Meeting Title: Uttam <> Jorrell Date: 2025-01-10 Meeting participants: Jorrel Sto Tomas, Uttam Kumaran
WEBVTT
1 00:02:43.960 ⇒ 00:02:44.870 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Here, you’re coming.
2 00:02:50.000 ⇒ 00:02:51.340 Uttam Kumaran: Hey! How are you?
3 00:02:52.070 ⇒ 00:02:58.339 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Good man. I’m calling, calling from a a share lounge in in Japan right now. So.
4 00:02:58.698 ⇒ 00:03:05.869 Uttam Kumaran: You’re all good. No problem. Thanks. I know you’re like you’re traveling like here and there, so I appreciate it.
5 00:03:06.350 ⇒ 00:03:16.429 Jorrel Sto Tomas: It’s all good. It’s all good, you know. We’re we’re we’re moving on speed. So you know, time is of the essence. So I I know how things I I know how to prioritize my.
6 00:03:16.430 ⇒ 00:03:29.509 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, are you? I was gonna ask you, are you are you guys in the light of the fire and stuff in la, like, I didn’t know. I guess I know Robert’s a little bit north, but everybody I know kind of from that area. I’m asking. Just thought I’d ask.
7 00:03:30.720 ⇒ 00:03:36.039 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. The Pacific Palisades fire is probably less than
8 00:03:36.260 ⇒ 00:03:39.040 Jorrel Sto Tomas: 4 miles away from from.
9 00:03:39.040 ⇒ 00:03:39.760 Uttam Kumaran: Wow!
10 00:03:39.760 ⇒ 00:03:48.000 Jorrel Sto Tomas: My neighborhood South Town. So yeah, it’s it’s a lot of my friends are like, either hunkered down or have evacuated South.
11 00:03:48.994 ⇒ 00:03:52.840 Jorrel Sto Tomas: So yeah, it’s I’m I’m I’ve been traveling so.
12 00:03:52.840 ⇒ 00:03:53.210 Uttam Kumaran: I know.
13 00:03:53.550 ⇒ 00:04:06.490 Jorrel Sto Tomas: So it’s it’s a little bit. It’s a little bit nuts over there. But yeah, I’m I’m getting back in tomorrow, so I’ll be back in La, or at least back in California. Tomorrow. So.
14 00:04:06.490 ⇒ 00:04:07.030 Uttam Kumaran: Okay.
15 00:04:07.550 ⇒ 00:04:15.940 Uttam Kumaran: Well, if I can help with anything or let me know, I mean, I don’t have a couple of people down there. I mean. Most of my people are in the Bay Area. But
16 00:04:16.545 ⇒ 00:04:19.940 Uttam Kumaran: yeah, man, hope nothing happens. It sucks.
17 00:04:20.910 ⇒ 00:04:38.499 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Yeah, I think I mean, it’s it’s in general, it’s it’s 1 of the worst we’ve ever seen. But it’s not something that we’re not used to, which is kind of sad. We’re. We’re pretty much used to fire season, being around like November. So it being this late, is a little bit shocking
18 00:04:38.965 ⇒ 00:04:49.699 Jorrel Sto Tomas: and the fact there hasn’t been any rain, I think, is yeah, deeply concerning. But you know, just another one of the challenges of of our climate crisis. So
19 00:04:50.370 ⇒ 00:04:57.029 Jorrel Sto Tomas: solutionize and you know, survive. And figure out a, you know, a better way to bounce back. So.
20 00:04:57.260 ⇒ 00:05:02.076 Jorrel Sto Tomas: yeah, which is a lot of what the community is doing. But yeah, it’s really really bad.
21 00:05:02.520 ⇒ 00:05:12.939 Jorrel Sto Tomas: I’m yeah. I’m I’m a little concerned how parts of la are gonna recover from this cause. It’s like full on decimation. It’s not like.
22 00:05:13.250 ⇒ 00:05:18.359 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah. And it’s not even just like the hills, or like on a dry land.
23 00:05:18.570 ⇒ 00:05:21.750 Uttam Kumaran: It’s like right on the coast. And
24 00:05:22.090 ⇒ 00:05:29.300 Uttam Kumaran: and like a lot of yeah, I mean, I think the biggest crisis right now is just insurance exactly what’s happening in Florida, right? Where.
