I automate business ops with teams of AI agents to help you scale w/o increasing overhead | Top Artificial Intelligence Voice | AI Consultant | Founder at Synthoria Labs

Most B2B founders and consultants are not spending enough time on revenue generating activities.

This is because they rely too heavily on the old way of doing everything manually.

So their days are filled with:

→ Managing their pipeline, trying to nurture every lead before they go cold
→ Sifting through Sales Nav, reading endless profiles to build a perfectly targeted list
→ Piecing together contracts/proposals for every client
→ Training yet another employee to try and pick up the slack

How can you focus on growth when 60% of your time is taken up by mind-numbing busywork?

The cycle continues..

Sleepless nights worrying about customer churn rates.

Laying awake wondering if their pipeline will dry up.

It doesn't have to be this way

All of this goes away with an AI Implementation Strategy

And no, I don't mean copying and pasting prompts into ChatGPT hoping it will save you.

Here's my 3 step strategy to reclaim 15 hours every week:

1) Streamlined Sales Funnel System
2) Client Relation Autopilot
3) Internal Productivity optimizer

You don't need more employees. You need the right systems that empower your current team to produce twice the results

...in half the time.

You'll eliminate 60% of the mind numbing work that's holding you back from substantial growth.

The stress of juggling a million tasks is gone, you focus on revenue generating activities, your employees thank you

Join the top 1% of founders leveraging automations to become a business of the future

Check my featured section to see see how you can do it too

Jake George

Shelly T.

Director of Sales, Co-Manufacturing

The rules changed overnight.
Most experienced leaders aren't scrambling because they don't understand AI.

I work with senior executives who are brilliant at their jobs but find themselves in rooms where the vocabulary shifted, the assumptions flipped, and asking clarifying questions feels like career suicide. And, we're surrounded by work that doesn’t meet our standards. 

Here's what I know: Your experience isn't obsolete. Your translation layer is.

AI didn't erase two decades of hard-won judgment. It just changed the frequency. And if you can't tune in, you get tuned out.

We fix that.

Not by teaching you to code. Not by handing you someone else's talking points.

By updating how your expertise shows up in the rooms that matter, so you can lead AI conversations with the same authority you bring to everything else. You've got this.

My background? 

Professional Engineer. 20+ years across manufacturing, oil & gas, and engineered equipment. MBA. M&A cert from Columbia. I've led transformations where mistakes cost millions and silence is THE liability.

Translation? I speak "executive instinct" and "engineer who needs proof."

I do this work privately with a handful of executives each year. Publicly, I keynote and run workshops for leaders who are allergic to AI hype and hungry for signal.

If you've felt the tectonic plates shift beneath your feet, you're not late.

You're early enough to build differently.

→ Let's talk: shelly@building-beta.com

Director Global eCommerce

Jake and Steven Maxey! 🎙️⚡
YOU TWO ARE BRILLIANT WEIRDOS AND I LOVE IT. Episode 138 - The Impactful Engineer Podcast is THE unfiltered conversation about AI and engineers. All questions that will make people think: wait, what have I been missing? 

I'm tuning in for more.

(Also thank goodness you made this audio-only because I talk with my hands like I'm conducting a symphony. Your audience was spared the full windmill experience. 😂)

You're helping engineers see what's happening in reality while everyone else is still debating whether they're "ready yet." The community is being bombarded with LinkedIn thought leaders screaming about disruption, but you've got something way more valuable in these conversations: mentorship, career strategy, and ideas for leverage without burnout. An hour flew by!

Already sent this to my network because if you're an engineer who wants impact (beyond just technical excellence), this podcast needs to be in your rotation. Period. Round 2 whenever you're ready. I've got more fringe cases and takes to test.

P.S. "Letting your work speak for itself" is a career-limiting belief. SAY IT LOUDER. 📢

Shelly Thomas, P.E.

Your playbook expired. Let’s fix it! | Executive Coach for Leaders Navigating AI Disruption | Professional Engineer | MBA

AI just put me in the driver's seat. On the passenger side. With complete confidence. (See photo)

A lot of times,  AI simply misses the mark.

Speaking of "AI," 
I just walked out of a training with a team of executives who actually GET it. They asked all the right questions. They wanted to understand how it could help their TEAM before throwing AI at everything. They leaned IN instead of delegating it away.

Oh, did I mention we ALL drove through a BLIZZARD to get there today? Yeah, Alaska doesn't play.  And neither do these folks.

It made me want to do 10 more of these. Maybe 20. Maybe 50.

But you can't automate what you can't explain. AI will do things FAST. It'll do them with complete certainty. And you won't realize you're about to drive into a ditch until it's way, way too late.

We have to understand the work.

"But Shelly, I don't have TIME to get in the weeds. I'm supposed to stay at 30,000 feet. Isn't that literally what they PAY me for?"

