Meeting Title: Brainforge Project Manager Interview Date: 2025-08-20 Meeting participants: Amber Lin, James H
WEBVTT
1 00:00:18.340 ⇒ 00:00:20.759 Amber Lin: This is fine, but, like, a lot of things.
2 00:00:35.940 ⇒ 00:00:36.630 Amber Lin: Mmm.
3 00:00:51.430 ⇒ 00:00:51.900 James H: Hello.
4 00:00:52.310 ⇒ 00:00:53.789 Amber Lin: I’m so sorry, I….
5 00:00:53.790 ⇒ 00:00:55.059 James H: I am too.
6 00:00:55.060 ⇒ 00:00:59.809 Amber Lin: Scheduled to 20 minutes later, because the other interview ran a bit over.
7 00:00:59.810 ⇒ 00:01:06.090 James H: That’s okay. I’m sorry for interrupting, I hope I didn’t throw anybody off, you know.
8 00:01:06.090 ⇒ 00:01:09.509 Amber Lin: It’s all good. I’m very excited to meet you today.
9 00:01:09.650 ⇒ 00:01:11.279 James H: Oh, thank you, you too.
10 00:01:12.730 ⇒ 00:01:18.100 Amber Lin: Let me pull up… Our notes….
11 00:01:18.460 ⇒ 00:01:22.210 James H: I tried to look at the video.
12 00:01:22.210 ⇒ 00:01:27.230 Amber Lin: on YouTube that you submitted, I don’t think I was able to open it, because it was a private.
13 00:01:27.230 ⇒ 00:01:27.760 James H: Oh.
14 00:01:27.760 ⇒ 00:01:33.390 Amber Lin: Yo, so… Unfortunately, I might ask some duplicate questions that you I’ve already answered there.
15 00:01:33.390 ⇒ 00:01:35.519 James H: That’s okay. I’m sorry about that, I…
16 00:01:35.840 ⇒ 00:01:37.690 James H: I should have changed the permissions.
17 00:01:38.090 ⇒ 00:01:58.060 Amber Lin: All good. So, I would love to get started after we do a quick intro. I’m going to introduce myself and then have a few questions about your experience, about who you are, and at the end, I want to make sure that you get the chance to ask us questions so that we can both see if the position is a fit.
18 00:01:58.670 ⇒ 00:01:59.370 James H: Okay.
19 00:01:59.370 ⇒ 00:02:08.900 Amber Lin: Yeah, and to start off, my name is Amber. I joined Brainforge about 5 months ago, and I started as a project manager, and right now I’m helping them set up their
20 00:02:08.900 ⇒ 00:02:33.840 Amber Lin: PMO, so also looking for people to join as project managers, and also to join as someone, who can run the PMO. And I used to also be… I saw that you worked at Accenture, and you’re working at Deloitte right now. I used to also work as a strategy consultant, so I am quite familiar with the background that you’re coming from, and that’s something, actually, that we are also
21 00:02:33.840 ⇒ 00:02:40.640 Amber Lin: Looking forward to learn more from, especially because we’re also a consultancy and not a product company.
22 00:02:40.710 ⇒ 00:02:41.560 Amber Lin: Fantastic.
23 00:02:42.320 ⇒ 00:02:43.219 James H: Good deal.
24 00:02:43.220 ⇒ 00:02:47.509 Amber Lin: Yeah, so to start off, …
25 00:02:47.880 ⇒ 00:02:56.960 Amber Lin: Let’s see… could you do a quick intro about yourself and tell me about what your career goals and motivations are?
26 00:02:57.770 ⇒ 00:02:59.880 James H: Sure, yeah, so…
27 00:03:00.150 ⇒ 00:03:10.830 James H: I have about 12 years of experience, I’ll save you the long version, but I started… I think it’s in my cover letter, right? I started in analytics development.
28 00:03:10.840 ⇒ 00:03:26.170 James H: And my most recent position was with Deloitte, working mostly for state and local government, or I did work with Toyota for a while as a Scrum Master in a safe, agile environment.
29 00:03:26.320 ⇒ 00:03:30.570 James H: And… I’m…
30 00:03:31.230 ⇒ 00:03:44.580 James H: just trying to capture it in a small way, I basically would run development teams, right? So, Agile… you said you did a lot of strategy, I mostly did, like, IT implementation, delivery.
