With each passing day, it becomes clearer that AI is making the intelligence side of startups and entrepreneurship more accessible, distributed, and abundant. As that happens, the real differentiators for success will increasingly come down to two things: agency and social skills. The more computers can do what we previously thought of as thinking and intelligence, the more it falls on founders and team members to initiate action, make things happen, and get things done. At the same time, the human side of business becomes more important, whether that is corporate culture, relationships, trust, or the intangible feeling you get from working with colleagues, customers, and vendors. Being smart and making good business decisions will increasingly become a commodity. Consider agency and bias toward action. When the computer tells you the next best step, analyzes the market, identifies the trends, points out a problem, or highlights an opportunity, it is still up to the humans to act. One of the arguments for people working less in the future is that AI will do more of the work. In the startup world, that can actually create an advantage. The more people at established companies work fewer hours, the greater the opportunity for startups to work harder, move faster, provide more value to customers, and gain ground. If old-line companies work less, that creates an opening for upstarts to work more. But taking advantage of that opportunity requires teams with high agency. They need to be self-starters with a strong bias toward action. They cannot simply wait for someone, or some AI, to tell them what to do next. A similar dynamic will play out with social skills. If AI can give you a great answer, make a good recommendation, and analyze all the different trade-offs, everyone else will eventually have access to the same capabilities. When intelligence becomes abundant, other forms of differentiation matter more. For purely commodity or self-service transactions, much of business will become technology driven, with AI agents increasingly interacting with other AI agents. But high-consideration purchases will be different. Consulting engagements, large enterprise deals, M&A transactions, partnerships, and other high-stakes decisions will continue to involve people. If everyone involved has powerful AI, along with some level of human expertise layered on top, the people who win the business will increasingly be the ones with the better soft skills. They will be the people who are enjoyable to work with, who build trust, who communicate well, and who others genuinely want to spend time with. For AI-pilled entrepreneurs, this should be encouraging. The future is becoming even more oriented toward high-agency people. People who do not need to be told what to do. People who enjoy going above and beyond. People who find new opportunities and get after them. At the same time, as intelligence becomes abundant, the things AI cannot do autonomously, or the situations that still require an expert human in the loop, will place an even greater premium on soft skills, people skills, and social skills. Entrepreneurs would do well to invest in both sides of the equation: increase their agency and deliberately improve their ability to work with people.