How to stay irreplaceable and build AI-powered businesses

Executive overview

AI is automating the functional middle of every job — the repeatable, task-oriented work that education trained us to do. What remains irreplaceable is vitality: the human capacity to initiate, judge, and close with integrity.

The framework maps every task onto a 10-step arc. Steps 1–2 and 9–10 are human (wisdom, courage, justice, temperance). Steps 3–8 are functional — and increasingly owned by AI.

Build AI systems around three ingredients: your intellectual property, a UX that collects data, and prompts to a large language model.

Vitality vs. functionality

• Functionality is reliable, repeatable task execution — what most jobs and schooling optimised for.
• Vitality is irreplaceable life-force work: the thing that wouldn't have happened without you.
• AI and automation will take over functional steps; humans must shift identity from task-performer to initiator.
• Stop seeing yourself as a replaceable part; start acting as irreplaceable life-force energy.

The four Stoic virtues as a work framework

The four virtues map to the start and end of any project — the only phases AI cannot own:

1. Wisdom — knowing what the right action is
2. Courage — acting on that knowledge
3. Justice — ensuring fair exchange for everyone involved
4. Temperance — knowing when to stop and move on

Steps 1–2 (wisdom + courage) drive initiation. Steps 9–10 (justice + temperance) drive ethical closure. Everything in between is functional and automatable.

Building an AI system: the three ingredients

• Intellectual property — your documented process, methods, case studies, and examples. Feed this to the AI as a roadmap it can execute.
• UX and data collection — a user-facing interface that gathers the additional context the AI needs to act.
• LLM interface (prompt engineering) — API calls to a large language model (e.g. OpenAI) that processes your IP and user data to perform functional work.

Package all three and you have a product. Package the product for investors and you have an AI SaaS company.

Plural careers and what comes next

• Current default: serial careers — one thing at a time, over 40 years.
• Future default: plural careers — simultaneously running a festival, writing a book, sitting on a board, launching a software company, acquiring a legacy business.
• This becomes possible when you focus only on the vital steps and automate the functional middle.
• The result is more output, more variety, and more life-force energy — not more stress.