Most engineering teams are still optimizing for the wrong thing. They chase the speed of code when the real bottleneck is the speed of context. Matt Watson and Eban Bisong, founder and CEO of Senvi, get into what actually changes when AI moves from a coding tool to a teammate.

Eban has spent his career as a founding engineer, and his approach is hands-on: don't tell skeptical engineers AI works, show them, every standup, until the pushback turns into excitement. At Park DNA he built "RTD2," an OpenClaw-powered droid wired read-only into their data sources, Slack, and Jira. It answered support questions before an engineer could, created its own bug tickets, and joined meetings through Fireflies so nothing got lost. The lesson underneath all of it: record everything, because the team that captures the most context ships the right thing fastest.

Matt also shares his own three-week rabbit hole with Claude Cowork, $8K in tokens, a fully rebuilt Full Scale website, a thousand dead blog posts deleted, and 200 more rewritten. They go a few rounds on why it's a bad time to be a coder but a great time to be a builder, why "good enough" is a real standard and not a cop-out, and why ownership beats asking permission every time.

If you build software or lead an engineering team, listen now. And if you want to try Eban's voice-first AI journal, visit senvi.ai.

00:42 From Founding Engineer to Solo Founder

01:52 Using AI as an Engineering Leader

03:24 Building RTD2: An AI Teammate for Support

05:27 The Speed of Context, Not Code

06:11 Why You Should Record Everything

08:59 Winning Over AI-Skeptical Engineers

11:50 The AI Spectrum Across 80 Clients

13:35 A Bad Time to Be a Coder, a Great Time to Build

14:03 Why "Good Enough" Is Good Enough

14:52 Human-in-the-Loop and Reviewing AI's Work

16:28 Going All-In on Senvi

19:01 Validating the Product With a Beta Group

21:01 Bootstrapping a Truly AI-Native Company

Connect with Eban Bisong on LinkedIn

Senvi.ai - senvi.ai

What Smart CTOs Are Doing Differently With Offshore Teams in 2025

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Full Scale – Build your dev team quickly and affordably

If you’re trying to get your team out of the basement and into real product ownership, this episode is your playbook. Stop being a ticket factory. Build teams that think, create, and lead.

Follow the show, rate it, and send this to someone who’s still trying to do “real Scrum.” They need it more than you do.

Most people are already asking AI about their health. Almost none of them believe the answers. Around 40% use it to make wellness choices, but fewer than 5% trust what it says. Matt Watson and Josh Anthony, CEO of Nlumn, dig into why.

Josh has spent 25 years in food and nutrition, and his take is blunt: trust drops fast as the question gets serious, from a recipe to a diagnosis, and the fix isn't a smarter chatbot. It's pairing the data with a human people actually trust. They cover what's real right now too. The protein obsession. Beans having a moment. GLP-1s and why weight loss is now about saving muscle, not just dropping fat. Why people are building their own messy personalization stacks because no single company does it well.

Matt also explains why he flat out ignores his doctors on cholesterol, and he and Josh go a few rounds on whether ultra-processed food is the problem or a missed opportunity.

If you build or invest in health products, listen now. And if you want help with personalized nutrition, reach Josh@nlumn.com or info@nlumn.com.

00:28 Introduction to Health Tech and AI

03:36 Trust in AI for Health and Nutrition

06:29 Personalization in Health and Nutrition

09:26 Emerging Trends in Health Tech

12:23 The Role of GLP-1 in Weight Management

15:29 Challenges in the Food Industry

18:37 Innovative Products in Health and Nutrition

Connect with Joshua Anthony on LinkedIn

Nlumn Website - https://www.nlumn.com/

Email - mailto: info@nlumn.com

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Full Scale – Build your dev team quickly and affordably

If you’re trying to get your team out of the basement and into real product ownership, this episode is your playbook. Stop being a ticket factory. Build teams that think, create, and lead.

Matt Watson sits down with Beth Epperson, founder and CEO of Legacy Purposed, here in the Kansas City area. Beth came up through marketing and branding, including the brand launch for Hyvee Arena, before deciding to build something of her own.

Her company is built around two products. Aligned Legacy measures how people think in real time and helps teams see how aware, connected, and aligned they actually are. HIKMET, or Wisdom Illuminated, keeps a company's knowledge governed and accurate so nothing walks out the door when an employee leaves.

Beth and Matt get into the messy reality of being a founder. She self-funded the whole thing, learned to code her own prototype, and pitched for over a year through a pile of rejections. She also walked away from a paid pilot because the people on the other side were not aligned on ethics and accountability.

Matt shares why he thinks Beth represents a new kind of founder. Sales first, build second, now that AI can help build the thing. They also dig into validating an idea, the pull you want to feel from customers, and why getting your first case studies is the hardest part.