31 00:03:44.580 ⇒ 00:03:45.210 Amber Lin: Okay.
32 00:03:45.210 ⇒ 00:03:53.360 James H: So large-scale analytics solutions, at the Toyota client, they used…
33 00:03:53.690 ⇒ 00:03:57.239 James H: They were making a predictive model for supply chain.
34 00:03:57.570 ⇒ 00:03:59.990 James H: Sorry.
35 00:04:00.620 ⇒ 00:04:09.120 James H: And… you asked what my goals are, so my goals are to…
36 00:04:09.500 ⇒ 00:04:19.259 James H: find an opportunity to pivot… well, I’m looking for new challenges, right? To find an opportunity to pivot into the AI and,
37 00:04:19.269 ⇒ 00:04:19.639 Amber Lin: Hmm.
38 00:04:19.640 ⇒ 00:04:23.609 James H: Space… and I…
39 00:04:23.820 ⇒ 00:04:32.679 James H: left Deloitte about 6… or at the end of last year, like December, and …
40 00:04:32.990 ⇒ 00:04:46.049 James H: To help my mom and family and stuff like that. So, I’m getting back into the market, and I’m just looking for a role, not just any role, you know, I’m looking for the right role.
41 00:04:46.750 ⇒ 00:04:54.139 James H: But I am interested in BrainForge. I read about the product offerings and some of the client testimony stuff.
42 00:04:54.320 ⇒ 00:05:02.290 James H: So it seems like you guys do, something I’m interested in, right? Automating workflows.
43 00:05:02.550 ⇒ 00:05:12.779 James H: and implementing AI, I would love to have, the opportunity to do project management in that space.
44 00:05:13.390 ⇒ 00:05:24.090 James H: A lot of what I did previously was long-term… this isn’t a complaint, I’m just giving context, right? A lot of what I did earlier was long-term, year-plus.
45 00:05:24.320 ⇒ 00:05:27.430 James H: Very large-scale implementations, ….
46 00:05:27.880 ⇒ 00:05:30.530 James H: Running multiple Scrum teams.
47 00:05:30.810 ⇒ 00:05:40.030 James H: A few… you mentioned needing help with PMO. One of the things I did was, usually I would be a person who would integrate
48 00:05:40.460 ⇒ 00:05:42.850 James H: with the client’s PMO.
49 00:05:43.420 ⇒ 00:05:55.250 James H: and then run Deloitte’s development team. So I was, like, I was the person who was like, okay, what are your delivery practices? Do you have standardized delivery templates?
50 00:05:55.280 ⇒ 00:06:04.060 James H: making sure that Deloitte or Accenture was aligning to that so that we met the client need for PMO requirement.
51 00:06:04.280 ⇒ 00:06:05.150 James H: ….
52 00:06:05.150 ⇒ 00:06:08.890 Amber Lin: I see. You must have seen a lot of different standards, right?
53 00:06:08.890 ⇒ 00:06:15.569 James H: Yeah, yeah, and in the… I mean, in the government space, woo, they can be very, very…
54 00:06:15.730 ⇒ 00:06:22.880 James H: litigious with what they want and what they need documented. Right, so…
55 00:06:23.220 ⇒ 00:06:31.630 James H: really the… the ideal… one of my big goal… one of the big things I did was I helped a…
56 00:06:31.840 ⇒ 00:06:45.789 James H: One of my most recent clients, Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board, they basically are in charge of all the data for all of the public schools and universities in Texas.
57 00:06:46.020 ⇒ 00:06:57.399 James H: And they had a project management office that was pretty… it was split up very verti- vertically, like, they had a business PMO and a tech PMO, and they didn’t talk to each other.
58 00:06:57.400 ⇒ 00:07:07.010 James H: And, I helped them define some new practices. I helped them implement agile methodology framework that worked for them.
59 00:07:07.300 ⇒ 00:07:25.409 James H: I’m a certified Scrum Master, and I have a lot of experience in project management and Scrum Master, but I’m not the type of person that says, this is how you do Agile, you have to do it this way, right? Agile is a framework, you know, it’s a framework you work within.
60 00:07:25.540 ⇒ 00:07:44.710 James H: And what works for you is whatever is fastest, and meets the requirements. So, there’s things you can’t skip, but generally speaking, I try not to be too in the weeds with it, you know, if that makes sense, right? I’m not trying to add more burden to any development team.
