Want to use OpenClaw, but aren’t sure where to start? TWiST put the question ‘what should people automate’ to two founders who are also OpenClaw power users. Their response? Automate what stresses you out, or automate incrementally as you work.
Using OpenClaw to attack stress
Former founder and current homeschooling parent @jessegenet, who uses OpenClaw to power in-depth, personalized curriculum for her children, told Jason and Alex that she finds the right places to automate her kids’ education when she runs out of capacity.
“I go through my day,” she said on @twistartups, and “anytime I hit a slow moment when my mental load is at max, I give that job to my OpenClaw and try to automate it.”
This approach is powerful because it’s episodic. If you are worried about spending too much time trying to figure out what to automate or building skills to work on your behalf, don’t! Simply wait until you are buckling under the load of your tasks, and then sort out which is the most painful and send it into battle with your AI agents.
Attacking the ‘next thing’
In contrast, longtime founder @hnshah said that he tries to automate “the thing that comes up,” likening his process to a game of ‘Whack-A-Mole.’ The upside to Shah-style OpenClaw automation is that it can become a habit; the downside is that you might spend time automating work that doesn’t necessarily require it.
Still, extra reps in the automation game will help you get more out of your agents when the task at hand really is a perfect fit for OpenClaw.
Start small
Combining the two approaches, start by using OpenClaw to just take on your two most painful tasks – the work you hate doing, the action items that are repetitive. Build skills, tinker, learn how OpenClaw works, and don’t try to add any more assignments until you have nailed those first two.
Once you have that firm foundation in place and debugged, add as required. Not every OpenClaw user will need four agents running on five different Macs. You might need a single agent running a hosted model. But no matter how complex your OpenClaw setup becomes, it has to start somewhere.
Go big
There’s no ceiling. Shah showed off a sales-enrichment CRM he built with OpenClaw. Genet use OpenClaw to scan whole books into her curriculum planning process.