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Matt Wolfe Learnings - Implementation Plan

Created: Feb 15, 2026
Source: Critical analysis of Matt Wolfe's advanced OpenClaw setup vs Project Minnie
Priority: Tactical improvements to accelerate toward Tier 2 graduation
Timeline: 2-4 weeks (Feb 16 - Mar 15)

Executive Summary

Matt Wolfe (YouTuber, solo content creator) has spent weeks building an advanced OpenClaw system. While his mission differs (personal productivity vs organizational escape velocity), he's discovered valuable tactical patterns we can adopt.

Key insight: His Telegram organization, meeting automation, and cost discipline are directly applicable to our operational efficiency goals.

What we're adopting: 5 high-value tactical improvements
What we're skipping: AI council (conflicts with Jedi Council), content workflows (wrong business model)

Expected impact:

WEEK 1: Foundation (Feb 16-22, 2026)

Priority 1: Telegram Topics + 1-Year Sessions ⚡

Time estimate: 2 hours
Owner: Minnie (with Quan approval on structure)
Status: 🟡 Ready to implement

Why this matters:

Topics to create:

  1. RMA/Operations - Valencia outsourcing, repair procedures, Jerry documentation
  2. Finance - Vania transition, Zoho Books, financial automation (Tier 2)
  3. Training/Steve - Playmaker activation, admin burden reduction, field reality
  4. Partner Relations/Kristin - Relationship depth, CRM systematization, trust-building
  5. Charlie/Design - Brand strategy, creative advisory (protected scope)
  6. Gantom - Lighting business, Philip/Vania coordination, separate context
  7. Personal/Quan - Passport, travel, skiing, family, embodied vitality

Implementation steps:

  1. Create 7 Telegram topics in main group
  2. Configure session expiration to 365 days (vs default daily reset)
  3. Document topic purpose in each channel description
  4. Migrate relevant context from MEMORY.md to appropriate topics
  5. Update AGENTS.md with topic-based workflow

Deliverable: docs/telegram-topic-organization.md

Calendar block: Saturday Feb 15, 2:00-4:00 PM (or delegate to next available 2-hour block)

Priority 2: Daily Markdown Maintenance ⚡

Time estimate: 3 hours (setup) + 5 min/day (automated)
Owner: Minnie
Status: 🟡 Ready to implement

Why this matters:

What Matt does:

Implementation steps:

  1. Download OpenClaw best practices markdown → store in reference/openclaw-best-practices.md
  2. Download Anthropic Opus 4.6 prompting guide → store in reference/anthropic-opus-4.6-prompting.md
  3. Create script: tools/markdown-consistency-check.sh
  4. Script logic:
    • Read all workspace .md files (AGENTS.md, SOUL.md, MEMORY.md, HEARTBEAT.md, etc.)
    • Cross-reference against best practices
    • Flag: Conflicting directives, outdated patterns, anti-patterns for Opus 4.6
    • Output: memory/markdown-drift-report-YYYY-MM-DD.md
  5. Add to daily cron (runs 3:00 AM PT, reports to Telegram if issues found)
  6. Integrate into Sunday rebuild hygiene checklist

Deliverable: tools/markdown-consistency-check.sh + cron job

Calendar block: Sunday Feb 16, 10:00 AM-1:00 PM (after morning briefing)

Priority 3: API Cost Audit + Tiered Fallback ⚡

Time estimate: 4 hours
Owner: Minnie
Status: 🟡 Ready to implement

Why this matters:

What Matt does:

Implementation steps:

  1. Audit current API usage:

    • Document all external APIs currently used
    • Note: Cost per call, free tier limits, rate limits
    • APIs: UPS, Google (Gmail, Calendar, Drive), YouTube, Fathom(?), OpenClaw/Anthropic, etc.

  2. Create cost tiers document:

    • Tier 0: Free (Google free tier, etc.)
    • Tier 1: Very cheap (<$0.001/call) - Gemini Flash
    • Tier 2: Cheap ($0.001-0.01/call) - Haiku, Gemini Pro
    • Tier 3: Moderate ($0.01-0.05/call) - Sonnet
    • Tier 4: Expensive (>$0.05/call) - Opus

  3. Design fallback chains:

    • Email parsing: Gmail API (free) → Gemini Flash (cheap) → Sonnet (moderate) → Opus (expensive)
    • Meeting analysis: Gemini Flash (classification) → Sonnet (synthesis) → Opus (strategic insights)
    • CRM updates: Gemini Flash (routine) → Sonnet (complex)

  4. Update usage tracking:

    • Extend current usage log to include cost tier classification
    • Weekly report: Cost by tier, % distribution, recommendations

  5. Document cost optimization patterns:

    • When to use which tier
    • Fallback trigger conditions
    • Cost vs quality tradeoffs