61 00:07:44.790 ⇒ 00:07:50.990 James H: Right, so… and then you asked, motivations, or what was the….
62 00:07:51.050 ⇒ 00:07:52.970 Amber Lin: Motivation, what motivates you?
63 00:07:53.270 ⇒ 00:07:54.920 James H: Yeah, so….
64 00:07:55.170 ⇒ 00:07:56.260 Amber Lin: Oh, I have tons of….
65 00:07:56.450 ⇒ 00:08:03.809 James H: Let’s see… having… Can I say it.
66 00:08:05.100 ⇒ 00:08:10.110 James H: Having a clear idea of where I’m going in a position is.
67 00:08:10.110 ⇒ 00:08:10.430 Amber Lin: Cool.
68 00:08:10.430 ⇒ 00:08:13.180 James H: I don’t know if that makes sense. It…
69 00:08:13.200 ⇒ 00:08:31.190 James H: I’m trying not to say, like, I don’t mind having ambiguity, right? Ambiguity is part of the job, like, you have to flush out requirements, you have to understand what’s happening in an ambiguous way, and then get more detailed as you filter it down. But I really enjoy, …
70 00:08:31.360 ⇒ 00:08:34.950 James H: Or what motivates me is, is… to…
71 00:08:35.340 ⇒ 00:08:44.099 James H: go to work and be like, here’s what I need to do today. Otherwise, you kind of get, at least I personally kind of get stuck with, what am I doing, you know?
72 00:08:44.100 ⇒ 00:08:44.470 Amber Lin: Mmm.
73 00:08:44.470 ⇒ 00:08:51.420 James H: And, I’ve felt that way in the past, and it kind of is a stall in my mind, at least, so….
74 00:08:51.420 ⇒ 00:09:00.969 Amber Lin: Oh, I would imagine that at big companies, like the Loyal Accenture, it’ll be very clear what you need to do that day. Is that not the case in those companies?
75 00:09:00.970 ⇒ 00:09:09.010 James H: Oh… with… It is… how can I say it?
76 00:09:10.460 ⇒ 00:09:12.750 James H: It is when…
77 00:09:14.510 ⇒ 00:09:31.960 James H: So, being self-directed, I guess, is the answer there. As a Scrum Master or Project Manager, you get… I mean, Accenture Deloitte was, you know, not a lot of oversight. The people above me were like PPMDs. They only cared about the weekly report.
78 00:09:32.060 ⇒ 00:09:38.290 James H: Right? So, when it came to what am I doing today, I was supporting the team, basically.
79 00:09:38.740 ⇒ 00:09:56.059 James H: And… and then trying to make sure that the team’s roadblocks were cleared, and it was all very self-directed. So, as long as I have, I have a checklist I keep that, actually I got from, my Scrum training that’s basically, like.
80 00:09:56.150 ⇒ 00:10:07.049 James H: a daily checklist of, have you done this today? Which is really helpful. So that’s kind of, like, how I drive myself with project management, is making sure I’ve done my daily tasks of
81 00:10:07.210 ⇒ 00:10:09.549 James H: you know, working with the team, so….
82 00:10:09.550 ⇒ 00:10:11.399 Amber Lin: You know, so….
83 00:10:11.400 ⇒ 00:10:15.859 James H: Yeah, I don’t know if that… sorry, I had an interruption with a phone call, but….
84 00:10:15.860 ⇒ 00:10:29.069 Amber Lin: All good, all good. Yeah, that’s all good. That’s actually very interesting, because I… we recently hired… hired coordinators to help us support the project load, and eventually, I realized that
85 00:10:29.070 ⇒ 00:10:48.629 Amber Lin: it’s best that we all have checklists, so right now, what we have is that, every day we have an internal project management team meeting, and then everybody fills out for each client the checklist of how have you done this today, have you done that? And I think it made our, even reporting process a lot easier, and made sure that we got
86 00:10:48.630 ⇒ 00:10:49.979 Amber Lin: Everything that we need.
87 00:10:50.290 ⇒ 00:10:53.790 James H: Yeah, yeah, it is helpful, …
88 00:10:54.810 ⇒ 00:11:10.499 James H: one of the challenges I had in state and local government was consistent engagement with the product owners. A lot of times, they were stretched very thin, or, you know, being a very long-term project, like a year plus, they would scope it in waterfall, and then deliver it in Agile.
