Meeting Title: Brainforge Project Structure and Client Updates Date: 2026-01-07 Meeting participants: Greg Stoutenburg, Uttam Kumaran
WEBVTT
1 00:00:07.630 ⇒ 00:00:08.830 Uttam Kumaran: Hello!
2 00:00:11.090 ⇒ 00:00:13.009 Greg Stoutenburg: There we go. How’s it going? Good!
3 00:00:13.010 ⇒ 00:00:13.850 Uttam Kumaran: Good, how are you?
4 00:00:14.280 ⇒ 00:00:16.189 Greg Stoutenburg: I am pretty good today.
5 00:00:16.420 ⇒ 00:00:19.770 Greg Stoutenburg: Just getting all sorts caught up in all sorts of things.
6 00:00:19.770 ⇒ 00:00:20.860 Uttam Kumaran: Good, good, good.
7 00:00:22.220 ⇒ 00:00:27.210 Greg Stoutenburg: Oh, yeah, I saw the, I saw the notes. Are we waiting for Clarence?
8 00:00:27.700 ⇒ 00:00:37.610 Uttam Kumaran: Let’s get started. He’s, like, in and out of a bunch of stuff, so we can get… we can kind of get started. Yeah, I mean, I mainly wanted to have this time… we’re gonna… we’re booking time with, kind of, everybody.
9 00:00:37.780 ⇒ 00:00:39.370 Uttam Kumaran: that we…
10 00:00:39.550 ⇒ 00:00:50.750 Uttam Kumaran: sort of assigned one of these new roles to, so this time is, like, entirely for you. I know we have also some other, like, work stuff to talk about, but, mainly, I want to make sure that, like.
11 00:00:51.220 ⇒ 00:00:57.330 Uttam Kumaran: the new structure, like, makes sense, that you kind of… I feel like, in seeing…
12 00:00:57.490 ⇒ 00:01:14.469 Uttam Kumaran: your energy, and I feel like you’re… you kind of understand, like, kind of what we’re trying to do. I feel like, also, I’ve talked to Clarence about, like, I think the way you’re thinking about things and the communicating Slack is, like, exactly what we’re trying to push, basically, everybody else to… to also do. So, I feel pretty good. I think the…
13 00:01:14.480 ⇒ 00:01:27.139 Uttam Kumaran: Compared to everyone else, though, like, we’re trying to get you into projects, so I think that’s, like, probably the biggest thing. But, so be it. I’m pretty confident that, like, at least one of these will work, if not both, so… yeah, I feel, I feel okay.
14 00:01:27.320 ⇒ 00:01:39.470 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah, yeah, and I appreciate that, too. I’ve been, you know, like, as I’ve been telling people, I’m like, yeah, you know, so still doing this sort of very contingent thing, but, you know, they got two more clients, like, this week, so, you know.
15 00:01:39.470 ⇒ 00:01:54.189 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, I think you’ve also seen, like, how fast we move, and how fast we try to evolve, so that is our pace, and we’re doing it with, like, Robert and I, and now Clarence being, like, spending maybe, like.
16 00:01:54.430 ⇒ 00:01:56.619 Uttam Kumaran: A fifth of our time, or…
17 00:01:56.620 ⇒ 00:02:01.680 Greg Stoutenburg: less spending on company strategy. So imagine as our time frees up.
18 00:02:01.690 ⇒ 00:02:13.390 Uttam Kumaran: Right. How fast things can move, or how much more sales. So, we’re sitting… we’re actually, without this new delivery model, I am sitting on people to sell to, as I just don’t… I just don’t have, like…
19 00:02:13.640 ⇒ 00:02:21.900 Uttam Kumaran: I… I need to have the trust that we have a model to deliver really consistently, and that our baseline expectations are set for me to…
20 00:02:22.060 ⇒ 00:02:33.360 Uttam Kumaran: start to be able to be, like, handing off to pods, and so this is that switch to flip. Our quarterly, like, sales goals and stuff are really aggressive, like, so…
21 00:02:33.730 ⇒ 00:02:41.210 Uttam Kumaran: I feel confident that, for me, the next, like, 2-4 weeks are just making sure everyone hits the minimums, people feel good in their spots.
22 00:02:41.210 ⇒ 00:02:42.649 Greg Stoutenburg: Yup. And then…
23 00:02:42.780 ⇒ 00:02:47.889 Uttam Kumaran: I’m gonna just go spend my time getting more people and getting more clients, basically.
24 00:02:47.890 ⇒ 00:02:48.470 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah.