If you have ever tried to get a product to market on your own, this one is for you.

00:38 Introduction to Legacy Purposed and Beth Epperson

03:37 Beth's Entrepreneurial Journey and Corporate Experiences

06:37 The Birth of Legacy Purposed and Its Mission

09:52 Understanding Emotions and Accountability in the Workplace

12:35 The Development of Innovative Tools for Corporate Growth

15:38 Challenges in Building and Marketing the Software

18:28 The Importance of Case Studies and Market Validation

21:37 Future Aspirations and Closing Thoughts

Connect with Beth Epperson on LinkedIn

Legacy Purposed Website - https://legacypurposed.com/

Email - mailto:Beth@legacypurposed.com

What Smart CTOs Are Doing Differently With Offshore Teams in 2025

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Full Scale – Build your dev team quickly and affordably

If you’re trying to get your team out of the basement and into real product ownership, this episode is your playbook. Stop being a ticket factory. Build teams that think, create, and lead.

Follow the show, rate it, and send this to someone who’s still trying to do “real Scrum.” They need it more than you do.

Data centers are multiplying fast, and the energy demands are staggering. Matt Watson sits down with Tim Tarver, founder and CEO of Exceed Geo Energy, to talk about one of the most underrated power sources in the conversation: geothermal. Tim breaks down how his company is adapting drilling technology from the oil and gas industry to generate clean, baseload energy almost anywhere in the country, why geothermal outlasts solar and wind by decades, and how it could be the right fit for the next wave of AI infrastructure.

If you're watching energy costs climb and wondering where the power for all these data centers is actually going to come from, this one's worth your time.

Listen now and learn why geothermal might be the energy answer nobody's talking about enough. And if you enjoyed this episode, leave us a review and subscribe so you never miss a conversation with the founders and operators building what's next.

00:44 Introduction to Data Centers and Energy Challenges

03:40 Geothermal Energy: A Sustainable Solution

06:33 The Role of Geothermal in Data Center Energy Needs

09:41 Entrepreneurship in Geothermal Energy

12:41 Water Usage and Cooling in Data Centers

15:40 Cost Comparison: Geothermal vs. Other Energy Sources

18:50 Technological Advances in Drilling and Geothermal Energy

21:48 Future of Geothermal Energy and Closing Thoughts

Connect with Tim Tarver on LinkedIn

Exceed Geo Energy - http://www.exegeoenergy.com

What Smart CTOs Are Doing Differently With Offshore Teams in 2025

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Full Scale – Build your dev team quickly and affordably

If you’re trying to get your team out of the basement and into real product ownership, this episode is your playbook. Stop being a ticket factory. Build teams that think, create, and lead.

Follow the show, rate it, and send this to someone who’s still trying to do “real Scrum.” They need it more than you do.

Most retail investors don't know what to do after they open a brokerage account. Sean Tepper was one of them until he built a traffic light rating system for stocks and turned it into a SaaS platform used by 13,000 customers across 50 countries.

In this episode of Startup Hustle, Matt Watson sits down with Sean Tepper, founder and CEO of Tykr, to break down the real story behind building a B2C SaaS product in a crowded fintech space.

They get into why Warren Buffett and Charlie Munger inspired a process engineer to build a stock screener, how Tykr cuts through 100+ data points to give investors one simple signal, the broker API nightmare that nearly broke their best feature, and why onboarding is harder than the product itself. Sean also gets honest about the hiring mistake he made for years—and what finally changed.

If you're building a self-serve SaaS product or trying to find your footing as a solo founder, this one's worth your time. Tune in to Startup Hustle now.

00:41 Introduction to Ticker and Sean Tepper

03:31 The Journey of Building Ticker

07:04 Understanding the Stock Market and Investment Strategies

11:09 Building Trust and Confidence in Investment Decisions

21:31 Acquisition Strategies and Metrics for Success

16:21 The Impact of AI on Investment Platforms

19:41 Challenges in Building a High-Tech Investment Platform

22:11 Key Lessons Learned in Entrepreneurship

25:33 Final Thoughts and Team Dynamics

Connect with Sean Tepper on LinkedIn

What Smart CTOs Are Doing Differently With Offshore Teams in 2025

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Full Scale – Build your dev team quickly and affordably

If you’re trying to get your team out of the basement and into real product ownership, this episode is your playbook. Stop being a ticket factory. Build teams that think, create, and lead.

Follow the show, rate it, and send this to someone who’s still trying to do “real Scrum.” They need it more than you do.

Eric Ries wrote The Lean Startup. Sold 2 million copies. Helped hundreds of people build companies from nothing. Now he's back with a harder question: why do so many of those companies eventually go bad?