89 00:11:10.500 ⇒ 00:11:10.900 Amber Lin: Hmm.
90 00:11:10.900 ⇒ 00:11:21.800 James H: So you end up with, like, a product owner, being engaged at the beginning for requirements gathering, and scoping of the project, and, you know, etc.
91 00:11:21.890 ⇒ 00:11:40.730 James H: And then you end up with an agile delivery, which caused the product owner to not, you know, they didn’t need to be engaged as often, because the decisions had been made up front, but I oftentimes would end up being the voice of the customer for the development team.
92 00:11:40.850 ⇒ 00:11:43.830 James H: So, kind of a mix of, like.
93 00:11:45.000 ⇒ 00:11:56.309 James H: business analyst slash scrum master slash project manager. At times, I did program management as well. I, I was, managed three.
94 00:11:56.430 ⇒ 00:12:16.320 James H: You know, it was very high level. It was basically coordinating all the reporting, coordinating all of the meetings, and making sure everyone was connected. They were 3 pretty big, like, each team had 25 to 30 people, and then they all had independent products, but they were interacting with the same client.
95 00:12:16.420 ⇒ 00:12:25.899 James H: So I was the point of contact for all the product owners to come and talk to, and then… so that they didn’t get interrupted by 3 different project teams trying to interact with them all.
96 00:12:25.900 ⇒ 00:12:36.840 Amber Lin: I see, I hear you. What is the type of working environment and the pace that you would… you would prefer that you work the best in, and what doesn’t help you?
97 00:12:38.690 ⇒ 00:12:44.219 James H: I… oh yeah, this was one of the video questions, I apologize for….
98 00:12:44.220 ⇒ 00:12:45.509 Amber Lin: I’m very safe.
99 00:12:45.510 ⇒ 00:12:54.700 James H: … basically, I thrive in… I’ll go back to, …
100 00:12:54.950 ⇒ 00:12:57.579 James H: how can I say it? Regularity?
101 00:12:58.160 ⇒ 00:13:00.300 James H: Having a…
102 00:13:01.510 ⇒ 00:13:10.369 James H: having, like, knowing what I’m doing that day, I guess, is the simplest way to say it. I know that’s not a straightforward answer, but, …
103 00:13:10.770 ⇒ 00:13:17.629 James H: For instance, if… I know that I have a set of morning meetings.
104 00:13:18.050 ⇒ 00:13:24.050 James H: And then I know that I have a block of time midday to do XYZ tasks for myself.
105 00:13:24.320 ⇒ 00:13:39.329 James H: And then I know that I have a few meetings in the afternoon, and that’s like a, you know, the stand-up’s consistent, all that stuff, like, that helps me a lot, just knowing where I’m gonna get my work done in a day. The things that…
106 00:13:39.640 ⇒ 00:13:44.730 James H: I focus on, for development teams and my own growth.
107 00:13:44.880 ⇒ 00:13:48.900 James H: Is to be the person who’s a little bit more…
108 00:13:49.080 ⇒ 00:14:03.369 James H: I’m gonna use the same analogy, in the weeds, right? But to, to clear the runway for the team… I hate using all this business jargon, right? But to clear the runway for the team, to be the person who’s at the front of the train… oh, jeez, sorry.
109 00:14:04.790 ⇒ 00:14:07.230 Amber Lin: I want to put that on Do Not Disturb.
110 00:14:07.350 ⇒ 00:14:10.050 James H: It’s the end of the day, so all my friends are calling, and….
111 00:14:10.050 ⇒ 00:14:11.030 Amber Lin: Yeah, all good.
112 00:14:11.030 ⇒ 00:14:15.350 James H: Meh, so, … the, …
113 00:14:16.350 ⇒ 00:14:24.499 James H: Anyway, what I was saying is I try to put myself in the more ambiguous place, So that developers….
114 00:14:24.640 ⇒ 00:14:28.119 Amber Lin: Can be the ones who have a more clear picture.
115 00:14:28.130 ⇒ 00:14:44.570 James H: You know, being the person who needs to talk to a product owner about a decision that needs to be made, and then bringing that back and saying, okay, that decision was made, right? Instead of the developers needing to take away their time from doing just basic…
116 00:14:44.640 ⇒ 00:14:52.500 James H: you know, doing their development tasks, right? So, sorry, I… did you ask any other parts to that question, or what.