25 00:02:48.640 ⇒ 00:02:58.290 Greg Stoutenburg: That is awesome. And I think I do, like, as far as the model goes, like, just, like, as a question,
26 00:02:58.520 ⇒ 00:03:04.149 Greg Stoutenburg: I think it’s clearer to me How the, engagement pods
27 00:03:04.350 ⇒ 00:03:09.839 Greg Stoutenburg: are supposed to work as a team. That’s clearer to me than how the project team as a whole
28 00:03:10.010 ⇒ 00:03:11.880 Greg Stoutenburg: coheres. Okay.
29 00:03:12.040 ⇒ 00:03:13.770 Greg Stoutenburg: So, I mean, it…
30 00:03:13.770 ⇒ 00:03:19.149 Uttam Kumaran: I think that’s probably because the README… the README project has mainly been, like, you and Robert.
31 00:03:19.150 ⇒ 00:03:20.699 Greg Stoutenburg: So, like, you haven’t been on a…
32 00:03:20.700 ⇒ 00:03:23.980 Uttam Kumaran: We haven’t been on a project that has been more…
33 00:03:24.580 ⇒ 00:03:30.849 Uttam Kumaran: like, traditional, I would say. Yeah. I’m wondering, like, how we can… impart that.
34 00:03:31.040 ⇒ 00:03:32.929 Uttam Kumaran: sort of wisdom.
35 00:03:33.460 ⇒ 00:03:47.929 Uttam Kumaran: I mean, maybe it’s just time spent together, but yeah, like, a client pod… previously, like, we used to have, like, stand-ups for every client would have their own stand-up, and we run, like, very isolated. In this situation, we’re doing stay… we’re doing stand-ups for a service.
36 00:03:48.030 ⇒ 00:04:03.709 Uttam Kumaran: And the CSO can sort of run it how they want, run the client engagement how they want. Of course, we set, like, some minimums, activities to do, but whether you’re like, cool, me and my engagement planners, we need to meet every day, whether, like, let’s just do as much async.
37 00:04:03.870 ⇒ 00:04:22.400 Uttam Kumaran: We’re trying to actually, like, leave a lot of that to you. And I think that was something Clarence really pushed me to think about, is, like, again, we’re trying… I can’t say in one side, give people ownership, and then also be like, yeah, but this is exactly how you’re gonna own things.
38 00:04:22.400 ⇒ 00:04:22.880 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
39 00:04:22.880 ⇒ 00:04:40.930 Uttam Kumaran: So I do want… I do want people to be flexible. Like, we’ve run clients with, like, one meeting a week, because it’s, like, chill. We’ve also run clients where it’s, like, we gotta meet every day, and we’ve, like, sort of scaled up and down. So I want to, like, leave that to you guys. We have a bunch of examples, and I think as CSOs.
40 00:04:40.950 ⇒ 00:04:45.259 Uttam Kumaran: We’ll just talk and sort of share, like, what models are working for everybody.
41 00:04:45.260 ⇒ 00:05:08.250 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, that’s good. And, well, and as well, things like resources. Like, I know we’ve talked about team structure, before this change to the delivery model. So, like, just taking default as an example, right? Sure. One amplitude setup. So once it’s… once exactly… once that scope is really clear, then it’s like, alright, I think then the next step is me fleshing out a roadmap, working with whoever the EP is on that. I think it’s…
42 00:05:08.250 ⇒ 00:05:09.050 Greg Stoutenburg: Demi?
43 00:05:09.050 ⇒ 00:05:09.430 Greg Stoutenburg: I think.
44 00:05:09.430 ⇒ 00:05:23.009 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah. So it’ll be, like, yeah, it won’t be, like, we flesh out the roadmap together, then it’s actually, I would work with the service leader. So you work with Robert to determine who can I… who can come help me execute.
45 00:05:23.020 ⇒ 00:05:23.820 Greg Stoutenburg: Right.
46 00:05:23.820 ⇒ 00:05:28.110 Uttam Kumaran: And so, I think we’re gonna figure out who ends up being the EP, but…
47 00:05:28.110 ⇒ 00:05:28.520 Greg Stoutenburg: Hmm.
48 00:05:28.520 ⇒ 00:05:32.090 Uttam Kumaran: we’re not a huge team, so that’s where the CSOs and the service leaders, like.
49 00:05:32.190 ⇒ 00:05:37.809 Uttam Kumaran: are my estimates correct? Right. And who can… who has the capability to do this?
50 00:05:37.810 ⇒ 00:05:38.590 Greg Stoutenburg: Yes, yeah.
51 00:05:38.590 ⇒ 00:05:46.700 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, and then, basically, what… what should happen is as, like, we… as, like, resources we expect to kind of spread thin.