Deliverable: docs/api-cost-optimization.md + updated usage tracking

Calendar block: Monday Feb 17, 2:00-6:00 PM (after passport appointment)

WEEK 2-3: Automation Build (Feb 23 - Mar 8, 2026)

Priority 4: Fathom → Todo Extraction 🔥

Time estimate: 6-8 hours
Owner: Minnie
Status: 🟡 Design phase (requires Fathom API access)

Why this is GOLD:

What Matt does:

What we'll do:

  1. Phase 1: Historical extraction (one-time, 3-4 hours)

    • Process 747 existing meetings
    • Extract action items from each
    • Classify by owner (Quan, Charlie, Steve, Kristin, Tin, Klansys, Malachi, etc.)
    • Store in database: workspace/data/meeting-todos.db
    • Report: Action items still open, completed, overdue

  2. Phase 2: Ongoing automation (3-4 hours setup)

    • Set up Fathom API webhook (if available)
    • OR: Daily poll Fathom for new transcripts
    • For each new meeting:
      a. Download transcript
      b. Send to Gemini Flash: "Extract action items (task, owner, deadline)"
      c. Cross-reference CRM: Who is the owner? What company?
      d. Classification: Urgent, routine, follow-up
      e. Integration point: Create calendar time blocks for todos (you requested this!)
      f. OR: Create Asana tasks
      g. Send summary to appropriate Telegram topic

  3. Phase 3: Proactive follow-up (2 hours)

    • Weekly report: Open action items by owner
    • Flag: Overdue items, bottlenecks, patterns (who drops the ball?)
    • Send to appropriate owner via Telegram topic

Prerequisites:

Deliverable:

Calendar blocks:

Suggested schedule:

Priority 5: Hybrid Database Pattern Standardization

Time estimate: 4-6 hours
Owner: Minnie
Status: 🟡 Design phase

Why this matters:

What Matt does:

Our databases to refactor:

  1. Meeting corpus (747 meetings) - already CSV, needs SQLite + vector
  2. Email archive (Gmail data) - needs structured + semantic search
  3. CRM (when we build it) - contacts + interaction history
  4. Fathom transcripts (meeting todos) - already planned as SQLite, add vector
  5. Knowledge base (if we build like Matt) - articles, references

Implementation steps:

  1. Create template/helper library:

    • tools/hybrid-db-helpers.py
    • Functions: create_hybrid_table(), insert_with_vector(), search_semantic(), search_sql()

  2. Refactor meeting corpus:

    • Convert CSV → SQLite with schema:
      CREATE TABLE meetings (
  id INTEGER PRIMARY KEY,
  date TEXT,
  time TEXT,
  topic TEXT,
  summary TEXT,
  attendees TEXT,
  transcript_link TEXT,
  vector_embedding BLOB,  -- for semantic search
  created_at TIMESTAMP
);
    • Generate embeddings for all 747 meetings (use cheap OpenAI ada-002 or similar)
    • Store in SQLite

  3. Refactor email archive:

    • Similar schema for emails
    • Enable semantic search: "Find emails about Jerry and manufacturing"

  4. Document pattern:

    • docs/hybrid-database-pattern.md
    • When to use SQL vs vector
    • Example queries
    • Cost considerations (embedding generation)

Deliverable:

Calendar blocks:

Suggested schedule:

Priority 6: Council Briefing Synthesis (NOT AI Council)

Time estimate: 4 hours
Owner: Minnie
Status: 🟡 Design phase

Critical distinction:

Why this matters:

What I will synthesize:

  1. Recent decisions needing follow-up (from meeting corpus)
  2. Emerging patterns (from email, Slack, Fathom transcripts)
  3. Team capacity signals (Tin overloaded? Steve buried in admin? Charlie scope violations?)
  4. Financial signals (when we have Zoho Books access - Tier 2)
  5. Operational blockers (RMA, Code 5 progress, training bottlenecks)
  6. Escape velocity indicators (Council autonomy, operational independence, human empowerment)

Output format (example):

# Jedi Council Briefing - Week of Feb 23, 2026

## Signals Requiring Deliberation
1. **Charlie Scope Violation** (Finance/ops routed to her on Feb 21)
   - Source: Email thread about Q1 financials
   - Recommendation: Redirect to Vania immediately
   
2. **Steve Admin Burden** (5 hrs this week on scheduling, not training)
   - Source: Meeting corpus + Slack activity
   - Pattern: Increasing over last 3 weeks
   - Recommendation: Delegate scheduling to Klansys or automate
   
3. **Jerry Window Closing** (RMA documentation still not started)
   - Source: working/ops/rma-repair-outsourcing-feb2026.md
   - Urgency: HIGH (Jerry returns to China soon)
   - Recommendation: Schedule documentation session THIS WEEK