117 00:14:52.500 ⇒ 00:14:56.660 Amber Lin: No, I heard your answer, and I like that, that you’re saying to…
118 00:14:56.860 ⇒ 00:15:07.469 Amber Lin: Essentially to help take on the burden, or communication burden of figuring out what to do, so that the engineers can focus on doing the actual task.
119 00:15:07.470 ⇒ 00:15:10.289 James H: Yeah, yeah, and you know, that’s what…
120 00:15:11.070 ⇒ 00:15:20.980 James H: That’s what the stand-ups are supposed to, help align, is if, on a daily basis, they would say, hey, we’ve got this task, we don’t quite understand it, help us.
121 00:15:20.980 ⇒ 00:15:21.730 Amber Lin: Hold on.
122 00:15:21.730 ⇒ 00:15:30.879 James H: And hopefully, I have done enough of my job to be able to directly answer that question and not need to bounce back and forth with it.
123 00:15:30.880 ⇒ 00:15:31.200 Amber Lin: Mmm.
124 00:15:31.200 ⇒ 00:15:36.939 James H: Right? And so that’s what I said when I… when I acted as a product owner.
125 00:15:36.940 ⇒ 00:15:44.819 Amber Lin: pretty, you know, never officially had the title, but pretty much represented as a product owner pretty consistently. I see.
126 00:15:44.820 ⇒ 00:15:45.410 James H: No.
127 00:15:45.710 ⇒ 00:15:47.869 Amber Lin: Okay. …
128 00:15:50.090 ⇒ 00:16:06.689 Amber Lin: I want to leave space for you to ask me any questions. I have a few other questions regarding your previous roles, but I want to make sure we answer that first, and if we come up and we don’t have time, it can always be asked in a future… in a future interview, so I want to make sure…
129 00:16:06.690 ⇒ 00:16:21.310 Amber Lin: If you have any questions, I can help answer it right now. Yeah, the… but I was trying to understand about, … I read about, you know, the products and the type of work done. What I was interested in knowing more about is the, ….
130 00:16:22.550 ⇒ 00:16:27.529 James H: Is it a intake role? Is it a… meaning…
131 00:16:27.680 ⇒ 00:16:35.109 James H: I noticed, like, you have a pricing structure on your website, like, you know, you’ll do, like, a 2- or 3-week assessment type thing.
132 00:16:35.110 ⇒ 00:16:35.460 Amber Lin: Hmm.
133 00:16:35.460 ⇒ 00:16:38.100 James H: Is it more saying….
134 00:16:38.230 ⇒ 00:16:44.020 Amber Lin: Hey, we’ve got a constant stream of clients coming in, and we need to build project….
135 00:16:44.020 ⇒ 00:16:47.940 James H: Plans, and run these teams, and then deliver that stuff.
136 00:16:48.140 ⇒ 00:16:59.410 James H: Is it a… is it a 2- or 3-week cadence on this, or are these longer-term projects, or, you know, is it 2 or 3 month projects, etc?
137 00:16:59.860 ⇒ 00:17:09.709 Amber Lin: Yeah, so we have, … projects for us have a different… have a whole life cycle, so what you see on the website, the scoping, the
138 00:17:09.710 ⇒ 00:17:24.390 Amber Lin: the proof of concept for 2 and 3 weeks, that’s where a lot of our projects start, and usually from those, we’ll have a percentage that converts to longer-term projects, and then those are usually, I would say.
139 00:17:25.569 ⇒ 00:17:30.449 Amber Lin: 10 to 30K per month, and… …
140 00:17:30.800 ⇒ 00:17:37.669 Amber Lin: About 3 to 6 months long. And so, as a project manager.
141 00:17:37.910 ⇒ 00:17:52.210 Amber Lin: I think we place the more experienced project managers on the bigger, longer-term projects, and usually we can… we have the coordinators run the shorter projects, and sometimes the…
142 00:17:52.360 ⇒ 00:18:14.150 Amber Lin: solutions architect who’s the lead on developing those POCs can also help run those shorter projects, because those are very engagement-heavy, those are actually very sales heavy, because their next phase of projects depend on them. So, as project managers, at least right now, I focus on those, later stage projects.
