Penelope:
Hey there, Penelope Bent here. Welcome to BUILD IT, BABY!, the podcast for dreamers who are doers.
Over the past year, I have noticed BUILD IT, BABY! really evolving, and I've come to realize that didn't happen by accident. It happened through thousands of conversations—and not all with people. Some actually with artificial intelligence.
Now, before you click away and think this episode is about technology, come on now, stay with me here. Because this isn't really a story about AI. It's a story about what happens when you finally find a place where you can think out loud without judgment, where every crazy idea gets explored instead of dismissed, where questions become much clearer, where patterns begin to emerge, and where your own voice becomes louder than your fear.
That's what happened to me.
This is BUILD IT, BABY!, the show for big ideas, brave pivots, and bold next chapters. So let's do it. Let's build it, baby.
Every builder throughout history has had a sounding board—or sounding boards. Perhaps it's editors, mentors, friends, mastermind groups, business partners, or coaches. Today I'd like to chat about the idea that maybe, just maybe, that sounding board might also include a bit of artificial intelligence.
Like I mentioned before, before you jump out of your chair here, I'm not suggesting that AI replaces wisdom. I actually believe AI may help expand our ability to think.
Think about this for a second. When you've previously worked with collaborators, the first thing we do is have our idea, then we refine it. We organize, then we reorganize. We challenge the concept. We start to look for deeper patterns. That's collaboration, right?
I've been doing that for years with an amazing team. One thing I've noticed over the past year is that my first idea is almost never my final idea.
I know in the process of creating BUILD IT, BABY!, one minute I want to talk about fear, and then 30 minutes later I find myself actually thinking about identity, or alignment, or trust, or becoming. Why? Because throughout the process, I keep asking better questions, defining my work every step of the way.
I believe that process is valuable. I think many people quit thinking way too soon, and I think some of that might be because they haven't found the perfect thinking partner.
I've had an interesting experience from when I owned the modeling and talent company. We had a terrific producer, Neela Ritt—fabulous gal. I'm always sitting on the floor talking a thought through or thinking about what the next creation is going to be.
One thing I found with Neela was that we'd have this big morning get-together, throw a bunch of stuff against the wall, and come out with a plan. Well, by two o'clock that afternoon, that plan had changed dramatically because it's all kind of an evolution. It's a creative process.
Neela would ask to speak to me in the office. She'd come in, close the door, and say, "You know, I thought we had this dialed this morning." She was having a really hard time with the flexibility required in that whole collaborative process.
I know when we first started talking about BUILD IT, BABY!, I honestly thought it was going to be a how-to business-building podcast. As you know, I love to build businesses. I think everyone should own one. So, of course, my focus was to help others build.
But instead, I slowly uncovered what I believe BUILD IT, BABY! is truly about.
Today, I don't think it's only about building businesses or the career or life of your dreams. It's more than that. I think business is just one of the expressions that we have. I think it's really about who we're becoming along the way and the constant identity growth that we all experience while we're building.
Whether we're building a business, building a career, building confidence, building relationships, or building a meaningful life, I don't think I saw that on day one. I know I didn't. I discovered it.
Many people become attached to their first draft. I have learned not to.
I'll spend weeks asking, "Does this feel right? Am I missing something? Is this really who BUILD IT, BABY! is? Is this really what I want BUILD IT, BABY! to be about?"
That curiosity is probably one of the biggest reasons BUILD IT, BABY! keeps growing.
People often ask if AI will replace creativity. Through my experience, I think it's exactly the opposite.
Being able to tap into AI from time to time doesn't give me my purpose. It sure as hell didn't give me my experiences. It didn't tell me what I believe. It simply helped me hear my own voice more clearly.
The interesting thing about that—and why I shared the piece about Neela—is that when things like that happen and you're working with a collaborative team, it also made me nervous about testing my ideas. It inhibited me.
Through my experience with my AI thinking partner, I can keep throwing out my ideas. There's no big sigh in the room like, "What the hell? We've been over that before."
I've experienced that.
I remember when we were trying to decide the colors of a new building we'd moved into. I remember my art director saying, "Oh, for Christ's sake, we've talked about that before. Let's make a decision here."