25 00:05:29.410 ⇒ 00:05:33.780 Uttam Kumaran: yeah, basically can’t get insured. It’s ridiculous! I don’t know. It’s like.
26 00:05:34.290 ⇒ 00:05:43.979 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Yeah, I don’t think well, I mean the the entire city of like of of Pacific palisade is basically gone, like everything like the the whole town.
27 00:05:44.500 ⇒ 00:05:55.579 Jorrel Sto Tomas: All the major buildings, all the major property, are just completely gone. So, yeah, like, for all intents and purposes like, that city doesn’t exist anymore.
28 00:05:55.990 ⇒ 00:05:56.860 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, that’s correct.
29 00:05:56.860 ⇒ 00:05:57.710 Uttam Kumaran: Amazing.
30 00:05:57.890 ⇒ 00:06:04.789 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Which is, which is shocking. How fast like! It only took one week for an entire like multi trillion dollar, you know.
31 00:06:04.970 ⇒ 00:06:05.580 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Yeah.
32 00:06:05.580 ⇒ 00:06:08.777 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Value city to just disappear right
33 00:06:09.310 ⇒ 00:06:10.020 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.
34 00:06:10.310 ⇒ 00:06:13.700 Jorrel Sto Tomas: And you know, that’s the reality of of it. Right?
35 00:06:14.420 ⇒ 00:06:24.251 Jorrel Sto Tomas: and so, yeah, like, similar to Florida, I think we’re gonna have the same thing like earthquake and fire insurance is going to become incredibly expensive.
36 00:06:25.120 ⇒ 00:06:29.998 Jorrel Sto Tomas: yeah. And that’s just the reality that we have to deal with.
37 00:06:31.950 ⇒ 00:06:52.450 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Yeah. But yeah, you know, I’m like, I said, I’m I’m pretty much insulated from it. Since I’m not. I haven’t even been there and I move into my new apartment next week. So yeah, I’m largely of like missing all of the all of the craziness. So it’ll be good, though, to to help out with the recovery efforts, though, when I get back. So
38 00:06:52.850 ⇒ 00:06:54.244 Jorrel Sto Tomas: yeah. But anyways,
39 00:06:54.986 ⇒ 00:06:55.540 Uttam Kumaran: Lots of.
40 00:06:55.540 ⇒ 00:06:56.690 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Not to start off the.
41 00:06:56.690 ⇒ 00:07:00.440 Uttam Kumaran: No, it was my question, so it’s my fault. But yeah.
42 00:07:00.440 ⇒ 00:07:03.259 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Yeah, you’re good. You’re good. No, I appreciate the concern.
43 00:07:03.260 ⇒ 00:07:21.500 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah. And then I guess, yeah, let’s get right in. I mean, I know we we talked about that Jd for the analyst role interested in in what you thought of that. You know, it’s it’s funny we we just on boarded. One more analyst, who’s sort of taking over stuff. And we’re probably will. I mean.
44 00:07:21.630 ⇒ 00:07:39.569 Uttam Kumaran: sort of my goal as a whole. And I think probably Robert’s new to this is like, I’m just basically like, working to just free Robert’s time up like, entirely. So a lot of the analyst work that he’s doing, but also still doing. I’m like dude. Your number one goal is for us to get you out of there.
45 00:07:39.861 ⇒ 00:07:55.320 Uttam Kumaran: So we’re we’re, I think, we have a pretty good path. And then also one of the products that we’re selling, which is like this data audit, we’re getting really close to basically having it pretty straightforward. Where, like if as long as someone who’s familiar with like event data modeling can do
46 00:07:55.613 ⇒ 00:08:21.149 Uttam Kumaran: they can handle you know, we’re still ironing out a little bit of the kinks of like, okay, do we need like A, we need someone who’s like a point of contact like me or Robert on each client. But the actual work we’re sort of doing as a pod. But yeah, we’re we’re really probably gonna need. At least we’re we’re gonna right now. We’re dealing with all contractors. But at this rate. You know, we’re thinking about potentially having someone just full time.