52 00:05:46.700 ⇒ 00:06:00.179 Uttam Kumaran: then, like, the ops team gets indicated, hey, we need to go search for these. At the moment, we’re basically searching for all resources, so we’re, like, we’re basically trying to get people that can do all of the roles, but…
53 00:06:00.180 ⇒ 00:06:08.880 Uttam Kumaran: We have internal support for everything, and… and again, at minimum, we want to make sure that there’s at least 3 people thinking about every client.
54 00:06:08.880 ⇒ 00:06:11.699 Greg Stoutenburg: Right. And right now, we just have 2 service leads.
55 00:06:11.740 ⇒ 00:06:20.079 Uttam Kumaran: we’ll end up getting a third on data, we’ll end up probably getting Robert out of the strategy stuff and getting someone there too, and so, like, that’s how things are gonna go.
56 00:06:20.080 ⇒ 00:06:25.370 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay, yeah, that’s good. Yeah, cool.
57 00:06:25.370 ⇒ 00:06:40.009 Uttam Kumaran: And again, default… Default and Hedra are existing clients, so I’ll be… I’ll be alongside you the whole way, as much as you need me. We… we… we already have, like, ex… like, Caitlin on default is actually, like, a friend of mine, so we… we have a lot of, like,
58 00:06:40.120 ⇒ 00:06:46.939 Uttam Kumaran: we have a lot of goodwill built there. Hydra is a little bit newer client, but still, we’ve done a good job at our initial engagement, so these are, like.
59 00:06:47.110 ⇒ 00:06:48.319 Uttam Kumaran: I would say…
60 00:06:48.480 ⇒ 00:06:59.689 Uttam Kumaran: should, I’m hopeful, are just like, let’s tee it up, let’s… hopefully they bite at the new thing, and then I think I’ll be right alongside you until then you kind of get the sense of how the whole thing works.
61 00:06:59.890 ⇒ 00:07:20.049 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah, yeah, and some of this, you know, honestly, and I think this is… I think this is something that you and Robert and Clarence are working on, like, you know, I saw that comment yesterday about, yeah, we’ve got information sources in many places, we’ve got stuff in Linear, we’ve got stuff in GitHub, we’ve got stuff in Notion, we’ve got stuff in the platform, is, like, just me trying to catch up. Like, I got to a certain point where I was like, okay, this has honestly taken too long.
62 00:07:20.050 ⇒ 00:07:30.029 Greg Stoutenburg: And I, you know, I… for the… I respect my role in the company, like, this is taking me too long, this is costing the company too much money for me to continue trying to read stuff.
63 00:07:30.030 ⇒ 00:07:34.869 Greg Stoutenburg: And looking all around, so I’m just gonna wait till these calls happen, and just be like, alright, what has happened so far?
64 00:07:34.870 ⇒ 00:07:35.550 Uttam Kumaran: Yes.
65 00:07:35.550 ⇒ 00:07:44.830 Greg Stoutenburg: I need some… some further context. I did appreciate the one… the screenshot, very enthusiastic from, Caitlin.
66 00:07:44.830 ⇒ 00:07:46.890 Uttam Kumaran: Yes, yes.
67 00:07:47.040 ⇒ 00:07:47.760 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah.
68 00:07:47.760 ⇒ 00:07:52.619 Uttam Kumaran: No, but I agree, like, it’s… things are not… that’s why I’m always gonna push to be, like.
69 00:07:52.740 ⇒ 00:07:59.590 Uttam Kumaran: if I’m not… if I don’t see the output, and I don’t hear questions, then I’m like, something’s wrong, so you’re gonna see me. For everybody, I’m like…
70 00:07:59.830 ⇒ 00:08:17.449 Uttam Kumaran: I need to see Slack messages, and like, I don’t mind that type of spam at all. Yeah. If you go searching, it’s just not… it’s not all organized in a super coherent way at the moment, so it’s all a lot of tribal knowledge that we’ll have to get through two calls. I don’t mind doing that, and I don’t mind doing… getting Slacked all the time.
71 00:08:17.570 ⇒ 00:08:18.709 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, probably. Yeah, yeah.
72 00:08:18.730 ⇒ 00:08:27.709 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah, yeah, and then for, like, for the SOWs themselves, and yeah, you know, I scheduled just short conversations, later in the day,
73 00:08:27.830 ⇒ 00:08:42.049 Greg Stoutenburg: for the… for the SOWs themselves, I will follow the instructions in the repo that you pointed to, and use those examples. So yeah, that sounds good. Oh, and actually, if you can just name
74 00:08:42.049 ⇒ 00:08:53.139 Greg Stoutenburg: what, you know, between now and when we do have that call. If you could just, like, pick what you think is the closest approximation to what we’re doing for default, and just tell me that name, I’ll go find it and use that as an example.
75 00:08:53.140 ⇒ 00:09:02.970 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, so let me, let me think about, a couple.
