Disposable Software

How to Turn Messy Data Into a Working Tool in 20 Minutes

Lucas Bennington · Founder, Codi Technologies

Microsoft AI Culture of Learning · April 9, 2026

Today's Agenda

Lucas Bennington

Founder, Codi Technologies (Portland, OR) AI-native software agency. I build with AI every day.

60 Minutes Together

01

15 min — Two Big Ideas

AI-Native Teams and Disposable Software

02

15 min — Live Build

VS Code + Copilot: messy CSV → working tool

03

30 min — Open Q&A

The part I'm most looking forward to

Today's Outcomes

A clear mental model

What "AI-native" actually means beyond Copilot-for-email

Permission + a recipe

Kill one annoyance in your workflow this week

Real ideas to try

In Copilot when you get back to your desk

About Lucas


I build things because it's fun.

A solution to a problem only I have

We'll explore this today as an example of disposable software but first the state of AI


AI is being sold as a productivity headset.

Put it on → same human → more output. More emails. More tickets. More decks.

"How much more can we squeeze out of the same person?"

I think this is the wrong way to think about what's happening.

AI should make your people better, not just busier.

The problems they couldn't reach last year. The work that was too ambitious to try.

This is the change worth unlocking

What AI-Native Actually Means

Designed with AI at the center.

Not bolted on the side.

Intake. Scoping. Delivery. Internal ops. All of it assumes AI is part of the workflow.

Not this

"We have Copilot licenses."

"Chat, can you draft a response to…"

"Generate an image for my presentation"

This

"An agent has prepared my schedule, triaged my tasks, and has a list of questions for me before I start the work day"

"Our AI has a complete understanding of the work we do and fits right alongside our team"

"Every workflow we build starts with AI at the center"

Disposable Software

Kleenex for workflows.

A tool you build to solve one problem, use, and throw away.

For 20 years, your options were:

  • Buy a tool → adopt somebody else's workflow
  • File a ticket → wait weeks
  • Or just live with the annoyance

With AI, the cost of building a tool collapses to minutes.

Tools cost weeks and months of effort

You treat them as sacred

Tools cost 10 minutes

You don't

Disposable software lets someone without technical expertise automate a workflow.

Three Principles to Watch

Keep these in mind when I build in a minute:

1

Describe outcomes, not code.

Tell the agent what you want. Not how to write it.

2

Iterate, don't plan.

No spec. Ugly-and-working first. The first version is the spec.

3

Nothing is sacred.

The moment you treat software as sacred, you stop building new ones.

Software should work for you.

Not the other way around.

Now let's actually build one.

What you're about to see:

Messy conference CSV plus a context folder

VS Code and GitHub Copilot — tools you already have

~15 minutes, two phases: a prioritized follow-up doc, then a working tracker app

Close the loop: push clean data into our CRM

Q&A

1

Software should work for you, not the other way around.

2

This week pick the smallest annoyance in your workflow, open Copilot, describe a tool, use it once, delete it.

Connect with me for:

The slides

The demo repository and prompts/context

Battleship tips

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