47 00:08:22.530 ⇒ 00:08:30.230 Uttam Kumaran: because that person can one be online and then also just handle probably like 3 or 4 of these, you know, concurrently, so.
48 00:08:31.410 ⇒ 00:08:32.520 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Yeah, yeah.
49 00:08:33.630 ⇒ 00:08:40.960 Jorrel Sto Tomas: that makes sense. I mean, it was the same kind of thing that we were. We were trying to tackle over a year ago. But it’s nice that you guys are. Well, I think.
50 00:08:40.960 ⇒ 00:08:48.010 Uttam Kumaran: I push. I yeah, I mean, I push a lot. But of course, but like this is also where I think you know, we we balance each other. I think
51 00:08:48.290 ⇒ 00:08:57.126 Uttam Kumaran: I’m I’m I’ve seen everything in data. So I’m like, nothing really freaks me out anymore. Even clients who are like all over the place.
52 00:08:58.110 ⇒ 00:09:01.309 Uttam Kumaran: so I’m like, yeah, this is just the same thing. So let’s
53 00:09:01.450 ⇒ 00:09:06.149 Uttam Kumaran: let’s get me and him just more of an elevated position, and then get people to fill in
54 00:09:06.330 ⇒ 00:09:17.610 Uttam Kumaran: the work. And so that’s what we’re we’re doing. And then we’re starting to. In this. We just sent out a a bunch of contracts. Probably the most amount of proposals we’ve sent.
55 00:09:18.500 ⇒ 00:09:19.540 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Awesome. That’s great.
56 00:09:19.540 ⇒ 00:09:26.140 Uttam Kumaran: In the last 2 weeks. Basically. So I have a good feeling about a couple of them. And so yeah, we’ll definitely be.
57 00:09:26.300 ⇒ 00:09:29.740 Uttam Kumaran: we’re we’re definitely gonna maximize the people we have. But we’re
58 00:09:29.960 ⇒ 00:09:32.550 Uttam Kumaran: we’re trying to continue to build pipeline. So.
59 00:09:35.090 ⇒ 00:09:42.440 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Okay, okay? So well with, I mean, you know, with with more contract work. That means more manpower needed. So
60 00:09:43.570 ⇒ 00:09:56.225 Jorrel Sto Tomas: that’s that’s just how it always is. So you know. Not not to, you know. What’s it called? Let’s just get straight to it, like what? How how do we? Wanna how do we wanna
61 00:09:57.140 ⇒ 00:10:03.089 Jorrel Sto Tomas: get stuff going with a fusion node? I do have a couple of guys. That we are.
62 00:10:03.489 ⇒ 00:10:24.630 Jorrel Sto Tomas: That have data data background. Obviously, Matthew is one of them. But I’m bringing on another experienced data scientist. Actually, we’re actually in the middle of trying to getting him on board here. But yeah, we’re we’re starting to build out that funnel. So whatever you know, if there’s if there’s something we can pilot together, you know. Let me know what’s what you’re thinking.
63 00:10:25.090 ⇒ 00:10:36.360 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, I think. Yeah, I mean, if if I think one would love to see sort of like resumes and and like, compare it to some stuff we’re doing for me. I’m
64 00:10:36.550 ⇒ 00:10:49.310 Uttam Kumaran: I’m actually, I’m more push for people to be more technical because we’re we’re going to run. I mean, this is where really, it’s like my background, we’re going to run engineering more like a software development firm than than like a real
65 00:10:49.310 ⇒ 00:11:12.039 Uttam Kumaran: like date sort of data service company, meaning like we, I mean, this is just how I’ve run data teams before. So the more technical we can have people, even if the work is analyst. Most of our work is gonna start to be more technical over time. We are handling still, like event level stuff and sort of building dashboards. But we all we’re we’re starting to do a lot more data modeling and data engineering work.
66 00:11:12.070 ⇒ 00:11:26.099 Uttam Kumaran: So the more technical the better. I think the big things that I mainly look for is just some familiarity with one of the major. You know, data warehouse providers so either like Snowflake or Bigquery, or Databrick.
67 00:11:26.100 ⇒ 00:11:26.810 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Yes.
