Product.ai / Join / Projects / Builder Trial End-to-End — pick one Product.ai problem and ship the agent-based solution
Project Open to Alpha Team

Builder Trial End-to-End — pick one Product.ai problem and ship the agent-based solution

Pick one concrete Product.ai problem — a SimplyCodes operations workflow, a Cortex curation pattern, an AIOS team-coordination gap, an Alloy edge case. Ship the agent-based solution end-to-end. Real production code. Real merged PRs. Real users. Same shape as Spencer Seay's McMaster-Carr AI agent — builder mentality, end-to-end ownership, working artifact at trial end.
Project Overview
Discipline
ai-systems-associate · founders-associate · AI Systems — AI Engineer
Duration
2 weeks
Compensation
Your stated freelance rate
Surface
Product.ai · SimplyCodes · Engineering
Kernels
productai · simplycodes · engineering
Outcomes
team-velocity · dev-integrate · mlp-convert
Tier
Applied
Alpha Team
Open to alpha members who want to take this on
Tooling
Claude Code or Co-work

Why we want this done

The Founders Associate / AI Systems Associate hire is the team member who absorbs work into the system itself — who can take a vague problem ("our Slack inbox is overwhelming," "our recruiting pipeline is leaking 50% of HIRE-NOW candidates," "our SimplyCodes verification fleet has a 33% failure rate") and ship the agent-based solution end-to-end. Spencer Seay's McMaster-Carr AI agent is the canonical builder-archetype demonstration — Stanford IED, end-to-end ownership, working artifact. The candidate proves they can do the same on Product.ai's actual surfaces. AIOS access. Real codebases. Real users. The deliverable is the artifact AND the demonstration of builder mentality under live conditions. AISA hires fail when they over-architect or under-deliver; AISA hires win when they ship.

Scope

  1. Day 1-2 — survey Product.ai surfaces; talk to 3-5 team members; identify candidate problems
  2. Day 3 — pick the problem; argue for it in a one-page memo (mechanism + cost + leverage)
  3. Day 4-12 — build. End-to-end. Production code. Sub-agent orchestration where applicable. Verification ladder per multi-agent physics
  4. Day 13 — ship. PR merged. Users using it.
  5. Day 14 — write the one-page debrief: what was built, what failed, what the candidate would change next iteration

What success looks like

  • The artifact ships in production — code merged, users using it
  • The problem chosen is real (the team agrees with the diagnosis)
  • The solution respects multi-agent physics where applicable (deterministic gates, oracle separation, external truth anchors per phase)
  • The 24-hour archaeology ritual fires on any failure during the trial
  • The candidate's debrief is honest — what failed gets named alongside what worked
  • The scope is right-sized: a 2-week-shippable problem, not a 2-week-ambitious-prototype

References

references.md
Cortex CLAUDE.md §5.2 rules 7-10 (Multi-Agent Engineering Physics)
AI Engineering Phase 3 briefing axiom E1 (Engineer-Plus-Agent-Fleet)
Spencer Seay McMaster-Carr AI agent (referenced in VEC-16, recruiting cockpit)
Existing Product.ai codebases (productai-web, simplycodes, productai-extension, alloy, aios)
Existing AIOS skills as architectural reference

Constraints

  • Claude Code as primary substrate
  • The artifact must ship in production — code merged, not parked on a feature branch
  • Multi-agent physics applies — deterministic gates, oracle separation where applicable
  • IP separation: application-layer surfaces are in scope; methodology paths are out of scope
  • Scope right-sizing is part of the test — over-ambitious prototypes that don't ship are a fail
  • The 24-hour archaeology ritual applies to any failure during the trial
  • Quality-first cost-aware: any sub-agent fan-out follows model_router.py routing discipline
Apply
01

Read the Codex (10 min)

The operating principles we work by. If they resonate, the rest of this will land. Open the Codex →

02

12-minute video screen

Hireflix, async. Questions are calibrated to this project specifically.

03

Chemistry call (30-60 min)

Direct call with the CEO. Strategic alignment and mutual fit. No problem-solving exercise.

04

Project begins within 2-3 weeks

1099 contractor agreement, NDA, paid at your stated rate. Day 1 in Santa Monica.

Alpha Team members can take this project without the screen-and-call sequence. Reach out via the Alpha Team channel.