Meeting Title: Awaish <> Robert <> Uttam Date: 2025-04-30 Meeting participants: Robert Tseng, Awaish Kumar, Uttam Kumaran
WEBVTT
1 00:05:38.440 ⇒ 00:05:39.470 Robert Tseng: Hey! Wait!
2 00:05:45.565 ⇒ 00:05:46.150 Awaish Kumar: Hello!
3 00:05:53.130 ⇒ 00:05:54.350 Robert Tseng: Oh, wow!
4 00:05:54.670 ⇒ 00:05:57.676 Robert Tseng: My hair is a mess. I’m gonna put on a hat
5 00:05:58.060 ⇒ 00:06:00.180 Robert Tseng: 1.st 1st video of the day.
6 00:06:13.400 ⇒ 00:06:14.606 Robert Tseng: Okay, better.
7 00:06:26.250 ⇒ 00:06:30.750 Robert Tseng: And we’ll just wait a couple of minutes every time to get in here. But
8 00:08:42.440 ⇒ 00:08:54.378 Robert Tseng: okay, Tom should be joining soon. Sorry for late. I’m actually gonna record a loom video. So I’ll go off audio while I quickly record this and and send it off to the marketing team.
9 00:08:55.010 ⇒ 00:08:55.525 Robert Tseng: yeah.
10 00:08:56.280 ⇒ 00:08:57.050 Robert Tseng: One sec.
11 00:09:43.950 ⇒ 00:09:46.389 Uttam Kumaran: Hey, guys? Sorry. So I’m with Miguel.
12 00:09:47.450 ⇒ 00:09:48.220 Awaish Kumar: One of them.
13 00:09:48.890 ⇒ 00:09:49.610 Uttam Kumaran: Hey!
14 00:09:55.440 ⇒ 00:09:56.110 Robert Tseng: Okay.
15 00:09:56.220 ⇒ 00:10:02.230 Robert Tseng: Hello. I was. I was recording the loom for the Vc.
16 00:10:02.566 ⇒ 00:10:03.240 Uttam Kumaran: Okay. Cool.
17 00:10:04.451 ⇒ 00:10:06.298 Robert Tseng: I’ll finish it later.
18 00:10:06.930 ⇒ 00:10:30.410 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, Hannah, I think it’s gonna help Hannah a lot, and I’ll take what you say and then add a couple of things, and then it’ll it’ll get done really quickly. But yeah, I I think for for this meeting I I was mentioning to Robert away. How like happy, you know I was personally to see that you’re interested in in like investing more in us. And, you know, trying to
19 00:10:30.690 ⇒ 00:10:59.060 Uttam Kumaran: trying to find ways to scale your time. I think we feel really similarly, after working with you, that we want to put you in the highest leverage position. I shared with Robert some of the things. But maybe I would love if you can take just like a few minutes, and maybe just walk us through what you wrote down for those goals and sort of maybe just give us a little bit of like the narrative. And then I think we can talk a little bit about sort of how to put some plans in place.
20 00:10:59.510 ⇒ 00:11:03.550 Uttam Kumaran: you know, to to execute against it. Pretty soon.
21 00:11:07.230 ⇒ 00:11:12.159 Awaish Kumar: Yeah, so I, can, I share the notion or.
22 00:11:12.160 ⇒ 00:11:13.040 Uttam Kumaran: Sure, sure.
23 00:11:17.930 ⇒ 00:11:18.600 Awaish Kumar: Okay?
24 00:11:18.890 ⇒ 00:11:21.349 Awaish Kumar: So what I have been, yeah, like.
25 00:11:21.670 ⇒ 00:11:30.649 Awaish Kumar: thinking about my career from here on onwards is that I wanted to grow from like as I mentioned before, that
26 00:11:30.910 ⇒ 00:11:33.589 Awaish Kumar: from senior to to grow in a
27 00:11:34.080 ⇒ 00:11:41.159 Awaish Kumar: more tech, being more technically proficient as well as needing the technical teams.