68 00:11:26.810 ⇒ 00:11:28.380 Uttam Kumaran: I don’t really care
69 00:11:28.530 ⇒ 00:11:48.930 Uttam Kumaran: which one, but that saves a lot of time. And just knowing kind of the core concepts. A real big plus is some experience either in analytics, dashboarding or in data modeling or in doing data engineering. I’m happy to send over.
70 00:11:49.020 ⇒ 00:12:02.198 Uttam Kumaran: you know, tools and like sort of keywords, but those are the sort of the things that I that I really look for. I don’t I don’t. I mean, this is, I don’t really need them to be like customer facing
71 00:12:02.850 ⇒ 00:12:13.469 Uttam Kumaran: For the most part, I think it’s still gonna come through either the Project manager or me or Robert. So for me, it’s really like technical aptitude is what I look for. And then.
72 00:12:13.630 ⇒ 00:12:14.030 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Yeah.
73 00:12:14.030 ⇒ 00:12:23.445 Uttam Kumaran: Just like, kind of like hunger to want to learn more on the data side. Because we’re gonna as a firm, we’ll get continue to get technical and more technical over time.
74 00:12:24.300 ⇒ 00:12:42.037 Uttam Kumaran: So like, we’re doing a lot, we’re still doing some bi and stuff like that. But most of our work will start to be more on the data engine data modeling side, and like more complicated sort of analysis and data science. So those are the sort of people that I’m like, sort of prioritizing.
75 00:12:42.360 ⇒ 00:12:42.810 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Perfect.
76 00:12:42.810 ⇒ 00:12:43.700 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.
77 00:12:43.700 ⇒ 00:12:44.099 Jorrel Sto Tomas: No problem.
78 00:12:44.700 ⇒ 00:12:51.949 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Yeah. I mean, if that’s if that’s the case. like, I was telling you our our partnership with Bodonga State University. Which is there.
79 00:12:51.950 ⇒ 00:12:52.470 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.
80 00:12:52.470 ⇒ 00:12:56.709 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Like their 1st and only engineering university in in
81 00:12:56.900 ⇒ 00:13:17.339 Jorrel Sto Tomas: in the Philippines. They’re very, very technical. So if this is something that they’re like. They don’t need to be too client facing. In fact, that’s the stuff that we try to train them to be a bit better at but if if the case is that you need highly technical people, this is yeah, we can. We can definitely start building out a funnel for it.
82 00:13:17.820 ⇒ 00:13:36.551 Jorrel Sto Tomas: yeah, in terms of like that. That’s just like the graduate side of things. The 2 folks like Matthew and this other guy, Rex. They have. They do have data backgrounds. But you know, but no tooling. So a lot of the a lot of the training that I’ve been putting Matthew through has been like learning. Dbt, learning amplitude.
83 00:13:36.840 ⇒ 00:13:44.390 Uttam Kumaran: And then how they’ve been picking it up like, are you just having them go through like their courses, or like what sort of the play? Okay.
84 00:13:44.390 ⇒ 00:14:01.650 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Yeah. So so I I’m having Matthew just go through the courses. And then I I just assess whether or not you know, I just have him do random tasks, just so that I can see if he’s picking it up. And you know, mind you, these these folks are like valedictorians of their you know of the university. So
85 00:14:01.997 ⇒ 00:14:14.499 Jorrel Sto Tomas: they pick things up incredibly quickly. They like Matthew’s almost done with most of the Dbt fundamentals. And actually, majority of the courses on the Dbt website. So that’s how quickly he’s consuming.
86 00:14:14.821 ⇒ 00:14:35.290 Jorrel Sto Tomas: You know, the the data modeling. And so. I think it’s just a a matter of like what tools you know to your point, right? Like what tools they need to know, because their sequel and their python skills are pretty high. I had a I had another potential candidate do a technical assessment. And yeah, like, it was flawless like.
87 00:14:35.290 ⇒ 00:14:35.780 Uttam Kumaran: Okay.
88 00:14:35.780 ⇒ 00:14:40.960 Jorrel Sto Tomas: There, and little to no AI was used so.