143 00:18:14.580 ⇒ 00:18:16.319 Amber Lin: Hope that answers your question.
144 00:18:16.490 ⇒ 00:18:23.450 James H: Yeah, it does. I was trying to figure out where I would fit into that, do you know, or would it just be dependent on what the need is?
145 00:18:23.880 ⇒ 00:18:25.230 Amber Lin: I think…
146 00:18:25.700 ⇒ 00:18:44.950 Amber Lin: we will try to… because you have a lot of experience in that space, and it’ll be a shame if we don’t learn from your knowledge, so I definitely think you’ll be placed on the more strategic, longer-term projects. We’ll also want to have your insight to see, okay, what is the right methodology that
147 00:18:44.950 ⇒ 00:18:56.569 Amber Lin: we should deploy. We already have some frameworks set up, we had some advisors that help us set it up, and we worked together to develop it for the different teams, but would want…
148 00:18:56.680 ⇒ 00:19:06.289 Amber Lin: would want someone to lead and own those projects, as well as give advice on how the PMO should be run.
149 00:19:07.030 ⇒ 00:19:13.089 James H: Okay, that makes sense. Yeah, I… I think I would fit in well in that capacity to, …
150 00:19:13.450 ⇒ 00:19:17.060 James H: To act as a person who…
151 00:19:18.070 ⇒ 00:19:27.130 James H: Oversees one to two longer-term projects is something that’s well within my capacity to do.
152 00:19:27.390 ⇒ 00:19:30.990 James H: It really, it depends on the level of,
153 00:19:31.310 ⇒ 00:19:46.189 James H: interaction required. That’s why I was asking, because if it’s… if it’s a role where, hey, I’m just spinning up project plans, that’s fine, I can pump them out, right? But if it’s spin up project plans and then manage those projects.
154 00:19:46.190 ⇒ 00:19:51.539 Amber Lin: well, then how many projects is it, right? That’s the question, right? So….
155 00:19:51.540 ⇒ 00:19:59.750 James H: Right, so yes, I… you know, if… and I agree, I think even, you know, as a person who’s coming into the company.
156 00:20:00.260 ⇒ 00:20:06.530 James H: As a newer employee, it would make more sense to have me after
157 00:20:06.880 ⇒ 00:20:17.879 James H: the requirement gathering and sales section, right? Maybe I could slowly move that way, but I wouldn’t have the product knowledge yet, right? So…
158 00:20:17.990 ⇒ 00:20:22.589 James H: It would make sense to me to fit in there as well. So, okay.
159 00:20:22.590 ⇒ 00:20:26.989 Amber Lin: Oh, so you’re saying to start out closer to the sales side, so develop.
160 00:20:26.990 ⇒ 00:20:29.709 James H: No, no, no, what you said, to start.
161 00:20:29.710 ⇒ 00:20:30.340 Amber Lin: Oh, okay.
162 00:20:30.340 ⇒ 00:20:32.010 James H: from the sales side.
163 00:20:32.010 ⇒ 00:20:32.450 Amber Lin: Good luck.
164 00:20:32.450 ⇒ 00:20:38.920 James H: Like, because, like, it would take me time and interaction with
165 00:20:39.320 ⇒ 00:20:43.289 James H: The teams to know what kind of products are offered.
166 00:20:43.490 ⇒ 00:20:51.840 James H: Right, I wouldn’t be able to sit at the front of the line yet and say, here are our products, here’s how they work, right? That would take time, so….
167 00:20:52.350 ⇒ 00:20:57.719 Amber Lin: Yeah, I totally understand. And I think currently, I manage, I think.
168 00:20:58.120 ⇒ 00:21:13.460 Amber Lin: two big projects in one relatively… one medium project and one smaller project. When we create project plans, we use a lot of AI in our daily work. The AI, where it…
169 00:21:13.460 ⇒ 00:21:31.060 Amber Lin: we can call ourselves an AI-first company. The internal AI team has actually developed a lot of cool tools that we can use, especially for me as a project manager. So, for instance, all our meetings on Zoom are recorded, and from those meetings, we can chat with the transcript, we can
170 00:21:31.060 ⇒ 00:21:44.590 Amber Lin: create meeting summary template from our templates, and then we can also create tickets using our interface. So, when it comes to project plans, we also use that. We take
171 00:21:44.590 ⇒ 00:22:01.010 Amber Lin: say I copy two sales meeting transcripts, I copy our internal offerings, and then I copy a template for a project plan that we agreed on, and then it spits out an initial draft, and it speeds us the process a lot more, and
172 00:22:01.010 ⇒ 00:22:06.340 Amber Lin: It also helps me create the tickets that’s needed, and then quickly I just hand that over to the
173 00:22:06.340 ⇒ 00:22:11.629 Amber Lin: Project lead or the architect to, edit it, and then we can send it to the clients.