28 00:11:41.370 ⇒ 00:11:49.060 Awaish Kumar: And so 3 of the goals which I have mentioned, which are like what like
29 00:11:49.480 ⇒ 00:11:59.410 Awaish Kumar: one of the thing is that leading up for, like client facing data, project from scope into delivery is that like this is something which is kind of the
30 00:12:00.700 ⇒ 00:12:05.169 Awaish Kumar: aligns perfectly well with a with a with a brain force.
31 00:12:05.907 ⇒ 00:12:10.092 Awaish Kumar: Goals as well. So how you
32 00:12:12.410 ⇒ 00:12:33.399 Awaish Kumar: Whenever we have a new client, how we we go from gathering like after the the sales calls are finished, and we want to like, take build something for them on board them for for our analysis, like from that point onwards, like when we successfully deliver some project
33 00:12:34.080 ⇒ 00:12:44.019 Awaish Kumar: so I I wanted to like, have a have the like the
34 00:12:44.450 ⇒ 00:12:47.079 Awaish Kumar: what you say, like the
35 00:12:47.210 ⇒ 00:12:58.216 Awaish Kumar: the opportunity to work on a full life cycle. Number 2 was like, yeah, getting in on more like, while I’m doing working on this
36 00:12:59.110 ⇒ 00:13:15.159 Awaish Kumar: client facing data project like. So I’m working from scratch building the data architecture. And so in that process, like, take a lead role and yeah, delegate responsibilities and achieve the the final
37 00:13:16.055 ⇒ 00:13:19.589 Awaish Kumar: the results for the client. Yeah.
38 00:13:20.150 ⇒ 00:13:26.487 Awaish Kumar: And yeah, this is how like, as I mentioned, like, how they are going to align with Brentford.
39 00:13:27.040 ⇒ 00:13:32.282 Awaish Kumar: So this like this is particular, like the primarily what the the Brentfords will be doing
40 00:13:32.850 ⇒ 00:13:41.960 Awaish Kumar: in the in the coming time, like getting more clients for for data analytics and AI,
41 00:13:42.460 ⇒ 00:13:48.110 Awaish Kumar: and and that’s what I have been doing. If I just oh.
42 00:13:48.760 ⇒ 00:13:55.207 Awaish Kumar: tied to my previous experiences at data. Gpt, so we have had some clients like
43 00:13:57.044 ⇒ 00:14:13.149 Awaish Kumar: video streaming company or something. So I have on boarded them from Skype, understanding like when getting directly requirements directly from the client. it, it’s like it gives much more
44 00:14:13.837 ⇒ 00:14:22.749 Awaish Kumar: perspective to to look at the data and and solve the basically the the
45 00:14:23.170 ⇒ 00:14:30.400 Awaish Kumar: the data issues onwards, and how we are like
46 00:14:31.250 ⇒ 00:14:35.950 Awaish Kumar: going to like the mail it. Like, as I,
47 00:14:36.780 ⇒ 00:14:42.389 Awaish Kumar: I can tell it tell here like so like, obviously
48 00:14:44.476 ⇒ 00:14:48.639 Awaish Kumar: number one is, we can mirror it where we with.
49 00:14:49.320 ⇒ 00:15:13.160 Awaish Kumar: we’re talking to colleagues and the peers, and also like how looking at the work I’m doing. Secondly, if the client is happy, and second, thirdly, is is what I wanted to be in more leading roles is that I I kind of talk to team members and kind of
50 00:15:13.430 ⇒ 00:15:20.229 Awaish Kumar: sessions, or whatever to understand more how they want to grow within the company
51 00:15:20.837 ⇒ 00:15:24.312 Awaish Kumar: and what kind of resources would be needed is like
52 00:15:25.090 ⇒ 00:15:27.360 Awaish Kumar: So number one is that I
53 00:15:27.460 ⇒ 00:15:30.560 Awaish Kumar: I’m I’m surely going to get a lot of
54 00:15:31.524 ⇒ 00:15:37.289 Awaish Kumar: knowledge from both of you. Like. How? You have a lot of experience
55 00:15:37.824 ⇒ 00:15:41.135 Awaish Kumar: in managing in people’s management, and also like
56 00:15:42.071 ⇒ 00:15:49.369 Awaish Kumar: how to do sales and and and how to improve the communication, and also like doing some
57 00:15:49.570 ⇒ 00:15:52.220 Awaish Kumar: certifications, and the
58 00:15:53.587 ⇒ 00:16:06.752 Awaish Kumar: like, the training sessions like, maybe from like the Youtube course, or whatever like to to do those. And like, most like, while doing these certifications.
