Meeting Title: Brainforge Weekly Ops and Recruitment Sync Date: 2026-02-24 Meeting participants: Elizah Joy, Rico Rejoso, Uttam Kumaran, Kaela Gallagher
WEBVTT
1 00:00:20.340 ⇒ 00:00:21.530 Elizah Joy: Hi, Rico.
2 00:00:25.200 ⇒ 00:00:25.800 Rico Rejoso: Hey, yo.
3 00:00:26.640 ⇒ 00:00:29.200 Elizah Joy: Alright, let’s just wait for, Utang.
4 00:00:29.430 ⇒ 00:00:30.010 Rico Rejoso: Okay.
5 00:00:36.290 ⇒ 00:00:37.960 Rico Rejoso: By the way, you did the interruption, Tony.
6 00:00:39.310 ⇒ 00:00:40.530 Elizah Joy: Mmm, sorry?
7 00:00:40.790 ⇒ 00:00:43.030 Rico Rejoso: You can do the introduction, introduction.
8 00:00:43.440 ⇒ 00:00:44.530 Elizah Joy: Oh, okay, okay.
9 00:02:08.780 ⇒ 00:02:09.490 Uttam Kumaran: Hey, guys.
10 00:02:10.660 ⇒ 00:02:11.990 Elizah Joy: Hi, Tom.
11 00:02:11.990 ⇒ 00:02:14.490 Uttam Kumaran: Hi, how are you? Sorry for moving,
12 00:02:14.680 ⇒ 00:02:18.249 Uttam Kumaran: Moving this meeting around. This is my favorite meeting of the week, so…
13 00:02:18.990 ⇒ 00:02:22.799 Uttam Kumaran: I, I feel bad, but I appreciate… I know you guys are flexible, so thank you.
14 00:02:24.050 ⇒ 00:02:25.040 Rico Rejoso: No worries.
15 00:02:28.810 ⇒ 00:02:29.390 Rico Rejoso: Yep, 11.
16 00:02:31.150 ⇒ 00:02:37.739 Elizah Joy: Okay. So yeah, for today, for ops meeting.
17 00:02:37.780 ⇒ 00:02:53.340 Elizah Joy: We’re gonna go through the renewals for this week and the… for the next two weeks, the recruitment updates, expense requests, what was accomplished last week, and then we’re also gonna do a review on the priorities that we have for the Gantt chart.
18 00:02:53.340 ⇒ 00:03:00.660 Elizah Joy: And then this week’s priorities based on the Gantt chart as well, which was the, which is the operating and then invoice reminder automation.
19 00:03:01.730 ⇒ 00:03:02.240 Uttam Kumaran: Okay.
20 00:03:06.950 ⇒ 00:03:14.819 Rico Rejoso: Yep, for the next two weeks, here are the, updates that we have for client contracts. Remote, we haven’t got any renewal updates yet.
21 00:03:14.950 ⇒ 00:03:17.380 Rico Rejoso: Contract ended last February 9.
22 00:03:17.510 ⇒ 00:03:35.110 Rico Rejoso: For Magic Spoon, we have sent a contract for signing both the MSA and SOW, just waiting for, the following signer to sign it. Urban Stems, I… we heard about our thoughts about, renewal for Urban Stems, but haven’t got any, clarification about the
23 00:03:35.290 ⇒ 00:03:38.850 Rico Rejoso: SOWs for the discussion about it yet.
24 00:03:39.200 ⇒ 00:03:46.719 Rico Rejoso: I know you had your, meeting with LMNT in regards, contract renewal, right, and SOWs.
25 00:03:47.300 ⇒ 00:03:47.800 Rico Rejoso: So…
26 00:03:47.800 ⇒ 00:03:52.849 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, so… yeah, so for Remo, Remo is, is, is, ending.
27 00:03:53.120 ⇒ 00:04:01.190 Uttam Kumaran: So, no renewal on Remo, which is… which is expected, like, I don’t think we expected to,
28 00:04:01.740 ⇒ 00:04:03.500 Uttam Kumaran: So, that’s one piece.
29 00:04:03.700 ⇒ 00:04:09.229 Uttam Kumaran: Like, what’s helpful, Rico, should I just, like, comment directly on the slides? Like, I just want to make sure, or what do you think’s helpful?
30 00:04:09.580 ⇒ 00:04:11.039 Rico Rejoso: Yeah, I can note it, no worries.
31 00:04:11.040 ⇒ 00:04:16.340 Uttam Kumaran: Okay, okay, okay, cool. So Remo, that’s ending, Magic Spoon, it’s still…
32 00:04:16.829 ⇒ 00:04:23.070 Uttam Kumaran: being litigated. Drink Element, we’re on… we’re… we are on track. We just met with them today.
33 00:04:23.300 ⇒ 00:04:26.670 Uttam Kumaran: And then Hydra, yeah, that, that, that’s ending.
34 00:04:27.040 ⇒ 00:04:35.510 Uttam Kumaran: For Jasmine and Joe, yeah, I need to talk… can you start a… Group chat with,
35 00:04:36.220 ⇒ 00:04:42.260 Uttam Kumaran: me, with, with, with Asa and, and and Hannah and Luke?
36 00:04:42.500 ⇒ 00:04:45.189 Uttam Kumaran: to ask about whether they want to keep Joe.
37 00:04:46.130 ⇒ 00:04:49.050 Uttam Kumaran: And, like, whether we want to extend, it’s gonna be their decision.
38 00:04:49.650 ⇒ 00:04:50.720 Rico Rejoso: Okay, got it, yeah.
39 00:04:53.890 ⇒ 00:04:56.040 Rico Rejoso: And for Jasmine,
40 00:04:56.660 ⇒ 00:05:01.160 Rico Rejoso: Are you and Robert taking care of, what are the next steps for Jasmine Wick?
41 00:05:03.460 ⇒ 00:05:06.340 Uttam Kumaran: Yes, me and Robert are taking care of that as well.
42 00:05:06.710 ⇒ 00:05:16.250 Rico Rejoso: Okay, gotcha. So let us know in case, so we can prepare the contract ahead of time, or prior to the expiring of the contracts, to get it prepared for the amendment.
43 00:05:18.130 ⇒ 00:05:18.910 Uttam Kumaran: Okay.
44 00:05:19.080 ⇒ 00:05:32.170 Rico Rejoso: Alright, that’s it for our contracts. Next up, for recruitment, so I’m still ramping up… I mean, I’m still syncing with Kayla, and we’re gonna ramp up with the process and everything, so I’ll be providing the short updates for the recruitment. For our schedule.
45 00:05:32.170 ⇒ 00:05:38.130 Uttam Kumaran: So I guess question, question there, like, I guess two things, Rico. One, like, maybe let’s have,
46 00:05:38.760 ⇒ 00:05:43.330 Uttam Kumaran: Let’s have, her in this meeting, so she can present.
47 00:05:43.540 ⇒ 00:05:48.059 Uttam Kumaran: I don’t know… I don’t know what her plan is, but maybe that’s also something we can…
48 00:05:49.140 ⇒ 00:05:50.400 Uttam Kumaran: We can talk about?
49 00:05:51.620 ⇒ 00:05:53.410 Uttam Kumaran: If she wants to take this slide.
50 00:05:53.550 ⇒ 00:05:56.590 Uttam Kumaran: Or if she wants to book another meeting for recruitment each week.
51 00:05:57.000 ⇒ 00:06:02.739 Uttam Kumaran: Can you… can you… can you ask, can you coordinate with that in the… in the channel with her? Because then I’d like to pass this off to her.
52 00:06:03.150 ⇒ 00:06:22.990 Rico Rejoso: Yeah, actually, it’s one of my notes. We’re meeting after this one, and we’re gonna discuss about her plan and, you know, also continue to wrap her up when it comes to the recruitment process. I don’t want to overwhelm her yet by, you know, introducing or having her present this, so I’m just doing a first pass on this, and afterwards, we’ll have, Kayla do the recruitment updates.
53 00:06:23.630 ⇒ 00:06:24.800 Uttam Kumaran: Okay, okay.
54 00:06:26.130 ⇒ 00:06:31.489 Rico Rejoso: So, yeah, short updates for recruitment. We have the following for scheduled applicants for…
55 00:06:31.630 ⇒ 00:06:44.530 Rico Rejoso: for first round, two for second round, two for final round. We are supposed to have, like, another two for final round, but we need to confirm the interview task for… on data engineers. I haven’t got a response yet for Voish.
