Our cold email setup is technically working. Opens are decent, replies are okay. But every quarter we burn through another chunk of budget on warming services because deliverability slowly tanks no matter what we do.

The tool we use to send the emails is the reason we need the tool that fixes the emails. We are paying twice for one outcome.

Mentioned this to a friend who runs ops at a bigger shop. He laughed and said his line item is closer to $1,400. So apparently, it just gets worse with scale.

Is this just how outbound works now, or am I missing some setup that makes this go away?

Straight to the point. I am from Sthenos Technologies. We do AI automation across 22 industries and have completed over 1500 client projects.

I built a free calculator to help business owners figure out what manual work is actually costing them before they spend anything on fixing it.

Here is what it does.

You put in your team size, weekly hours on manual tasks, fully loaded hourly rate, error rate, and average rework cost. It calculates your annual labour baseline and projects what automation could save you annually across conservative, moderate, and aggressive scenarios. It also shows hours freed per year, accuracy improvement, first year ROI, and estimated payback period.

Two minutes to use. No email required. No demo wall.

We built it because we were tired of businesses getting sold made up numbers by vendors and having no way to sanity check them. Now you have your own number before any conversation starts.

But I also want honest feedback from people outside our bubble.

Does the methodology make sense to you? Are the automation rate ranges realistic for your industry or do they feel off? Is there an input that is missing that would make this more useful? Would you trust the output enough to show it to your CFO, or does something feel off about it?

We are actively working on improving it, and Reddit tends to give better feedback than any user testing session I have ever run.

Correctional Registered Nurse

7 openings

Agency: Department of Corrections (DOC)

Assignment: Temporary, up to 6 months per placement

Open Locations & Shifts

VMS 796146 SCI Mercer — 801 Butler Pike, Mercer, PA 16137 | 2nd: 3:00 PM – 11:00 PM | Expert

VMS 796147 SCI Mercer — 801 Butler Pike, Mercer, PA 16137 | 3rd: 10:00 PM – 6:00 AM | Expert

VMS 791007 SCI Coal Township — 1 Kelley Drive, Coal Township, PA 17866 | 1st: 7:00 AM – 3:00 PM | Expert

VMS 798789 SCI Waymart — 11 Farview Drive, Waymart, PA 18472 | 2nd: 2:00 PM – 10:30 PM | Expert

VMS 797918 See job description — PA DOC facility | Per assignment | Expert

VMS 798679 SCI Phoenix — 1200 Mokychic Drive, Collegeville, PA 19426 | Open shift | Advanced

Minimum Qualifications

• Active PA RN license or non-renewable temporary practice permit

• Documented ability to enter health data into electronic medical records (EMR)

• Proficient in computer skills, including Microsoft Office

Responsibilities

• Provide nursing care and treatment for inmates and detainees in Commonwealth correctional facilities

• Serve as charge nurse, staff nurse, or assessment coordinator

• As charge nurse: direct and coordinate nursing care on assigned shift, assess staff and equipment needs, supervise paraprofessional nursing personnel

• As assessment coordinator: develop, implement, and evaluate individualized nursing care plans; coordinate with interdisciplinary teams; meet with residents and families

• As a staff nurse: provide professional nursing care; may manage specialty areas including infection control, quality improvement, and risk management

• Required clinical competencies: airway insertion, CPR, IV therapy, heparin lock, medication administration (oral/topical/injectable/suppository), catheter care, AED, oxygen, EKG, glucometer, wound and decubitus care, tracheostomy, ostomy care, neurological checks, full body assessments, and Plans of Care

All positions are contract/temporary assignments with Pennsylvania state agencies: DOC, DHS, and DMVA. PA licensure required where noted.

To apply, email your resume to careers@sthenostechnologies.com with the position title and VMS ID in the subject line.

NURSING — REGISTERED NURSE

Psychiatric RN

2 openings

Agency / Division: Department of Human Services (DHS) — OMHSAS

Facility: Torrance State Hospital, 121 Longview Drive, Torrance, PA 15779

Contract Length: Ongoing temporary assignment

Available Shifts

VMS 798846 Day shift — Sat & Sun 7:00 AM – 11:00 PM (16 hrs/day) | Optional add-on: Fri 3:00 PM – 11:00 PM | Expert

VMS 798958 Night shift — Sat & Sun 3:00 PM – 7:00 AM (16 hrs/day) | Optional add-on: Fri 3:00 PM – 11:00 PM | Expert

Minimum Qualifications

• Active PA RN license or non-renewable temporary practice permit

• Minimum 1 year experience in a psychiatric setting

• Proficient in Microsoft Office

Responsibilities

• Develop, implement, and revise interdisciplinary age-specific patient Plans of Care

• Integrate general nursing practice with interventions for emotionally ill patients

• Apply de-escalation techniques; manage restraints and seclusion protocols per approved standards

• Ensure patient safety: contraband checks, suicide/homicide precautions, 1:1 observation monitoring

• Understand legal issues related to competency, guardianship, and psychiatric care of minors

• Perform crisis interventions; recognize and respond to suicide and homicide risks

• Address spiritual and emotional needs of patients and families during times of stress

Weekend-only structure. Compatible with a primary hospital job. 32 hrs/week base — up to 48 with Friday add-on.

