u/Away_You9725

Building this startup has been a dream, but the sales side is starting to kill me. I spent four hours today just cleaning up email lists and trying to write personalized openers. I’ve looked into several cold email services, but I’m overwhelmed by the choices. Some are just software platforms where I still have to do all the work. I need something in the middle, a service that handles the list building, the technical setup, and the initial sending. If I keep doing this manually, I’m going to burn out before I even close my seed round. What are people using these days that actually works for a small team with a limited budget but big growth goals?

Happy to admit that I took a job as Chief AI Officer at a large enterprise nine months ago and six months in, I'm still in active negotiation about what I actually own vs. what I advise on. IT thinks I'm a glorified consultant. Engineering thinks I'm a compliance function. Business units think I report to them contextually. The ambiguity is slowing everything down. For those who've navigated this role, what's the core of the job and how did you establish authority?

I got permission from my HOA to host a small food truck gathering in our community park next month, maybe 150-200 neighbors, a couple of food trucks, and some lawn games. The park doesn’t have public bathrooms, and honestly just thinking about 200 people standing around needing to go is giving me a headache. I have no idea if I should be arranging portable toilets myself or if the HOA usually handles that. I just want to make sure the logistics don’t ruin the day. Any insight will be appreciated, thanks!