89 00:14:40.960 ⇒ 00:14:45.619 Uttam Kumaran: For me. It’s like for me, the day on the so on the data modeling side, the biggest thing is
90 00:14:45.730 ⇒ 00:14:59.820 Uttam Kumaran: like, look, some of it will come with experience, like as you work for like A, b 2 b Saas company understand? Like orders, users, customers, sales, whatever. Yeah, that sort of stuff you’re kind of. It’s hard to. It’s hard to take a course on like
91 00:14:59.980 ⇒ 00:15:05.329 Uttam Kumaran: sort of pairing business and data. The biggest thing I just need them to be familiar with is like.
92 00:15:05.490 ⇒ 00:15:20.059 Uttam Kumaran: can you write code? Vs, are you familiar with Dbt, and and basically what the course that what I would put them through is basically, yeah. One sequel course, basically dbt, as many of the courses that they have there and then probably a couple of the snowflake ones.
93 00:15:20.466 ⇒ 00:15:35.179 Uttam Kumaran: I would say, out of the out of. Like all the 3 major, like warehouses, Snowflake probably has the best and most free like trainings. Gcp. Is complicated for a host of reasons. And Amazon, like a lot of people, aren’t on redshift anymore. And then databricks is.
94 00:15:35.300 ⇒ 00:15:39.320 Uttam Kumaran: you know, it’s I would say it’s there’s a lot of parallel. But again, more like data, science world.
95 00:15:39.320 ⇒ 00:15:42.640 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Yeah, so I would is still ramping up. I would say, Yeah.
96 00:15:42.640 ⇒ 00:15:44.900 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, like, in terms of their warehousing.
97 00:15:45.220 ⇒ 00:15:45.540 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Oh, yeah.
98 00:15:45.540 ⇒ 00:15:47.220 Uttam Kumaran: People through the Snowflake
99 00:15:47.450 ⇒ 00:15:53.284 Uttam Kumaran: sort, of course, and I can even help, you know, show a couple of them that are that are really really strong.
100 00:15:54.740 ⇒ 00:16:00.720 Uttam Kumaran: And then, yeah, I mean, look, the course, the core work that we have in terms of data. Engineering is one setting up warehouses.
101 00:16:01.127 ⇒ 00:16:24.459 Uttam Kumaran: We do have some work that we want to start doing on like cost monitoring. But a lot of it is just making sure that warehouses are set up and users can get created. We already have documents on basically naming conventions and everything like that. A lot of the core work is still on data modeling. So taking in a request understanding, okay, is this a new column? Is this a new model? How do I create that? The nice thing is.
102 00:16:24.460 ⇒ 00:16:25.119 Uttam Kumaran: yeah, like.
103 00:16:25.120 ⇒ 00:16:35.350 Uttam Kumaran: I’ve been writing Dbt for a ton of time. We have other people on the team. So we were, everybody reviews. Prs, so this isn’t like a throw. People in the deep end like, it’s actually like an engineering team.
104 00:16:35.350 ⇒ 00:16:35.740 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Oops!
105 00:16:35.740 ⇒ 00:16:44.302 Uttam Kumaran: So really, as long as they understand the core stuff they’ll quickly fill in the gaps through like reviews. And then,
106 00:16:44.930 ⇒ 00:17:01.106 Uttam Kumaran: yeah, I mean, everything just comes in as tickets. And we’re we’re basically like for me. I’m sort of overseeing all the engineers and kind of shielding them from a lot of the you know, client facing stuff as much as possible, and things just come in as tickets, and we execute as a team. So
107 00:17:01.390 ⇒ 00:17:02.060 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Great. Okay.
108 00:17:02.060 ⇒ 00:17:09.019 Uttam Kumaran: Especially on the more technical stuff on the analyst side. This is where it’s sometimes tough, like, as some some questions we have like.
109 00:17:09.150 ⇒ 00:17:15.289 Uttam Kumaran: you know. One day. Sla’s on some stuff, you know. We have a little bit of time to work through. This is where.
110 00:17:15.290 ⇒ 00:17:15.640 Jorrel Sto Tomas: You know.