Yeah. Kinda. But also... not really.

Look. You don't need to know which checkbox lives on which tab in which godforsaken system that Sharon swears she'll retire before she stops using.

Somewhere along the way, we decided that "strategic leader" means you're not allowed to be curious anymore. That asking your team how something actually works is micromanaging.
That's insane.

You know what your job really entails. Connecting dots across departments.
And knowing you, you love it!!

You're sitting in rooms where decisions get made that completely upend your team's Monday morning, and if you don't understand what they DO, you can't protect them when things go sideways.

Which they will. Because they always do.
AI can do things faster. It can also do things faster AND wrong. Confidently, impressively, expensively wrong.

So yeah, stay at 30,000 feet when you need to see the whole landscape. Just don't lose your inner geek just because they stuck "VP" on your business cards. Don't stop asking questions.

Because when you understand the work, even at a high level, even just enough to explain it to someone else, you can actually help. You can clear obstacles.
Even if you ARE the obstacle sometimes. Especially then.

The executives I met with today? They're going to crush it with Microsoft 365 Copilot because they're approaching it the right way. Curious, thoughtful, strategic.

If you want that kind of training for your leadership team (the kind where I show up, we laugh about AI getting it all wrong, and then we actually fix stuff) reach out.
Stay curious.

Share this if it resonates. ♻️

Executive Coach & Keynote Speaker | Helping leaders stay relevant as AI changes how experience is valued | PE, MBA

Confession: I may have gotten a little carried away. Tis the season...Sun sets at 3 PM. Roads are icy. It's -10°F outside.

Normal people: Netflix and hibernate
Me: Hey, let's get certified in Microsoft Power Platform! 🤷‍♀️

Just wrapped the PL-200 Cert Prep course and my take? Rishona Elijah made this actually pretty great. 

10/10 would recommend.

Thanks, Rishona - already queuing up your next video!
 https://lnkd.in/gSeTNgwF #microsoftpowerplatform

A LinkedIn Learning course completion certificate for Microsoft Power Platform Functional Consultant Associate (PL-200) Cert Prep

Open article: Certificate of Completion by linkedin.com

Your "next day delivery" takes nine days and a bush plane.  Your "scalable solution" isn't scalable when the servers are in Seattle and your customers are in Bethel. 

Your AI strategy has to account for the fact that your team is 12 people, half of them are seasonal, and your CTO also plows the parking lot.

THIS is Alaska!

I'm moderating a panel at the Alaska SBDC Summit in March, organized by the fabulous Gretchen Fauske and the Alaska SBDC team!Not because I'm the expert... because I found four people who are actually doing this work, and killing it.

Galen Hecht Went from protecting salmon on the Kenai River to building custom software. Now experimenting with AI tools on real client projects where nothing looks like a Silicon Valley case study.

Jason Child Scaling AI and machine learning at Resource Data. Has done the startup chaos. Knows the difference between pitch deck dreams and what actually ships.

Cara Fox Teaches "human powers," the stuff AI can't replace. Also piloting AI simulations to help people practice those skills. She gets it: AI supports humans. It doesn't replace them.

Erik Williams Alaskan engineer. Started the UAA Robotics club. Worked on permafrost monitoring and salmon stream sensors. Now co-founded beadedcloud to turn environmental data into Arctic infrastructure insights. He builds tech for problems the Lower 48 doesn't know exist.

We ARE gonna talk about what worked. What failed. How to choose pilots when you can't afford to waste money. How to train people who didn't sign up to be early adopters. How to budget on margins that make VCs cry.

Data privacy when one breach ends you.  
Legacy systems held together with hope.  
ROI timelines that are "eventually."  

This is for the leaders making the hard calls. The ones who need tactical next steps, not theory.

Alaska runs on 73,000+ small businesses. They operate on hard mode.

We don't need hype. 

We need this panel.

March. Let's go.

I have a faculty workshop coming up with UAA College of Engineering and I'm low-key freaking out.

Not because I don't know my stuff. I mean, I've built an entire program around teaching responsible AI use. I've got the frameworks, the examples, the "try this tomorrow" activities that actually work.

It's fun, I promise.

But how would you feel if you were about to walk into a room full of exhausted educators and tell them that the AI genie isn't going back in the bottle?
Still, I'm weirdly excited.  

We're going to have THE conversation that matters: How do we teach students to use AI as a thinking partner instead of a cheat code? How do we guide them to accelerate their learning without skipping the hard, beautiful, messy parts that actually BUILD their brains?

I don't have all the answers. 

What I DO have is a workshop that's practical, immediately implementable, and designed for people who are already drowning in work. No fluff. No "let me explain AI like you've been living under a rock." No offense,  guys and gals. We have all spent time under our respective rocks 🫣 Just real strategies for the actual humans in your actual classrooms. That's it!