But I needed to go through my process.
With AI, I have the freedom to just chat my ass off with this unknown thinker. That's what allowing that has taught me.
It's taught me to ask better questions of myself, to challenge my assumptions, and to organize my thoughts.
I learned that by having a thinking partner, I could dig deeper and define or polish my ideas. I found reassurance and clarity because, honestly, there's no judgment there.
I think it's a kick because AI and I do not always agree on everything. We certainly battle it out, but it's great because it brings a deeper understanding of what I've been wanting to uncover.
In the beginning of building BUILD IT, BABY!, I had a hundred ideas spinning in my head because BUILD IT, BABY! wasn't really formed yet. Recruiter Mania was evolving at the time. Everything was there—it just wasn't completely organized.
Then I started asking questions and having authentic conversations with my thinking partner, artificial intelligence.
They weren't questions like, "What should my logo be?" They were questions like, "Who am I really trying to help? What keeps showing up here? Why does this matter so much to me?"
Those are the conversations that changed everything.
I remember the day I discovered BUILD IT, BABY! was never only about business. It was always about building the life you were designed to live.
I remember thinking, "There it is. That's the heartbeat. That's the true essence of what I want to share."
I want to share the fact that I know you have all the parts and pieces to build an incredible life for yourself. I think we were given all of those parts and pieces at birth.
I didn't come up with anything brilliant. It's because I had finally uncovered my own why.
I could just throw it out there. There weren't any judgments. There were, like I mentioned, no sighs in the room.
I can't tell you how many times I've said to my thinking partner, "Let's just play with this." That's becoming one of my signature phrases.
Let's just play with this.
Let me play with this.
I never expect perfection.
You know what I expect now? It's very exciting.
I expect discovery.
One minute I might say something doesn't feel right, and then I just keep digging. I do this sometimes for days until it finally clicks for me.
That process is what people usually never see because ideas are everywhere. Most people have them. But builders—we do something with them.
Let me tell you, there were days I thought I had everything figured out, and then one question completely changed the direction of the conversation.
One day I asked a question about a LinkedIn post. I had the basic idea and just wanted some clarity. Somehow we ended up redesigning an entire business model.
How we went from wanting a little more clarity on a post to ending up with an entirely new business model, I'll never know.
That isn't about artificial intelligence. It's about building your own personal board of directors.
It's about building the people who help you think, who challenge your assumptions, who remind you of your strengths, and who ask better questions than the ones you're already asking yourself.
Sometimes that's a mentor. Sometimes it's a friend. Perhaps it's a coach. And sometimes it's a conversation with artificial intelligence.
The tool matters less than the willingness to engage honestly.
People ask me all the time, "Is AI going to replace human creativity?"
After a year of working with AI from time to time, here's what I believe.
AI didn't give me my stories. It didn't give me my experiences. It didn't give me my purpose. Those, like I said earlier, were already mine.
What it gave me was simply a place to think, to test my ideas, to ask one more question, and to hear my own voice a little more clearly.
In the end, that's what BUILD IT, BABY! has always been about.
Not building faster.
Not building bigger.
But building something that's genuinely yours.
Sometimes the bravest thing you can build is a safe place for conversation that changes the way you see yourself.
You too may discover the conversation that changed everything.
Because I believe that's what this journey has really always been.
The quality of your conversations comes from the quality of your questions.
You don't come looking for someone to tell you what to think. You come looking for a thinking partner who allows you to think more deeply.
Through my thinking partner, I discovered I didn't want to help people become someone else. I wanted to help them uncover who they already were.
That wasn't AI.
That was me, Penelope.
The conversation simply created enough space for me to actually hear myself.
So here’s the part where I tell you exactly what I know. These are my knowings, the things I no longer question because they've shown themselves to me again and again—not from a book, but from building, getting knocked down, getting back up, and doing this work in the real world.
Okay, so here are my knowings.
Number one: I know that the deeper I dive into my own truth, the clearer I get as to who I am, and that opens my mind for self-discovery.
Number two: I know that life is long and full of very bright possibilities.
Number three: I know that the greatest gift I have is my mind and the courage to use it.
So those are my knowings.
Okay, here we go. It's time for the listener question.
