Tactful AI’s Mohamed Elmasry on how a smart home idea became a customer experience business

Mohamed Elmasry, co-founder and CEO of Tactful AI: Each week, My Morning Routine looks at how a successful member of the community starts their day — and then throws in a couple of random business questions just for fun. Speaking to us this week is Mohamed Elmasry LinkedIn, co-founder and CEO of Tactful AI.

Edited excerpts from our conversation:

It was Luxor that drew me to science. I grew up in a middle-class family in Upper Egypt, far from tech or entrepreneurship. I wanted to understand how a civilization built something so perfect and so beautiful, so I became an engineer. I’ve spent more than 23 years since then in deep tech, from AI and semiconductors to electronics and telecoms. My mission is to build world-class teams and products out of Egypt for the rest of the world, because we built wonders thousands of years ago and I believe we can do it again.

I do everything no one else wants to do. People assume being a founder means choosing your work, but it’s the opposite. I make sure everyone knows where we’re headed, clear whatever stands in our way, and help each person find where they can contribute most. Most of my time goes to meetings, and the rest goes to problems nobody has tackled yet: I break the ice, make progress, then hand it off.

We started out building something else entirely. As an electronics and communications engineer, I wanted to make smart home technology anyone could use, no technical degree required. Along the way, we realized the problem we were solving cut across every industry: what sets any consumer-facing company apart is the experience it offers. Uber is essentially a taxi company with a better experience layer. Tactful gives businesses the technology and know-how to serve their customers well across every channel.

AI is the biggest trend in customer experience right now, without question. Nearly 10 years into this business, we’ve watched waves like blockchain and fintech push the industry in different directions, but AI is different: it’s everywhere, and everyone is under pressure to adopt it. What few people understand is that technology changes the way people think and behave. Companies are forcing AI in without considering that, and that’s exactly the problem we help them solve.

I’m usually up between 6-8am, depending on the night before. Before the school run every morning, I clear any critical emails left over from the previous day. I read a lot, and EnterpriseAM is part of my regular reading, both for the tech coverage and for the stories of entrepreneurs facing the same challenges I do.

From around 9:30am, it’s back-to-back meetings. I’m based in Cambridge, two hours behind our team in Egypt, so they’re already working by the time I start. My first job is making sure they have what they need from me. Until late afternoon, I’m unblocking customers and teammates, and my own work waits until the end of the day.

Plenty of coffee and a quiet home office in the loft help me stay focused. I also split my month rather than my day. I spend half at home on strategy and long-term planning and the other half on the ground with the team, customers, and partners.

My team’s success is how I measure my own. I’d love to see some of them go on to start their own companies, and many are already better at this than I am. Products change, but people last. As for Tactful, most of our clients are in Egypt and the region, and we’re taking something more efficient and affordable to Europe, the Middle East, and Africa. In a few years, I want us recognized as an international brand built in Egypt.

Work-life balance is very hard to find when you run a company. Our clients trust us with mns of customer interactions a month, many with real money at stake, so some nights we’re up until morning keeping everything stable. I take it day by day, and if I need an early night or a movie, I take it. But I feel responsible to everyone who believes in me, from investors to customers and employees, and that stays with me even on a walk. That’s the game.

To switch off after work, I build things. I’ve spent years managing people rather than building things myself, but AI has made it easy to get back into it, so one of my three screens is for hobby projects. I also watch action, drama, and some horror, which pull my mind completely away from work, and I play with my kids, especially the little one.

I keep returning to Ben Horowitz’s The Hard Thing About Hard Things. It reminds me that even the most successful founders have been through the same struggles. Team Topologies is a more specialized read but excellent on how team structure shapes outcomes. For podcasts, I watch The Diary of a CEO, and we’re launching our own, called 100 Signals, in November.

“God has opened a door of blessings for you, but you have a responsibility to share what you were given.” My late grandfather, who raised me, told me this when I started earning good money abroad, and it’s the best advice I’ve ever received. I’ve lived by it ever since, whether it’s sharing knowledge, helping someone out, or giving money, and it gives me peace of mind. He was a simple man but a wise one, and those words changed my life.