59 00:16:07.590 ⇒ 00:16:13.350 Awaish Kumar: yeah, this is going to help with the technical vocabulary which which can be used
60 00:16:13.610 ⇒ 00:16:19.840 Awaish Kumar: to to gain. Gain the clients. And yeah, that’s what I yeah.
61 00:16:20.040 ⇒ 00:16:22.659 Awaish Kumar: almost. That’s what what I have wrote here.
62 00:16:24.490 ⇒ 00:16:37.430 Uttam Kumaran: Okay. Great. Yeah. I think. So a couple of things like, I I love all the you know sort of initiatives that that you mentioned, I think, to give you like the company perspective. You know part of what we’re spending a lot of time thinking about.
63 00:16:37.949 ⇒ 00:16:57.440 Uttam Kumaran: And I know we’re starting to talk to a lot of people is basically like building out this like middle management class of of folks of people who want to invest in the company. And then how can we, you know in return, give them more responsibility and more. You know autonomy to to go make an impact right like when I think
64 00:16:57.470 ⇒ 00:17:21.290 Uttam Kumaran: about your time. There’s, of course, like every hour spent on doing engineering work is effective. But I want to know how every hour you spend. Actually leads to 3 or 4 or 10 more hours of leverage. Right? So couple of opportunities is one working on you know, the platform work like, how do we enable all the engineers? Second is definitely on managing like.
65 00:17:21.300 ⇒ 00:17:41.149 Uttam Kumaran: how do you get people to accomplish their goals? Feel that they have agency over it, and you know your time spent with them turns into 5, 10 extra hours from them, you know. And then certainly, I think there’s opportunity on sort of this like client lifecycle. Which I think we’re still sort of working on
66 00:17:41.150 ⇒ 00:17:53.169 Uttam Kumaran: who fits in in what piece right like right now, I think we have. We have a pretty good project management structure. We’re spending a lot of time on like the sales side. There certainly is this like handoff piece.
67 00:17:53.170 ⇒ 00:18:15.260 Uttam Kumaran: There’s actually 2 aspects. There’s like the sales engineering which is like coming on the calls and helping to sort of close deals given architecture. There’s also, like, once things are close to closing or about to get close. It’s how do they get translated from the sow to like ultimately projects and tickets right and like, how did the how does the actual roadmap get formed?
68 00:18:15.618 ⇒ 00:18:41.701 Uttam Kumaran: And then the last piece is on managing people? I think there’s a huge leverage, and especially the couple of junior folks that we have in turning them into into yourself, right turning them into really high leverage individuals and helping them accomplish their goals. You know. I think I think the one probably piece of feedback I have is, that’s a lot right. Those all 3 of those things are are very important, and there’s something around sales. There’s something around
69 00:18:42.270 ⇒ 00:19:11.050 Uttam Kumaran: sort of project management project scoping. And then there’s also around management, I think, you know, and I’ll let Robert sort of give his feedback. But I think we want to get everybody to stretch a little bit, and I think, as a company grows, this sort of scope may, you know, get more slim, right? Because just your ability to handle as the company grows, we’re going to have a lot of different areas. But I’m certainly committed to trying to get people who want to stretch, to give it a really good go and try to enable
70 00:19:11.190 ⇒ 00:19:16.069 Uttam Kumaran: that possibility. So yeah, I don’t know, Robert, if you have any feedback or thoughts.
71 00:19:18.490 ⇒ 00:19:32.479 Robert Tseng: Yeah, I think, definitely, I’ll just kind of give general feedback. I mean, I wish I’m I think you’re. I think you’re our best I see on the engineering side. Frankly. So like you definitely can execute on everything like broadly
72 00:19:32.810 ⇒ 00:19:59.430 Robert Tseng: and you know, I think that’s why everyone says that you’re the most helpful like teammate, you know, like you’re able to answer everyone’s questions pretty much so. I think that definitely. I I see that you have this breath of skill set. I know that you want to go deeper in a few areas. Sounds like you want to get more technical and hopefully leading on the data platform side is really going to give you the opportunity to like, yeah, you’re building like the data platform of of this company, you know.