76 00:09:10.380 ⇒ 00:09:15.179 Uttam Kumaran: Hold on, let me find out. We… I have a list of everyone we’ve done Amplitude stuff for.
77 00:09:36.650 ⇒ 00:09:47.180 Uttam Kumaran: These are all gonna be ones to call… to talk to Robert about, but all of these are Amplitude or Mixpanel engagements that we did, where we basically…
78 00:09:47.450 ⇒ 00:09:50.250 Uttam Kumaran: Either came into, like, a crappy setup, or we set it up.
79 00:09:50.730 ⇒ 00:09:51.260 Greg Stoutenburg: Okay.
80 00:09:51.260 ⇒ 00:09:51.780 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.
81 00:09:53.220 ⇒ 00:09:54.879 Greg Stoutenburg: Are you sending me something right now?
82 00:09:54.880 ⇒ 00:09:57.170 Uttam Kumaran: I just put it in our… in our Slack thread.
83 00:09:57.170 ⇒ 00:09:59.610 Greg Stoutenburg: Oh, cool. Okay, cool. Yeah, I’ll rely on that then.
84 00:09:59.610 ⇒ 00:10:00.130 Uttam Kumaran: Okay.
85 00:10:00.130 ⇒ 00:10:12.419 Greg Stoutenburg: Okay, cool. And then, yeah, I mean, then I guess my only other question is how, you know, so, like, you announced Monday for CSOs, like, here’s what we’re gonna do for, for comp, here’s what we’re.
86 00:10:12.420 ⇒ 00:10:12.950 Uttam Kumaran: Yes.
87 00:10:12.950 ⇒ 00:10:23.470 Greg Stoutenburg: for, KPIs and things like that. I was in one of those positions where I was like, I’m not sure how much of this applies to me, so I’m just gonna wait and bring it up when we have our one-on-one.
88 00:10:23.470 ⇒ 00:10:31.579 Uttam Kumaran: So, one thing is, like, I… I wanna see, if you land this, I feel pretty good about being able to bring you on, like.
89 00:10:31.840 ⇒ 00:10:36.100 Uttam Kumaran: full-time. So, that’s sort of, like, where I am, because
90 00:10:36.240 ⇒ 00:10:51.290 Uttam Kumaran: with the scope you’ll have for default and with Hydra, and it seems like the README thing is probably gonna end up coming back, like, that’s enough for you to manage. And then, even if we don’t, like, in my lens, even if I’m not making money, I’m gonna go get more clients, so it’s just enough…
91 00:10:51.310 ⇒ 00:11:00.699 Uttam Kumaran: I need enough to bring you on. So I think in the next 3 weeks, like, if we can arrive there. Otherwise, though, all the incentives on selling the deal.
92 00:11:00.990 ⇒ 00:11:12.219 Uttam Kumaran: like, on, bringing in new logos, that still all applies. We’re gonna… we’re gonna do contract amendments, like, this month to… to codify all that, but…
93 00:11:13.360 ⇒ 00:11:20.300 Uttam Kumaran: But yeah, I would say, like, any of the… any of the, deal-related incentives totally apply.
94 00:11:21.350 ⇒ 00:11:25.020 Uttam Kumaran: So I’ll just pay that out, like, whatever happens.
95 00:11:25.020 ⇒ 00:11:35.809 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah, yeah, yeah, okay. Yeah, and I’m, you know, like, as we… when we were talking about this, in December, I’m… I’m okay with being a contractor as long as I’m, you know, hitting some floor where,
96 00:11:35.810 ⇒ 00:11:36.310 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.
97 00:11:36.310 ⇒ 00:11:37.709 Greg Stoutenburg: You know, where the rent’s getting paid, so…
98 00:11:37.710 ⇒ 00:11:38.410 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
99 00:11:38.410 ⇒ 00:11:43.869 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah, I mean, I guess… Well, I don’t know.
100 00:11:43.870 ⇒ 00:11:47.500 Uttam Kumaran: I wanna, I, what I wanna do is, I wanna,
101 00:11:48.080 ⇒ 00:11:57.790 Uttam Kumaran: I think what we talked about is moving to some… moving to, like, hourly, like, with some minimums. Yeah. And so, that’s what I want to basically move to, at least, and then find a way to move that up to…
102 00:11:57.790 ⇒ 00:11:58.280 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah.
103 00:11:58.280 ⇒ 00:12:02.190 Uttam Kumaran: to 40 to something fixed. Like, that’s… those are the two milestones for me.
104 00:12:02.190 ⇒ 00:12:15.739 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah, no, that sounds good to me. So, like, I mean, so basically what I… in thinking about different ways that something like that could be structured, I was like, alright, what do I need? Just like… just like… I mean, can we talk numbers right now?
