Aboard has had a podcast for a long time, but if I’m being frank, it’s lacked a little for focus—it tends to be about what Rich and I, the co-founders, find interesting, things like “enterprise sales” and “how businesses overspend on software” and “obscure synthesizers.”

Recently, though, we keep coming back to one big question: What does AI mean for the software industry? Not to Google, or to Microsoft, or even Apple—although those are interesting, sure—but to the industry on a whole. Just look at a company like Accenture, which has more than 700,000 employees. They go into companies and consult—defining architectures, managing assets, setting up databases, worrying about cybersecurity. Now they’ve got AI buzzwords all over their homepage and marketing materials.

Why the name “Reqless”? Well—we’re not sure that AI is going to replace engineers, or artists, or musicians. It just doesn’t have the juice. But we’re increasingly sure that AI is going to replace…consultants. That doesn’t mean consultants go away. Just try to get rid of them! They’re everywhere. But it does mean the era of giant requirements documents may be coming to an end. Why spend all your time making a list of what to build when you could build it? 

For people in technology—especially the people with stakes in the current processes—this can feel very dangerous. We want to look it square in the eye. There’s a lot of heat and light about AI right now, and it’s hard to tell what’s substantive and what’s hype. The answer, of course, is “it depends.” We want to dig into that nuance. (It’s important to make fun of the hype, too!)

Moving beyond just Rich and me, we’re going to start having guests, and we’ll focus on different industries. Even if you hate AI, it’ll be a good time. And we’ll keep the focus on what people can do with these new tools to move their careers along. 

You can listen to the first episode (and subscribe to the podcast) here—or read along with the full transcript. We’ll also keep putting up episodes on YouTube.

And now, by the laws of marketing, I have to say it: It’s time to get Reqless!