56 00:06:44.700 ⇒ 00:06:52.640 Rico Rejoso: But right now, what we have are for AI engineers and for data analysts. So, wondering what should be the interview task for data engineers.
57 00:06:58.250 ⇒ 00:07:03.300 Rico Rejoso: I can send it to the Slack channel later on, so you can review the list of tests that we have currently.
58 00:07:03.660 ⇒ 00:07:10.180 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, send it to us, and then, again, I also can… I also think Kayla should be involved in that decision, so…
59 00:07:10.180 ⇒ 00:07:11.410 Rico Rejoso: Okay, yep, definitely.
60 00:07:11.410 ⇒ 00:07:12.220 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.
61 00:07:15.240 ⇒ 00:07:21.089 Rico Rejoso: Okay, let me, include that to our discussion later after this meeting, and we’ll provide updates on the Slack channel, okay?
62 00:07:23.740 ⇒ 00:07:24.270 Uttam Kumaran: Okay.
63 00:07:24.720 ⇒ 00:07:25.880 Rico Rejoso: Alrighty,
64 00:07:27.030 ⇒ 00:07:33.660 Rico Rejoso: And just speaking this, if in case we still have 3 individuals for review, I mean, for loom review.
65 00:07:34.030 ⇒ 00:07:45.120 Rico Rejoso: If in case you have the time later this week, feel free to review and let us know about the next steps for them, or if we can… if Awish has capacity to take on this, let me know. I can also forward it to him.
66 00:07:46.130 ⇒ 00:07:47.090 Uttam Kumaran: Okay, okay.
67 00:07:48.050 ⇒ 00:07:49.879 Rico Rejoso: Alright, so that’s for recruitment.
68 00:07:49.880 ⇒ 00:07:53.000 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, I can be… I can be involved in this. I think just, like.
69 00:07:53.000 ⇒ 00:07:55.119 Rico Rejoso: again, ideally, it’s, like, Kayla…
70 00:07:55.490 ⇒ 00:07:58.620 Uttam Kumaran: It’s like, me, you, Kayla, and Awash.
71 00:07:58.730 ⇒ 00:08:01.510 Uttam Kumaran: And, yeah, that would be ideal.
72 00:08:01.890 ⇒ 00:08:09.130 Rico Rejoso: Yeah, I think one question for Kayla, from Kayla, in regards to, reviewing the loom review for any position, like, what’s your criteria for it?
73 00:08:09.510 ⇒ 00:08:15.740 Rico Rejoso: what’s, basically, you’re looking for for each candidate, when reviewing their room, so we can also take note of it.
74 00:08:15.740 ⇒ 00:08:21.560 Uttam Kumaran: Actually, here, Kayla’s actually said she can just sit in on it, so let me just… let me just ping this to her, I can ask her if she can join.
75 00:08:22.050 ⇒ 00:08:23.360 Rico Rejoso: Okay, yep, definitely.
76 00:08:29.180 ⇒ 00:08:32.030 Uttam Kumaran: Okay, let’s, let’s wait till she comes, we can, we can move forward.
77 00:08:32.400 ⇒ 00:08:33.659 Rico Rejoso: We’ll come back to this.
78 00:08:33.659 ⇒ 00:08:34.450 Uttam Kumaran: Cool, cool.
79 00:08:35.659 ⇒ 00:08:39.569 Rico Rejoso: Yep, we can proceed with the expense request for now, Eliza?
80 00:08:40.100 ⇒ 00:08:52.849 Elizah Joy: Alright, so for our expense requests, we’ve got an tool request from Awasht. It’s actually a noise-canceling software, CRISP specifically, so it’s a monthly subscription.
81 00:08:52.930 ⇒ 00:09:07.790 Elizah Joy: My suggestion is, since he, what he mentioned is that he’s gonna be using that mainly for meetings, he’s got a noise-canceling headphones, but he, mentioned that it only cancels
82 00:09:08.280 ⇒ 00:09:21.769 Elizah Joy: noise on his end, but not for the clients. So, I would suggest him to, get initially, like, a Zoom built-in noise cancelling feature, if he could use that. I’m not sure if he’ve used that one before, but,
83 00:09:21.830 ⇒ 00:09:29.329 Elizah Joy: a message to that one for him. And then for Sales Navigator, this is about the,
84 00:09:29.920 ⇒ 00:09:36.520 Elizah Joy: linear message that you’ve sent over, Utam. So, let’s go with the team. So, 4 seats for Sales Navigator.
85 00:09:36.520 ⇒ 00:09:46.990 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, maybe let’s, like, on the tool request side, I think you’re… I think you’re correct, Eliza. I think if that doesn’t work, I mean, this headphone that I have, is the one that we recommend. It is, like.
86 00:09:46.990 ⇒ 00:09:47.550 Elizah Joy: Hmm.
87 00:09:47.550 ⇒ 00:10:04.679 Uttam Kumaran: it’s not noise cancelling for me, but it is, like, noise-canceling for anyone on the line. So, I think this is… this is in our device policy, right? So, he should… he should just use this, but you’re right, the Zoom… the Zoom noise-canceling is really good, like, he should just consider using that.
88 00:10:05.060 ⇒ 00:10:19.360 Elizah Joy: Yeah, also, because we, since it’s a tool request, and it, this is what Rico mentioned earlier, it’s gonna be a monthly subscription, right? So if we’re gonna do… push forward with the crisps, and it’s also…
89 00:10:19.360 ⇒ 00:10:35.790 Elizah Joy: gonna impact our software expenses, and, we’d rather have that… if we’re gonna use Crisp, like, have other team members use that as well. So we did factor that in. So yeah, for the meantime, I think, Zoom built-in noise cancelling feature is a good one, but I’ll message him about that.
90 00:10:35.800 ⇒ 00:10:38.710 Rico Rejoso: And then, go ahead, Nikka.
91 00:10:38.880 ⇒ 00:10:53.769 Rico Rejoso: I mean, just to add on that, so we haven’t really narrowed down the expense request, documentation that we have, but we’re planning to also include there, like, for any recurring subs… or subscription like this, to, you know, provide a note on how this should go, or…
92 00:10:53.920 ⇒ 00:10:58.369 Rico Rejoso: Because I don’t think that it’s included, that’s why this has been requested by a wish, right?
93 00:10:58.370 ⇒ 00:10:59.050 Elizah Joy: Yeah.
94 00:10:59.260 ⇒ 00:11:00.819 Elizah Joy: Yeah, not yet.
95 00:11:02.440 ⇒ 00:11:03.320 Rico Rejoso: Okay, yeah.
96 00:11:06.120 ⇒ 00:11:24.029 Elizah Joy: Okay, and then, yeah, software, so Sales Navigator, we’ll go with 4 seats, because we, at the moment, we have your account there, Utam, and then Robert’s, and then we want to have Luke’s as well. And then, yeah, we’re creating a transition plan, or…
97 00:11:24.030 ⇒ 00:11:27.240 Uttam Kumaran: So, wait, who is it? It’s me, it’s me, Robert, Luke, and then who else?
98 00:11:27.240 ⇒ 00:11:32.890 Elizah Joy: Yeah. There was one, I think it’s, Ryan, if I’m not mistaken.
99 00:11:33.290 ⇒ 00:11:36.709 Uttam Kumaran: Okay. Yeah, I wonder if one of them can just use, like.
100 00:11:37.120 ⇒ 00:11:40.840 Uttam Kumaran: like, if Ryan is not directly sending messages from his account, I was wondering if.
101 00:11:40.840 ⇒ 00:11:41.530 Elizah Joy: Interesting smile.
102 00:11:41.530 ⇒ 00:11:42.399 Uttam Kumaran: my account.
103 00:11:42.560 ⇒ 00:11:45.739 Uttam Kumaran: And we can do 3, because it’s like a… it’s like 120 bucks a month.
104 00:11:45.740 ⇒ 00:11:51.160 Elizah Joy: Hmm, okay, yep. I’ll look into that, and then I’ll keep you posted on that.
105 00:11:51.710 ⇒ 00:11:52.579 Uttam Kumaran: Okay, okay.
106 00:11:53.090 ⇒ 00:11:53.770 Elizah Joy: Hmm.
