Greg Brainerd
MSP Founder & AI Implementation Practitioner
Founder & CEO, Braintek · Houston, TX
Twenty-four years running a technology company, a cybersecurity author's instincts about access — and a team currently building private AI into the way that company actually operates. Greg Brainerd comes to Spooner as a practitioner, not an AI futurist.
Save $500 — register by August 31, 2026
What Greg's Work Actually Produces
Most AI talks are given by people who will never have to operate the thing they just demonstrated. Greg's company runs private AI against its own ticket queue and sells AI implementation to Texas businesses the same size as the ones in the room — so his examples arrive with the failure modes still attached, which is the half that actually helps you.
24 years
running the company he teaches from
Braintek has been Greg's full-time business since 2002. Every AI call he walks you through, he has already had to make with his own payroll attached to the outcome.
$2M → $3.6M+
annual revenue, as Braintek publishes it
MSP Success profiled Braintek at $2 million a year in 2021; Braintek now publishes revenue over $3.6 million with a team of nearly twenty and clients in the hundreds. The growth happened while he was doing the delegating and systems work he talks about on stage.
10–200
employee clients, across two Texas metros
Houston and Dallas–Fort Worth, in construction, manufacturing, and professional services — the same size and shape of business as most of the retreat room, rather than the enterprise case studies AI conferences usually run on.
The Long Version
It started with a layoff
In 2002 Greg was working at Pennzoil when Shell acquired the company. He and his wife Tracy had already been moonlighting — fixing systems for small businesses on nights and weekends. When the walking papers came, they made it the real job. Braintek started in their living room, then moved to a small office near The Woodlands, where Greg made his first full-time hire.
Two decades of running the business he now advises about
Braintek is today one of Houston's established managed IT providers: a team of nearly twenty, clients in the hundreds, and offices serving the greater Houston metro and Dallas–Fort Worth. Its customers are 10-to-200-employee companies — construction, manufacturing, professional services. That is the same shape of company that fills the room at this retreat, which is why his examples translate without adjustment.
He taught himself the other half of the job
Nothing about running a company came with the network administrator résumé. Greg went and got it the long way — Toastmasters, BNI, and the Woodlands Chamber — including joining Toastmasters specifically to get over being uncomfortable in front of a room. MSP Success has profiled the result twice, in print and on its MSP Spotlight podcast, where he talks about the change that nearly doubled revenue, the mindset shift behind hiring his first technician, and building a company that can eventually run without him.
Braintek is building the AI, not recommending it
This is the part that earns him a spot on this faculty. Braintek's AI practice publishes what it runs: “Private, local AI for ticket triage & ops” and “a private AI operator technicians can chat with.” The ticket queue is the highest-volume, highest-judgment workflow a managed services company has — putting AI on it means the system is running against the operation Greg is personally accountable for, not a demo dataset. For clients the same practice ships “an AI assistant that answers from your documents, policies, and job history instead of guessing,” automations for “intake, follow-ups, reporting, data entry,” and “live dashboards built from your QuickBooks, ERP, or line-of-business data.”
The cybersecurity habit is what makes the AI work worth copying
Greg came up through security — he wrote Protecting Your Business Against Hackers for business owners, and has been featured in MSP Success and MSP Cybersecurity Magazine. That produces a specific instinct: before “can it do this,” ask what it is allowed to reach. Braintek states the rule as “guardrails first: your confidential and regulated data stays protected while your team uses AI.” It is the question most AI presentations skip, and the one an owner has to answer before anything touches client work.
Where this came from
Greg has no public AIBMM speaker profile yet, so everything on this page comes from Braintek's own site and from trade-press coverage — including the quotes describing what Braintek's AI practice does, which are theirs rather than our summary of them.
Credentials
- Founder & CEO, Braintek
- Founded 2002 in the family living room; now one of Houston's established managed IT providers, serving the Houston metro and Dallas–Fort Worth.
- Certified AI Business Maturity Model Coach
- Trained in the same AIBMM framework the retreat's Score → See → Build → Plan arc is built around.
- Cybersecurity author
- Wrote Protecting Your Business Against Hackers, a guide written for business owners rather than IT departments.
- Private AI in production
- Braintek publishes private, local AI for ticket triage and operations, plus an AI operator its own technicians chat with.
- MSP Success & MSP Cybersecurity Magazine
- Featured in both, and profiled on the MSP Success Podcast's MSP Spotlight series.
- Toastmasters, BNI & the Woodlands Chamber
- Joined Toastmasters on purpose to get comfortable in front of a room — the speaking came from deliberate practice, not from being a natural.
See Greg at the Retreat
- When
- Tuesday, Sept 15, 2026
- Day job
- Braintek
- Speaks elsewhere
- Nationally, from Houston
- Where
- The Island · Spooner, WI (or attend live remote)
- Price
- In person
$995$495 · Remote $250
Save $500 — register by August 31, 2026
One registration covers the full retreat — every session, every track.
All 20 sessions
See the full retreat agenda →
What Greg Speaks On
The ground Greg can cover from work his own company has already done. The retreat is the hands-on version — you build the thing instead of watching a slide about it.
- From Scattered ChatGPT Use to Workflows That Actually Run
- Building an AI Employee: What We Learned Building Our Own AI Operator
- Private AI: Using Company Data Without Giving Away the Company
- Stop Chatting With AI — Put It to Work
- What an AI Agent Is Allowed to Touch: Permissions, Approvals, and Audit Trails
- Live Dashboards From QuickBooks, ERP, and the Spreadsheets in Between
- AI for the 10-to-200-Employee Company: What's Real and What Isn't Yet
- Protecting Your Business Against Hackers — the Owner's Version
- Build a Business That Doesn't Need You
At the retreat
Greg is the answer to “fine, but has anyone actually done this?” His company is running the thing the day is about — AI connected to real systems, with permissions, approvals, and an audit trail — inside a business the same size as yours. He is worth finding in the hallway if you are the owner weighing what AI is allowed to touch, or the one who has been told an agent will fix a workflow and wants to hear the honest version from someone who shipped one.
Retreat Sessions Closest to Greg's Work
One registration covers all 20 sessions across the Leadership, Sales & Marketing, and Builder tracks. These sit closest to what Greg does for a living.
Hire Your First AI Employee (No Developers, No IT Department)
Session detailsChatGPT, Claude, or Grok: A Straight-Answers Buyer's Guide
Session detailsWire AI Into Everything: Your Data, Your Apps, Live
Session detailsOld ERP, New Tricks: Let AI Upgrade Your Line-of-Business Software
Session detailsSession-by-session presenter assignments are still being finalized and will be announced closer to the retreat — this is a map of subject matter, not a teaching schedule.
Greg Brainerd — Questions & Answers
Spend a day in the room with Greg Brainerd.
Five instructors, three tracks, twenty hands-on sessions — and a written 90-day AI roadmap you leave with. Sept 15, 2026 · The Island, Spooner WI · or attend live online.
Save $500 — register by August 31, 2026