73 00:20:00.069 ⇒ 00:20:25.839 Robert Tseng: And then also, yeah, as far as like wanting to be more involved in the client facing things. I know you’ve jumped on calls. Maybe we don’t like. Have you talking to clients as much as as we as we could, and I’m happy to, you know. Work with you more on that. Like I, I feel like I’m pretty opinionated about. You know what a good client message is. And you know.
74 00:20:26.030 ⇒ 00:20:26.820 Robert Tseng: okay.
75 00:20:26.980 ⇒ 00:20:34.110 Robert Tseng: go talking through some of those escalation paths with clients. So I’m happy to kind of loop you into that more.
76 00:20:34.990 ⇒ 00:20:41.340 Robert Tseng: Yeah, I think just with our existing client base. Maybe that’s like I feel like we’re in a good place. Don’t necessarily wanna
77 00:20:41.510 ⇒ 00:20:57.940 Robert Tseng: shake that up too much, but for new, for new clients like that can can definitely keep you top of mind for like, okay, maybe when we’re when we’re kicking off with the client away, she’s kind of like there from Step one, and we’ll just kind of like, take it as we go. So
78 00:20:58.800 ⇒ 00:20:59.939 Robert Tseng: I think.
79 00:21:00.920 ⇒ 00:21:05.349 Robert Tseng: Yeah. So that’s kind of my, those are. My, that’s that’s how I’m you know.
80 00:21:06.080 ⇒ 00:21:08.449 Robert Tseng: hearing what you’re what you’re saying.
81 00:21:09.310 ⇒ 00:21:14.060 Robert Tseng: I think, as far as like, where else you want to stretch in both
82 00:21:14.170 ⇒ 00:21:20.119 Robert Tseng: helping like kind of grow kind of amplify the team like Utah mentioned.
83 00:21:20.537 ⇒ 00:21:28.280 Robert Tseng: Being able to really support the engineers like help them level up, because obviously there are folks that are more junior than you on the team.
84 00:21:28.990 ⇒ 00:21:40.580 Robert Tseng: I think that’s probably the like immediate need. And it’s it’s on us to get you more. You know, more on onto more projects, clients that you can really get to see like the
85 00:21:40.680 ⇒ 00:21:44.019 Robert Tseng: full end to end from scoping to delivery. So
86 00:21:44.672 ⇒ 00:21:48.300 Robert Tseng: yeah, I think that just gives you a better sense of like.
87 00:21:48.770 ⇒ 00:21:53.399 Robert Tseng: What’s what I think is possible. Now, versus like what I think there are some.
88 00:21:53.570 ⇒ 00:22:08.449 Robert Tseng: I mean. The the contingency is that we need. We just gotta get get more like full full data data like clients in in for for you to be able to to, you know, achieve that second goal. That you have here.
89 00:22:11.170 ⇒ 00:22:19.640 Awaish Kumar: Yeah, so like what I why have I have mentioned it here is that when I, when I was working with data, Gpt, it is also
90 00:22:19.830 ⇒ 00:22:21.750 Awaish Kumar: yeah, like analytics
91 00:22:21.910 ⇒ 00:22:30.400 Awaish Kumar: company. They. They have some standardized dashboards, but like we had some templated template created. When the client is
92 00:22:30.540 ⇒ 00:22:59.728 Awaish Kumar: like you, you are done with sales calls. Then we had to build, build the template which we can talk to client to get like what exactly their pain points are, and which one or 2 dashboards are like much needed for the client, and they cannot really have a good impact and and focus on that in the initial weeks to deliver those like instead of like getting everything in there and getting models and like a lot of things.
93 00:23:00.727 ⇒ 00:23:11.852 Awaish Kumar: and then we we show a lot of things. But and then they are not like, we are not 100%. They are not 100% reliable. We maybe miss out on some
94 00:23:12.560 ⇒ 00:23:16.780 Awaish Kumar: important issues which were like really meaningful for the client.