107 00:11:56.880 ⇒ 00:12:14.070 Elizah Joy: Okay, and then, yeah, I’ll send over the transition plan for that, so, once that’s finalized. But basically, that’s gonna include, having that individual account into Teamplan, migrate those leads if we have those, and then assign DRIs for that.
108 00:12:14.070 ⇒ 00:12:29.170 Elizah Joy: And then, for equipment requests, so this is the monitor that Kayla requested. So, the request was submitted, last February 17th, but, we’ve already received a receipt yesterday, so this has been…
109 00:12:29.420 ⇒ 00:12:31.480 Elizah Joy: Already, bought.
110 00:12:32.350 ⇒ 00:12:32.880 Uttam Kumaran: Cool.
111 00:12:33.290 ⇒ 00:12:39.870 Elizah Joy: Yep, and then for Sheshu, we’ve declined or denied his request, because,
112 00:12:40.650 ⇒ 00:12:54.200 Elizah Joy: Initially, he did not, attach any receipts to that, so at the moment, that’s declined, but, we’ll send him an email if he could, send out that travel receipt so that we can get that updated and reimbursed for him.
113 00:12:54.980 ⇒ 00:12:55.510 Uttam Kumaran: Okay.
114 00:12:57.870 ⇒ 00:13:03.410 Rico Rejoso: Okay, yeah, since we had Kayla, we can, go back to the recruitment updates, perhaps? Yeah.
115 00:13:03.410 ⇒ 00:13:13.030 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, so to give you context, Kayla, right now, basically everything… several teams sort of are peeling off out of, like, ops.
116 00:13:13.250 ⇒ 00:13:22.490 Uttam Kumaran: Right, ops was sort of the high-level ownership of, like, delivery, operations, Recruiting, finance, and just, like.
117 00:13:22.600 ⇒ 00:13:29.430 Uttam Kumaran: I’ll just say, like, general operations. So, recruiting is sort of the first one that’s now sort of being
118 00:13:29.770 ⇒ 00:13:45.820 Uttam Kumaran: sort of, like, moved under your purview, so you kind of have a decision to make. It’s like, we… we meet every week around this time. Recruitment has a slide here. If you’d like to use the same meeting and… and present sort of an update, we can go through, again.
119 00:13:45.820 ⇒ 00:14:01.420 Uttam Kumaran: like, sort of what the update format is. I think it’s all gonna be a lot… it’s… it’s really, really small, so, like, I assume you’re gonna be presenting probably on a bit more. So if you want to have another meeting for that, we can totally do that, or if you want to also do it in conjunction with this meeting.
120 00:14:01.530 ⇒ 00:14:05.689 Uttam Kumaran: If you… I can also give you my advice, so up to you.
121 00:14:06.200 ⇒ 00:14:17.390 Kaela Gallagher: Okay, yeah, I think for now, while I’m ramping up, being a part of this meeting is totally fine, and then once I see how a couple of these go, maybe then we can make a call.
122 00:14:17.810 ⇒ 00:14:32.550 Uttam Kumaran: Okay, cool. Yeah, I agree. I mean, really, the people involved in recruiting, apart from the interviewers, are all here, so I also agree. I think if you find that, like, hey, we want to include other people, or we just want to, like, have, you know, a longer session, we can branch out, so…
123 00:14:32.810 ⇒ 00:14:33.530 Kaela Gallagher: Cool.
124 00:14:33.810 ⇒ 00:14:40.830 Uttam Kumaran: Great. So yeah, maybe Rico, go through, kind of like, how you typically do recruitment update, and then we’ll just do our usual.
125 00:14:42.350 ⇒ 00:14:43.370 Rico Rejoso: Yep,
126 00:14:43.940 ⇒ 00:14:58.549 Rico Rejoso: Just to inform about the current applicants that we have for schedule, and for those that are still for booking, applicants are those that we have already sent out emails with, but haven’t booked yet with the team members, we have the following list for a total of 8.
127 00:14:58.590 ⇒ 00:15:13.289 Rico Rejoso: applicants that were scheduled, for first round, second, and final round. I think one thing, we still have two applicants that are pending, or that’s, that needs to book for final round, but we haven’t confirmed the data engineers in 30 tests yet.
128 00:15:13.290 ⇒ 00:15:25.970 Rico Rejoso: Right? So, we were talking about earlier, what should be the interview test for the data engineers. Currently, we have one for data analysts and for AI engineers. So, if, you know, Kaylee, you can take a first pass on the
129 00:15:26.050 ⇒ 00:15:44.440 Rico Rejoso: interview tasks, for data engineer, based off what we currently have right now on the hiring and recruitment page. We can discuss data as, you know, help from Awash, our engineer head, and with, in regards to finalizing the interview task for, data engineers, yeah.
130 00:15:45.730 ⇒ 00:15:46.360 Rico Rejoso: So we have…
131 00:15:46.360 ⇒ 00:15:52.029 Uttam Kumaran: We have, like, we have final round, sort of, presentation style,
132 00:15:52.160 ⇒ 00:16:09.610 Uttam Kumaran: interviews, where there’s, like, a task, and you come and present to sort of a panel. I think, you know, again, it’s sort of, like, where we are at now, so totally open to, like, any feedback or best practices that you want to institute. We can make those changes basically at any moment. So if you’re like, hey, I have
133 00:16:10.210 ⇒ 00:16:19.909 Uttam Kumaran: we should just run this style thing, or whatever, like, we could do that. We have a few people that are going to go into final round, so I guess I would ask that, like.
134 00:16:20.010 ⇒ 00:16:26.830 Uttam Kumaran: maybe if we’re, like, if you review that, and you’re like, hey, I think there’s some better changes to the structure, we should just go ahead and do that, because.
135 00:16:26.830 ⇒ 00:16:27.290 Kaela Gallagher: Okay.
136 00:16:27.290 ⇒ 00:16:32.370 Uttam Kumaran: It’s gonna be better than, like, what I thought through in, like, 10 minutes, probably 6 or 9 months ago.
137 00:16:32.600 ⇒ 00:16:35.070 Kaela Gallagher: Okay. Okay. Got it.
138 00:16:35.800 ⇒ 00:16:41.219 Uttam Kumaran: I don’t know if you had any, like, learnings from, like, final round technical interviews before, or, like, any thoughts?
139 00:16:41.540 ⇒ 00:16:43.190 Uttam Kumaran: Just, like, off the cuff.
140 00:16:45.420 ⇒ 00:17:02.389 Kaela Gallagher: I’m trying to think, because typically in the past, I haven’t been, like, the decision maker on what is asked in the interviews. Okay. So I can definitely look into it a bit further, but I’m not, technical.
141 00:17:02.390 ⇒ 00:17:02.820 Uttam Kumaran: myself.
142 00:17:02.830 ⇒ 00:17:04.040 Kaela Gallagher: So…
143 00:17:04.040 ⇒ 00:17:06.259 Uttam Kumaran: I guess more, more I’m thinking about, like.
144 00:17:06.670 ⇒ 00:17:14.580 Uttam Kumaran: what the ergonomics of that… even that call is. Like, typically what we do is we give… we give people, like, a week to work on an exercise, they come.
145 00:17:15.230 ⇒ 00:17:31.839 Uttam Kumaran: I don’t know… I actually should re-read it, like, if we ask them to put the deck together, or put something together, and then we basically spend an hour, like, kind of poking and prodding at it, like, the solution. I think there’s probably some… that process probably needs a lot more harnesses.
146 00:17:32.390 ⇒ 00:17:41.039 Uttam Kumaran: Like, probably some clarity, both for the interviewer side and for the interviewee on, like, what the expectations are.
147 00:17:42.950 ⇒ 00:17:57.250 Uttam Kumaran: So, like, even, like, the technical assessment itself aside, I think even help making sure that that, like, coordination is happening would be helpful. Because I think this is an exercise, a wish and I came up with, yeah, maybe, like, 6, 7, or 8 months ago.
148 00:17:57.250 ⇒ 00:17:58.380 Kaela Gallagher: Okay.
149 00:17:58.390 ⇒ 00:18:05.040 Uttam Kumaran: it’s okay, like, you can leave that… what the exercise is to us. I think just having a, like, an idea of, like, what
150 00:18:05.410 ⇒ 00:18:20.500 Uttam Kumaran: like, what makes a great exercise, or, like, some way for us to evaluate, like, does this exercise hit at these key points? And then, does the candidate understand, like, what the expectations are of that final interview? And certainly, like, I would love to have you sit in on those so you can see.
