Solo, Not SmallOne-person businessFrom 75 people to one
I had 75 people. Now I work alone, with AI.
A team is the slowest way to grow.
I'm Bhavik Sarkhedi. I started Write Right in 2016 with two people, grew it to seventy-five by hiring, and sold it in 2023. Today I do thirteen jobs alone, each on a system I built in Claude.
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- 2016: two peopleI moved to Ahmedabad and started Write Right with two people and no outside money.
- 2023: seventy-five peopleEvery new job meant a new hire. It worked. I sold the company that year.
- Today: one personThirteen jobs, each on a system I built in Claude. And I have my evenings.
The short answer
The jobs stayed. The hiring stopped.
A one-person business has the same jobs a company has. I counted thirteen in mine, and the full list is here. Most of each job is steps that repeat, and steps can be written down once and followed by a system.
The part that can't be written down is judgement. That part is mine, and it is the reason clients come to me. So I kept the judgement and handed the steps to Claude.
Only on this page
The numbers are from my own companies. The split of each job, further down, is how I work today.
- 2 people in 2016
- 75 people by 2023
- 3 companies built and sold
- 13 jobs, one person, today
How I got to 75
Hiring was my answer to everything.
From 2016 to 2023, hiring was how I grew. By the time Write Right reached seventy-five people, every new job meant a new hire.
It worked. I built and sold three companies with no outside money: Dad of Ad in 2021, Write Right in 2023 and a UK web agency in 2026. What it took from me was my evenings.
Today I'm a business of one, and that is a choice. I built the systems to get those evenings back, and they did.
Who does what now
Seven of the thirteen jobs, split in two.
| The job | My part | The system's part |
|---|---|---|
| The assistant | I keep one Claude project for each kind of work, with three files inside. | It knows my business before I type. |
| The trainer | I write down my way of doing a job, once. | Claude follows it every time. |
| The LinkedIn writer | The story comes from a real client conversation, and I write the draft. | It edits my draft. It never starts the post. |
| The web developer | I write the words first, and bring my colours and my logo. | Claude builds the page. |
| The researcher | I take the call. | It has read their site, their LinkedIn and what ChatGPT says about them before I speak. |
| The proposal writer | I write the call notes in my own words. | It builds the proposal from them the same day. |
| The onboarding desk | I win the client. | The intake form, the welcome note and the first-week plan go out the moment they say yes. |
The other six work the same way. See all thirteen jobs.
What still needs me
Three things I don't hand over.
- What to say.I write the first draft of everything myself. The system takes it from there.
- Who to work with.I decide which clients I take. No system makes that call for me.
- What good looks like.Nothing goes out until I have read it and said yes.
Out of the thirteen, two jobs never go to a system. Which two, and why, is part of the talk I give on this.
Your turn
Before your next hire, do these five things.
- 1
Circle every task you did twice last week.
This is the first thing I ask in lesson one. I don't tell you whom to hire.
- 2
Write one of them down as steps.
The way you'd explain it to a new hire on their first day.
- 3
Give the steps to Claude as a skill file.
Now the job is done your way every time, and you haven't hired for it.
- 4
Keep the judgement.
What to say, who to work with and what good looks like stay with you.
- 5
Then look at what is left.
If a job still needs a person after that, you'll know exactly what to hire for.
Questions
About going from a team to one person.
Can one person replace a team with AI?
For the work that repeats, yes. I do thirteen jobs alone on systems I built in Claude. The judgement stays with me: what to say, who to work with and what good looks like.
Why did you stop hiring?
Hiring worked. It took Write Right from two people to seventy-five. It also took my evenings. I built the systems to get them back, and they did.
Should a solopreneur ever hire?
Build the system first. Circle every task you did twice last week and write it down as steps before you hire for it. If a job still needs a person after that, you'll know exactly what to hire for.
Is a one-person business a small business?
It has one person in it. The work is the same thirteen jobs a company has, and each one still has to be done well.
Which AI do you use?
Claude, for all thirteen jobs.
What is Solo, Not Small?
My initiative for solopreneurs and small business owners. In each video lesson I do one real job inside Claude, start to finish, and hand you the system file so Claude does that job your way.
- My exact AI setupSix files and folders that do thirteen jobs.
- My proposal deskA proposal that leaves the same day.
- Websites with ClaudeMy sites, built with no developer.
- All thirteen jobsThe one-person business, job by job.
Solopreneurs start here: what Solo, Not Small does for you. More about me on the About page.