This is from Michael in Atherton, California.
Here's Michael's question:
"How do I identify a viable idea?"
Yeah, you're taking it right from the top.
You have an idea and you're wanting to start looking at whether you should move forward on it.
First of all, I would definitely look at my own personal skill set.
Anytime you're thinking about building something—when you've got an idea for something—I want you to remember not to undervalue how important you, the builder, the top dog, are. Really take an honest look at whether you have the skill set to launch the idea and get it off the drawing board.
That's huge because you're eventually going to be looking at financial profitability. The more personal skill sets you have, the more you can jump in and wear several different hats, the better chance I think you have of succeeding, especially when you're starting from the ground up.
Really evaluate that.
Don't light your smokes and tell yourself jokes.
Look truthfully.
Because I know for myself, "Oh yeah, I can do that. Uh-huh. Yeah, I can do that."
Well, there's only so many hours in a day, and there's only so much energy you have.
Try to be realistic when you evaluate your own skill set as it relates to the viability of your idea.
The second thing I'd look at is market demand.
Whatever this thing is that you're thinking about building, is there a demand in the marketplace?
Then broaden that question.
Are you talking about a global marketplace? Are you talking about the marketplace in your own town? What are the parameters of the marketplace?
Determine the marketplace, and then determine whether there is demand for your idea.
I also think that when it comes to financial profitability, everybody always asks, "Is there financial profitability in this?"
One thing you have to remember—and I have learned this—is that there's much more profit in the beginning if you create a company that is service-oriented versus product-oriented.
Think about how much it's going to cost from a financial standpoint to launch the business.
Usually my profit in the beginning was slim to none. The money I had on hand was basically slim to none.
I had to look at how much it was going to cost to launch the business.
When you have a service business, it's a lot less expensive because you don't have engineers who might be needed to develop a product or other specialists you're going to have to pay from day one.
You really have to look at that.
Service businesses are so much easier to launch because there isn't that huge overhead to getting them off the ground.
The way I did it for most of the businesses I've built was that as I made money, I increased the business based on the money I earned. I was always reinvesting in the company.
Now, when I opened the clothing store, that was a little different because I had to have the budget to go to market and outfit an 1,800-square-foot store.
That was completely different.
In that particular venture, in the very beginning, I did have a business partner who had a lot of the funding for us to get it off the ground.
That might be another thing to look at when you're thinking about what's required to put your idea out there.
If you look at your own personal skill set, your market demand, the size of your market, and whether it's a service, a product, or a combination of the two, that will help you establish your financial profitability.
I also think it's really important to be very clear about the financial profitability.
Err on the lower end so you have a cushion.
If you make more money, great.
Look at the bare bones of it.
Do I have enough money to pay the overhead for my family while I'm launching this thing?
Don't make it pie in the sky.
Be realistic.
Come up with a lower number. If you have one particular figure in mind, lower it by twenty grand or whatever because there will always be some little piece of something that comes up that's going to cost you more money than you originally expected.
Michael, great question.
I hope you do follow through on your idea.
I think the exercise of identifying viability and going through the process is very, very important.
By doing all that work, I hope you come to the conclusion that it's something you can really see happening and can successfully launch.
Please keep me posted on that journey.
I'd love to hear how it all works out for you.
Thank you again, and I hope all is well there in Atherton, California.
Well, it is that time.
Thank you so much for listening to BUILD IT, BABY!.
Whatever you're building—whether it's a business, a career, relationships, or a whole new chapter of your life—I hope you truly remember this:
You don't have to build it alone.
Ask yourself:
Who helps me think?
Who helps me see what I can't see?
What conversations have I been avoiding that could change everything?
Who challenges my thinking?
Who asks better questions?
Because sometimes a single conversation doesn't just change your mind.
It could change the direction of your life.
Always best, P.
BUILD IT, BABY! is a Rainy Day Production House original, hosted by Penelope Bent and produced and edited by Morgan Clymer. Music by Yuri Shemshishin and Oleksii Holubiev. If this episode spoke to you, please follow the show and leave a review. It helps more dreamers like you find us. And remember, you’re not just building a bold business or career—you’re building a bold life.