Want to bring this conversation to YOUR campus? Virtual or in-person, I'm here for it. Let's talk about what responsible education actually looks like when you're not trying to scare students off AI, OR pretend it doesn't exist.

DM me. Let's make this happen.

#AILiteracy #HigherEducation #BuildingBeta #FacultyDevelopment #ResponsibleAI

2026 is the year of AI agents! Magic automation! Business transformation!

Cool. Now, let's talk reality.

Lewis Walker ➲ just showed us the BEST breakdown of BCG's new Enterprise AI Agents playbook (seriously, if you're not subscribed, fix that – every issue is worth the read).

BCG says "start with the business outcome."
But it doesn't always work, guys and gals.

I say: start with the workflow. 
I know...Boring.

Business outcomes sound great in boardrooms. "Reduce quote time by 50%." "Automate customer inquiries." "Speed up approvals."

Sadly, outcomes don't tell you about Sam who manually checks three different systems because the data never synced right. Or the customer service rep who knows to escalate immediately when someone uses specific phrases. Or the approval that takes 10 minutes on Tuesdays but 3 days on Fridays because of how the review cycle actually works.

𝙔𝙤𝙪 𝙘𝙖𝙣'𝙩 𝙖𝙪𝙩𝙤𝙢𝙖𝙩𝙚 𝙬𝙝𝙖𝙩 𝙮𝙤𝙪 𝙘𝙖𝙣'𝙩 𝙚𝙭𝙥𝙡𝙖𝙞𝙣.

And what you haven't mapped, is a mystery.

BCG gets this right when they talk about "messy data, old technology stacks, and complex governance" – this is the real world of enterprise operations. 

But we can't always jump straight to outcomes. Because for an agent to actually work in production, it needs to handle the fringe cases. The exceptions. The "this only happens 13% of the time but when it does, it's critical" scenarios.

Perfect conditions? Any agent can handle that. Congratulations! 

But enterprises don't operate in perfect conditions.

So go get in there. 

The extra time spent shoulder-surfing your team upfront saves you from expensive agent failures (and lost team trust) later. 

Want to know what our team is seeing out in the wild? Just reach out!

Your team doesn't care how many emails are in your inbox. They care how human you sound when you finally respond. They'll be patient with your backlog. They have zero patience for AI slop that sounds like a corporate nobody.

Most executives miss this entirely about AI email writing, let’s talk about why.

They hear "Save time on communications" and "Let AI handle your inbox" and think: Great, I'll clear it faster.

helloooooo inbox zero!

Bad news: It won't build the team up. And, it might make you look dumb.

Last week I talked an executive out of an AI drafted internal communication.

Here's what almost happened: They were about to let AI explain a big decision by leadership. The AI version opened with "As we navigate this challenging business environment..."

Their team would've stopped reading. Or worse - screenshotted it as proof leadership didn't care enough to write it themselves.

Picture the last email you sent that people actually remembered: Now, imagine AI getting the tone wrong there.

The real cost? 

𝑻𝒓𝒖𝒔𝒕 𝒆𝒓𝒐𝒔𝒊𝒐𝒏 - Your team can feel the difference between your voice and corporate-speak generated in 3 seconds.

𝑴𝒐𝒓𝒂𝒍𝒆 𝒅𝒂𝒎𝒂𝒈𝒆 - Nothing says "you don't matter" like a leader who automates caring.

Before you hand your internal communications to AI, answer:

☝️Would my team recognize this as actually from me?
🎭 Does this sound like how I'd say it in the room?
🫣 Am I avoiding a conversation I should be having in person?

Can't answer all three? Write it (or re-write it) yourself.

One hollow AI-drafted email does more damage than the hour it would have taken you to write it yourself.

So where should you use AI?

For research. Organizing thoughts. For when you're stuck on a blank page. Meeting logistics and status updates that truly don't need your voice. Drafting an SOP. Recording a workflow. Cold, hard, facts.

Never replace yourself with AI when people are watching to see if you care. And most of the time? They're watching.

You cannot automate what you cannot afford to lose: your voice. Your clarity. It's the currency of trust.

What do you do when hundreds of hours of work melt before your eyes?

Last year, it happened to us.

Found YouTube videos on making an igloo. Followed directions meticulously. Beautiful multicolored ice blocks. Couple feet high. We were so proud.

Then, Chinook winds. 35°F. Melt, melt, melt.

Our work became a rainbow puddle that soaked into the frozen ground. Not even one picture taken. (The one here was the vision)

The point? I feel like we've all been there, even if you didn't load up your family and all your worldly belongings in a U-Haul and trek 4,000 miles across some of the worst roads on earth. (For all of you planning an ALCAN vacation, what's wrong with you?)

Ok, so let's talk about AI.

