Moving years of product data
About three hours with the operations manager of a British e-commerce business, and a first corrected file for over 6,000 product kits.
Your AI,
set up properly.
I coach senior professionals who run their own business, one to one, on using AI in their work. Usually one to three hours, with your hands on the keyboard.
Or write to phil@lenirai.com.
- CoachingOurselvesCo-founded with Henry Mintzberg in 2007
- Speech recognitionFifteen years, from Bell‑Northern to Nuance
- A U.S. patentCo-inventor, speech recognition
- MontrealEnglish and Quebec French
Thirty years in your field, and a business of one. Your AI can be the team that helps you grow your business.
Who it’s for
Senior people who run a one-person business: consultants, advisors, specialists, coaches, who want their AI set up properly for the work they already do.
I’m roughly that person.
How it starts
An interview. About half an hour at the start of your first hour, on Google Meet, with AI transcribing. You tell me your story: why you do this work, what you sell and to whom, how clients find you, where you want to go. I ask the follow-up questions that get to the real answers, and I talk to your AI as we go.
Your AI gets all of it. I send you the transcript and you paste it into your own AI. It ends with my instructions to your AI: build a file on you and your business and keep it up to date, ask you before it guesses, and start on your first project.
Then you drive. You share your screen, with your real work open. I tell you why the AI just did the odd thing it did (because it will) and what to say to it instead. Knowing why is most of the skill. If your files are confidential, tell me first and we’ll pick work you can share.
Something real. By the end of a session there’s usually something in your hands: the market research you needed, the spreadsheet cleaned, the first draft that was a blank page that morning.
You work in your own AI account: Claude, which I usually recommend, or ChatGPT.
One hour is $350, in Canadian dollars, taxes extra. Most people need one to three.
One hour or two
One hour: Unstick one thing.
You have a specific task that’s been sitting there. We do it together and you keep the method.
Two hours: Reset how you work.
Usually two sessions. We look at the handful of things that eat your week and set your AI up to take on the repetitive work.
I’m Phil LeNir.
I spent fifteen years building speech recognition middleware and applications, from Bell‑Northern Research in the early 1990s to SpeechWorks and Nuance Communications. I’m a co-inventor on a U.S. patent from that work. In 2007 I co-founded CoachingOurselves, peer learning for managers, with Henry Mintzberg. I’ve coached and facilitated hundreds of senior professionals.
By the time my dad was fifty-five, he was forced into early retirement. The young engineers were faster and cost less. I went into management instead, and lost patience with the details of building software. AI changed everything. It handles the details now, and I build again.
For those of us with a few grey hairs, this might be the best tool we’ve ever been handed.
Latest article
Your job is to upskill your AI: three ways I’ve learned to teach mine, and a prompt to check yours is set up to remember what you teach it.
Things I’ve built with AI
Many of them on my own time.
The advice in my sent email
An AI designer that helps learning and development professionals plan a custom CoachingOurselves program, drawing on years of my own sent email.
The lake association newsletter
A volunteer newsletter, drafted with AI in plain Quebec French and checked by the board before it goes out.
Voice practice
People rehearse a hard work conversation out loud with an AI character. I designed and built the voice-to-voice system behind it.
In their words
“I was absolutely thrilled about your coaching, directness, knowledge and honesty.”
“Phil was fantastic to work with. He helped us understand how AI could be used practically within our business and gave us the confidence to start applying it in meaningful ways. He has a wealth of experience, explains things clearly, and was incredibly helpful throughout. I’d happily recommend him to any business looking to get started with AI.”
“Phil brings an engineering mindset to business problems. He gets to the heart of the issue, explains technical possibilities clearly, and keeps the conversation focused on what would be useful in practice. I value his thoughtful, grounded approach and would recommend him to any business looking for a sensible way to explore AI.”
“Working with Phil was a game changer. He helped me take the way I use Claude to an entirely new level. With his guidance, I was able to create a beautiful new website that I’m incredibly proud of but even more importantly, he gave me the knowledge and confidence to manage it myself. I’m now fully autonomous when it comes to making updates and evolving my site, which is something I never thought I’d be able to do on my own.”
One message is enough.
Let’s talk
Or write to phil@lenirai.com.