How Founders Can Tackle Avoided Problems with AI, According to Alvin Huang

In a recent LinkedIn post, Alvin Huang discusses a common challenge faced by founders: the tendency to avoid persistent problems, and how Artificial Intelligence can be leveraged to overcome this hurdle. Huang posits that founders often have a specific issue they repeatedly sidestep, an avoidance that ultimately proves more costly than confronting the problem directly.

Huang shares his personal experience and a structured approach he uses to address these deeply ingrained issues, emphasizing that while AI cannot solve the problem independently, it can significantly accelerate the process of identifying the core of the matter. He highlights that the real cost of avoidance lies in the escalating expense and complexity that accrues over time.

“There’s always one problem sitting at the bottom of the list, the one that’s been there for weeks because it’s easier to work around it than deal with it.”

Leveraging AI to Uncover Root Causes

Alvin Huang argues that the key to overcoming avoidance lies not in letting problems fester, but in proactively seeking clarity. He explains that his company, Truegenics, now utilizes AI to process these lingering issues before they become insurmountable. This strategy is rooted in the understanding that AI’s strength is in its ability to ask incisive questions, thereby guiding the founder toward the actual problem rather than just its symptoms.

Huang outlines a six-step framework designed to transform periods of being “stuck” into actionable progress. This framework is crucial for founders who find themselves repeatedly treating symptoms instead of addressing the underlying cause.

Huang’s Six-Step AI-Assisted Problem-Solving Framework

The structured approach detailed by Huang is designed to systematically dismantle avoidance and foster decisive action. Each step leverages AI’s questioning capabilities to push the founder’s thinking forward:

1. Find the root cause: Huang suggests prompting AI with a statement like, “I keep running into [problem]. Ask me a series of questions to help me find the real root cause, not just the symptom I keep treating.”
2. Break into solvable pieces: The next step involves asking AI to dissect the problem: “Break [problem] into the smallest possible pieces. Tell me which piece is actually blocking the rest.”
3. Stress-test current approach: To ensure thoroughness, founders can ask AI to critique their existing solutions: “Here’s how I’m currently handling [problem]. Play devil’s advocate and tell me where this approach will break down.”
4. Generate different angles: Huang recommends using AI to explore diverse perspectives: “Give me 3 completely different ways to approach [problem], each based on a different assumption about what’s really going on.”
5. Identify blind spots: For persistent issues, Huang advises, “I’ve been stuck on [problem] for [time period]. What’s a question I haven’t asked myself yet that might get this moving?”
6. Define the next step: Finally, the process culminates in concrete action: “Based on everything above, give me one specific action I can take in the next 24 hours to move this forward.”

According to Huang, problems often remain unresolved simply because the right question has not yet been posed. He asserts that founders who rely solely on intuition risk losing valuable time in discovering these crucial questions. In contrast, those who integrate AI into their problem-solving process can find these answers much more rapidly.

“Problems usually stay stuck because nobody’s asked the right question yet.”

The Value of Proactive AI Integration

Alvin Huang emphasizes that the strategic use of AI is not about outsourcing thinking but about augmenting it. By employing AI to probe and question, founders can accelerate their journey to understanding and resolving complex issues that might otherwise paralyze their progress.

“Founders who bring AI into the process find it a lot faster.”

Huang concludes by inviting discussion on how others use AI for persistent problems and points to ScaleVantage for further resources on AI prompts and systems used in running Truegenics. This approach underscores a forward-thinking methodology for tackling the inevitable challenges of entrepreneurship.