You built the product. Now automate the business.
A customized version of Codex for Business for BADM 350: Technology & AI Strategy at the University of Illinois. Learn to use OpenAI's Codex desktop app to automate real business processes — no coding required.
- Download the Codex app for Mac or Windows from chatgpt.com/codex
- Get the course files — clone this repo or download the ZIP from GitHub:
git clone https://github.com/vishalsachdev/codex-for-badm350.git
- Open the course folder in the Codex app
- Say "let's start"
Linux: The Codex desktop app currently supports Mac and Windows. Linux support is coming soon.
If you downloaded this course as a ZIP from GitHub, the easiest way to update is:
- Download the newest ZIP from GitHub
- Unzip it
- Open the new course folder in Codex
- Keep using the same NovaBrew workspace when Codex asks
Your lesson files live in the course folder you downloaded.
Your own work lives in your personal NovaBrew workspace, which Codex keeps separate from the lesson files. That means you can replace the course folder later without losing your reports, projects, or saved progress.
It is also fine if your course folder lives inside iCloud Drive, OneDrive, Dropbox, or another synced folder. The important thing is that your personal NovaBrew workspace stays separate from the lesson files.
Modules 0–2: Learn the tool through the NovaBrew Coffee Co. scenario — a startup with messy data, board pressure, and 8 months of runway. You'll synthesize meeting notes, run parallel research agents, build custom advisors, and ship a working web app.
Module 3: Apply it to YOUR project. You already have a working app from your semester project. Now you'll automate two business processes to prepare for launch:
- One marketing automation — waitlist page with email capture, or a social content pipeline
- One operations automation — competitor intelligence monitor, user feedback analyzer, or launch readiness dashboard
You'll walk away with deployable artifacts and a "before vs. after" story for your board memo.
| # | Module | Time | What You'll Do |
|---|---|---|---|
| 0 | Getting Started | 10 min | Meet NovaBrew, run your first prompt |
| 1.1 | Your First Business Prompt | 20 min | Process inherited PM notes, learn how Codex reads/writes files |
| 1.2 | File Exploration & Context | 25 min | Parse meeting notes, earnings transcripts, survey data |
| 1.3 | Working with Business Files | 30 min | Create financial models, customer analyses, strategy docs |
| 1.4 | Parallel Agents | 25 min | Launch 3 agents simultaneously on NovaBrew's retention problem |
| 1.5 | Advisors, Skills & Plugins | 30 min | Assemble an advisory team and arrive at the NovaBrew recommendation |
| 1.5b | Skills — Reusable Playbooks | 15 min | Install the superpowers collection, watch a skill auto-fire from a natural prompt, learn why descriptions are the whole game |
| 1.6 | Project Memory | 20 min | Give Codex persistent context about your business |
| 1.7 | What's Next | 10 min | Review fundamentals, prepare for vibe coding |
| 2.1 | Project Setup | 20 min | Choose your project and scaffold it |
| 2.2 | The Planning Interview | 25 min | Codex runs a Socratic planning session like a senior PM |
| 2.3 | Build & Iterate | 30 min | Describe features in plain English, watch them appear |
| 2.4 | GitHub & Version Control | 15 min | Push to GitHub with a professional README |
| 2.5 | Deploy & Go Live | 15 min | Ship to GitHub Pages — get a live URL for your portfolio |
| 3.1 | Toolkit Kickoff | 20 min | Set up your project context, choose 2 automations from the menu |
| 3.2 | Build Your Automations | 75 min | Build both automations, deploy artifacts, write reflections |
| 3.3 | The Innermost Loop (Optional) | 20 min | Use Codex to improve the course itself and experience recursive self-improvement |
| Total | ~6 hr 25 min core + 20 min optional |
- A Mac or Windows computer
- The Codex desktop app (free download)
- A free ChatGPT account (or ChatGPT Plus for faster responses)
- A free GitHub account (for deploying your project)
- Your BADM 350 semester project — live URL, Supabase database, Checkpoint 4 report
- Zero coding experience required — just business thinking
BADM 350 students at the University of Illinois who have a working app and want to automate their go-to-market and operations before the final presentation.
codex-for-badm350/
├── lesson-modules/ # All course lessons (AGENTS.md in each folder)
│ ├── 0-getting-started/
│ ├── 1-fundamentals/
│ ├── 2-vibe-coding/
│ └── 3-pre-launch-toolkit/ # YOUR project — marketing + operations automation
├── business-scenario/ # NovaBrew company files (the "inherited chaos")
├── templates/ # Reusable business templates
├── docs/ # Course website (GitHub Pages)
├── case-studies/ # Curated standout case studies from past cohorts
├── course-structure.json # Machine-readable course outline
└── SPEC.md # Course design specification
Student case studies live in two places:
- Class collection —
badm350-spring-2026-case-studiesis the standalone repo where every team submits their Module 3 case study as a pull request. Template and submission instructions are in that repo's README. - Curated teaching set —
case-studies/in this repo mirrors 3–5 standout case studies per cohort (with explicit student opt-in) so future students working through Module 3 can see real peer examples of what good looks like.
After learning Codex through NovaBrew, you'll choose 2 automations for your own project:
Marketing & Acquisition (pick one):
| # | Automation | What It Automates |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Waitlist & Teaser Campaign | Lead generation: visitor → signup → confirmation → nurture sequence |
| 2 | Social Content Pipeline | Content marketing: product knowledge → platform-tailored posts → scheduled distribution |
Operations & Intelligence (pick one):
| # | Automation | What It Automates |
|---|---|---|
| 3 | Competitor Intelligence Monitor | Market intelligence: raw competitor data → structured analysis → strategic recommendations |
| 4 | User Feedback Analyzer | Feedback triage: raw comments → classified themes → prioritized roadmap |
| 5 | Launch Readiness Dashboard | Quality assurance: manual testing → automated multi-dimension audit → prioritized fix list |
Each automation involves multiple steps with intermediate outputs — this is process automation, not single-prompt generation.
Adapted from Codex for Business, which was inspired by Claude Code for Everyone by Carl Vellotti.
MIT License. See LICENSE for details.