## Escape Velocity Metrics
- Council Autonomy: 🟡 (some decisions without Quan, but not yet routine)
- Operational Independence: 🔴 (RMA still depends on Quan)
- Human Empowerment: 🟡 (Steve training, but admin burden rising)

## Patterns Observed
- Email volume to Quan increasing (12% vs last week)
- Meeting density unchanged (53 meetings/month avg)
- Charlie async participation (good), but finance still routing to her (bad)

## Recommendations for Deliberation
1. Enforce Charlie scope boundary (redirect finance to Vania)
2. Automate Steve's scheduling burden
3. Prioritize Jerry documentation THIS WEEK

Implementation steps:

  1. Create tools/council-briefing-generator.py
  2. Logic:
    • Scan emails (past 7 days)
    • Scan meeting transcripts (past 7 days)
    • Scan working/ops/ for active projects
    • Check escape velocity metrics
    • Identify patterns, blockers, violations
  3. Generate briefing markdown
  4. Send to Telegram (or store for on-demand query)
  5. Schedule: Weekly (Friday afternoons? Before weekend planning?)

Deliverable: tools/council-briefing-generator.py + weekly cron

Calendar block: Week 3, flexible 4-hour block

Suggested schedule: Friday Mar 7, 1:00-5:00 PM

WEEK 4: Integration & Testing (Mar 9-15, 2026)

Integration Testing

Time estimate: 4 hours
Tasks:

  1. Verify Telegram topics maintain context across sessions
  2. Test markdown consistency checks (intentionally introduce drift, verify detection)
  3. Validate API cost tracking (check tier classification accuracy)
  4. Test Fathom → todo extraction on 5 sample meetings
  5. Query hybrid databases (semantic + SQL queries)
  6. Generate test Council briefing

Documentation Update

Time estimate: 2 hours
Tasks:

  1. Update AGENTS.md with new workflows
  2. Update MEMORY.md with Matt Wolfe learnings integration
  3. Document in PROTECTION-PROTOCOL.md (backup new databases)
  4. Update ROI dashboard with time saved (estimate 3-5 hrs/week additional)

Retrospective

Time estimate: 1 hour
Questions:

  1. Which Matt Wolfe learnings had highest impact?
  2. What didn't work / needs adjustment?
  3. What should we double down on?
  4. Ready for Tier 2 graduation criteria? (25 hrs/week saved, 4 weeks zero errors)

What We're NOT Adopting (And Why)

❌ AI Council

Matt's approach: 4 AI agents (Growth Strategist, Revenue Guardian, Skeptical Operator, Team Dynamics Architect) deliberate daily

Why we're skipping:

❌ Video/Content Creation Workflows

Matt's workflows: Video idea pipeline, YouTube analytics, thumbnail optimization

Why we're skipping:

❌ Broad Autonomy (Send Authority)

Matt's approach: AI creates Asana tasks, sends Slack messages, posts to social media autonomously

Why we're not ready:

Success Metrics

By March 15, 2026:

  1. ✅ Telegram topics active, 1-year sessions configured
  2. ✅ Daily markdown consistency checks running
  3. ✅ API cost audit complete, tiered fallback chains documented
  4. ✅ Fathom → todo extraction working (historical + ongoing)
  5. ✅ Hybrid database pattern standardized (meetings + emails)
  6. ✅ Council briefing synthesis generating weekly reports

Impact:

Tier 1 → Tier 2 graduation progress:

Calendar Time Blocks (Requested by Quan)

Note: Calendar write access still pending (need OAuth authorization code). Once authorized, these blocks will be created:

Week 1 (Feb 16-22)

Week 2 (Feb 23 - Mar 1)

Week 3 (Mar 2-8)

Week 4 (Mar 9-15)

Total time investment: 32-36 hours over 4 weeks (~8-9 hours/week)

To enable calendar blocking: Need to complete Google Calendar OAuth (authorization URL sent earlier, waiting for code)

Next Actions

Immediate (This Weekend):

  1. Create Telegram topics (2 hours) - Saturday afternoon
  2. Set up daily markdown maintenance (3 hours) - Sunday morning
  3. Start API cost audit (2 hours initial scan) - Monday after passport

This Week (Feb 16-22):
4. Complete API cost audit + tiered fallback chains (2 hours) - Monday
5. Design Fathom todo extraction workflow (1 hour) - planning

Next Week (Feb 23-29):
6. Build Fathom todo extraction (6-8 hours) - Tue/Wed
7. Refactor hybrid databases (6 hours) - Thu/Fri

Week After (Mar 2-8):
8. Build Council briefing synthesis (4 hours) - Friday

Final Week (Mar 9-15):
9. Integration testing (4 hours) - Tuesday
10. Documentation + retrospective (3 hours) - Friday

Owner: Minnie
Approval: Quan 🙌
Status: Ready to execute
Next: Create calendar blocks (pending OAuth) + start Telegram topics setup