What the ChatGPT Outage Taught Me About Teamwork

When ChatGPT went down, the internet panicked.Posts stopped. Projects paused. Minds froze.

And I get it - I’ve been there too.

But it made me realise something deeper:We’re using LLMs like tools when we should be treating them like team members.

If your co-founder or assistant was suddenly unavailable, you’d have systems in place. You’d adapt.But when ChatGPT glitches, most people have no backup plan - because they’ve never built a working relationship with it.

The truth is:

→ GPTs aren’t just here to rewrite your email or summarise your notes.

→ They’re thinking partners, research assistants, and sounding boards.

→ And the way you use them matters.

An outage isn’t just an inconvenience - it’s a mirror.It reflects how we’ve come to depend on AI, but also how we might be missing its full potential.

If you’re serious about working smarter, it’s time to move from automation to collaboration.That’s how I work - it’s how I build.

→ Want to build that way too? alan@dna.co.za

(This is the part where I admit ChatGPT helped me create the image about ChatGPT being down.)