95 00:23:18.210 ⇒ 00:23:30.379 Robert Tseng: Yeah. So I hear, it’s like, I guess, in that initial scoping, just making sure we have, like the one or 2 things that we could really define clearly and and and get get that 1st win on.
96 00:23:31.640 ⇒ 00:23:36.020 Robert Tseng: You know, I’m actually, I mean, as I’m talking out loud, it feels like
97 00:23:37.660 ⇒ 00:23:44.677 Robert Tseng: this might even be something that we have to offer before we we like sign contracts. Utah.
98 00:23:45.440 ⇒ 00:24:09.909 Robert Tseng: yeah, I feel like we’ve lost some deals on like doing like the sales, pitch the demo, and then, like the next step of like, Okay, you know. Pay us upfront. We’ll come in and we’ll run this discovery with you like, I feel like there’s a gap there. And so you know, as an experiment, I’m ha. I would be willing to be like, Okay, great. That 1st call was good. Let’s do a follow up. We’ll do that workshop immediately, and maybe we have a way to join that.
99 00:24:10.280 ⇒ 00:24:23.340 Robert Tseng: and he can help like define with the with the technical team, or I mean they may not. They may not have a technical person, but he’ll just be involved in that call. So we can get that first.st Those requirements for the 1st one or 2,
100 00:24:24.290 ⇒ 00:24:33.339 Robert Tseng: whether it’s dashboards, report, or analysis, and that that might have to be part of the pre-sales, or I’m that I’m willing to try that. Yeah.
101 00:24:34.020 ⇒ 00:24:37.969 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah. And you know, one of the things that I’m thinking a lot about is like me and you
102 00:24:38.312 ⇒ 00:25:06.759 Uttam Kumaran: like, succeed when we can go on these calls. But I think even better is like when we’re shadowing. We’re in the background. And then we’re coming up and basically like thinking through the one or 2 things that that like weren’t covered right, as like much more, as much more like an important piece. So that’s where, like, I want us to to focus on and so we can either have, like a way. Sure, a couple of other people that are related to the pre sales. Motion like that would be.
103 00:25:07.050 ⇒ 00:25:17.120 Uttam Kumaran: I think, super important. I was talking to Miguel today, who is very interested in helping with Demos and sort of sales engineering work as well. And I think just layering more people onto
104 00:25:17.290 ⇒ 00:25:44.260 Uttam Kumaran: once we get people into the sales cycle, how do we wow them as much as we can before close and then we can start considering. Okay, what is the 1st day week month look like for a new client. And how do we basically like really ramp up quickly. Which I don’t think we have like any struggle. I think just we’re some sort of order of operations problem. And partly. It’s just involving more people, I think, in the sales cycle who are interested.
105 00:25:44.676 ⇒ 00:26:00.049 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah. So I certainly I certainly see that as well. And I agree with you in that. I think, as new clients come in we sort of have to nail like what is every step in the sales cycle. I don’t think we have it clearly written down. There is a sales engineering aspect. But there’s also like a
106 00:26:00.080 ⇒ 00:26:17.230 Uttam Kumaran: basically, once deals are closed, or once deals get to, like, you know, basically like 95%. We should then kick off some motion within project management and engineering management that says, this is coming down the pipe. Who’s gonna get assigned? What’s the scope? Right? Things like that?
107 00:26:17.330 ⇒ 00:26:23.169 Uttam Kumaran: That’s, I think, a really great opportunity as well where we have, where I basically like, you know me. And you are covering.
108 00:26:24.150 ⇒ 00:26:27.260 Robert Tseng: Yeah, okay.
109 00:26:29.364 ⇒ 00:26:47.089 Uttam Kumaran: So I also agree that I think short term like managing the you know couple of engineers that are really, I think, not getting as much support, you know, from me would be really, really helpful. You know, I especially. I’m thinking about Luke Kyle and Annie. I think
110 00:26:47.190 ⇒ 00:27:04.349 Uttam Kumaran: purely just setting up like biweekly one on ones. I think we’re we can enable all the folks that are sort of gonna sit in this middle management layer to meet with us. But then, also, like, learn from us, like how we want, like, how we’ve been managing folks to date, what’s been really effective?
