The craft · operator manuals + AI-for-X
/comparison names what each adjacent role is. /craft does two things on top. Twelve operator manuals walk you through the work itself, step by step, with the stress-tests Stan runs in the background. Seven AI-for-X manuals draw the line for each role: where AI pays, where it harms, where it never goes. Written for operators, and for the AI agents that assist them.
Operator manuals AI-for-X tier
Why these pages exist
The /comparison pages answer one question: when does the business need a business coach instead of a lawyer, accountant, board, coach, peer group, or LLM. That is the buying decision.
Operators kept asking the next question. What does the work itself look like? What do I run before I bring in the role? Where do I test my own thinking so I know when I am the constraint and when the situation has outgrown me?
The /craft pages answer that. Each one walks an operator through one of the adjacent disciplines: what mastery actually requires, the full process, how to fact-check your own output, and the moment to escalate. The same structure works as a prompt for AI agents who are asked to assist on the same work.
Tier one · twelve operator manuals
01 · AIpaired with advisor-vs-ai
Knowing how an LLM actually works, drawing the full process before you prompt, building the flow, stress-testing every output, and using AI as the help tool it is.
Open the manual →02 · Coachingpaired with advisor-vs-coaching
The questions an executive coach actually asks, the ones you can ask yourself with a notebook, and the limit beyond which a coach earns the seat.
Open the manual →03 · AI for coachesextension of /coach-yourself
For coaches who want to use AI to run intake, session prep, follow-up assets, and the back office without leaking client material or losing voice.
Open the manual →04 · Accountingpaired with advisor-vs-accountant
The five views every owner should pull monthly, the questions to ask the accountant, and the gap between recording the past and understanding the decision.
Open the manual →05 · Boardpaired with advisor-vs-board
Self-imposed governance: the four artifacts that hold a founder accountable when no fiduciary body is doing it for you yet.
Open the manual →06 · Consultingpaired with advisor-vs-consulting
The brief, the workplan, the deliverable, the test of done. Run a real internal project without paying for the deck.
Open the manual →07 · Exit planningpaired with advisor-vs-exit-planning
The personal pre-work owners skip and pay for later: what you actually want, what the business has to look like, and what you stop running before the buyer arrives.
Open the manual →08 · Influencepaired with advisor-vs-influencer
What a senior operator gets from publishing, the cadence that survives a real week, and the tactic stack that does not turn the founder into a content machine.
Open the manual →09 · Peer grouppaired with advisor-vs-peer-group
Three to five operators, a real cadence, a written charter. Most of what YPO and Vistage deliver, run by you, on the decisions you actually have.
Open the manual →10 · Interim CXOpaired with advisor-vs-interim-cxo
What it actually means to hold a CXO seat for ninety days: the brief, the operating cadence, the artifacts you ship, and the moment to hand it over.
Open the manual →11 · Legalpaired with advisor-vs-lawyer
The decisions a founder routinely files without naming the legal layer. A self-audit, a question stack for counsel, and the line you do not cross alone.
Open the manual →12 · Selfpaired with advisor-vs-therapist
A short self-check protocol for the founder who keeps making the same call at 11pm. Not therapy. The structural floor under the decision.
Open the manual →Tier two · seven AI-for-X manuals
Each AI-for-X page draws the scope diagram for one profession (HUMAN owns · AI assists · NEVER), names the workflows, and gives the second-brain stack adapted to that role's hard floor: bar rules, MNPI, deal confidentiality, audience trust, regulator data rules.
AI · lawyerssolo & small firm
Research, drafting, checking, and document automation without breaking privilege, fabricating citations, or crossing the rules of professional conduct.
Open the manual →AI · consultantsindependent & boutique
Throughput on the back-of-house: research, hypothesis trees, deck mechanics, model audits. Methodology and perspective stay yours.
Open the manual →AI · accountantssolo & small firm
Throughput on categorization, reconciliation, variance narratives, and tax research. Audit trail intact, sign-off stays human.
Open the manual →AI · boardschairs, NEDs, secs
pre-brief throughput, briefing notes, governance research, action tracking. MNPI never enters; fiduciary duty does not delegate.
Open the manual →AI · exit plannersboutique M&A
Comp transactions, CIM mechanics, model audits, diligence prep. Code-name protocol keeps the live file sealed.
Open the manual →AI · creatorsoperator-publishers
Idea capture, drafting support, repurposing, comment triage. Voice and source stay yours; fabrication does not enter.
Open the manual →AI · interim CXOsCFO, COO, CRO, CMO
Onboarding compressed from weeks to days. Artifacts, decision drafts, handover-from-day-one. The seat itself stays human.
Open the manual →AI · coachessolo & small team
Intake, session prep, follow-up assets, and the back office. The business is the work; AI does not enter the session.
Open the manual →Two roles deliberately do not have an AI-for-X manual: therapists (clinical and ethical floor sits below what a public manual should normalize) and peer groups (a self-organized loop is not a profession to scale). The /comparison pages cover both directly.
When the manual is no longer enough
The /craft pages exist so you can outgrow them. When the work in front of you is too consequential to file with a manual, the conversation moves to /apply.
Apply for business coachingApplication-gated · Direct reply within 48 hours · See the three tiers
Craft
Route map
Use the next page only when it clarifies the next real decision.