174 00:22:12.450 ⇒ 00:22:14.380 James H: Cool. That’s very neat.
175 00:22:14.570 ⇒ 00:22:15.970 James H: So the, ….
176 00:22:15.970 ⇒ 00:22:17.070 Amber Lin: Oh, no.
177 00:22:17.660 ⇒ 00:22:22.669 James H: I know we’re near the end of our time here. I was just gonna ask the…
178 00:22:22.960 ⇒ 00:22:25.040 James H: To, or to confirm…
179 00:22:25.470 ⇒ 00:22:37.809 James H: the period of time… like, I would be sitting in a position, potentially, right, if hired, sitting in a position where scope is known, timeline is known.
180 00:22:38.210 ⇒ 00:22:40.650 James H: Like, those things would be agreed upon already.
181 00:22:40.870 ⇒ 00:22:47.209 James H: Or would it be… More in, like you said, in the phase of developing the project plan itself.
182 00:22:48.920 ⇒ 00:23:06.229 Amber Lin: I would say when it comes to the bigger, longer-term projects, it is 6 to… three to six months, there would be a process where we draft out a technical design document, the client approves it, and then project managers would create the
183 00:23:06.230 ⇒ 00:23:19.270 Amber Lin: timeline and the plan and the client would agree on it. Currently, I am involved in that process as well, of getting new scope agreed on. So that, I think.
184 00:23:19.270 ⇒ 00:23:32.030 Amber Lin: That would be part of the job, but we have the engineering leads and the, and the project… so essentially the CEO, they will be… also be involved in that process.
185 00:23:32.330 ⇒ 00:23:41.680 Amber Lin: So, if there is a need, I do think, at least now, I feel supported when I don’t know how long this project’s gonna be.
186 00:23:41.680 ⇒ 00:23:43.779 James H: Okay, that answers the question, thank you.
187 00:23:44.330 ⇒ 00:23:47.640 James H: Awesome. Okay, I’m done asking questions.
188 00:23:47.640 ⇒ 00:23:54.429 Amber Lin: Okay, well, I just wanna… I think usually people also ask me about the next steps, so I think….
189 00:23:54.430 ⇒ 00:23:54.840 James H: I guess.
190 00:23:54.840 ⇒ 00:23:57.840 Amber Lin: We’re… yeah, because we’re wanting to…
191 00:23:57.950 ⇒ 00:24:08.809 Amber Lin: complete this period of hiring pretty soon, because it does take up a lot of time from our work. So I would say you’ll hear back about the next steps,
192 00:24:09.210 ⇒ 00:24:24.570 Amber Lin: in one week or two, so this or next week, so the next round will be, if there’s the next round, that will be scheduled pretty soon, you’ll hear back from us. And you have my email, you also have Rico’s email, who helped, schedule.
193 00:24:24.570 ⇒ 00:24:38.199 Amber Lin: I’m gonna be out of office in the next 2 days, but if there’s any… some… if there’s something urgent, or you need a quick update because you have conflicting priorities, feel free to message us, and he will escalate to the team, and we’ll try to
194 00:24:38.200 ⇒ 00:24:40.779 Amber Lin: Come up with an answer to that as soon as possible.
195 00:24:41.420 ⇒ 00:24:47.749 James H: Okay, no worries. And let me know if you need any other information from me. Otherwise, thank you.
196 00:24:48.160 ⇒ 00:24:52.709 Amber Lin: Of course! Thank you so much. I appreciate your time today, I know it’s pretty late in the day.
197 00:24:52.710 ⇒ 00:24:55.550 James H: Oh, no worries, thank you for staying a little longer.
198 00:24:55.820 ⇒ 00:24:57.519 Amber Lin: Okay. Yeah, you too.
199 00:24:57.520 ⇒ 00:24:58.240 James H: Bye!