- Mark Cuban told Business Insider that he thinks AI creates job opportunities for young job seekers.
- He shared three prompts to feed into Claude to sharpen skills.
- Cuban's advice comes as companies build AI models to automate tasks — but agent costs are growing.
AI is changing white-collar work fast.
Tasks are automated, workflows are shifting, and companies are pouring money into figuring out what AI actually does for them.
Mark Cuban — the billionaire, minority owner of the Dallas Mavericks, former "Shark Tank" investor, and cofounder of Cost Plus Drugs — told Business Insider that the confusion around AI is an opportunity.
In an email, he said workers who learn to build practical AI tools for businesses can get ahead.
"Be an expert in making agents for business," he wrote.
Cuban pointed to Anthropic's chatbot Claude as a starting point. He shared three prompts to get started:
- "Tell me how to be an expert at creating agents for small businesses."
- "Create study guides that ask me questions."
- "Correct me and adapt to my knowledge level."
So we tried Cuban's prompts in Claude
Claude responded with a list of business problems to target and tools to build them. The response prioritizes cost savings and automation.
First, it zeroes in on unglamorous tasks that businesses already struggle to keep up with, like answering routine customer questions, scheduling appointments, and chasing down invoices.
It then outlines a basic technical stack to work with. That includes orchestration tools like LangGraph, CrewAI, and AutoGen for managing multi-step tasks, as well as different AI models depending on the job. More advanced models are suggested for complex reasoning, while cheaper, faster models are recommended for high-volume tasks.
Finally, it suggests a learning path: build several agents, study documentation from major AI providers, and focus on a small number of industries.
Claude specifically pointed to restaurants, real estate, and e-commerce businesses as potential areas for AI improvement.
Where Cuban sees the opportunity
Cuban has been hammering his optimism about opportunities in a world with AI.
In an August TBPN interview that's now making the rounds on X, he said companies are still figuring out how to use AI effectively — and that's created an opening for young job seekers, especially in smaller businesses.
Mark Cuban on the next job wave.
Customized AI integration for small to mid-sized companies.
"Software is dead because everything's gonna be customized to your unique utilization. Who's gonna do it for them... And there are 33 mn companies in the US."pic.twitter.com/JczlPMOC1C
"There are going to be integrators, particularly young kids," he said in the interview. "Learn all you can about AI, but learn more on how to implement them in companies. Because, to your point, companies don't understand how to implement all that right now to get a competitive advantage."
That optimism is colliding with some practical constraints. Right now, companies are grappling with how to pay for their AI usage.
And experimentation is getting expensive.
On LinkedIn, Swan AI's CEO reported a six-figure monthly bill for AI spending. Meanwhile, larger companies are rushing ahead — Visa told Business Insider it's burned through 1.9 trillion tokens a month as of March.
Skepticism about the reliability of AI systems persists. Nicolas Darveau-Garneau, a former Google executive, said agents are still struggling with frequent hallucinations.
The impact of AI spending is seeping into employees' daily responsibilities.
Software engineers recently told Business Insider their day-to-day work shifted when agents like Claude Code and OpenAI's Codex rolled out. Tasks that once took days are now compressed into minutes.
Cuban has acknowledged the pace of change. In the TBPN interview, he said AI's impact "blows them all away" compared to past tech shifts.
Even so, his view is grounded in adaptation and not replacement. He told Business Insider he remains hopeful for young workers who stay entrepreneurial.
"Start there," he said about his three Claude prompts. "You will figure it out."
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