151 00:18:21.460 ⇒ 00:18:26.519 Kaela Gallagher: Yeah, yeah, that would be really helpful. I think we have one going off this week.
152 00:18:28.040 ⇒ 00:18:35.439 Kaela Gallagher: Okay. Yeah, we can definitely look into that a little bit… a little bit further. Do you guys do any, like, live…
153 00:18:36.100 ⇒ 00:18:40.749 Kaela Gallagher: like, challenges, or technical review, or anything like that? Okay.
154 00:18:40.750 ⇒ 00:18:53.740 Uttam Kumaran: Not really. I mean, this is kind of like an executive decision on my end, in that, like, I was an engineer and did a lot of technical interviews, and I feel like they’re incredibly stressful, and not really a good judge of, like.
155 00:18:54.300 ⇒ 00:18:58.050 Uttam Kumaran: Whether someone is gonna thrive at Brainforge, necessarily.
156 00:18:58.390 ⇒ 00:18:58.780 Kaela Gallagher: Yeah.
157 00:18:58.780 ⇒ 00:19:11.229 Uttam Kumaran: I’ll say… I’ll say this, then I’m interested in, like, what your feedback is, but, so instead, what I said is we have to raise the bar in how we interview and how we onboard, not just, like.
158 00:19:11.520 ⇒ 00:19:27.139 Uttam Kumaran: let’s just put a lead code thing in front of people. So, we… we try to have two interviews, one that’s more technical, one that’s more behavioral, and then a presentation, because a lot of our job for on the delivery side is communication. And so.
159 00:19:27.340 ⇒ 00:19:34.779 Uttam Kumaran: as AI is coming up, I actually feel that, like, in the first two interviews, it’s easy for us to suss out whether someone is, like, legit, like…
160 00:19:34.940 ⇒ 00:19:47.899 Uttam Kumaran: I mean, we’ve had the gamut of people try things, like use AI to do interviews and stuff like that, but, like, it’s actually… all of our people are senior, they can pretty easily find out if someone, like, knows what they’re talking about. Then, really, what it’s up to do is find out whether they can present.
161 00:19:47.960 ⇒ 00:19:52.259 Kaela Gallagher: Like, can they be… can they come to a meeting, organize, and present a solution?
162 00:19:52.260 ⇒ 00:19:55.030 Uttam Kumaran: That is, like, what’s actually much more valuable.
163 00:19:55.550 ⇒ 00:19:56.000 Kaela Gallagher: Yeah.
164 00:19:56.000 ⇒ 00:20:02.789 Uttam Kumaran: And in my career, I felt… I was DQ’d many times for technical interviews, and, like, that was a mistake on their part for doing that.
165 00:20:02.790 ⇒ 00:20:03.240 Kaela Gallagher: Yeah. You know?
166 00:20:03.240 ⇒ 00:20:11.269 Uttam Kumaran: So, I, and I was… it was, like, so ner… it was, like, horrible. Like, I hated it. And so, I don’t know, it felt, like, weird to have to…
167 00:20:11.950 ⇒ 00:20:13.409 Uttam Kumaran: To do that, you know?
168 00:20:13.410 ⇒ 00:20:22.870 Kaela Gallagher: Yeah, that’s the feedback that I’ve received from engineers as well, is, like, that any sort of, like, live coding or technical test is…
169 00:20:22.870 ⇒ 00:20:37.010 Kaela Gallagher: not accurate to, like, what you’re actually going to be doing in a job. You know, you’re gonna have time to go think and present and, you know, prepare and whatever. So, I think especially given the roles that we’re hiring for, being very delivery-focused.
170 00:20:37.230 ⇒ 00:20:50.109 Kaela Gallagher: having a final round at… with the presentation, like, makes sense right now, but, especially as I’m, like, sitting in each of the rounds and learning more about the process, I can share feedback if I… if I see it.
171 00:20:50.490 ⇒ 00:20:51.100 Uttam Kumaran: Okay.
172 00:20:53.760 ⇒ 00:20:56.699 Kaela Gallagher: Sorry, Rico, to interrupt and go on a tangent.
173 00:20:56.700 ⇒ 00:20:59.529 Uttam Kumaran: No, I think this is great, like, we haven’t had…
174 00:20:59.860 ⇒ 00:21:03.430 Uttam Kumaran: To be able to have a discussion about it, you know, so this is helpful.
175 00:21:03.660 ⇒ 00:21:04.490 Kaela Gallagher: Perfect.
176 00:21:06.280 ⇒ 00:21:11.860 Rico Rejoso: Yep, we can also deep dive further, on our site later, Caleb, and, you know, maybe brainstorm.
177 00:21:12.000 ⇒ 00:21:13.059 Rico Rejoso: Like, a few.
178 00:21:13.060 ⇒ 00:21:26.650 Uttam Kumaran: I think, Rico, one thing that would be helpful for this slide, too, is just to know, like, when some of these interviews are happening. Like, you don’t even have to write it in here, you can even just take a screenshot of, like, the Notion board, just so I can… I can understand, like.
179 00:21:26.750 ⇒ 00:21:44.069 Uttam Kumaran: the sequencing, because for me, we’re… we’re starting… some clients are hitting renewals, and so I just want to know, like, okay, for folks that are getting the final round, like, of course, like, we have some… some faith that they’ll make it, like, when they can slot in, and so just… just seeing that on a weekly basis here would be helpful.
180 00:21:44.710 ⇒ 00:21:45.510 Rico Rejoso: Gotcha.
181 00:21:45.760 ⇒ 00:21:46.720 Kaela Gallagher: Yeah, I…
182 00:21:47.530 ⇒ 00:22:01.769 Kaela Gallagher: Just to add, Rico, sorry, really quick, I feel like as… also, like, this… what we’re reading in front of us right now is different than what the Notion board reads right now. I think there’s some candidates on the Notion board that are,
183 00:22:02.060 ⇒ 00:22:15.239 Kaela Gallagher: not in the process anymore, like, not active, so, yeah, it would be helpful to kind of see both. And then, I know we called out yesterday, but, like, one of our final rounds is scheduled over a month out. So, yeah, it would be helpful to see that.
184 00:22:16.500 ⇒ 00:22:31.400 Rico Rejoso: Yep, definitely, I can add that. In regards to that individual, I also noted, like, if we can confirm a date that everyone on that panel interview can agree on, we can move it until an earlier date. I also informed the candidate through email.
185 00:22:32.510 ⇒ 00:22:33.910 Kaela Gallagher: Thank you. Perfect.
186 00:22:36.460 ⇒ 00:22:38.449 Rico Rejoso: Okay, we can continue.
187 00:22:41.690 ⇒ 00:22:54.730 Rico Rejoso: Alright, so next up, we have the operating dry run. We… I mean, we presented, or we sent out the, current operating review yesterday for the following projects that we have, and,
188 00:22:54.880 ⇒ 00:23:01.859 Rico Rejoso: The following on green are goods, meaning that there have been engineers assigned to it with their allocations and stuff.
189 00:23:01.940 ⇒ 00:23:16.129 Rico Rejoso: for the ones that need action, we have to, add 50 members. Upon checking yesterday, I only see the EPs and the stakeholder assigned on those, particular projects, sample for Elementine Eden.
190 00:23:17.660 ⇒ 00:23:30.070 Rico Rejoso: I mean, for the one that Brad is handling, well, it is given since Brad is also ramping up with the AP task, so I also offer my help to, help allocate the hours. I just need to get the list of engineers that we have.
191 00:23:30.230 ⇒ 00:23:30.799 Rico Rejoso: Oh, okay.
192 00:23:30.800 ⇒ 00:23:33.880 Uttam Kumaran: Can we do this? Can we do this in Slack today? I have time.
193 00:23:34.170 ⇒ 00:23:36.309 Uttam Kumaran: Yep. Can we,
194 00:23:37.710 ⇒ 00:23:48.640 Uttam Kumaran: Just tell me what you need, I guess, is what I’m saying. Like, do you need who, or how many hours, and what role? Just give me some place to put that, I can do that, or I can Slack it to you.
195 00:23:49.020 ⇒ 00:24:00.849 Rico Rejoso: Yeah, let me collate all the, based off the channels, all the team members that should be on this project, and you can just send me, the hours that they should have, or they should be spending for that project, and I can help put in operating.
