“AI Business Operating System” is not a phrase I expected to be using a few weeks ago when referencing what will revolutionize my operations at my Public Relations Agency.
I’m a PR guy. I own a communications, marketing, advertising and video production firm in St. Louis. I’ve spent my career helping companies clarify their message, tell better stories, navigate moments of opportunity and crisis, and figure out how to get people to actually care about what they do.
I am not a programmer and I do not write code.
And yet, in 12 days, I built the first working version of an internal operating system for Chemistry PR & Multimedia.
This is not because I woke up one morning and decided I wanted to become a software developer. I built it because I was tired of paying for a stack of software that only partially worked for the way our company actually operates. It was sort of like buying five different meals in order to create a single dinner because I liked one portion of each one.
We had one system for project management. Another for marketing and CRM. Another for social media planning and posting. Another for internal communication. Another for time tracking. Another for business development. Another for company priorities, leadership accountability and scorecards.
Then add accounting, proposal development, reporting dashboards, automations, integrations and all the other tools that almost connect, almost automate and almost give you what you need.
Combined, all those SAAS services became very expensive. Every month brought another subscription. Every quarter brought another renewal. Every new employee, contractor or freelancer brought another round of “let me get you the login.”
And here’s what finally got me: none of it fit how our team at Chemistry really works.
We’re not a generic company. We’re a PR, marketing, advertising and video production firm that has been operating since 2009 – that’s more than 17 years in business. Our client relationships often begin with a Message Mapping Strategy Session. That is our thing! It is how we pull strategy, audience, proof points, positioning and storytelling into one clear direction before we start producing content, pitching media or building campaigns.
Try finding an off-the-shelf software platform that understands that. You can’t.
So, like most companies, we adapted. We bent our process around somebody else’s system. We used their fields, their dashboards, their stages, their assumptions and their vocabulary. And, the price adds up each month.
After 17 years, I was tired of adapting.
The Conversation That Changed It
The PR industry has been talking nonstop about artificial intelligence. Some of it is real. Some of it is noise. Some of it is people pretending the AI industry is going to magically solve problems they haven’t taken the time to define. (Even the high-profile leaders of the industry are already backing off their initial predictions that technology was going to wipe out entire sectors of jobs.)
I had been hearing more about what was possible from other entrepreneurs, agency owners and business leaders who were using AI for more than writing emails or summarizing meeting notes. Many of these leaders are in my Entrepreneurs Organization (EO) and in my EO forum.
So, upon being provoked by a colleague who placed Claude Code on my laptop and explained the endless possibilities, my mind started to break free of the clutter.
I had a 1 ½ hour conversation with ChatGPT where I told it what I really wanted to do: eliminate as many disconnected software subscriptions as possible and create one internal operating system that worked the way Chemistry actually works.
Then I gave it one simple instruction: Interview me one question at a time until you have enough information to create a Claude Code prompt that will create everything I need.
I reiterated, “Don’t let me skip ahead. Don’t let me ramble past the details. Ask me what’s broken. Ask me what I want. Ask me how my team actually works. Ask me where information falls through the cracks. Ask me what needs to be tracked, automated, visible and accountable.”
This was not a coding session. It was one of the clearest strategic conversations I have had about my own business in a long time (while using my own chat history to help answer), which is funny because I am literally a communications strategist for a living.
I had 17 years of frustrations, workarounds and “we should really fix that someday” ideas rattling around in my head. AI helped pull them out and put them in order.
Modules. User roles. Dashboards. Business development activity. Client work. Project status. Team accountability. Scorecards. Time tracking. Internal communication. Proposal tracking. Social media planning. Client reporting.
It forced me to answer questions I probably should have answered years ago.
- What should the dashboard show on a Monday morning and/or each day thereafter?
- What should business development look like when every employee opens their laptop?
- What should my leadership team see without having to ask?
- What should my Director of Client Services know the second he opens a client file?
- What should time tracking do for an agency where every hour either makes us money or costs us money?
That conversation became the blueprint for the Chemistry Operating System.
What 17 Days Actually Looks Like
Let me be honest about this part, because the “AI built my company” stories are getting a little ridiculous.
It was not magic. It was not one prompt. It was not me typing, “Build me software,” then walking away to drink coffee while a robot created my dream company.
There were moments when I tested something and hated it. There were moments when the system worked, but not the way Chemistry needed it to work. There were moments when I asked for a change, got something worse, backed up, clarified the logic and tried again. That was the work.
The thing I brought to the table was knowing what “right” looks like for our agency.
The thing AI brought to the table was helping turn that vision into something that actually runs in a browser.
Twelve days in, what we had was real. And by the 20th day, I pushed the software to a staging server so my entire team could test in real-time.
