The studio that hired a model before an intern
Sam’s studio has six people and no interns. Over two hours they explained why their first junior hire was a model, and what it taught them about managing people.
TL;DR
- Six people, no interns, one model doing the junior work.
- They trained it like a person: a written list of everything they were tired of explaining.
- The list turned out to be more valuable than the model.
Talked for 2h 04m
- 00:03:12Why a model before an intern?
- 00:41:50Where did it stop being useful?
- 01:12:05What is on the list?
- 01:57:30What would you tell someone starting today?
We met in their studio on a Tuesday, in the one room without screens. They had cleared the table and put a single sheet of paper in the middle, face down. We didn’t ask about it for an hour.
Sam started the studio four years ago with two friends from school. They grew slowly on purpose: one new person a year, never more. Last spring, when the work finally outgrew the six of them, they didn’t post a job. They opened a chat window instead.
“I wanted to see how far it would go before I needed a person,” they said. “It went further than I expected, and stopped exactly where I should have expected.”
What they mean is taste. The model could resize, rename, write first drafts of client emails and turn meeting notes into tasks. It could not tell a good idea from a merely correct one. “That part is still my job,” they said. “Maybe it always will be.”
00:52:10It went further than I expected, and stopped exactly where I should have expected.
The surprising part was the list. To get the model to do the junior work well, they had to write down everything they usually explain to a new person: how files are named, what a client email should never say, when to ask instead of guess. It ran to eleven pages.
The list
They turned the sheet over then. It was page one of the eleven. The first line said: if you are not sure, ask, and ask early. The model follows it most of the time. The people in the studio, they admitted, follow it less often.
Day one
Now every new person, human or not, gets the same eleven pages on day one. They think that is the real change AI brought to the studio: not fewer people, but a studio that finally knows how it works.
We asked what they would tell someone starting a studio today. They thought for a long time. “Write it down before you need it,” they said. “You will need it.”
sum up this story
Small studio hires a model, ends up writing a manual for the humans. Honestly, relatable.
Thanks for reading,