🎮 The Next Input — Issue #009

Your Trello Cards Are Now Invoices

Aaron Bost
July 14, 2025

⚡ The Briefing — 60 sec

OpenAI delays release of its open model—again. Chinese labs keep shipping ever-larger open weights while OpenAI wrestles with governance (11 Jul 2025).
Study warns of “significant risks” in AI therapy chatbots. Researchers say inconsistent advice and data leaks mean the human friend still beats the silicon shrink (13 Jul 2025).
AI outsmarts 30 top mathematicians at secret California summit. LLM-powered theorem prover cracks problems humans couldn’t solve in months (12 Jul 2025).

🛠️ The Playbook — Auto-Draft Invoices from Trello “Done” Cards

Mission When a project card hits “Done,” generate a draft invoice in Xero—no manual entry.
Difficulty Easy | Build time 25 min
ROI Saves finance ≈ 10 min per invoice and eliminates copy-paste errors.

Step	Action
1	Trigger – Trello → Card moved to list “Done”.
2	AI Action – Prompt: “Parse card title & description. Return JSON {client, service, hours, notes}.”
3	Formatter – Multiply `hours × bill_rate` for amount.
4	Create Draft Invoice – Xero API with JSON fields.
5	Slack Alert – Post to #finance-review with invoice link for approval.
6	Fail-safe – On error, DM #ops-alerts with card URL.

Pro tip: Email clients a weekly summary once invoices are approved via a Zapier Digest.

🎯 The Arsenal — Tools & Prompts

Asset	What it does	Link
Whalesync	Two-way sync between Airtable, Notion & HubSpot.	https://www.whalesync.com
Relay.app	Visual flow builder with built-in human approvals.	https://www.relay.app
Humata AI	Ask questions over huge PDFs and get cited answers.	https://www.humata.ai
Prompt: Three-Point LinkedIn Post	One paste → punchy social take.	prompt below ↓

Turn this insight {idea} into a LinkedIn post: Hook (1 line), Lesson (2 lines), CTA (1 line). Casual, first person.

💡 Free Office Hours

Need your invoices to write themselves?
Book a free 15-minute Office Hours slot—no sales pitch, just workflows solved.

→ Grab a slot: https://calendly.com/aaron-cylentis/the-next-input-office-hours

🕹️ Game Over

Automate one billing task tonight—tomorrow’s cashflow will thank you.
Share your win; you could headline Issue #010.

— Aaron

Automating the boring. Amplifying the brilliant.

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