All positions are contract/temporary assignments with Pennsylvania state agencies: DOC, DHS, and DMVA. PA licensure required where noted.
To apply, email your resume to careers@sthenostechnologies.com with the position title and VMS ID in the subject line.

NURSING — REGISTERED NURSE

Psychiatric RN

2 openings

Agency / Division: Department of Human Services (DHS) — OMHSAS

Facility: Torrance State Hospital, 121 Longview Drive, Torrance, PA 15779

Contract Length: Ongoing temporary assignment

Available Shifts

VMS 798846 Day shift — Sat & Sun 7:00 AM – 11:00 PM (16 hrs/day) | Optional add-on: Fri 3:00 PM – 11:00 PM | Expert

VMS 798958 Night shift — Sat & Sun 3:00 PM – 7:00 AM (16 hrs/day) | Optional add-on: Fri 3:00 PM – 11:00 PM | Expert

Minimum Qualifications

• Active PA RN license or non-renewable temporary practice permit

• Minimum 1 year experience in a psychiatric setting

• Proficient in Microsoft Office

Responsibilities

• Develop, implement, and revise interdisciplinary age-specific patient Plans of Care

• Integrate general nursing practice with interventions for emotionally ill patients

• Apply de-escalation techniques; manage restraints and seclusion protocols per approved standards

• Ensure patient safety: contraband checks, suicide/homicide precautions, 1:1 observation monitoring

• Understand legal issues related to competency, guardianship, and psychiatric care of minors

• Perform crisis interventions; recognize and respond to suicide and homicide risks

• Address spiritual and emotional needs of patients and families during times of stress

Weekend-only structure. Compatible with a primary hospital job. 32 hrs/week base — up to 48 with Friday add-on.

All positions are contract/temporary assignments with Pennsylvania state agencies: DOC, DHS, and DMVA. PA licensure required where noted.
To apply, email your resume to careers@sthenostechnologies.com with the position title and VMS ID in the subject line.

I checked. literally pulled up the doc from the previous one. Eight of the twelve "key lessons" were word-for-word identical. different project, different team, same lessons.

So either we're really bad at learning, or the lessons-learned format produces a kind of output that doesn't actually translate into different behavior next time. I'm starting to think it's the second one.

We go through the motions. We write the doc. We file it in the same folder as the last one. nothing about how we plan the next project actually changes because the doc isn't read by anyone making the planning decisions.

Does anyone run retros in a way that the next project actually inherits something from them. not asking rhetorically. genuinely don't know what that looks like.

When I started, we had a phone, a notepad, and a shared spreadsheet. Not pretending it was better. But the reps actually sold.

Now every team I work with is running five or six subscriptions, and somehow the people I hired to sell are spending three hours a day being the glue between things that were never built to talk. Logging calls the dialer should have logged. Manually pausing sequences, the sequencer was supposed to pause. Reconciling one list against another.

A friend of mine called it the human Zapier problem. Cannot get the phrase out of my head.

Is anyone actually happy with how their stack runs? Not resigned to it. Happy.

I’m 28 years old and only know the basics of skincare. I have oily skin, so currently I use Dove Men+Care soap and Vaseline Oil Control facewash, along with a few other products. Honestly, I’m still a beginner when it comes to skincare. I’d really appreciate recommendations for essentials like sunscreen, moisturizer, and body wash, as well as any other products that could help me build a proper routine.

Not the problem. They're doing the problem. Same thing.

Pattern I keep seeing. An early-stage company has a gap that nobody on the team can fill: procurement, vendor stuff, something around data. The founder hires a senior to solve it.

The hire shows up. Starts mapping things out. Has real ideas about fixing it properly. Then a deadline hits, and they step in manually because that's the fastest way through. Three months later, they're doing it every week, and the actual fix has quietly moved to next quarter. Then the quarter after that.

The mistake isn't the hire. It's assuming someone good at a process can fix the process. They just end up running it.

Counted last weekend. Six. Six prospects who actually replied and we just got to them too slow. One of them told me straight up they went with a competitor because we took two weeks to circle back.

What kills me is the reps aren't lazy. They had other live threads, a sequencer firing on its own schedule, a CRM that doesn't tell you which conversation is hot right now. By the time anyone noticed the reply the window was already shut.

Is six a lot? Honestly don't know. Curious what your actual number is when you sit down and count.

Genuinely asking because I’m losing my mind a little.

How are you handling being the CEO, the SDR, the account exec, and the CRM admin all at the same time?

I’m in this right now and some days it feels like the actual work I’m supposed to be doing is the last thing I get to. I open my laptop and somehow two hours are gone before I’ve done anything that actually moves the needle. Half of it is just keeping everything synced and updated and not broken.

Is this just the reality of early stage or am I doing something wrong?