Startup Show: Actual AI Gives Project Managers the (AI) Tools They Need 73571y

Most people don't think about engineering managers until something breaks. Code slows down. Tickets pile up. Meetings drag on. Then someone asks, “Who’s managing all this?” John Kennedy, CEO of Actual AI, knows that problem better than most. He’s building software for the people holding the tech world together — engineering managers who plan, coach, and report across teams but are often stuck doing it with duct-taped dashboards or a dozen browser tabs. I talked to John on Startup Show about why Actual AI isn’t just another dashboard or bot. It’s an agent. It sees code changes, turns them into business summaries, tracks developer velocity using Stanford-grade metrics, and cuts out the grunt work that usually drags teams down. Not by flooding your Slack with hallucinated code reviews, but by actually working — quietly, usefully, and consistently — in the background. He told me their biggest goal is giving engineering managers their time back. Not with chat prompts or half-baked integrations. But by building something custom-fit: a true system of record for real-time development. The endgame? Let managers coach their devs, not babysit them. It's not flashy. It's not buzzwords. But it’s exactly the kind of thing that matters if you’re trying to build something real and not fall apart halfway through. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.keepgoingpod.com/subscribe 3h611f