I Paid 700K a Month for a Team. Claude Code Did the Job.
At our peak I was paying about 700,000 pesos a month. The range was 500,000 to 700,000, going to a team of around 30 people. We still lost clients.
Why does a bigger team not fix the problem?
I used to believe the answer to every gap was another hire. More work than I could handle? Hire someone. A function I did not want to touch? Hire someone to own it. So I built a team. I even sent a CEO hire through an expensive leadership program, hoping that would protect the company while I stepped back.
I watched it degrade anyway. This is the part I have to own. The people I hired did not care about the work as much as I did, and that is not their failure. It is the gap between paying for people and getting ownership. You can buy hours. You cannot buy someone who lies awake thinking about your clients. I was paying for a team and expecting a founder's heart in return.
What changed my mind about tools?
I started with base Claude in the browser. Useful, but it could not touch my actual files. Then I moved to Co-work, the first version that felt semi-agentic. It could reach into my local files and do real work. Then I hit the context-window wall, where the tool forgets what you told it earlier in a long job.
So I tested another agent tool. In one hour it ran up 120 dollars. Powerful, but not sustainable for how I work. Then I noticed something. That tool was built on Claude. The intelligence I was paying a premium for was the same intelligence I could direct myself. So I rebuilt the same setup inside Claude Code.
What did I actually move into it?
Everything I had been outsourcing went into one place, directed by me:
- Design work
- Code
- Scheduling
- Virtual-assistant tasks
- Social content
The plan I run costs about 200 dollars a month. Compare that to 700K pesos and a leadership program. The math is not close.
So what is the real lesson?
Tools are not roles. For years I treated them as the same thing. A new function meant a new person, and a new person meant another person to manage and another person to babysit. That is how a founder ends up running a payroll instead of running a business.
I wanted to run a business, not be the boss. The best CEO I could have hired was Claude.
I am not saying fire your people. I am saying stop reaching for a hire every time you see a gap. A function is something you can direct. You replace it by learning to give clear instructions to AI, not by adding another seat and hoping that seat cares the way you do.
I wish I had known this a year ago. The 500K, the lost clients, I could have done it with Claude Code. I cannot get that year back. You can skip it.
Frequently asked questions
How much was Cris paying for his team?
He was paying 500,000 to 700,000 pesos a month, about 700K at peak, for a team of around 30 people. He still lost clients during that time.
What does "tools are not roles" mean?
It means you do not have to hire a person every time you see a gap in your business. A function like design, scheduling, or social can be a tool you direct with AI, not another seat on payroll to manage.
What is Claude Code and how does Cris use it?
Claude Code is an agent tool that can work directly with your files and do real tasks. Cris moved his outsourced design, code, scheduling, virtual-assistant work, and social content into it. His plan costs about 200 dollars a month.
Did Cris fire his team and replace them with AI?
His message is not to fire people. It is to stop defaulting to a new hire for every gap. Some functions are better directed through AI than handed to another person to manage.