196 00:24:04.080 ⇒ 00:24:04.660 Uttam Kumaran: Okay.
197 00:24:05.170 ⇒ 00:24:15.610 Rico Rejoso: We’ll do that afterwards. And also, had this response coming from Amber, she’s not aware about the Eden Strategy project that we have on the list.
198 00:24:15.980 ⇒ 00:24:17.650 Rico Rejoso: That you and Bryl have.
199 00:24:19.150 ⇒ 00:24:30.190 Rico Rejoso: I mean, she mentioned about handing it off to her, and also notifying her about it, but I don’t know if this has been going… I didn’t have a clear start and end date for the Eden Strategy SOW.
200 00:24:30.730 ⇒ 00:24:35.440 Rico Rejoso: But this one is being handled by Robert, so I think I… should I confirm with Robert instead?
201 00:24:35.960 ⇒ 00:24:39.280 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, it’s, so on Eden, we have, like.
202 00:24:39.410 ⇒ 00:24:44.359 Uttam Kumaran: the BI, the stuff that’s Greg’s doing, we have Zoran.
203 00:24:45.050 ⇒ 00:24:45.620 Rico Rejoso: No more tech.
204 00:24:45.620 ⇒ 00:24:51.340 Uttam Kumaran: We… yeah, we also have, like… Eden DE,
205 00:24:51.650 ⇒ 00:24:55.430 Uttam Kumaran: And then we have Eden Strategy. Eden Strategy is Amber and Robert.
206 00:24:56.080 ⇒ 00:25:02.009 Uttam Kumaran: So… yeah, that’s… if you want to start a Thread and Eden channel, or…
207 00:25:02.460 ⇒ 00:25:07.209 Uttam Kumaran: in the EP channel, I can… we can discuss there, too, and I can… I can give her the clarity.
208 00:25:07.630 ⇒ 00:25:15.669 Rico Rejoso: Okay, got it. I’ll mention you on the thread, about the operating stuff, and, have you respond to Amber’s inquiry about it, okay?
209 00:25:16.150 ⇒ 00:25:16.690 Uttam Kumaran: Okay.
210 00:25:17.050 ⇒ 00:25:36.489 Rico Rejoso: Alrighty, that’s for operating. We’ll further update this one and also follow up with the EVs today. If in case we move on to the escalation process that we have, we already provided them with a guide, and we started rolling this out last week, which is a dry run that we have. Right now, we’re fully implementing this, and we’re following the escalation plan that we initially have for operations, for operations.
211 00:25:36.490 ⇒ 00:25:39.579 Uttam Kumaran: Okay, okay. So there’s an EP Leads meeting later today.
212 00:25:39.630 ⇒ 00:25:41.999 Rico Rejoso: That’s the dry run, it’s happening later today?
213 00:25:42.720 ⇒ 00:25:46.269 Rico Rejoso: No, the dry run happened last week.
214 00:25:46.670 ⇒ 00:25:47.180 Uttam Kumaran: Oh, okay.
215 00:25:47.180 ⇒ 00:25:54.800 Rico Rejoso: with the operating. For the EPDs later on, I’m not sure what the discussion would be, but we can also chime in the operating stuff to add on their list.
216 00:25:54.800 ⇒ 00:25:58.819 Uttam Kumaran: Two… also two changes on the EP Leads meeting. Can we remove,
217 00:25:58.920 ⇒ 00:26:01.329 Uttam Kumaran: We have to remove Ashwini and Casey.
218 00:26:01.570 ⇒ 00:26:02.460 Rico Rejoso: It’s all good, yeah.
219 00:26:03.030 ⇒ 00:26:04.260 Uttam Kumaran: from that meeting.
220 00:26:04.260 ⇒ 00:26:07.369 Rico Rejoso: Oh, the channel only, let me remove them from the meeting.
221 00:26:07.730 ⇒ 00:26:10.109 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, from the meeting, and then…
222 00:26:10.380 ⇒ 00:26:15.730 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, I mean, look, it’s… right now, it’s mainly Amber, Brile Mustafa.
223 00:26:16.320 ⇒ 00:26:17.899 Rico Rejoso: Okay, got it. Yeah.
224 00:26:17.900 ⇒ 00:26:23.319 Uttam Kumaran: So, small crowd, like, Brile’s gonna take over anything that I’m on.
225 00:26:23.920 ⇒ 00:26:31.469 Uttam Kumaran: You know, so… Can we also include him on this… on this meeting, this ops meeting?
226 00:26:32.110 ⇒ 00:26:35.580 Uttam Kumaran: Because he’s just kind of… Yeah, just gonna be next.
227 00:26:35.580 ⇒ 00:26:36.549 Rico Rejoso: me on stuff.
228 00:26:37.000 ⇒ 00:26:43.879 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, and one thing that he can also start to do is maybe even present Rico on some of the delivery stuff, you know?
229 00:26:44.550 ⇒ 00:26:45.280 Rico Rejoso: Yeah, definitely.
230 00:26:45.280 ⇒ 00:26:52.210 Uttam Kumaran: I would say you hand that off to him, because it’ll give you some more time, and then that way he can prepare it, and then you can review.
231 00:26:53.410 ⇒ 00:27:00.489 Rico Rejoso: Got you. I’ll also… I also need to sync with him in regards to the EP test, or the process map that we are, working on, because
232 00:27:01.020 ⇒ 00:27:04.020 Rico Rejoso: Moving on to the next slide, we have the delivery process map.
233 00:27:04.230 ⇒ 00:27:14.750 Rico Rejoso: For CSOs and SLs, we’re trying to narrow it down. Since we already have the planned tasks that they should be doing on a daily, weekly, monthly cadence, we just need to also, you know.
234 00:27:15.010 ⇒ 00:27:18.179 Rico Rejoso: Check it along with the tasks that they are actually doing.
235 00:27:18.190 ⇒ 00:27:35.830 Rico Rejoso: So that’s our main goal, but since we know that the engineers are all busy and we don’t want to take up much of their time, we sent out a form for them to input those tasks. We just have, like, two responses so far, but we follow up again yesterday, and we’re looking forward to have everything today as… I mean, by end of day. But if not, we’ll proceed.
236 00:27:35.830 ⇒ 00:27:40.639 Rico Rejoso: With what we… with the data that we have right now, and merge the actual versus the…
237 00:27:40.640 ⇒ 00:27:50.810 Rico Rejoso: blackout desk. Okay, and also the KPI for, I know we have on the leadership transition agreement, we have KPIs that each delivery lead should
238 00:27:50.820 ⇒ 00:27:58.740 Rico Rejoso: meet for, particular bonus and stuff, we haven’t set that up yet, so I think that’s one thing that we need to… we need to finalize.
239 00:27:59.020 ⇒ 00:28:02.930 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, so that’s also something that, like, I would like to try to do.
240 00:28:03.710 ⇒ 00:28:08.400 Uttam Kumaran: I wonder, like, if you want to work on a plan for that, or, like, what you think…
241 00:28:09.400 ⇒ 00:28:18.269 Rico Rejoso: Definitely. I was thinking of, creating one for each, delivery lead, and also add it to your linear task, so you can work on it whenever you can.
242 00:28:18.680 ⇒ 00:28:19.779 Rico Rejoso: With that word.
243 00:28:21.340 ⇒ 00:28:24.349 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, and then the one thing I just wanna,
244 00:28:26.850 ⇒ 00:28:31.429 Uttam Kumaran: One thing I just want to, maybe I could share with… for everybody is, we have this,
245 00:28:38.420 ⇒ 00:28:46.769 Uttam Kumaran: So… This is our, like, how we’re doing our weekly, monthly, and quarterly, like, review.
246 00:28:47.070 ⇒ 00:28:50.949 Uttam Kumaran: And so, Kayla, you’ll start to get included on some of this.
247 00:28:51.100 ⇒ 00:28:58.159 Uttam Kumaran: But we kind of are having… we’re kind of splitting up our OKRs into two different areas. Again.
248 00:28:58.360 ⇒ 00:28:59.290 Uttam Kumaran: Given, like.
249 00:28:59.980 ⇒ 00:29:07.680 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, we technically now have a few teams, but it’s kind of… it’s… everything is kind of lean. We’re just kind of considering go-to-market and, like, business operations.
