Business owners
You run the shop and wear most of the hats. Come see what AI can take off your plate, and what it can't.
Community
AI Collaborative Waco
AI Collaborative Waco is a community program of Smith Revenue Strategy. A few times a year, on an evening or a weekend, we get Waco business owners, software builders, and entrepreneurs in one room. We talk about the tech that's changing how we work and how we earn, and we try it out together.
Why it exists
This stuff is easier to figure out with neighbors.
AI is changing how local businesses find work, serve customers, and get paid. It moves fast. I've watched people do a lot better with it once they have a few others to compare notes with.
So that's what this is. Good people, honest questions, and time to actually try things. Some folks run crews. Some write code for a living. Some are just getting a first idea off the ground. It works because they're all in the same room.
Who comes
Waco people who build things.
Software builders
Bring what you're working on. Test it with people who might actually use it, and hear what they think.
Entrepreneurs
Got an idea and not much time? Meet the people who can help you shape it, and see how others got started.
The format
The AI Enablement workshop.
The main event we run is the AI Enablement workshop. It's hands-on. Half of it is teaching in plain language. The other half is working time on your own business, with guides close by. Tables are grouped by experience, so builders sit with builders and owners sit with owners.
We ran the first one in June. The working time was the best part.
- Format Two afternoons, in person, with guided working time on real problems.
- Group Small tables by experience level, with guide support kept close.
- Focus AI basics, where it fits your work, and a plan you can use Monday morning.
The agenda
What we ran in June, block by block
Day one, Thursday June 25
- 1:00 Framing the why. Who built this, and the crawl-walk-run shape of the two days.
- 1:20 Building your table. A mixer so the peer work later actually works.
- 1:45 Foundations. What AI is and isn't, in plain language. Model, prompt, token, context window.
- 3:00 Lab one, your first useful prompt. Everyone picks a tedious weekly task and rebuilds it.
- 4:00 Lab two.
- 4:50 Wrap and homework.
Day two, Friday June 26
- 1:00 Homework share-outs. One win, one thing that didn't work.
- 1:10 Pick your path, round one. Five tracks, picked by role and by the problem you brought.
- 2:45 Running it for real. Budgets, oversight, and what tokens actually cost, in plain English.
- 3:25 Pick your path, round two. Go deeper or switch, on your own situation.
- 4:40 Your AI first 30. Three changes and your first Monday action, written down.
One idea sat on the whiteboard the whole time: 60 / 30 / 10. Most of a good result comes from the files you give the AI. Less comes from the rules you set. The least comes from the model's own judgment. Most people spend all their energy on that last part.
The room
Two afternoons in downtown Waco.
What's next
Come to the next one.
Upcoming events live on our Luma calendar. Follow it there and you'll hear about the next date as soon as it's set.
Got a question, or want to help host one? Reach me on the contact page.