111 00:17:15.640 ⇒ 00:17:20.550 Uttam Kumaran: We may consider having, like a mix of people, some people that are
112 00:17:20.589 ⇒ 00:17:50.439 Uttam Kumaran: sort of abroad or not, customer facing that can sort of pick up stuff intraday. And then we definitely will probably end up needing somebody who, you know, is like an analyst. That’s again just like answering questions as they come in. I’m not sure we’re we’ve we’re 100% decided on that yet. But definitely doing like the the analytics audit and basically taking on probably 60 to 80% of the analytics tasks can be done like without that sort of sla. So
113 00:17:52.640 ⇒ 00:17:55.789 Jorrel Sto Tomas: So, yeah, I mean, I mean, like, tell, me, what like.
114 00:17:55.890 ⇒ 00:18:02.080 Uttam Kumaran: In terms of those 2 people like, what are like, what are the next steps like? Kind of, how do you guys like.
115 00:18:02.570 ⇒ 00:18:08.540 Uttam Kumaran: I mean what? What would be like the path forward to try to like, evaluate those guys on some of our work, and things like that.
116 00:18:09.139 ⇒ 00:18:13.619 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Yeah, so so one of our one of the clients that we work with
117 00:18:14.500 ⇒ 00:18:18.730 Jorrel Sto Tomas: functionally. So we we provided them with 6
118 00:18:19.383 ⇒ 00:18:20.390 Uttam Kumaran: Network engineer.
119 00:18:20.500 ⇒ 00:18:24.960 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Near. So cause we, you know, we we mainly focus on cyber security. So
120 00:18:26.020 ⇒ 00:18:37.249 Jorrel Sto Tomas: basically, 6 network engineers. That are just doing 24, 7 monitoring of of of this specific clients. like their book of business. So because they they are.
121 00:18:37.250 ⇒ 00:18:37.570 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.
122 00:18:37.570 ⇒ 00:18:59.120 Jorrel Sto Tomas: This client has a bunch of clients in cyber security and so, functionally, they work as if they are a part of that company, so like they attend the same stand ups. They’re managed by by that company, etc. But any of like the the additional things like benefits, or micro learning like we provide coursera for our
123 00:18:59.451 ⇒ 00:19:13.719 Jorrel Sto Tomas: for for our employees. Like, we take care of all that. So the only thing that that this client worries about is invoicing is basically paying the the invoice at at the end of every month. And so
124 00:19:14.180 ⇒ 00:19:43.359 Jorrel Sto Tomas: yeah, so we treat. You know, we treat those employees as if they’re our own. But you basically get to deploy them as you wish, based on, like whatever like Msa agreement, or if you’re treating them as part timers like they’d be functionally your part timers right? And so yeah, that’s kind of one of the agreements. And then we have another one kind of a similar thing. We’re just purely their employer on record of record. And yeah, they’re functionally, the interns of of this this pretty big Enterprise company that we’re working with.
125 00:19:43.700 ⇒ 00:20:00.739 Jorrel Sto Tomas: And so yeah, that’s basically how how that works. And we source. These people so like we source them from the school recent grads. Alumni from from a Bsu. Yeah. And and that’s generally kind of like our our relationship is like we help
126 00:20:00.940 ⇒ 00:20:21.550 Jorrel Sto Tomas: do partial training if they need, like the gaps to to cover, you know, in order to to actually be useful to these clients. And then at the same time, we also we are the Eor so that you don’t have to worry about like the the complicated like benefits, or all that other things that come with with having these these employees on your.
127 00:20:21.760 ⇒ 00:20:26.749 Jorrel Sto Tomas: you know back end systems or your back office systems. So yeah, that’s kind of how we work.
128 00:20:27.470 ⇒ 00:20:38.379 Jorrel Sto Tomas: So you get to review the resumes yourself. But you can. You can interview like. Well, we just have like a constant funnel, and then kind of like part of the agreement we have with some of these is we also put on shadow
129 00:20:38.862 ⇒ 00:20:41.989 Jorrel Sto Tomas: employees. So like, we have, like one or 2 other
130 00:20:42.020 ⇒ 00:21:05.829 Jorrel Sto Tomas: folks that are just like learning like shadowing the work, so that we basically can double that workforce. Or you know, the capabilities of of these folks or backfill. If, let’s say one of these folks gets sick, they know exactly how to do the same work. Yeah. Cause our goal is just to, you know, elevate the profession of data as well as cyber security. So this is like the fastest way to up up talent and upskill these.