250 00:29:07.830 ⇒ 00:29:15.610 Uttam Kumaran: And so business operations is going to include everything on delivery operations, business operations, recruiting, people ops.
251 00:29:15.950 ⇒ 00:29:19.399 Uttam Kumaran: And then we also have some aspirational OKRs. These are, like.
252 00:29:19.540 ⇒ 00:29:23.429 Uttam Kumaran: Okay, like, these are the things that we just want to make sure we’re…
253 00:29:24.600 ⇒ 00:29:30.439 Uttam Kumaran: if I take a step back, looking at this, what we should see is a mix of
254 00:29:30.530 ⇒ 00:29:44.189 Uttam Kumaran: we should see some that start as red, and then we get to greens. And really, the way that we’re gonna start to do, like, bonuses is, like, how many weeks in a row of greens can we do? Like, are we on track to hit this?
255 00:29:44.190 ⇒ 00:29:58.310 Uttam Kumaran: what you’re gonna see, Kayla, is we do a weekly meeting, it’ll just be me, you, Robert, and Luke, where we’ll fill this out, and my name is on a few of these. We’ll fill these out, and then we’ll give some commentary on, like.
256 00:29:58.460 ⇒ 00:30:08.580 Uttam Kumaran: why… why it is on track or not, right? So, for example, you can… you can see, like, core SOPs for NDAs, here’s the…
257 00:30:08.850 ⇒ 00:30:25.310 Uttam Kumaran: Here’s a commentary that was previously put there. So, this is the format that we’re starting to do. I would like to also add to this, Rico, a version of this for our CSOs and for the EPs and the SLs.
258 00:30:25.520 ⇒ 00:30:28.369 Uttam Kumaran: So that’s kind of, like, what I would…
259 00:30:29.580 ⇒ 00:30:33.750 Uttam Kumaran: Just want to kind of say that out loud so you guys can kind of see how we’re… how we’re doing all this.
260 00:30:33.920 ⇒ 00:30:39.470 Uttam Kumaran: If anything, I may… move all this under, like, one thing, but I don’t know, it’s whatever.
261 00:30:40.020 ⇒ 00:30:47.080 Rico Rejoso: Yeah, I just, just got a chance to see this. Let me take a look further on it. I didn’t know it was on this weekly.
262 00:30:47.440 ⇒ 00:30:48.160 Rico Rejoso: 40 degrees.
263 00:30:48.160 ⇒ 00:30:50.529 Uttam Kumaran: No problem, yeah, we moved it around, like…
264 00:30:50.990 ⇒ 00:30:58.610 Uttam Kumaran: I think it’s here, because the sales team uses this document every week, twice a week, to do their, like, numbers.
265 00:30:58.750 ⇒ 00:31:05.469 Uttam Kumaran: So, I think it’ll be a good place for us to also centralize our stuff.
266 00:31:05.970 ⇒ 00:31:13.389 Uttam Kumaran: And then again, like, this is the first time that now we have, like, recruiting, delivery, ops, like, we can figure out if we want to keep it here or move it.
267 00:31:14.260 ⇒ 00:31:19.180 Rico Rejoso: Gotcha, yeah. Let me take a look at it and also discuss it with the team, with Eliza and I.
268 00:31:21.480 ⇒ 00:31:22.260 Uttam Kumaran: Cool.
269 00:31:22.370 ⇒ 00:31:30.569 Rico Rejoso: Alright, so yeah, that’s for the delivery process, map that we’re working on right now. We can proceed to the finance. Eliza?
270 00:31:31.270 ⇒ 00:31:47.720 Elizah Joy: Okay, so yeah, for just an update on the finance process map out that we did. So what we’ve completed, so far is we’ve mapped out the finance tasks, things, or tasks that they’ve been doing on a daily basis, monthly basis, quarterly and annual.
271 00:31:47.720 ⇒ 00:31:58.640 Elizah Joy: And then what we’ve also did was to clarify, ops versus finance leadership, ownership on how we can, support finances, on their task, and…
272 00:31:58.720 ⇒ 00:32:13.070 Elizah Joy: basically shadowing, or what we can do for what they’re doing, and then a few key improvements that we’ve identified is that, we can reduce some reconciliation noise, between ops and finance systems. So…
273 00:32:13.590 ⇒ 00:32:28.310 Elizah Joy: I think it’s on a, with the finance team, somehow it’s in a good standing point, because, yeah, currently what’s in progress are, we’re doing the, finance aging automation for, the,
274 00:32:30.020 ⇒ 00:32:40.379 Elizah Joy: basically connecting QuickBooks, and then, Slack visibility on that, and then use… we are trying to use Zapier on this.
275 00:32:40.410 ⇒ 00:32:56.170 Elizah Joy: And then a monthly ops control dashboard that we’re gonna build out. So this, also includes the dashboards that we have for the ones that we have in our, Gantt charts. So the margins dashboard, cost dashboard, and then the revenue dashboard.
276 00:32:56.170 ⇒ 00:33:03.309 Elizah Joy: So it’s tied into that, and then, we’re also planning to do, a structured op finance bi-weekly Sync.
277 00:33:03.380 ⇒ 00:33:19.369 Elizah Joy: Cadence, if that, is… if finance team is good with it, so that, ops team can continue to work with finance to get a better understanding of the tasks and ongoing projects that, we have ongoing with the finance team.
278 00:33:20.500 ⇒ 00:33:21.020 Uttam Kumaran: Okay.
279 00:33:24.660 ⇒ 00:33:26.630 Elizah Joy: And then a few additional updates.
280 00:33:26.630 ⇒ 00:33:30.950 Uttam Kumaran: Is there a… I guess, Eliza, on the finance… on the finance one,
281 00:33:31.670 ⇒ 00:33:38.369 Uttam Kumaran: Is there a, like, a… is there a document that you’re working on, that has, sort of, some of this?
282 00:33:38.820 ⇒ 00:33:51.650 Elizah Joy: Yeah, actually, we did send that in, the Slack, the daily updates that we’ve been sending in Slack, but just to give you an overview, it’s under,
283 00:33:52.100 ⇒ 00:33:57.969 Elizah Joy: Operations, and then Operations Manual that we have. Great. It’s the…
284 00:33:58.960 ⇒ 00:34:02.819 Elizah Joy: Is it this one? Yeah, finance team process map.
285 00:34:03.080 ⇒ 00:34:07.820 Elizah Joy: So we have the tasks up until, and then our plan for that.
286 00:34:08.400 ⇒ 00:34:17.760 Uttam Kumaran: Oh, amazing. Okay, so I guess one thing I want to call it is, like, that document is, like, amazing for finance processes, and the one thing I want… I keep…
287 00:34:17.860 ⇒ 00:34:28.620 Uttam Kumaran: having, like, one place to go answer, especially for, like, for Robert and I, to say, like, what are our finance processes is really, really helpful. So, appreciate that. I’ll go spend some time
288 00:34:28.800 ⇒ 00:34:31.629 Uttam Kumaran: In there as soon as I can.
289 00:34:31.969 ⇒ 00:34:35.129 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, and then I, like, I think, like, let’s…
290 00:34:35.199 ⇒ 00:34:48.069 Uttam Kumaran: One thing that could be helpful, Eliza, is actually for you to just put in, like, the requirements you want for the dashboard, because I… other people on the team can build it. Like, I don’t want you to go figure out how to build it.
291 00:34:48.069 ⇒ 00:34:55.249 Uttam Kumaran: Not that you can’t figure it out, but, like, your time is much better leveraged doing things that other people can’t do, which is, like, you know, so…
292 00:34:55.250 ⇒ 00:34:55.860 Elizah Joy: Yeah.
293 00:34:55.860 ⇒ 00:34:57.849 Uttam Kumaran: If you can put together, like.
294 00:34:58.100 ⇒ 00:35:04.149 Uttam Kumaran: So, kind of, one thing that I also want to highlight is in Notion, there is a template for dashboard requirements.
295 00:35:05.640 ⇒ 00:35:13.170 Uttam Kumaran: And if you just search dashboard requirements… so, you can go use this. This is what we actually use for our clients, but you could go use this.
296 00:35:13.600 ⇒ 00:35:17.009 Uttam Kumaran: If you want to create the requirements for any of the dashboards that you want?
297 00:35:17.190 ⇒ 00:35:21.739 Uttam Kumaran: and you make one of these, I can then pass it to the team to build, to the platform team.