105 00:12:15.740 ⇒ 00:12:16.470 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
106 00:12:16.470 ⇒ 00:12:23.570 Greg Stoutenburg: It’s like, alright, realistically, what do I need to keep the lights on? It’s $8,000 a month. Okay. I was like, alright, so how do I get… For…
107 00:12:24.110 ⇒ 00:12:26.969 Uttam Kumaran: What’s it called? For this new product.
108 00:12:27.190 ⇒ 00:12:39.420 Uttam Kumaran: It’s sort of similar to… if you’re familiar with Clay, Clay.com, it’s sort of, like, linear… it’s like an enrichment product. They’re trying to get more into, like, allowing you to do… basically manage your entire sales team.
109 00:12:39.420 ⇒ 00:12:54.719 Uttam Kumaran: Within default, because they own the front of the funnel for inbound. Any inbound, they own the front of the funnel. Additionally, they also have all the same features as, like, a Cal.com or a Calendly. Like, you can create a default booking link that’s unique to you, that hooks into your calendar, so…
110 00:12:54.760 ⇒ 00:13:13.609 Uttam Kumaran: But in addition to just those features, because they own the inbound, they’re, like, really leveraged really well. And so they’re just basically, like, they’re like, okay, we own the person coming in, what are all the things that happen after that? Like, and so if you think about, like, a really big enterprise company, like, for example.
111 00:13:13.800 ⇒ 00:13:18.129 Uttam Kumaran: Like, this company, Cherry,
112 00:13:20.460 ⇒ 00:13:23.899 Uttam Kumaran: I forgot what it is… Barry…
113 00:13:26.950 ⇒ 00:13:29.529 Uttam Kumaran: I don’t think it’s these guys,
114 00:13:32.410 ⇒ 00:13:35.600 Uttam Kumaran: I forgot what the company… but, like,
115 00:13:35.820 ⇒ 00:13:51.809 Uttam Kumaran: like, there’s just a bunch of very, like, big companies that use default, because… but really, they’re poised for anybody that gets a lot of inbound. So, typically, like… but inbound, where they also have, like, a sales, like, enterprise, or a more…
116 00:13:51.810 ⇒ 00:13:52.280 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah.
117 00:13:52.310 ⇒ 00:13:55.760 Uttam Kumaran: Heavier sales motion. Yeah.
118 00:13:56.160 ⇒ 00:14:08.929 Uttam Kumaran: like, our company doesn’t… like, most of our stuff is not coming through inbound, it’s coming through, but we still have a presence, and we do get some, but it’s not big, so, like, we’re not a great customer of theirs, and so one of their strategies is they’re actually, like.
119 00:14:08.960 ⇒ 00:14:22.479 Uttam Kumaran: they’re gonna… they’re releasing… right now, they just have, like, one or two tiers. They’re working on a couple other tiers, they’re working on more sophisticated, like, features and things like that. They are thinking about releasing, like, a free version of the product.
120 00:14:22.480 ⇒ 00:14:37.499 Uttam Kumaran: But what they don’t want to do is, like, give those people, like, any support or anything. So, like, they basically use that as a magnet to get people to, like, add all your users, start booking meetings, and then they just sort of, like, ramp you up. But they are trying to go for enterprise, and so one of their big things is, like.
121 00:14:37.500 ⇒ 00:14:55.099 Uttam Kumaran: How do we identify people who have product usage characteristics that indicate they should be enterprise? Where is there friction on, like, sign-up? Basically, like, where is there friction on, like, doing anything within the platform, right? So part of this is, like, what are the core events that you want to track?
122 00:14:55.160 ⇒ 00:14:56.570 Uttam Kumaran: And,
123 00:14:56.680 ⇒ 00:15:02.269 Uttam Kumaran: I… let me see, I think I may have access to their amplitude. If so, I’m just gonna add you in there.
124 00:15:02.270 ⇒ 00:15:02.860 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah, please do.
125 00:15:05.780 ⇒ 00:15:13.609 Uttam Kumaran: I don’t… they don’t have any… I don’t think they have, like, anything, basically set up yet.
126 00:15:16.030 ⇒ 00:15:18.089 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, let me log in, hold on.
127 00:15:19.690 ⇒ 00:15:21.960 Uttam Kumaran: But yeah, any questions so far?
128 00:15:22.420 ⇒ 00:15:31.580 Greg Stoutenburg: No, this is good, and this is exactly the kind of context I need, because it’s, you know, it’s one thing to go and be like, alright, you know, statement of work, we’re gonna set up amplitude and log all.