In this episode, Matt Watson sits down with Eric to talk about his new book Incorruptible—a deep dive into the invisible forces that corrupt organizations, why profit-maximization becomes pathological, and what it actually takes to build a company that stays great.

They get into why the stage-gate development model keeps failing founders, the story of Saul Price and how Costco was born from a betrayal, and what a real fiduciary duty to your customer looks like in practice. Plus, how to structure your company so your values outlast you.

Listen to the full episode on Startup Hustle. And if Incorruptible sounds like your next read, pre-order it at incorruptible.co before May 26th.

00:37 Introduction to Eric Ries and The Lean Startup

06:57 The Journey to Incorruptible: A New Perspective

12:38 The Challenge of Short-Term Thinking in Business

16:14 Understanding Corruption in Business Practices

22:51 Building Trustworthy Organizations

31:03 Who Should Read Incorruptible?

Connect with Eric Ries on LinkedIn

What Smart CTOs Are Doing Differently With Offshore Teams in 2025

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Full Scale – Build your dev team quickly and affordably

If you’re trying to get your team out of the basement and into real product ownership, this episode is your playbook. Stop being a ticket factory. Build teams that think, create, and lead.

Follow the show, rate it, and send this to someone who’s still trying to do “real Scrum.” They need it more than you do.

Most founders get the order wrong. They build for two years, then ask a marketer how to sell it.

Connie Lund flipped the script.

She started Zaboom with no dev team, no code background, and no VC funding. What she had was 50+ years of combined marketing and product experience, a GoHighLevel account, and a willingness to break things at 2 a.m. on a Sunday.

In this episode, Connie walks Matt through how she built a working voice AI product for insurance agencies—using N8N, GoHighLevel, and Claude as her "CTO." Then landed paying customers in under 90 days. She also gets honest about what AI can't do for you: use good judgment, know when to stop, and figure out if what you're building actually matters to anyone.

They cover the difference between outputs and outcomes, why talking to customers beats building in isolation every time, and how the traditional "raise VC, hire devs, ship product" playbook is getting replaced by something scrappier and faster.

If you're a founder who's been waiting until the product is perfect to talk to people, this episode will make you uncomfortable. Good.

Listen to this Startup Hustle episode now.

00:49 Introduction to Connie Lunn and Zaboom

02:33 The Journey of Building Zaboom

05:41 Tech Stack and Tools Used

11:58 Prototype vs. Final Product

16:16 Marketing and Customer Engagement

21:09 Coaching and Helping Others

25:31 Democratizing Technology and Skills

32:08 Final Thoughts and Advice

Connect with Connie Lund on LinkedIn

What Smart CTOs Are Doing Differently With Offshore Teams in 2025

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Full Scale – Build your dev team quickly and affordably

If you’re trying to get your team out of the basement and into real product ownership, this episode is your playbook. Stop being a ticket factory. Build teams that think, create, and lead.

Follow the show, rate it, and send this to someone who’s still trying to do “real Scrum.” They need it more than you do.

Most product managers are just project managers with a fancier title. They make zero real decisions, answer to everyone, and wonder why nothing ships on time.

Willis Jackson has been building product teams for over a decade. He's blacklisted entire companies from his hiring pool. And he moved to the Bay Area to measure himself against the best—only to find out nobody there really knows how to do product either.

In this episode, Willis and I get into why product thinking is now the most valuable skill in tech, why AI didn't solve the bottleneck problem (it exposed it), and what happens when engineers can build 10x faster but nobody knows what to build.

We also get into his company Middle Mile—basically the Airbnb of e-commerce fulfillment—and why stay-at-home parents running micro-warehouses out of spare rooms might be the future of how your next Amazon package gets delivered.

Fair warning: if you're a product manager who hasn't talked to a customer for two weeks, this episode is going to be uncomfortable.

Hit follow so you never miss an episode of Startup Hustle.

00:35 Reconnecting and Early Influences

03:27 The Challenges of Product Management

06:34 The Role of AI in Product Development

09:32 Understanding Risks in AI and Software Development

12:34 Bottlenecks in Product Teams

15:25 The Importance of People in Business

18:17 Innovative Fulfillment Solutions

21:39 The Journey of Building a Business

Connect with Willis Jackson III on LinkedIn

What Smart CTOs Are Doing Differently With Offshore Teams in 2025

Subscribe to the Global Talent Sprint

Full Scale – Build your dev team quickly and affordably

If you’re trying to get your team out of the basement and into real product ownership, this episode is your playbook. Stop being a ticket factory. Build teams that think, create, and lead.

Follow the show, rate it, and send this to someone who’s still trying to do “real Scrum.” They need it more than you do.