The first cohort of the Second Brain System has officially started.
If you missed my emails or posts over the last few months, here's the context: this is a peer-building cohort where solo consultants and strategists are building their AI team. We're starting with designing a second brain and building a meeting assistant, then expanding from there. It feels weird to call it a "group program" or "online community." It's more like peer-building, where we're doing the work together, live.
Yesterday's lesson was a milestone. Not just because we're building something new, but because of how we're building it.
We all have different Tech Stacks
At the top of the session, I did a quick survey. I wanted to know what tools people were actually using so I could design the system to work with their reality, not some ideal scenario.
And what I found was really interesting.
Everyone (literally 100% of the cohort) is using Google Drive for file management. Some people also use Dropbox or OneDrive, but Google Drive is the anchor.
Virtual meeting platforms were evenly split between Zoom and Google Meet, and people use both depending on who they're meeting with.
But AI note-takers? That's where we had the most variation. Which makes sense because note-takers are the tool people are most likely to switch.
Why Note-Takers Are Different
File storage and meeting platforms are sticky. Once you commit to Google Drive or pick Zoom as your main platform, you're pretty locked in.
But note-takers are nimble. They're also where you can end up in vendor lock-in hell if you're not careful about how you capture those notes and transcripts.
What We Built Yesterday
So what we did was set up Google Drive as the central brain for all meeting information. Transcripts, notes, all of it lives there.
The note-taker feeds it, the meeting assistant we're building will read from it, but the foundation stays stable no matter what tools come and go. Your data, your control, your system.
Here's the thing about getting organized: if anyone on your team (a new hire, a vendor, anyone new to the business or not) can look at information and know what it is and have an expectation for what it means, that means AI is going to be able to do that too. That's the whole point of getting organized. When the structure is clear to humans, it's clear to AI. Here's what that looks like in practice.
