Set It Off: Your New IT Department Is a Browser Tab
A one-page test to spot which SaaS renewals AI just handed you leverage on - plus the prompt that writes your ask.
I started my tech career doing support at an ISP in the 90s, so I have real sympathy for your IT team. I also know the math from the other side: your ticket about a broken calendar sync sits in a queue behind forty bigger fires, or you burn your own afternoon spelunking through settings menus you'll never open again. Here's the shift. Both Claude and ChatGPTnow ship agents that can see the screen, click, type, and navigate. You don't prompt these like a chatbot — you dispatch them like a tech. Write the ticket, set the agent off, review the change log when it's done. Same workflow you've always had with IT, except your ticket gets picked up in eight seconds.
One thing that matters: this only works with an agent that has computer use — Claude for Chrome or ChatGPT agent mode (type /agent). The regular chat box will give you advice; the agent does the work. Open one, hand it your ticket, and set it off:
TICKET: [WHAT'S BROKEN — symptoms, exact error messages, when it started]
ALREADY TRIED: [WHAT YOU ALREADY TRIED — so the agent doesn't repeat it]
DO NOT TOUCH: [OFF-LIMITS — passwords, billing, admin consoles, anything you can't undo]
RULES OF ENGAGEMENT: Diagnose before you fix. Tell me what you're about to
click before you click it. Ask before anything destructive. If a fix fails,
undo it before trying the next one. Close the ticket with a change log:
what you found, what you changed, what to watch for.
Sample run (I set an agent off on a calendar that quietly stopped syncing invites):
DIAGNOSIS: Invites from your work account aren't reaching your calendar. Checking sync status before touching anything.
STEP 1: Opening calendar settings to verify the work account connection. Status shows "sync paused" — that's our lead suspect.
STEP 2: Found it. A scheduling extension you installed in March is intercepting calendar permissions. I'd like to disable it and re-enable sync. OK to proceed?
[You: yes]
STEP 3: Extension disabled, sync re-enabled, test invite sent. It landed in 40 seconds.
CHANGE LOG: Disabled "MeetSync" extension (re-enable anytime from the extensions page). Re-authorized calendar sync. Nothing deleted. Watch for: invites landing normally over the next 24 hours.
What changes: The small stuff — the stale browser extension, the SSO loop, the app that won't update — stops costing you an afternoon or a spot in IT's queue. You write a ticket, do something else, and skim a change log for two minutes.
Where else this works: Onboarding and configuring new software, fighting the expense portal, cleaning up old vendor accounts and unused subscriptions, and auditing which browser extensions actually deserve to live.
So why now? Anthropic's computer use tool (still in beta) lets Claude see screenshots and control desktop apps through the Claude API, and Claude for Chrome puts a browser-native agent — clicks buttons, fills forms, works across tabs — on every paid Claude plan. On the other side, ChatGPT agent mode is built right into ChatGPT (type /agent), with 40 messages a month on Plus and 400 on Pro, plus Business and Enterprise access. In the 90s we all became our own travel agents; this is the same move for tech support. One caveat from a guy who's been on both ends of a support call: keep these agents away from banking, admin consoles, and anything you can't undo — start with the low-stakes stuff. Then pick the one recurring annoyance you'd normally ticket or ignore, and hand it off this week.
But anyhow — start with one JD. The one you'd have to post next.
Your AI Sherpa,
Mark R. Hinkle
Founding Publisher, The AIE Network
Follow me on LinkedIn