298 00:35:22.420 ⇒ 00:35:24.060 Elizah Joy: Okay, yep, so I’ll leave.
299 00:35:24.060 ⇒ 00:35:34.260 Uttam Kumaran: So I would prefer you, yeah, you do that, like, and again, you could… you could write the requirements for any of the ones that you want, and then I’ll break it down and have the platform team work on it.
300 00:35:34.910 ⇒ 00:35:42.959 Elizah Joy: Alright. Yep, I think that’ll be very helpful, because we have, like, 3 or 4 dashboards that’s been yet to create for…
301 00:35:43.120 ⇒ 00:35:44.010 Elizah Joy: this.
302 00:35:44.360 ⇒ 00:35:47.829 Elizah Joy: Yep, I’ll set that up, and I’ll send that over in Slack.
303 00:35:48.770 ⇒ 00:35:49.370 Uttam Kumaran: Okay.
304 00:35:51.540 ⇒ 00:35:58.650 Elizah Joy: Okay, and a few more updates. So, again, the old Notion homepage, we closed that off last week.
305 00:35:58.730 ⇒ 00:36:14.989 Elizah Joy: And then AOR, we’ve already sent that to team members to update, so that on Friday, when we do our end of month review, we’ll have those updated, based on the, status updates for the DRIs that we have for team members.
306 00:36:14.990 ⇒ 00:36:15.580 Uttam Kumaran: Cool.
307 00:36:15.970 ⇒ 00:36:16.810 Elizah Joy: And then.
308 00:36:16.810 ⇒ 00:36:23.469 Uttam Kumaran: So, yeah, where’s, oh, so, sorry, sorry, so the upgraded tape, so AORs, so on the AORs, okay.
309 00:36:24.410 ⇒ 00:36:31.869 Uttam Kumaran: Do we have a meet… I guess this… technically, this Friday should be our… our end of month… okay, our end of month check-in meeting, right? Okay.
310 00:36:31.940 ⇒ 00:36:44.609 Uttam Kumaran: Cool, I have it. So, yeah, like, I think another piece, Kayla, is, like, end of the month, we try to… this will be our second month doing this, which is great, but we go through our AORs.
311 00:36:44.840 ⇒ 00:36:52.059 Uttam Kumaran: Which is area of responsibility. And really, what this is, is just mapping out, like, all the core responsibilities
312 00:36:52.210 ⇒ 00:36:53.450 Uttam Kumaran: in the company.
313 00:36:53.690 ⇒ 00:37:00.510 Uttam Kumaran: And this is currently here, and this… there’s a file here called Management Operations. Let me just…
314 00:37:01.040 ⇒ 00:37:02.090 Uttam Kumaran: share this.
315 00:37:02.380 ⇒ 00:37:09.770 Uttam Kumaran: And so basically, for each of the functions, right, we put in, like, what is the responsibility?
316 00:37:10.070 ⇒ 00:37:13.759 Uttam Kumaran: And then we put in, like, who is the directly responsible individual?
317 00:37:13.950 ⇒ 00:37:16.060 Uttam Kumaran: And… who is their backup?
318 00:37:16.330 ⇒ 00:37:18.960 Uttam Kumaran: That way, at any moment, we know that, like.
319 00:37:19.490 ⇒ 00:37:23.940 Uttam Kumaran: okay, a couple of goals. Again, I think the pattern here is, like.
320 00:37:24.270 ⇒ 00:37:27.920 Uttam Kumaran: Robert and I’s name, we want to be moved as much to backup.
321 00:37:28.350 ⇒ 00:37:43.110 Uttam Kumaran: And then ideally off this as possible. So we’re building redundancy, right? Some of these don’t even have backup, so that’s our first thing also, is just to make sure that they have backups. The second piece is, like, for each of these responsibilities, we’re gonna drive towards, like, okay, is there documentation on how to do this?
322 00:37:43.110 ⇒ 00:37:57.210 Uttam Kumaran: Some of these is, like, drive company culture. Okay, that’s, like, a little bit ambiguous, but there’s also some things on the operations side or the marketing side that are a little bit more narrow that we’ll start to link to places in Notion to learn about what this responsibility entails.
323 00:37:57.210 ⇒ 00:38:01.979 Uttam Kumaran: Ideally, this should grow, like, there will be some more responsibilities in the company as it grows.
324 00:38:01.980 ⇒ 00:38:12.729 Uttam Kumaran: But that this really has the list of, like, what is everything that we do as a company. This really… this sort of format came from… I don’t know if I have the book in front of me…
325 00:38:13.230 ⇒ 00:38:20.880 Uttam Kumaran: We read this together, there’s this book called The Great CEO Within. There’s also another book called, like, called Traction.
326 00:38:21.000 ⇒ 00:38:24.899 Uttam Kumaran: That I have sitting on the floor here.
327 00:38:25.380 ⇒ 00:38:44.429 Uttam Kumaran: traction that’s really good, that basically talks a little bit about OKR setting, and AORs, and, like, basically, like, what are the rhythms in the company, you know? And so, I’m happy if you’re… I don’t know if you’re a big reader, I’m happy to buy these for you, or if you just want to read… I’m happy to buy, you know, if you just want to read the one section.
328 00:38:44.460 ⇒ 00:38:46.319 Uttam Kumaran: On explaining this.
329 00:38:46.380 ⇒ 00:38:50.209 Uttam Kumaran: It will, like… you’ll be like, oh, that makes total sense.
330 00:38:50.210 ⇒ 00:38:52.700 Kaela Gallagher: Okay. Yeah, I would love that.
331 00:38:52.840 ⇒ 00:38:53.740 Uttam Kumaran: Okay, cool.
332 00:38:55.420 ⇒ 00:38:56.649 Uttam Kumaran: Cool, go ahead, Eliza.
333 00:38:58.460 ⇒ 00:39:06.650 Elizah Joy: Okay, and for the upgraded team, to answer your question, yes, we, no, we cannot upgrade. The…
334 00:39:07.040 ⇒ 00:39:16.989 Elizah Joy: like, the device that we get for those lease, my suggestion is that we can shorten the lease that we have for them. So basically, what we have now with them is
335 00:39:16.990 ⇒ 00:39:27.390 Elizah Joy: I mean, the quotation that we did get was a 3-year lease for the devices, so my suggestion is if we have that in mind, that we want to upgrade, maybe in the next
336 00:39:27.390 ⇒ 00:39:39.990 Elizah Joy: Or maybe within those 3 years, we can shorten the lease term for maybe, like, 2 years, or 1 and a half years, or yeah, we can also opt to return or own the device. But yeah, basically, we can shorten the lease term for…
337 00:39:40.460 ⇒ 00:39:47.490 Elizah Joy: maybe 2 years or less, if we’re looking to upgrade our devices down the line. And then,
338 00:39:47.770 ⇒ 00:39:52.119 Elizah Joy: A few, current team member requests, this is from your list. Oh, sorry.
339 00:39:52.740 ⇒ 00:39:57.910 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, I just didn’t know if there’s any other people that, like, had… had, like.
340 00:39:58.010 ⇒ 00:40:01.770 Uttam Kumaran: yelled out that they wanted it. I would like to just satisfy, like.
341 00:40:02.050 ⇒ 00:40:08.519 Uttam Kumaran: the folks that, like, immediately need equipment, and then I can work… I mean, I think…
342 00:40:08.830 ⇒ 00:40:11.630 Uttam Kumaran: Kayla, it’s probably something we need to work on, which is, like.
343 00:40:12.200 ⇒ 00:40:18.410 Uttam Kumaran: What is our, like, expense outlay and, like, plan for, like, team member devices?
344 00:40:18.590 ⇒ 00:40:20.849 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah. So…
345 00:40:21.030 ⇒ 00:40:28.140 Uttam Kumaran: But urgently, like, I need a new laptop, so I just need to solve that. I’m, like, using a 2020 MacBook Air, it’s, like, the worst.
346 00:40:28.630 ⇒ 00:40:33.570 Elizah Joy: And then, for the people that do need devices immediately, I think Eliza could just…
347 00:40:33.930 ⇒ 00:40:37.310 Uttam Kumaran: like, I think we can make a decision on that.
348 00:40:38.980 ⇒ 00:40:45.290 Uttam Kumaran: or Kayla, I don’t know if you prefer, like, we wait until, like, we kind of have a grasp on, like, what we want to do broadly as a policy.