129 00:15:31.580 ⇒ 00:15:37.419 Uttam Kumaran: No, no, no, I mean, that’s why I was like… I was like, when are the questions coming? Because I don’t even know what you’re looking at, yeah.
130 00:15:37.420 ⇒ 00:15:38.390 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
131 00:15:39.140 ⇒ 00:15:44.249 Uttam Kumaran: And I mainly don’t want, like, I don’t want to put you in front of Caitlin, you’ve never seen the… you’ve never, like.
132 00:15:44.560 ⇒ 00:15:48.030 Uttam Kumaran: Walked through the product before, so… That is…
133 00:15:48.340 ⇒ 00:15:49.680 Greg Stoutenburg: So Caitlin?
134 00:15:50.070 ⇒ 00:15:56.580 Uttam Kumaran: No, and this is, like, what bad salespeople and bad consultants do. They’re like, oh, yeah, I, like…
135 00:15:56.810 ⇒ 00:15:58.690 Uttam Kumaran: Nice to meet you, I’m Greg, like…
136 00:15:58.950 ⇒ 00:15:59.280 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah.
137 00:15:59.280 ⇒ 00:16:02.030 Uttam Kumaran: Well, tell me about your prom. It’s like, dude, what? Like…
138 00:16:02.220 ⇒ 00:16:05.879 Greg Stoutenburg: I just popped in for lunch. Yeah.
139 00:16:05.880 ⇒ 00:16:10.519 Uttam Kumaran: So this is their amplitude. We have an account under,
140 00:16:11.120 ⇒ 00:16:16.210 Uttam Kumaran: brainforge at default.com. Let me go ahead and add you to the 1Password for that.
141 00:16:16.360 ⇒ 00:16:17.890 Greg Stoutenburg: Okay.
142 00:16:19.360 ⇒ 00:16:20.800 Uttam Kumaran: Let you have that.
143 00:16:22.020 ⇒ 00:16:25.909 Uttam Kumaran: And they don’t use this at all. They have…
144 00:16:26.160 ⇒ 00:16:31.250 Uttam Kumaran: They have tracking set up, like, there is a pixel there somewhere.
145 00:16:31.260 ⇒ 00:16:32.800 Greg Stoutenburg: But.
146 00:16:32.810 ⇒ 00:16:36.200 Uttam Kumaran: nobody uses this. They set it up maybe, like, 2 years ago.
147 00:16:36.330 ⇒ 00:16:39.860 Uttam Kumaran: Okay, got it. And, like, it’s sort of sitting there, so…
148 00:16:39.860 ⇒ 00:16:40.460 Greg Stoutenburg: Yep.
149 00:16:41.070 ⇒ 00:16:44.160 Uttam Kumaran: You’re free to go through every single thing, and…
150 00:16:44.420 ⇒ 00:16:45.070 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah.
151 00:16:45.890 ⇒ 00:16:52.580 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, do whatever you need. I mean, the Amplitude Partners guy told us… to, like.
152 00:16:52.690 ⇒ 00:17:00.980 Uttam Kumaran: what… what’d he say? He said, try to cancel it and redo one. So, like, we can… if… if that’s possible here, I’m down to do that. I don’t…
153 00:17:01.100 ⇒ 00:17:02.560 Uttam Kumaran: Like, care too much?
154 00:17:03.220 ⇒ 00:17:05.840 Uttam Kumaran: I don’t know, like, if it’s, like, annoying, then…
155 00:17:06.479 ⇒ 00:17:12.609 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah, I wonder… yeah, I wonder what that comes to, like… Does that mean, like, completely…
156 00:17:12.709 ⇒ 00:17:15.890 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah. Delete their, yeah.
157 00:17:15.890 ⇒ 00:17:20.340 Greg Stoutenburg: their amplitude team, like, that seems like a big ask, even though we’d love to…
158 00:17:20.349 ⇒ 00:17:21.889 Uttam Kumaran: I don’t know, like, I don’t know…
159 00:17:22.129 ⇒ 00:17:28.709 Uttam Kumaran: I don’t… I don’t know how big of an ask it is, like, if they’re not really using it, then maybe it’s not that big of an ask, but .
160 00:17:29.390 ⇒ 00:17:29.920 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah, yeah.
161 00:17:29.920 ⇒ 00:17:38.959 Uttam Kumaran: Okay, so I just added you to the… Yeah, I just added you to the default 1Pass vault. You can log into the Brainforge at default.com.