You tried it last year. Got generic garbage. Your team rolled their eyes. You spent hours fighting tools that promised to save time.

You weren't wrong to walk away.

What if you were just early?

This year? Coldest Alaska winter in 40 years (maybe) Last week: -20°F (this Arkansas girl was NOT prepared).

On that frozen day, I saw a rainbow in the clear sky. No clouds. No rain. Just frozen air.

Different conditions. Time to get building.

Because the AI landscape changed while you weren't looking. The tools you gave up on 12 months ago have been completely rebuilt. And most people are still gun-shy.

Which means right now is your window.

If you have Microsoft Copilot, do these 3 things this week:

↳ Make AI your toughest critic (not your ghostwriter)

Everyone uses AI to write emails. Most of them sound like AI robot blip beep boop. Instead: Write your email first. Then ask Copilot: "Identify gaps in my response. Does my tone match the relationship I have with this person? What would make this clearer?" Let AI catch what you can't see.

↳ Weaponize it against documents you hate

That 47-page technical report your boss sent at 4:47pm Friday? Dump it in Copilot. Ask: "What are the 3 most important decisions this document is asking me to make?"

↳ Stop being a human copy-paste machine

Taking data from emails and manually organizing it into spreadsheets? Ask Copilot: "Create a workflow that extracts [specific data] from [source] and organizes it into [format]." Yes, it can do that. No, you don't need to code. Try Notebooks. Thank me later.

Important: I'm NOT telling you to use Copilot inside Word, Excel, or PowerPoint yet. Those  are just trickier and most people get it so, so wrong.

But here's the truth: Everyone's waiting for AI to get "better."

It's here, baby.

If you're struggling with Copilot:

This year, I'm bringing workshops directly to Alaska offices, events and local associations like Alaska SBDC and The Alliance. No fluff. No pitch. Just what actually works. 🥳

Tried these? Let's hear it! What AI experiment made you want to jump in a frozen lake last year?

#AIStrategy #MicrosoftCopilot #AlaskaBusiness

The best thing an executive client said to me last week: "I have no idea what our AI does." I could have hugged him.

FINALLY, someone said it out loud. Most executives are white-knuckling their way through these conversations. Nodding along when their teams say things like "we trained the model on historical data" (cool, cool, what does that mean though). Hoping desperately that no one asks them to explain it to the board.

Plot twist: Someone always asks.

The bright side? 
You're not supposed to understand every technical detail. That's not your job. (Thank goodness, right?)

Your job is knowing whether your team has done THEIR job.

→ Did they map what ACTUALLY happens? Not the perfect, if all the stars align, version. 

→ Can they explain the "logic" without making your eyes glaze over?

→ Can they defend this thing when compliance docs and contracts shift or it breaks at 2am on a Saturday?

If your honest answer is "...I think so?" then we need to talk.

You don't have to vibe code anything. 

But you do need to know what questions help you tell the difference between "we're building something solid" and "we're about to light money on fire."

I'm Shelly.

What's one thing you wish someone had explained to you BEFORE you got into this thing called "AI strategy"?

Your high performers are leaving. Your middle performers are quietly quitting. Your system-savvy people are spending lunch breaks on ChatGPT.

You think it's a culture problem. What if it's a capacity problem?

→ I know because I was the person reaching for the life raft.
Seven years in an Industrial sales and engineering role. 1,200+ accounts. Half of North America.

Systems built for a different decade. A team built for a different reality. New CRM. SAP. New ownership. New management. Same headcount.
Then, less headcount.

→ Here's what leaders are missing about what's happening to people everywhere right now:

Resource constrained = Your team is strategic about priorities (manageable)

Resource starved = Your team is MacGyvering solutions because they refuse to let customers down (heroic but unsustainable)

Reaching for a life raft = Your team is drowning (this is where we are)

→ When I started bringing spreadsheet solutions, building my own dashboards, reaching across departments for help, I wasn't being difficult.
I was surviving.

Leaders: If your people are experimenting with AI right now, they're not chasing shiny objects.
They're gasping for air.

→ They're drowning in complexity you can't see from your level. In systems that weren't designed for this volume. In workflows built for teams that no longer exist.
AI isn't about efficiency gains or productivity hacks.
It's oxygen.

→ The question isn't "Should we adopt AI?"
It's: Do you see your team reaching for the life raft?

Tell me, what are you hearing from your teams right now? Is this a thing where you are?

#Leadership #AIStrategy #WorkforceDevelopment

AI writing is always smoother. More professional. Better grammar.

Also: sounds like it came from literally anyone. Take some risks guys.

Use the tool. Just don't let it replace YOU. 

Your team wants YOU. 
And we are all getting ridiculously good at "spotting a fake." 

It can be your voice. With AI.

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Jake George

Shelly T.

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