Questions to ask before hiring an AI developer
Before you hire anyone to build an AI system, ask to try something they built, ask them to name the one job your system will do, and ask who has the final say when it is wrong. A good developer answers in plain words, puts the scope and the timeline in writing, and tells you what the system cannot do yet.
Part of: AI systems
Almost everyone now says they build AI. Some of them will ship a system that does a real job in your business. Some will ship a demo that impressed you in the meeting and quietly stops being used a month later. These questions help you tell them apart before you sign.
"Can I try something you built?"
Not a video, not a slide: something live you can use yourself, today. If everything they have built is behind a client's login, ask for a walkthrough of the real thing, not a mock-up.
Ours is Workzap pi, a WhatsApp agent anyone can message: tell it what is going wrong in your business and see what it asks you.
"What is the one job it will do?"
A good answer is one sentence: "it takes enquiries on WhatsApp and hands your sales team a written summary". A worrying answer is a list of everything it might do one day. An agent with one job can be tested. An agent with nine cannot.
"Who has the final say?"
Every useful AI system has a person at the end of the chain: someone who approves, overrules or takes over. Ask who that person is in your system, what the AI may do on its own, and what it must hand over.
"Can I read back what it did?"
You should be able to see what the system said to a customer, what it decided and why, after the fact. If there is no log, you will find out about a mistake from a customer.
"What can it not do yet?"
This is the question that matters most. The honest builder answers it straight away and in detail. Models get some things wrong, and a system designed around that, with checks and a person in the loop, is worth more than one sold as if it never errs. If the answer is "nothing", walk away.
"Is it open about being an AI?"
Customers forgive a machine that says it is one. They do not forgive one that pretends. Our own agent says it is an AI in its first message.
"What is the timeline, in writing?"
AI work should come with a scope and a timeline written down before anyone starts, not an open-ended monthly bill. Ask what is in the first version and what is not.
"Would I be better off without it?"
The best builders will sometimes tell you that the job needs forty minutes with the software you already have, not a new system. We start every AI conversation by trying to talk you out of the expensive version; see how a build starts on our AI systems page.