162 00:17:39.190 ⇒ 00:17:42.179 Uttam Kumaran: Gmail, but that Gmail is used for…
163 00:17:42.540 ⇒ 00:17:46.809 Uttam Kumaran: for amplitude, the passkey is all linked up. I…
164 00:17:47.090 ⇒ 00:17:50.410 Uttam Kumaran: This is where, like, my kind of knowledge stops,
165 00:17:50.610 ⇒ 00:18:02.080 Uttam Kumaran: But, like, I can tell you all about the product. Mustafa can tell you all about, like, underlying product data. We already have all of their user… but this is, again, this is…
166 00:18:02.500 ⇒ 00:18:04.880 Uttam Kumaran: outside of Amplitude, we already have all their…
167 00:18:04.990 ⇒ 00:18:19.449 Uttam Kumaran: we have access to their Salesforce data, their subscription and revenue data, their users and, like, logins, and what assets they’re using. But we don’t have any type of, like, funnel, except, like, the core checkpoints, right, of course.
168 00:18:19.620 ⇒ 00:18:23.360 Uttam Kumaran: And, like, I don’t think anything is…
169 00:18:23.970 ⇒ 00:18:32.160 Uttam Kumaran: We talked about this maybe, like, 8 months ago, and then I haven’t… we haven’t done any amplitude work since then, because we just had all this other stuff to do, so…
170 00:18:32.160 ⇒ 00:18:37.709 Greg Stoutenburg: Okay, yeah, yeah, okay, good. That’s, that’s very up my alley, so that sounds good.
171 00:18:38.250 ⇒ 00:18:42.060 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, and I don’t know if it, like, helps that we have it. I can also…
172 00:18:42.540 ⇒ 00:18:46.199 Uttam Kumaran: I can get you a more filled-out default, but I feel like ours is…
173 00:18:46.860 ⇒ 00:18:54.569 Uttam Kumaran: good enough to probably play and see everything. I don’t know if, like… I guess you’ll be able to see the events, right, like, in Amplitudes once…
174 00:18:54.760 ⇒ 00:19:05.069 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah, as I click around in here, as long as they’re… as long as I’m actually firing events, I can open up the, the browser, extension, and just click around, and then see what shows up in amplitude.
175 00:19:05.070 ⇒ 00:19:10.769 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah. The other, the other, theme of, of default and Hydra is,
176 00:19:11.640 ⇒ 00:19:17.809 Uttam Kumaran: like, dissimilar to README, they’re both growing a ton, and they have extremely limited time.
177 00:19:17.930 ⇒ 00:19:23.750 Uttam Kumaran: And they’ve, they, they really, like, just need, like, as much help as possible, and they’re very open to help.
178 00:19:23.810 ⇒ 00:19:29.250 Greg Stoutenburg: Right. But the problem with them is that they are very, like, they’re kind of, like, frantic, like, meaning…
179 00:19:29.410 ⇒ 00:19:34.120 Uttam Kumaran: You may not be able to get a ton of their time, and…
180 00:19:34.460 ⇒ 00:19:37.769 Uttam Kumaran: We all… we kind of have to, like… it’s gonna be…
181 00:19:38.030 ⇒ 00:19:44.530 Uttam Kumaran: they’re not gonna care about the form factor. Like, they’re not a big deck. Neither of them are gonna be a big, like, deck crews, although we can…
182 00:19:44.530 ⇒ 00:19:58.059 Uttam Kumaran: still do them, but I want to give you the vibe that, like, they’re like, get to the… tell me, like, what to do here, tell me what to do here, you know, next, next, next. All of the people at default and Hedra are, like, true Series A,
183 00:19:58.090 ⇒ 00:20:00.060 Uttam Kumaran: New York SF startup, like…
184 00:20:00.060 ⇒ 00:20:00.600 Greg Stoutenburg: Okay.
185 00:20:00.600 ⇒ 00:20:05.650 Uttam Kumaran: really aggro, like, super startup people, so they’re not gonna care about, like.
186 00:20:05.810 ⇒ 00:20:16.580 Uttam Kumaran: polished, they’re gonna care about output, and like, what do I get? Like, tell me what I get, let me see stuff, let me get you next decisions. So to just give you a sense of, like, the pacing.
187 00:20:16.690 ⇒ 00:20:24.270 Uttam Kumaran: Readme, as you can tell, is this, like, old SF startup. They kind of have remnants of, like, a kind of chic office, but, like, they’re not…
188 00:20:24.500 ⇒ 00:20:28.000 Uttam Kumaran: Doing… they’re like, you know, it’s still kind of moving a little bit sluggish.
189 00:20:28.000 ⇒ 00:20:31.719 Greg Stoutenburg: Yep. These guys are, like, tripling every month, kind of like companies.
190 00:20:32.970 ⇒ 00:20:35.269 Uttam Kumaran: So, just to give you a sense of, like…
191 00:20:35.270 ⇒ 00:20:36.129 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
192 00:20:36.130 ⇒ 00:20:38.700 Uttam Kumaran: When you call them, Ru…
193 00:20:39.050 ⇒ 00:20:50.089 Uttam Kumaran: think about that kind of pacing, like, you know, that’s how they’re gonna wanna move. You’ll see when we talk to Caitlin, too, it’ll be very informal in that way.
