitive scientist and host of the podcast A Slight Change of Plans. She served as a senior policy adviser in the Obama White House, where she founded and chaired the Social and Behavioral Sciences Team. She was also appointed as the first behavioral science advisor to the United Nations. Whats the big idea? What if the life upheavals that shake you most could also be your greatest opportunities? Change can feel like loss, but it can also be the start of a stronger, reimagined self. Listen to the audio version of this Book Biteread by Shankar herselfbelow, or in the Next Big Idea app. 1. Our brains arent wired to like uncertainty. We tend to dislike uncertainty, and a big change can inject a whole lot of uncertainty into our lives. Theres a fascinating scientific study showing that people are more stressed when they think they have a 50% chance of receiving an electric shock than when they think they have a 100% chance. We would rather know that something bad is going to happen than to wrestle with any ambiguity. Another reason change is scary is because it involves loss of some kind. By definition, change means were moving from an old way of being into a new one. We may find that, in addition to feeling fear, we also feel profound grief for what were losing. And when a big change happens, we can experience the loss of our self-identity. We might think, Who am I now that change has taken away what I once was? 2. A robust, expansive self-identity can make you more resilient to unexpected changes. As a kid, I was a budding concert violinist who studied at Juilliard under Itzhak Perlman. A sudden hand injury ended my dreams of becoming a professional overnight. I distinctly remember grieving, not just the loss of the instrument, but also who I was fundamentally. Fast-forward several decades, and I again found myself grappling with an unexpected, unwanted change in my personal life. After years of navigating numerous obstacles and disappointments, my husband and I were finally on the cusp of starting a family together. But life made other plans. I found myself not only grieving pregnancy losses, but also the loss of my identity as an aspiring mom. During these moments, I wish someone had given me this guidance: Try to define yourself not simply by what you doroles or labelsbut by why you do those things. For example, Ive discovered that a love of human connection was at the root of my musical and parenting aspirations. I am a person who thrives on emotional connections with others. And just because I lost the violin, that didnt mean I lost what led me to love it in the first place. I now see that its just a matter of finding new outlets to express these parts of myself. For instance, Ive been able to fulfill my desire for emotional connection through my role as an interviewer for my podcast and through writing this book. Its been freeing and empowering to reimagine myself in this way. By anchoring my identity to why specific pursuits make me light up, Im giving myself a softer landing the next time my what is put at risk. My why will still be there and can serve as the compass that guides me toward my next chapter. Ask yourself, What is your why? And can you anchor your identity to it? Research shows that you can, and engaging in a self-affirmation exercise could help. This takes only five or 10 minutes. Write out all the identities that you value about yourself that are not threatened by the change. Doing so can zoom you out to a perspective that reminds you that your identity and self-worth do not hinge solely on what life has taken away from you. 3. Distraction can be a healthy, productive coping mechanism. One narrative that has become pervasive, particularly in Western conversations about wellness, is that the only healthy way to move on from a bad experience is to fully confront it and immerse yourself in your negative feelings. Otherwise, you risk having those emotions resurface in the future with greater force. But recent research on resilience reveals a far more complex story. Individual differences play a big role in determining what makes for a healthy response. If directly and persistently confronting your negative emotions is working for you, stay the course. But if youre not gravitating toward that method and are doing fine, or if some combination of both approaching and avoiding your negative emotions is your sweet spot, theres no need to feel guilty or fear that you will pay for it later. If something doesnt keep resurfacing, its unlikely that it will suddenly haunt you with greater intensity years down the line. On a related note, if, in the wake of a change, you or your loved ones enter a state of denial, this reaction can be for the better in the short term. There is a grace in denial, as grief researchers Elisabeth Kubler-Ross and David Kessler say. It is natures way of letting in only as much as we can handle. Denial can give us a powerful feeling of control, motivation, and hope, which is sometimes the lifeline we need to stay resilient during our hardest moments. One research study explored the recovery trajectories of patients with heart problems. Those with high levels of denial in the short term spent less time in intensive care and had fewer heart-related symptoms during their hospital stays. 4. Change can serve as a critical moment of revelation. When a bad thing happens, it can feel like the world we know has been destroyed and that were experiencing a personal apocalypse. But apocalypse comes from the Greek word apokalypsis, which means revelation. This etymology is instructive. Change can upend us, but it can also reveal things to us. The unique demands and stresses of a change can uncover surprising things about who we are. Insights that, once revealed, we can use to challenge our self-limiting beliefs or otherwise guide our path moving forward. Two stories of people I interviewed for my book come to mind. In one, the lingering impact of a biking accident revealed to a woman named Ingrid just how much shame she had been carrying regarding her familys heritage and indigenous practices. Once she understood this, she was able to rework her relationship with her belief system and challenge her own negative attitudes. In another, a woman named Tara had a deeply insecure attachment style and was forced to confront this aspect of herself when facing a big change in midlife. Dealing with this change gave her the impetus to take slow, deliberate steps toward opening herself up to others and letting them in. Over time, she has built a life that brims with love and is full of deep, secure relationships. Many aspects of our self-identity are far more malleable than we might realize. Taras experience is corroborated by recent research showing that early childhood experiences are far less predictive of adult attachment styles than researchers previously thought. We can take active steps to reshape our attachment styles in adulthood. 5. We are bad at predicting how we will respond to big changes. When we anticipate how we will respond to a change, we falsely assume that we will be the same person in the future as we are today. This psychological bias is known as the end of history illusion, and it captures the idea that our brains reliably underestimate how much will change in the futre, even though we fully acknowledge that weve changed considerably in the past. We are always changing, and a major disruption in our lives can accelerate these internal shifts. Simply put, when a big change happens to us, it can lead to profound change from within. We become different people on the other side of change. We become different people because of the experiences we endure. For this reason, you may be able to endure a negative change far better than you think at the outset, and thats because youre underestimating your own ability to evolve as a result of that change. The relevant question to ask yourself isnt How will I navigate this change? But rather, How will I, with potentially new capabilities, values, and perspectives, navigate this change? By and large, the people Ive interviewed over the years have felt profound gratitude and awe for the person they became in the aftermath of what they went through. Personally, I was initially skeptical of this. I like to say that I have two allergies: soy and platitudes. But, amazingly, as I was writing this book and going through my own personal change, I witnessed this evolution within myself on the other side of change. What if we start seeing big disruptions as a chance to reimagine ourselves? Change contains so much opportunity, and my hope is that you will come to feel the same way. Enjoy our full library of Book Bitesread by the authors!in the Next Big Idea app. This article originally appeared in Next Big Idea Club magazine and is reprinted with permission.
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E-Commerce
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