A change of direction

Because the word ‘pivot’ makes me itch

I’ve been writing hard for the last six weeks. This post was going to be the launch of an ebook called “Finding your work”. It was going to be great. It would take you through the steps to find your strengths and values. It would help you match those with what the world needs. It would be the perfect thing if you know you need to do something, but are struggling with what.

This post is not the announcement of my ebook.

A couple of weeks ago I was talking to my coach, Carlos Saba of the Happy Startup School. We discussed the forthcoming launch. I complained about having to learn Adobe InDesign. We talked through other ways of delivering the content. Then, Carlos mentioned a chatbot.

I’ve been tracking the use of chatbots for a couple of years now. They press some my particularly nerdy buttons. They need a good understanding of language to work well. Understanding natural human language is hard for computers. Getting it to work needs linguistics backed by machine learning. Chatbots are very cool, at least to me. Up until now, though, I had no practical use for one.

Now, I have a use for one. What if you could talk through the exercises I’ve written with the bot? What if it would give you hints, and then give you a nice summary of what you had said? What if it learned from previous conversations, so it did better next time?That’s what I’m building. I can teach a bot everything I know. It can learn far more besides that.

For now, the bot’s name is Bitbot. It uses positive psychology to help you find a more satisfying working life. If you want to be able to talk with enthusiasm about your job to family and friends, then this is what you need. No more saying “mustn’t grumble” when people as you how it’s going.

This is exactly the kind of thing I founded Meaningbit to do. It’s about finding ways technology can help us get more out of life. It’s about new tools which make workplaces better and more human. There’s so many great things we can build. In case you can’t tell, this is by far the most exciting idea I’ve come across for a while.

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