The Chemistry Operating System now includes a business development pipeline that tracks opportunities and prospects the way we actually pursue them. It includes a project management system built around how PR campaigns, marketing initiatives and video productions actually move from strategy to execution. It includes task assignments by team, client, priority and due date.
It includes an internal communication system designed around the work, not endless chatter. It includes employee hours tracking. It includes social media planning and posting workflows. It includes client reporting. It includes accountability tools, leadership scorecards, company priorities and performance tracking.
It also reinforces our core values, our business goals and the way we want our team to operate. And, there is much more coming.
But here is the important part: I was not trying to recreate every feature of every software platform we had ever used or considered. That would be a waste of time.
Most companies only use a fraction of the software they pay for anyway. We all know it. We pay for the massive platform, use the pieces we need, ignore the rest and then spend even more time trying to connect that platform to five other tools.
I built toward the functions that matter most to Chemistry.
The important part is that the pieces now speak to each other.
Business development connects to accountability, automatically. Time tracking connects to reporting, automatically. Project status connects to team visibility, automatically. Company priorities connect to weekly scorecards. The system is built to make the work easier to see, easier to manage and harder to ignore. All done automatically in real time.
That last part matters. Because software should not just store information, it should help run the company with real-time data that guides leadership decisions on what works and what doesn’t.
This Is Not Really About Money
Yes, the subscription math is real. I hope to save about $18,000 per year.
Anybody running a small or mid-sized agency knows exactly what I am talking about. You can quietly bleed thousands of dollars each year across tools your team only partially uses.
For Chemistry, the number was around this equates to about $1,500/month in software expenses I wanted to reduce or eliminate.
That truly matters. But money is not what pushed me over the edge. Control, automation and accountability did.
When you rent software, you live inside somebody else’s idea of how a company should work. Their fields. Their language. Their workflow. Their roadmap. Their next price increase. Their version of what a dashboard should show.
At Chemistry, we do not think in generic categories. We think in opportunities, proposals, retainers, Message Mapping Strategy Sessions, media relations, crisis response, video shoots, advocacy campaigns, client work, billable time and business development activity.
We do not need a generic operating system. We need one that reflects how we sell, serve, communicate, create and grow.
When you build your own system, the software speaks your language. It mirrors your process and values. It changes when your company changes. It becomes part of your culture instead of something your culture has to work around.
That was the lightbulb moment. The Chemistry Operating System is not just a set of tools. It is a way to reinforce how we want the company to run.
What I Would Tell Another Business Owner
I am not telling anyone to cancel every subscription tomorrow. That would be reckless.
There are certain systems, including payroll, accounting, cybersecurity, email and other highly specialized functions, that I will gladly keep paying for because they are mission-critical and built by people with deep expertise in those areas.
But I do think the default question has changed. For 20 years, the question was simple: what should we buy? The new questions are better: What should we buy, what should we build and what should we connect?
That is a much more valuable conversation to have with your leadership team than simply asking whether to add another user, upgrade another package or renew another subscription.
It is especially important if you run a professional services firm, PR agency, marketing firm, video production company, association, nonprofit or any organization with a process that does not fit neatly into a generic software box.
Our workflows are not generic. They have never been generic. We have just been told to act like they are.
What I Actually Learned
Simply put, I did not need to know code. I needed to know my company. That is the whole thing.
I needed to know where information falls through the cracks. I needed to know what my Director of Client Services needs to see when he opens a client file. I needed to know how a video project moves from scope to shoot to edit to delivery to invoice. I needed to know what business development accountability should look like for me, for our leadership team and for every person who contributes to growth.
AI did not replace that knowledge. It truly needed that knowledge.
The clearer I was, the better the new software became.
So if you are a CEO sitting on a stack of subscriptions wondering whether any of this AI stuff is real for your business, I believe it is. But not in the way most people are pitching it.
Forget “AI writes your emails.” That is the appetizer.
The main course is AI helping you finally build the company you have been describing on whiteboards, in leadership meetings and in half-finished planning documents for years.
A work in progress
Let me be clear. I still don’t know what I don’t know. We are testing, finding things that don’t work well, and finding bugs. I’m sure there are still buttons we have not pushed that could lead to more things we need to change.
This is truly a work in progress and will remain one for months or even more. I have worked with my team in an effort to think of every security bugaboo, backup issue, and functionality problem we can come up with. That does not mean we thought of everything. In fact, I am nearly certain we have not.
I am still not a programmer. I am not going to pretend I am.
But Chemistry PR & Multimedia now has its own internal operating system, written in our language and shaped around our process. I created the initial version in 12 days, spending about 50 hours thinking, testing, refining and building.
Whatever you call this era we are heading into, it is going to belong to the people who know their own business and are not afraid to build around it.
As a visionary, I’ll take my new concept over another disconnected software subscription any day.
