Ever finish a job and think, “I’m not making that mistake again” — only to make a similar one six months later?

In the Army, we used a simple debrief process to learn from what had happened: what was supposed to happen, what actually happened, why was there a difference, and what should we do differently next time?

In this episode of The AI Tradesman, I look at how the same simple idea can work in a small trade business.

I share lessons from Arctic Warfare training, a gutter-cleaning job I badly underquoted back in 2008, and how AI can help you record these little business lessons and start spotting patterns you might otherwise miss.

No complicated technology. Just ten minutes of reflection that could help you make better decisions, price jobs better and avoid repeating expensive mistakes.

Practical AI. No hype. Just useful stuff for tradespeople.

Busy isn't the same as valuable. In this episode, Rick digs into one of the biggest — and most common — mistakes tradesmen make: spending skilled, £50-£80+ an-hour time on £10-an-hour admin.

Drawing on a real story of losing a customer's quote and spending twenty minutes hunting through emails and spreadsheets to find it, Rick explains how that moment changed the way he ran his business — and how AI has helped him build a proper system so it never happens again.

In this episode:

• The uncomfortable question every tradesman should ask themselves about how they spend their week
• Why your real hourly rate is probably lower than you think once admin, driving and prep are counted in
• Why AI isn't about replacing skill — it's about removing friction: the searching, the remembering, the repeating
• A simple three-day exercise — Keep, Automate, Eliminate — to find the jobs eating your time
• Two real examples from Rick's own week: learning to edit this podcast in GarageBand in two days with AI, and a five-minute conversation that saved £38 on a subscription renewal
• This week's challenge: swap one £10-an-hour job for a £50-an-hour one

How AI Can Help You Understand Your Business Numbers

Most tradesmen know they're busy.

Far fewer know which customers make them the most money, what it really costs to win new business, or how profitable each hour of work actually is.

In this episode, I look at five business numbers that every tradesman should understand—and how AI can help you track, analyse and improve them.

You'll discover:

• What Customer Acquisition Cost (CAC) really means. • Why Lifetime Value (LTV) changes the way you look at every customer. • How improving your conversion rate can win more work without spending more on advertising. • Why response time is one of the easiest ways to beat your competitors. • Why profit per hour matters far more than turnover.

This isn't about spreadsheets or complicated accounting. It's about using simple AI tools to make better business decisions, save time and build a more profitable business.