In this issue:

1. Important newly released features for OpenAI’s ChatGPT

2. Time Management in the Age of A.I.

3. The amazing secret feature just added to your phone

4. Data collected by DeepSeek – should you allow it?

5. Latest news

   • FORBES: Workers Don’t Trust Agentic AI

   • AI lands as top 2 jobs on LinkedIn’s 2025 growth list

   • Austin Business Journal: Six tips for becoming a better manager — and six mistakes to avoid

   • TechCrunch: Mark Cuban is ready to fund a TikTok alternative

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Important newly released features for OpenAI’s ChatGPT

January was a big month for ChatGPT users as several new features were released that are likely have big impacts on the way you use the product and the types of productivity you can gain from it.

First up: Scheduled tasks

Scheduled tasks in ChatGPT enable users to set reminders, perform routine checks, or fetch information automatically at specified times or intervals. By scheduling tasks, you can streamline repetitive actions, ensuring they run on a consistent timeline without requiring manual intervention. This can include reminders for events, daily notifications for important updates, or recurring searches for the latest news or product changes.

According to OpenAI, the goal is to improve efficiency and organization, giving you peace of mind that critical tasks won’t be forgotten and that timely information is always delivered when needed.

Scheduled tasks are available to all ChatGPT Plus and ChatGPT Enterprise subscribers. However, free-tier users do not have access to scheduled tasks. If you see an option to set up scheduled tasks in your account or workspace, then you can use them.

Plus subscribers can activate up to 20 scheduled tasks to run at once; enterprise level subscribers up to 50. If you attempt to create a new scheduled task after reaching your tier’s limit, you’ll be prompted to remove existing tasks before adding more.

Agents that do your bidding

Although Agents were originally released to some ChatGPT users in September 2024, they have been advanced far enough to be considered a real tool.

Agents in ChatGPT are customizable AI-driven assistants designed to perform specific tasks or answer queries within a defined scope. By creating an agent, you can tailor its knowledge and functionality to suit particular workflows, services, or domains. This enables a more specialized and focused interaction compared to general conversations.

For example, an agent might be set up to provide detailed technical support, guide users through a customer onboarding process, or supply in-depth knowledge about a product line. Once configured, agents can run continuously or on demand, offering users a flexible and targeted tool to handle repetitive tasks, provide specialized answers, or streamline complex processes.

Agents are currently available to ChatGPT Plus and ChatGPT Enterprise users. As of now, they are included in the price of those respective subscriptions.

Keep in mind that for some tasks, there are specialty AI products (and non-AI products) that can do the job and often give you better results because they are the experts in that domain. So, while it would be advantageous for you to use ChatGPT agents, it may not always be the best option.

We’ll also include more specifics in future Confirmed Achiever newsletters.

Time Management in the Age of A.I.

A workshop program for teams that helps them create their own customized methods of optimizing their time by combining the proven popular frameworks with customizations and new techniques like AI to get fabulous gains in their success.

Learn about it at www.MoreFromDavid.com.

This workshop grew out of a successful program first conducted for Executive MBAs at a prestigious university. It’s interactive – and from the comments we get from participants, it’s both fun and impactful:

• "Such a great session! Very interesting on all the different styles of time management. I can't wait to start.”

• "Amazing session. Totally loved it.”

• "This session is essential in life.”

• “You hit the nail on the head”

• “The time flew by — so much info. When I noticed the time, the session was almost over”

The amazing secret feature just added to your phone

You may have noticed over the past few years that Apple has been introducing features like fall detection and crash detection to their devices as well as the ability to call like 911 to a satellite under certain conditions. Google has been working with Samsung and other providers on other features that are both directly competitive and a bit different.

This week, though, Apple snuck something into the latest version of its iPhone operating system (iOS). Version 18.3, which became open for general distribution to iPhone users on Monday, is able to link more directly to Elon Musk’s Starlink system for satellite connectivity.

In an agreement between those two companies and T-Mobile, the trio is looking to expand service in the future. The government has already given them clearance to operate a cell-like service via satellite in emergency areas, such as western North Carolina.

According to the T-Mobile website, the initial trial includes text-via-satellite, and that future offerings will include voice and data. This is an intriguing milestone in personal productivity and mobility, even if it’s only in its infancy. We think there’s a good possibility of it disrupting the mobile market as we know it changing the strongest participants – with Musk’s SpaceX (the corporate owner of Starlink) becoming a big player like Google and Apple, and may relegate the services providers, such as Verizon, AT&T and T-Mobile (despite their inclusion in the service now) as vulnerable players.

Just because Apple just made their move with iOS 18.3, don’t count Google out. They have already developed similar capabilities for a few of their models.

Data collected by DeepSeek – should you allow it?

Suddenly DeepSeek, the AI from China, has burst on the scene – with a lot of questions being raised to go along with the answers you expect to learn about it and from it.One of the big questions relates to how much of your data is collected by this product; so we thought we’d give you the highlights, thanks to BGR.

• Profile info including username email address, phone number and date of birth

• Advertising measurements – including actions you have take outside the service and activites on other websites and apps or in stores, including the products or services you purchased online and in person

• Interaction and uses across your devices

• The privacy does NOT mention user rights, such as right to access, change info or withdraw consent. I suspect many of you will see several red flags in those bullets. Since we all have our own thresholds related to how much collected data we think is risky, you can dig more deeply by visiting the privacy policy on DeepSeek’s website.

Latest News:

• New Research Finds Why Some Surveyed Workers Don’t Trust Agentic AI (FORBES)

• AI lands as top 2 jobs (LinkedIn’s 2025 growth list)

• Six tips for becoming a better manager — and six mistakes to avoid (Austin Business Journal)

• Mark Cuban is ready to fund a TikTok alternative (Tech Crunch)

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David