131 00:21:06.430 ⇒ 00:21:12.129 Jorrel Sto Tomas: he’s very, very smart individuals. So that’s kind of like our. That’s our goal with with fusion. Node.
132 00:21:12.510 ⇒ 00:21:41.803 Uttam Kumaran: Perfect. Okay? So I mean, the first, st probably most pressing need is like just someone on the like analyst side. I mean, I I’m I’m sure that like, if that person who’s who’s if there’s anyone that’s been kind of poking at amplitude, I’m sure we can basically start to evaluate them. We have probably 2 other analyst candidates that we’re interviewing right now as well. And we’ll probably end up going with one of them in the next like month or so given like pipeline
133 00:21:42.280 ⇒ 00:21:50.759 Uttam Kumaran: And then I think we’re probably just like maybe a month or so away also from probably considering bringing on another data modeling person.
134 00:21:51.491 ⇒ 00:21:56.779 Uttam Kumaran: I feel like that. That role has a lot of cover because it’s like I I
135 00:21:56.780 ⇒ 00:22:21.779 Uttam Kumaran: it’s pretty clear the requirements from my side. And it’s really like, not client facing. And we already have another. We basically have, we already have me and one other person doing data modeling work. So that’s probably the next role that we would look for my alternatives. There are really expensive here in the States, like they’re basically like my equivalent. So that’s where I want to consider someone offshore with like Dbt, experience.
136 00:22:22.342 ⇒ 00:22:37.630 Uttam Kumaran: I think we’ll have to see like, basically for that person who’s who’s sort of learning. Dbt, now I want to get a sense for you know what like, what they’re capable of doing, but then, also, like what the gaps are still, and then sort of understand, like what client I can plug them into.
137 00:22:39.250 ⇒ 00:22:57.649 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Yeah, I mean, if if given that amount of lead time we definitely could get that like one of these resources trained up to do like, you know. Dbt, like, I said. They pick it. They pick it up really quickly. So I know, though, that Matthew, the one that we were considering putting on for Javi.
138 00:22:58.070 ⇒ 00:22:58.480 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.
139 00:22:58.480 ⇒ 00:23:28.071 Jorrel Sto Tomas: If the Javi stuff isn’t isn’t, gonna you know. Continue forward or whatnot. Matthew’s a great candidate for the analyst stuff. Since we’ve been training him on the sequel. Python, and I got him started 2 weeks ago on amplitude. So he’s someone that can be that learns very quickly, and can be trained very, very fast. So if that’s yeah, to fulfill, like the media analyst needs, I think Matthew would be a great candidate for that. Considering that he was also like the final candidate for for Javi
140 00:23:28.430 ⇒ 00:23:40.316 Jorrel Sto Tomas: But then, in regards to your engineering modeling, there’s a the data scientist I was talking about. I think he could be a good fit as long as you give me the list of tools that they need to learn. These guys will pick it up very, very fast.
141 00:23:40.550 ⇒ 00:23:41.220 Uttam Kumaran: Okay.
142 00:23:41.220 ⇒ 00:23:48.980 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Yeah, it’s it’s not like like these people are smarter than me, like it’s it’s it’s kind of insane like like these folks like are winning math like.
143 00:23:48.980 ⇒ 00:23:49.420 Uttam Kumaran: Are they.
144 00:23:49.420 ⇒ 00:23:49.880 Jorrel Sto Tomas: You know, mapping.
145 00:23:49.880 ⇒ 00:23:54.020 Uttam Kumaran: Are. Are any of those folks? Are you starting to train any folks on like the AI side?
146 00:23:55.749 ⇒ 00:24:11.419 Jorrel Sto Tomas: These guys are already trained in the AI side. In fact, like Rex, one of them or Rex, the guy that I’m you know, considering for for your data engineering and modeling as well. He’s actually the lead data scientist at the center for AI research in the Philippines. So he’s.
147 00:24:11.420 ⇒ 00:24:12.630 Uttam Kumaran: He’s like.
