No Figma. No Jira. No docs. How Gusto built a new product line with Claude Code | Eddie Kim (CTO)

Eddie Kim is the co-founder and CTO of the payroll and HR platform Gusto, which just crossed $1 billion in revenue and serves more than 500,000 small businesses. Recently he did something most CTOs don’t: he went back to writing code. With three other engineers and one designer, Eddie built Gusto Cofounder, a net-new AI product, from zero code to a tier-one launch in 10 weeks. He walks through how that team actually worked, why they threw out nearly every process, and how anyone can copy the approach.What you’ll learn:The trash-can method: how to write, review, and delete a full PR as a product decision instead of a planning docThe two-tool agent stack behind Gusto CofounderThe exact “perma-Zoom” setup that replaced standups, retros, and Slack threads for 10 weeksHow a designer with no engineering background hit the 94th percentile for shipping codeThe eval-first workflow Eddie uses to fix real customer bugs with Claude CodeHow a non-technical leader can prototype an idea to win buy-in, then carry it all the way to production-quality code—Brought to you by:Magic Patterns—Prototypes that look like your productJira Product Discovery—Prioritize with insights, build with confidence—In this episode, we cover:(00:00) Intro: five people, 10 weeks(02:38) The origins of Cofounder(08:32) Inside the 10-week build process(12:50) Building with no PMs(14:38) The “trash can” method(17:15) The stack architecture(19:10) Shipping to production from day one(22:03) How a designer became a top engineer(29:05) Demo: Cofounder over text and Slack(31:45) Demo: running a real payroll(36:26) Live coding with evals in Claude Code(39:39) Recap: prototype, small team, permission(43:17) Lightning round(48:44) Where to find Eddie and Cofounder—Tools referenced:• Gusto Cofounder (early access/waitlist): https://gusto.com/cofounder• Claude Code (Anthropic): https://claude.ai/code• Cloudflare Workers: https://workers.cloudflare.com/• Vercel AI SDK: https://sdk.vercel.ai/• DX (engineering analytics): https://getdx.com/• Wispr Flow (voice-to-text): https://wisprflow.ai• OpenClaw: https://openclaw.ai/—Other references:• Gusto (the main product, “Gusto Classic”): https://gusto.com• Mindbody (referenced as customer data source): https://www.mindbodyonline.com/—Where to find Eddie Kim:LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/edawerd/—Where to find Claire Vo:ChatPRD: https://www.chatprd.ai/Website: https://clairevo.com/LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/clairevo/X: https://x.com/clairevo—Production and marketing by https://penname.co/. For inquiries about sponsoring the podcast, email [email protected].