111 00:27:04.707 ⇒ 00:27:28.610 Uttam Kumaran: And and things like that. I think there’s a lot of learning there and then, basically are the principles we share scale through you right that way. Right now for me. I feel on the hook to go meet with everybody, and I can’t, just pure because of time, and I can’t spend the energy and quality that I want to with those folks. And so I do want to give that responsibility up. And I think a waste. You’re like a great
112 00:27:28.780 ⇒ 00:27:44.819 Uttam Kumaran: candidate for that, and that’s a huge win even here, just in the next few weeks for us to enable. And then certainly, I think I would love to see how you can take on and lead. You know a big portion of this data platform initiative.
113 00:27:45.392 ⇒ 00:28:14.510 Uttam Kumaran: I think both of those alone, if I can. If me and Robert, you know, can play more of an advisory role based on the decisions you make there and review your work. We’re like, it’s going to be an incredible accomplishment. I think it landing with us now is causing it to just, you know, either be done half baked, or we’re just sort of skip stuff because of time. And I think that’s a great opportunity for you to be really, really impactful.
114 00:28:19.236 ⇒ 00:28:33.120 Awaish Kumar: Yeah, like, I, I agree, like, I like what I’ve mentioned. These goals are like they are. I know that they are not like something can be accomplished in in few weeks. So I
115 00:28:34.520 ⇒ 00:28:40.770 Awaish Kumar: I agree with you like we can start off with some things, and then in the long run.
116 00:28:41.070 ⇒ 00:28:48.299 Awaish Kumar: We can then re re-review the personal goals and and the and the milestone.
117 00:28:48.300 ⇒ 00:28:54.709 Uttam Kumaran: So let’s let’s talk about like, if we want to drive towards okay, if we all 3 of us agree that like.
118 00:28:54.940 ⇒ 00:29:02.649 Uttam Kumaran: okay, we want. We would like you to sort of take on the leveling up and management, for you know, Annie Kyle, Luke.
119 00:29:04.240 ⇒ 00:29:12.170 Uttam Kumaran: like, how do you think like, what do you think are the next couple of steps for us to do there? And like, how equipped do you feel that you can.
120 00:29:12.300 ⇒ 00:29:22.810 Uttam Kumaran: you know, start to to own that process like, maybe let’s just talk about that while we have a few more minutes left, and then we can try on our side to take as much action as we can.
121 00:29:24.410 ⇒ 00:29:25.550 Awaish Kumar: I like.
122 00:29:28.970 ⇒ 00:29:30.499 Awaish Kumar: So, yeah, like, how
123 00:29:32.370 ⇒ 00:29:40.040 Awaish Kumar: like are you more like, do you want more to look towards like mentorship roles? Or, Oh.
124 00:29:40.800 ⇒ 00:29:51.959 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, to give you a little bit of sense of like what I think about. And what we’re doing now is one at minimum. It’s just meeting every like 2 weeks or so, and having a space where people can give feedback
125 00:29:52.140 ⇒ 00:29:57.920 Uttam Kumaran: right? Like, you know, this process that we do with folks that’s that’s really like the number one.
126 00:29:57.990 ⇒ 00:30:24.559 Uttam Kumaran: like the easiest low hanging fruit thing is just having a space for people to get feedback, and that we listen to feedback. I think the second thing is definitely we’re working on how each of the people in this middle management layer can set goals for the folks that they manage. So the second piece is basically running through this goal setting exercise with every person. And then and then basically, it’s like helping them actually achieve those goals over the quarter.
127 00:30:25.015 ⇒ 00:30:40.799 Uttam Kumaran: Part of this is also a couple more layers. And this is something that we’re not doing today, which, again would be incredibly helpful. Is is one speaking with the project managers and getting feedback on each of the engineers from the projects they’re working at
128 00:30:40.930 ⇒ 00:31:10.769 Uttam Kumaran: right and understanding like how effective they are taking a look at the tickets they’re working on understanding, like their efficiency and their throughput. And then also also making decisions on who’s going to work on the next project right now, that’s you know, I’m making a lot of those decisions which is like we have a new client. This person can go work, this person go work. I want to hand that off to somebody to make the decision. Who’s closer to those people who can understand. Hey, this person we may not have thought of, but they want to stretch in this direction. Let’s go. Put them on this new client right?
