The Weekly Grind: Issue 02

👋 Welcome to the grind

Hey, John here. If you’re a part of the MSP community, this is your new Friday ritual. Every week, I’ll be sharing what I’m seeing in the industry—from LinkedIn takes to event recaps to the tools that are actually helping MSPs win.

My goal? Help you think bigger, move faster, and avoid the noise. Let’s get into it.

Coffee & AI with Jimmy Hatzel: Innovation, Pragmatism, and the Power of Boring

Had a killer Coffee Chat with Jimmy Hatzell, CEO of Hatz AI, where we unpacked what’s real vs. hype in AI for MSPs—plus how to drive actual revenue from it. MSPs curious about productizing AI? This one’s a must-watch 👇

🔍 What we learned:

Jimmy brought his experience in cybersecurity, startups, and MSPs together to break down how AI is transforming service delivery—when applied strategically. From internal optimization to new client offerings, the big opportunity lies in solving real business problems, not chasing shiny objects.

💡 Biggest takeaways:

AI That Demos Well ≠ Business Value
Cool tech like AI phone agents may look great in a demo, but not all are ready for prime time. Focus on tools that drive real ops value.

Start Internal, Go External
Successful MSPs implement AI internally first—then scale those wins to clients as packaged offerings.

Find the “What’s in it for both” Zone
The best AI use cases sit at the intersection of MSP needs and end-client value—think HR bots, document summarization, or log analysis.

Verticalization Wins
MSPs targeting specific industries (e.g., manufacturing, legal, or recruiting) are gaining traction faster with tailored AI use cases.

✅ Recommendations:

• Focus on low-effort, high-value automations first—log analysis, email summarization, onboarding workflows.

• Use AI to enhance your value prop—especially around security, compliance, and client reporting.

• Avoid over-customization early on. Most MSPs don’t need to tweak system prompts—they need outcomes.

🤖 Rewst, RPA, and the Rise of the Future MSP

I also got a chance this week to sit down with my good friends at Rewst. One of our clients jumped on and shared how they’re using Auvik’s network management product alongside Rewst’s RPA platform. Rewst is easily one of the hottest tools in the market right now, and it’s easy to see why. MSPs everywhere are charging toward automation and AI to reshape how they run their businesses, and Rewst is sitting right at the center of it all.

What really stood out was how our client showcased some creative and effective automation use cases within the Auvik stack. They’ve built automations for pulling in alerts, syncing devices, and even handling some Tier 1 troubleshooting tasks. It’s the kind of stuff that used to eat up hours of tech time, now handled in the background.

🔮 Where It’s Going: The Future of MSPs

With RPA and automation becoming top of mind for so many MSPs, I can’t help but wonder… what does the future of the MSP look like when we start automating our customer interactions? Are we heading toward a world where those once-personal touchpoints become machine-driven? And if so, should we be designing those future interactions now, with automation in mind?

This line of thinking leads me to a term I’ve been hearing more often: BSP (Business Service Provider). As AI and automation let companies self-serve more of their IT needs, will MSPs evolve beyond tech support and into orchestrators of broader business services? Could a BSP manage not just IT, but all those operational needs that fall outside a company’s core focus? And if AI makes those solutions easy to replicate, will we see a wave of hyper-niche BSPs emerge?

As MSPs transform into versions 3.0, 4.0, and even 5.0, the question is: where’s the real value? Right now, it’s in automation and AI. But as those tools become more accessible to everyone, differentiation becomes the next big challenge.

🎙️ I’m Live This Week

How do MSPs actually use AI today? I’m asking Ashley Pyle, CXO at GadellNet, live on Coffee Chats next Thursday May 22 at 9am ET 👇

Why this conversation matters:
Ashley sits at the intersection of strategy, customer experience, and tech enablement — and she’s working firsthand as an MSP brewing up AI into real results (not just buzzwords).

What you’ll learn:
• What “AI readiness” actually looks like for MSPs
• How early adopters are turning experiments into value
• Why CX and ops leaders must align before the tools even land

🎧 Register here

🔗 Stuff Worth Clicking

• Unlocking MSP Growth Opportunities in BCDR

• Silk Typhoon hackers now target IT supply chains to breach networks

• Uncle Marv’s IT Business Podcast: Comparing Auvik and Domotz

📬 Hit Me Back

Are you experimenting with AI or automation in your MSP? Using Rewst, Hatz, or something homegrown? I want to hear what’s actually working—and what’s just hype.

Are we really heading toward a world of BSPs? Or are we still trying to get good ticket summaries out of GPT?

Reply and let me know what you’re seeing in the wild.