194 00:20:50.560 ⇒ 00:21:02.420 Uttam Kumaran: I just don’t have that, like, friendship relationship with her, so, like, we will have some… it will be more formal, but similarly, like, they’re like, tell me what this does for me, like…
195 00:21:02.630 ⇒ 00:21:03.330 Greg Stoutenburg: Right.
196 00:21:03.330 ⇒ 00:21:09.720 Uttam Kumaran: I want, like, show me the output, and, like, let me sign something, let’s go, like, let’s keep going. So, just to give you that, you know.
197 00:21:09.720 ⇒ 00:21:10.669 Greg Stoutenburg: No, that’s helpful.
198 00:21:10.900 ⇒ 00:21:18.870 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, which I think is actually… it’s… it’s good in that, like, they care more about output, less about polish. It’s bad in that,
199 00:21:19.100 ⇒ 00:21:24.139 Uttam Kumaran: they don’t… they’re gonna rely on us for a lot of decisions. Like, we may not have…
200 00:21:24.140 ⇒ 00:21:24.700 Greg Stoutenburg: Hmm.
201 00:21:24.700 ⇒ 00:21:27.950 Uttam Kumaran: The best internal stakeholder yet.
202 00:21:27.950 ⇒ 00:21:28.620 Greg Stoutenburg: I hate it.
203 00:21:28.620 ⇒ 00:21:36.130 Uttam Kumaran: So, in both of these, we’re gonna find out, is Sandra and Caitlin the ones, or is there someone else that, like, we should pair with?
204 00:21:36.130 ⇒ 00:21:36.460 Greg Stoutenburg: Right.
205 00:21:36.460 ⇒ 00:21:43.290 Uttam Kumaran: Like, so on… we have one other work stream with both of these. For default, for the other work stream.
206 00:21:43.290 ⇒ 00:21:56.499 Uttam Kumaran: We’re starting to work with the rest of their team, the head of revenue, other people, just… and then Caitlin is, like, our ultimate, like, stakeholder, who, like, we surface all the work we’re doing for people, but I’ve… I’ve now gone as sort of, like, we’re talking to others.
207 00:21:56.510 ⇒ 00:21:59.509 Uttam Kumaran: Similar here, Caitlin may be the first person, and then she…
208 00:21:59.580 ⇒ 00:22:08.150 Uttam Kumaran: Internally, they’re all doing a lot of stuff, so she’ll help you figure out, like, who’s the best person that, like, maybe needs to be looped in on this, that you can work directly with.
209 00:22:08.400 ⇒ 00:22:11.540 Uttam Kumaran: But she is our biggest champion internally, so…
210 00:22:11.540 ⇒ 00:22:12.210 Greg Stoutenburg: Okay.
211 00:22:12.420 ⇒ 00:22:14.489 Greg Stoutenburg: Okay, that’s excellent context.
212 00:22:15.380 ⇒ 00:22:16.000 Greg Stoutenburg: Cool.
213 00:22:16.000 ⇒ 00:22:16.580 Uttam Kumaran: Cool.
214 00:22:16.740 ⇒ 00:22:24.650 Greg Stoutenburg: Alright, very good. Cool, alright, and then I’ll be talking to… well, yeah, I mean, we’ll see if Demi logs on in…
215 00:22:24.650 ⇒ 00:22:36.459 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, just send a note, you can just send a note to him, and we can both hop on. But yeah, I mean, yeah, he’s also, like, fairly new to default, so he’s gonna know, but I think it’s helpful that you two kind of, like, yeah.
216 00:22:36.870 ⇒ 00:22:42.420 Uttam Kumaran: stay together on, like, everything, because I’m gonna start to… remove myself. 8 ounce.
217 00:22:42.420 ⇒ 00:22:42.890 Greg Stoutenburg: Yep.
218 00:22:42.890 ⇒ 00:22:43.600 Uttam Kumaran: Yes.
219 00:22:43.600 ⇒ 00:22:46.069 Greg Stoutenburg: Sounds good. But, again, it’s like, it’s.
220 00:22:46.610 ⇒ 00:22:51.990 Uttam Kumaran: This one is, like, I’ve already teed it up, I feel like it’s gonna go through, so… Yeah.
221 00:22:51.990 ⇒ 00:22:56.249 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah. Cool. Awesome. Alright. Thanks. Appreciate it.
222 00:22:56.460 ⇒ 00:22:57.919 Uttam Kumaran: Talk to you soon. Goodbye.