129 00:31:10.960 ⇒ 00:31:18.309 Uttam Kumaran: So those are a couple of things immediately that I think are helpful. And I’m only doing one of we’re, you know. I’m only doing one of those right now.
130 00:31:18.430 ⇒ 00:31:23.290 Uttam Kumaran: I mean, I think all of those, and more constitute, like great. You know, engineering management.
131 00:31:24.885 ⇒ 00:31:32.309 Awaish Kumar: Yeah, like, these can be done with like meeting with them, setting goals in terms of what they, what projects they want to work on, and
132 00:31:33.009 ⇒ 00:31:40.310 Awaish Kumar: how they want to stretch their responsibilities, but also then like setting up some like
133 00:31:40.420 ⇒ 00:31:52.140 Awaish Kumar: like the certifications are, we can, which we can also use like to leverage like how how able our engineers are. But like Snowflag certification.
134 00:31:52.140 ⇒ 00:31:52.570 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.
135 00:31:52.570 ⇒ 00:31:56.632 Awaish Kumar: We do certifications and help like
136 00:31:59.410 ⇒ 00:32:08.300 Awaish Kumar: and like like to see how interested they are in these certifications, and how how they can. Take them.
137 00:32:09.300 ⇒ 00:32:16.739 Awaish Kumar: Oh, and how? Yeah, what? They’ve learned, how how it can be applied in our day to day work.
138 00:32:18.850 ⇒ 00:32:24.629 Uttam Kumaran: So I don’t know. Like Robert, what do you think like? What? How fast do you think we can move some of these things
139 00:32:24.930 ⇒ 00:32:26.110 Uttam Kumaran: along.
140 00:32:35.510 ⇒ 00:32:37.319 Robert Tseng: I think we should.
141 00:32:38.420 ⇒ 00:32:42.950 Robert Tseng: I mean, for as far as like getting the sales engineering thing, yeah.
142 00:32:42.950 ⇒ 00:32:56.105 Robert Tseng: just as soon as we can get somebody. When the opportunity comes, we’ll just. We’ll just try to fluctuation. So that could be as soon as this week or next week.
143 00:32:56.910 ⇒ 00:33:02.970 Robert Tseng: And then, as far as like establishing regular one on ones. I I think maybe even just
144 00:33:03.830 ⇒ 00:33:09.570 Robert Tseng: have them have a ways just like meet. I guess 3 folks that you talked about first, st and then.
145 00:33:10.430 ⇒ 00:33:20.549 Robert Tseng: yeah, have a wish come back to us on like we don’t need to like. Write the script for you. You tell us like what you think would be helpful like. How you feel like you. You can support that.
146 00:33:20.670 ⇒ 00:33:36.320 Robert Tseng: you know. I think obviously it’s not fully your responsibility to manage them. We, Tom and I, also talk to these to everyone on the team for now and then, but it’d be good to, you know. At least we have another slack channel where it’s like people who are like managing, and we can start to.
147 00:33:36.320 ⇒ 00:33:36.970 Uttam Kumaran: Yes.
148 00:33:36.970 ⇒ 00:33:47.460 Robert Tseng: You into those conversations of like, Hey, you know, we’re noticing that so and so is struggling, or whatever and like this is how we need to support. And there’s maybe some ad hoc stuff where we kind of talk about like
149 00:33:47.700 ⇒ 00:33:53.823 Robert Tseng: wish. Are you seeing the same thing? You work with them as well, or you know, stuff like that where it’s it’s
150 00:33:54.200 ⇒ 00:34:01.249 Robert Tseng: yeah. At least, we we start to all be thinking about the team and sharing like what our observations with with the team are around. So
151 00:34:01.786 ⇒ 00:34:05.110 Robert Tseng: I think that would be helpful for you to know, like how.
152 00:34:05.290 ⇒ 00:34:07.009 Robert Tseng: by what we jump and I are.
153 00:34:07.330 ⇒ 00:34:12.720 Robert Tseng: you know, pay pay attention to. Maybe. Obviously, you need some context on like
154 00:34:13.550 ⇒ 00:34:27.520 Robert Tseng: what? What they’re what, where they’re at, what their, what their goals are as well. And we can just start to share share that knowledge. So I mean, frankly, like the only people that would be in that channel, for now would probably just be us 3, which is totally fine.
