a chief of staff doesn't do the work. they hold the week so the principal can.

A chief of staff has a specific posture. They are present without being loud. They remember what you said three weeks ago and bring it back when it matters. They tell you the uncomfortable thing — "you didn't send it" without softening it, because softening it would be a disservice. They are, in the most flattering possible sense, unflappable. Most of us will never work with one — they're a role reserved for executives and heads of state. 3ngram is the attempt to make that role available to everyone whose work now happens through conversation.

I built 3ngram because every AI tool I love — Claude, ChatGPT, Cursor, Codex — gave me something new and took away any sense that something was holding the week. Work became conversational. The conversations became the primary artifact. And nothing was catching what I'd committed to except my own memory, which was already losing.

The product is the most literal expression of that metaphor I could build. It saves exactly what you asked it to — your words, not a summary. It understands the context and builds context over time, so the next session starts where the last one left off. It holds the deadline. It reaches out on telegram when only you can finish the thing. It speaks in second-person declarative — "you committed Friday to Lindsey" — because a chief of staff wouldn't say "you may have wanted to."

I take three things seriously: verbatim capture, because paraphrase is how trust erodes; the channel you already live in, because a dashboard you forget to open is a tool that doesn't exist; and no foundation-model training on your data — full stop. (If I ever aggregate to improve the product itself, I'll tell you before I do.)

Right now, 3ngram is one person in Copenhagen. That's on purpose. Founded 03.03.2026, still pre-beta, building slowly and talking to every early user myself. Hiring will come when the product earns it, not before.