How Zapier’s EA built an army of AI interns to automate meeting prep, strengthen team culture, and scale internal alignment | Cortney Hickey
How I AI
2025/12/15
How Zapier’s EA built an army of AI interns to automate meeting prep, strengthen team culture, and scale internal alignment | Cortney Hickey
How Zapier’s EA built an army of AI interns to automate meeting prep, strengthen team culture, and scale internal alignment | Cortney Hickey
How I AI
2025/12/15
In this episode, Cortney Hickey shares how she’s harnessing AI to reimagine the role of the executive assistant, turning administrative workflows into scalable systems that benefit the entire organization. Rather than simply automating tasks, she demonstrates how intelligent tools can amplify human judgment, enhance strategic alignment, and foster a more cohesive company culture.
Cortney outlines several AI-powered systems she’s built using Zapier Agents and other tools to transform traditional EA responsibilities. Her meeting prep agent automatically gathers participant insights, pulls CRM data, and delivers actionable summaries via Slack, reducing manual research. She also developed an automated feedback system that reinforces company values by analyzing meeting behavior and offering real-time coaching—reducing emotional labor while promoting cultural consistency. An executive document review tool evaluates team submissions against leadership expectations, improving clarity and sometimes eliminating unnecessary meetings. Additionally, she created a centralized strategy companion using Google NotebookLM, enabling employees to interact with company strategy through natural language queries. These systems exemplify a 'progress over perfection' mindset, emphasizing iterative development. Far from replacing EAs, AI allows them to shift from task execution to strategic enablement, scaling their impact across the organization by building infrastructure that elevates everyone’s work.
01:30
01:30
AI can think like a human and handle repetitive tasks effectively
02:49
02:49
Using AI in my role as an EA is inevitable.
07:39
07:39
The agent checks CRM and communication history to provide context-aware meeting prep recommendations
10:23
10:23
The AI agent reveals its thinking process, including calendar checks and participant research in HubSpot.
12:16
12:16
AI agents can learn over time like interns and be shared as customizable templates.
18:12
18:12
Create a 'Ron Swanson agent' to reschedule all meetings for maximum efficiency
18:13
18:13
The Fellow agent was adjusted to balance supportive and demanding feedback based on executive input
27:54
27:54
Exec Prep GPT provides feedback on meeting documents, suggests rewrites, and can eliminate unnecessary meetings.
33:15
33:15
The tool can auto-generate content like podcasts from strategy documents
36:19
36:19
AI won't replace EAs but enables them to focus on creative and relationship-driven tasks
40:13
40:13
Use direct, rambling feedback when AI doesn't meet expectations