155 00:34:27.520 ⇒ 00:34:27.870 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.
156 00:34:27.870 ⇒ 00:34:33.125 Robert Tseng: Anybody else has is gonna be in a place to manage people yet.
157 00:34:33.840 ⇒ 00:34:37.109 Robert Tseng: but yeah, I think that’s maybe where we can. What we can do from here.
158 00:34:37.620 ⇒ 00:34:47.039 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah. And for me, I I think that’s a great. And then basically, we just share feedback on like, okay, maybe go chat with them. I mean, we could do something more formal where we share with people that like
159 00:34:47.070 ⇒ 00:35:09.070 Uttam Kumaran: you’re gonna get involved. But I think it’d just be helpful for you to go, have a natural conversation with folks, talk to them, ask them like what what they think about working here, and and gain a couple of insights, and then maybe we can circle back. After you’ve done that I’ll I’ll start the channel and sort of get us there and then I mean my goal again. And anything we’re trying to do is just to coach so as much as we can share
160 00:35:09.140 ⇒ 00:35:15.509 Uttam Kumaran: of our learnings about what’s worked or what hasn’t worked for engineering management. I don’t think we know everything, but I think we’ve
161 00:35:15.887 ⇒ 00:35:37.909 Uttam Kumaran: we certainly, you know, got a great crew of people now, so I think whatever we can share on how our perspective on engineering management, and then just have a great another line of communication with you. That way we go from speaking every few weeks. And now, hopefully speaking, every few days. And then you just become more leveraged. You know, here. So if you’re okay with that, and I’ll
162 00:35:38.130 ⇒ 00:35:39.920 Uttam Kumaran: pick some of that stuff off, and
163 00:35:40.180 ⇒ 00:35:43.850 Uttam Kumaran: I’ll sort of write a quick summary of this meeting, and then we can
164 00:35:44.300 ⇒ 00:35:46.590 Uttam Kumaran: just like drive as fast as we can.
165 00:35:47.740 ⇒ 00:35:49.080 Awaish Kumar: Yeah, sure.
166 00:35:51.130 ⇒ 00:35:51.840 Uttam Kumaran: Okay.
167 00:35:52.250 ⇒ 00:35:58.269 Uttam Kumaran: awesome. Well, great. I mean, I I think this is a great meeting like I, I’m really, really happy overall
168 00:35:58.290 ⇒ 00:36:17.210 Uttam Kumaran: we’re having. I think this comes at, an it couldn’t have come at a better time. In fact, a better time would have been any time. So I really am. I’m super happy that you’re spending time thinking about how to, you know, gain more leverage of your time and to do with us here. I think every all the feedback overall.
169 00:36:17.210 ⇒ 00:36:30.509 Uttam Kumaran: Everyone that’s worked with you has been incredibly positive, and for me I don’t look at that and say, cool, let’s let’s keep you in the same place for me. I’m like you’re such a great candidate for growth. And so I think this is a good step in that direction, and
170 00:36:30.660 ⇒ 00:36:47.700 Uttam Kumaran: you know how fast we move. We’ll move as fast as we can. So I would like to see at least the the goals and the data platform and engineering management accomplished, you know, and we sort of set a roadmap for that which we can work on in notion. And then we sort of work towards the sales work as as sales. Come in.
171 00:36:50.830 ⇒ 00:36:53.294 Uttam Kumaran: Okay, cool, alright guys.
172 00:36:54.090 ⇒ 00:36:57.880 Uttam Kumaran: thanks for taking the time. And then, yeah, I’ll set this up in slack and send some notes over.
173 00:36:58.600 ⇒ 00:36:59.448 Awaish Kumar: Okay, how are you?
174 00:36:59.660 ⇒ 00:37:00.410 Awaish Kumar: Okay?
175 00:37:01.840 ⇒ 00:37:02.200 Uttam Kumaran: Thank you.
176 00:37:02.200 ⇒ 00:37:02.730 Robert Tseng: You guys.
177 00:37:02.950 ⇒ 00:37:03.760 Uttam Kumaran: Bye.