349 00:40:46.700 ⇒ 00:40:53.920 Kaela Gallagher: I, I think… Priority right now would be, like, yeah, satisfying people who need the devices, get them.
350 00:40:53.920 ⇒ 00:40:54.290 Uttam Kumaran: Okay.
351 00:40:54.290 ⇒ 00:41:00.350 Kaela Gallagher: up and operational and… with working laptops, and then we can figure out things later.
352 00:41:00.520 ⇒ 00:41:01.689 Uttam Kumaran: Okay, okay, cool.
353 00:41:02.970 ⇒ 00:41:10.350 Elizah Joy: Yeah, on the team member’s side, the only team member who have requested for a computer or for a device is Iran.
354 00:41:11.080 ⇒ 00:41:13.499 Elizah Joy: Okay. At the moment, so only one team member.
355 00:41:16.630 ⇒ 00:41:26.070 Elizah Joy: Okay, so yeah, next in line, and a few of our, priorities would be the, remaining
356 00:41:26.190 ⇒ 00:41:42.379 Elizah Joy: projects that we have in the high priority con chart, so that’s the Consolidated Client Health Tracker, and then the dashboard, so that’s the margin cost and revenue, although this one’s a low priority. But we do, have, like.
357 00:41:42.510 ⇒ 00:41:59.890 Elizah Joy: still time for ad hoc tasks to take on for this quarter. And then, next is the leadership appointment and transition agreements that will be sent for signing. But yeah, if you have any priorities that you want us to prioritize for this week, or for March even.
358 00:41:59.890 ⇒ 00:42:07.110 Elizah Joy: Just let us know, because, yeah. Right, right now we’re working through the high priorities and low priorities that we have in our Gantt chart.
359 00:42:07.720 ⇒ 00:42:13.279 Uttam Kumaran: Can we plan, on… on walking through that with everybody on Friday?
360 00:42:13.910 ⇒ 00:42:14.329 Elizah Joy: I can do.
361 00:42:14.330 ⇒ 00:42:16.810 Uttam Kumaran: is I can ex… Yeah, like.
362 00:42:17.420 ⇒ 00:42:21.370 Uttam Kumaran: I think it would be great just to have…
363 00:42:21.730 ⇒ 00:42:24.010 Uttam Kumaran: Let me just even look at the calendar. So…
364 00:42:24.410 ⇒ 00:42:30.789 Uttam Kumaran: I basically wanted… what we’re hoping to do is that Robert and I can block, like, 2 hours or 3 hours at the end of the month.
365 00:42:31.110 ⇒ 00:42:37.449 Uttam Kumaran: We’re kind of having all the core teams try and come, basically, like, present, sort of, like, how the month went.
366 00:42:37.650 ⇒ 00:42:42.459 Uttam Kumaran: And then, what’s the plan for next month? And then we spend the last sort of our…
367 00:42:42.610 ⇒ 00:42:51.619 Uttam Kumaran: Or so, being like, okay, like, what are our priorities? So I… I do think, like, last month, what we did, Eliza, is, like, we just had ops come and present for 30 minutes.
368 00:42:52.460 ⇒ 00:42:53.140 Elizah Joy: Yeah.
369 00:42:53.430 ⇒ 00:42:57.799 Uttam Kumaran: Right? Sales presents also. Sales does a retro right before…
370 00:42:58.010 ⇒ 00:43:04.519 Uttam Kumaran: You know, and so maybe we can do that, and then we can also just have a… have a break, Kayla, just for recruiting.
371 00:43:04.740 ⇒ 00:43:18.020 Uttam Kumaran: or… and think through, like, okay, how do we make sure we talk through the core pieces of the business? Which for me, again, like, outside of what Robert and I directly own, is gonna be delivery, recruiting, and operations and sales.
372 00:43:18.230 ⇒ 00:43:21.139 Uttam Kumaran: So really, like, being able to get, like, a…
373 00:43:21.320 ⇒ 00:43:24.099 Uttam Kumaran: Pulse check on, like, how did the month go?
374 00:43:24.310 ⇒ 00:43:26.370 Uttam Kumaran: And, like, what’s the plan for next month?
375 00:43:26.560 ⇒ 00:43:29.810 Uttam Kumaran: Take a look at, like, OKR Health, take a look at AORs.
376 00:43:30.280 ⇒ 00:43:34.230 Uttam Kumaran: would be great to do on, like, on the last Friday of the month.
377 00:43:34.680 ⇒ 00:43:39.159 Uttam Kumaran: So we can plan on that for… for, this Friday, and I’m…
378 00:43:39.480 ⇒ 00:43:43.249 Uttam Kumaran: Even just saying that out loud, like, we may need more time than just…
379 00:43:43.400 ⇒ 00:43:50.470 Uttam Kumaran: 2 hours, so… but that was sort of my hope, was probably blocking, like, from, like.
380 00:43:50.840 ⇒ 00:43:55.160 Uttam Kumaran: 2 Central or 3 Central, sort of until EOD, and just…
381 00:43:55.460 ⇒ 00:44:06.889 Uttam Kumaran: Making sure that every… every team leader, every team itself gets that chunk to discuss, to hear our reflection, to, like, to hear how we should calibrate for… for next month, and then…
382 00:44:07.400 ⇒ 00:44:08.660 Uttam Kumaran: We sort of drive.
383 00:44:09.660 ⇒ 00:44:13.800 Uttam Kumaran: So this month, Kayla, it’ll really just be, like, hearing your reflections, and then…
384 00:44:13.800 ⇒ 00:44:14.370 Kaela Gallagher: And, you know.
385 00:44:14.370 ⇒ 00:44:16.260 Uttam Kumaran: Mainly planning for next month, yeah.
386 00:44:16.260 ⇒ 00:44:17.469 Kaela Gallagher: Yeah, okay.
387 00:44:18.780 ⇒ 00:44:25.599 Uttam Kumaran: Okay, cool, so maybe, Rico, I can work with you on just, like, getting organized for that meeting.
388 00:44:26.330 ⇒ 00:44:30.490 Uttam Kumaran: And then, yeah, I think probably my… just, like, rounding out this call, I think…
389 00:44:30.630 ⇒ 00:44:34.850 Uttam Kumaran: kind of, like, maybe two things high level. One is, like, Rico, I’m sort of…
390 00:44:35.160 ⇒ 00:44:47.249 Uttam Kumaran: you know, I would try to start to hand things off to Kayla and work with her on… on owning some of the priorities, and anything you’re starting to do, have her shadow, so it’ll be easier for her to pick things up.
391 00:44:47.410 ⇒ 00:44:57.309 Uttam Kumaran: I am interested, Rico, in also your time, some… helping with some of the things we need on, like, broad company OKRs, and
392 00:44:58.000 ⇒ 00:45:02.459 Uttam Kumaran: you know, it’s doing things like these Friday end-of-month meetings and some of that organization, so…
393 00:45:02.580 ⇒ 00:45:19.850 Uttam Kumaran: that’s where I’m kind of hopeful I can get some of your help. And the third item is I want to start to loop in Bryle on this call, so that he can do a slide or two on delivery and the state of delivery. And I think this will be, like, this is sort of the operations, like, brain trust in the company right now.
394 00:45:19.950 ⇒ 00:45:26.989 Uttam Kumaran: So if we… if we have a lens of, like, how’s delivery going, delivery and delivery operations, how’s recruiting going.
395 00:45:27.100 ⇒ 00:45:38.859 Uttam Kumaran: How is, you know, ops, finance, just, like, the rest of it? Like, this is… this’ll be a really, really great meeting. And then, as things get longer, we can break things out. It will happen naturally, so…
396 00:45:41.300 ⇒ 00:45:41.930 Kaela Gallagher: Cool.
397 00:45:43.810 ⇒ 00:45:46.580 Uttam Kumaran: Okay, awesome. Well, thanks, everyone. Appreciate it.
398 00:45:47.530 ⇒ 00:45:48.749 Kaela Gallagher: Yeah, thank you guys.
399 00:45:48.750 ⇒ 00:45:49.309 Rico Rejoso: Thank you.
400 00:45:49.310 ⇒ 00:45:49.900 Uttam Kumaran: Thanks.
401 00:45:49.900 ⇒ 00:45:50.240 Kaela Gallagher: Thanks.
402 00:45:51.460 ⇒ 00:45:52.730 Elizah Joy: Thank you.