S1E3: Agent Talk #3: Shawn Harris (Coworked) - How Coworked Solved The Impossible

"35% of projects fail, and the numbers haven't budged in 20 years."

That's what kept Shawn up at night before founding Coworked. After two decades in project management, he'd seen every methodology, tool, and framework come and go - yet the fundamental problems remained stubbornly unchanged.

Shawn is building an AI project manager that could transform how work gets done. But not by replacing humans - by unleashing them.

Harmony, Coworked's AI agent is rewriting the rules of project management. While most AI companies are focused on chatbots and automation, Coworked is tackling something far more ambitious: creating an AI teammate that handles everything from resource allocation to risk analysis.

What's fascinating is how they've navigated enterprise adoption. When they first pitched to project managers, they hit a wall of resistance.

But then they had an insight - they were talking to the wrong people.

PMO leaders immediately got it. Not as a way to reduce headcount, but as a solution to a persistent problem: how to handle 2x the projects without 2x the team.

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Project managers spend up to 80% of their time on process tasks rather than strategic work. As Shawn puts it:

"There's a subtle but crucial difference between replacing a job and replacing a role."

Harmony handles the routine while enabling humans to focus on what matters.

Their early results are turning heads. Fresh out of Techstars, they're already landing enterprise clients who see the potential to transform their project delivery.

Perhaps the most interesting part is their insight about AI adoption: success comes not from elimination, but elevation. It's not about replacing project managers - it's about making them superhuman.

AI transformation isn't just about automation - it's about reimagining how work gets done. And sometimes, the biggest breakthroughs come not from replacing humans, but from freeing them to do what they do best.

Just as we saw with Zendesk revolutionizing customer support, Coworked is showing us what's possible when we think bigger about AI's role in enterprise transformation.

The question isn't whether AI will transform project management - it's how fast organizations will adapt to this new reality.

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