Build an iPhone Shortcut Your Friends Will Use
Maps to: Automation Engineer · AI Application Builder · Operations Analyst · Productivity Designer · Knowledge Worker
You're going to build an iOS Shortcut, a chain of steps your phone runs when you tap one button, that kills one annoying job you keep repeating, with AI doing the clever bit. Then a few friends actually install it and use it. The skill is the eye for what is worth handing to a machine: spotting a thing you do over and over and going 'I could make that disappear.' That's how automation engineers think, seeing a chain of steps where other people see a chore. You'll have a Shortcut friends keep on their phones.
You're done when: A Shortcut that does one useful thing with AI, that 3+ friends actually installed and ran, cut to the one step that works every time. Getting it onto other phones is the work: not 'it ran once for me,' but 'other people actually use it.'
How this shows up on a resume or college app
I built an iOS Shortcut used by N friends, adding AI to a job I kept repeating and cutting it to the one step that works every time. I learned that thinking in chains of steps beats one-off tools: see a job you keep redoing, and make it run itself.
When you finish, BuildMe drafts your Common App activity description from what you actually built.
The plan
- 1
Step 1
Pick a job you keep redoing, and make it run once
Pick a job you do over and over, then build the plainest Shortcut that does the easy part and runs once, before you add any AI. Seeing it actually run is what gets you; the clever part comes next.
- 2
Step 2
Add the step that does the thinking
Add the step that does the thinking: shorten it, rewrite it, or pull out just the bit you want. That step sends your text to an AI using the 'Get Contents of URL' action, with a free key that needs no credit card, and it's where most people get stuck.
- 3
Step 3
Keep the one step that always works, then share it
Cut it to the one step that works every time, and delete anything shaky. Then be honest: is the annoying bit it removes something other people have, or just you?