148 00:24:12.630 ⇒ 00:24:26.669 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Yeah, yeah. So he, I’m I’m trying to poach him, basically and so given an opportunity like yours. And he’s more interested in in private sector stuff. Because a lot of the things that he does is is public sector or like AI enablement. And he.
149 00:24:26.670 ⇒ 00:24:27.050 Jorrel Sto Tomas: yeah.
150 00:24:27.050 ⇒ 00:24:35.092 Jorrel Sto Tomas: more client facing or not really client facing, but actual client work. So stuff like what you’re saying is probably going to be more enticing for him.
151 00:24:35.710 ⇒ 00:24:57.060 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, that the I think the only issue, I would say, one, yeah, I mean, I I think we’re. We’re also probably in talks with. I mean one. I think we have one sort of AI client that’s about to close. But we already have 2 people on the bench that are gonna come and take on that and then we have a few others that we’re pitching that area out of out of everything, though, is so early that like
152 00:24:57.360 ⇒ 00:25:06.949 Uttam Kumaran: what a training curriculum would look like, I would have to think about but even there, I think we have. We have some interest, because in that area like there’s no us
153 00:25:07.889 ⇒ 00:25:11.839 Uttam Kumaran: like candidates like that meeting.
154 00:25:11.840 ⇒ 00:25:12.290 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Yeah.
155 00:25:12.290 ⇒ 00:25:29.759 Uttam Kumaran: The people who are in AI in the Us. Are like people that are doing like Llms or foundational models in terms of building. Like I, we’re looking for people that are like building agents, and, like, you know, sort of building those sort of systems. But that would probably something we consider also like later this year.
156 00:25:33.240 ⇒ 00:25:38.404 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Okay, yeah, no. I mean, like, I said, just give me a wish list of like, you know the types of people you want.
157 00:25:39.067 ⇒ 00:25:45.290 Jorrel Sto Tomas: You want you want on staff and we’ll make it happen. It’s really like, you know. I
158 00:25:45.520 ⇒ 00:25:57.330 Jorrel Sto Tomas: I I pride myself in finding quality talent and it’s been crazy. How easy it’s been! Here, like with with the stuff we’re doing at Fusion. Node. So yeah, just
159 00:25:57.390 ⇒ 00:26:19.536 Jorrel Sto Tomas: like, just give me give me the list of tools. Give me the the roles you need fulfilled. And yeah, we can. We can. We can definitely get that in for very cheap, too. So I can give you a cost basis offline Async, just to give you an idea of like what what you can, bill. But yeah, it’s very it’s very, very low. So
160 00:26:19.840 ⇒ 00:26:23.877 Uttam Kumaran: And then do you mind this week, or or I guess next week, connecting me with
161 00:26:24.150 ⇒ 00:26:38.209 Uttam Kumaran: with Matthew? I don’t think I’ve I’ve had a chance to chat with him. I know Robert mentioned him, you know, when, like probably a month or 2 ago, maybe I can give just chat with him. And then, yeah, I wanna I’m kind of like owning sort of like recruiting broadly
162 00:26:38.507 ⇒ 00:27:02.679 Uttam Kumaran: and Robert sort of kind of owning like Pm. And and sales. So I’m just sort of making the decisions and plugging people in. So if I can chat with him, and then sort of give him the thumbs up. And then I can think about basically as we bring on new clients. I just do the assignments and then also sort of bring him into slack. And then, yeah, we can get anything signed. Sort of as stuff hopefully closes in the next 2 weeks.
163 00:27:04.320 ⇒ 00:27:24.700 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Yeah, sounds good. I mean, we can. Once I give you cost basis stuff we can also talk about. You know what type of like service agreement. You you wanna wanna do like, you know billable. Or, you know, some sort of like Msa, I can basically just copy and paste we have with, like, our current clientele. But yeah, the like. It’s it’s
164 00:27:24.930 ⇒ 00:27:38.929 Jorrel Sto Tomas: it’s very cheap. So yeah, so so so margin will be beneficial, I think, for for the both of us. So yeah, I’ll I’ll give you a sample next next week when I get back into la, so.
165 00:27:38.930 ⇒ 00:27:39.500 Uttam Kumaran: Okay.
166 00:27:39.500 ⇒ 00:27:40.080 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Yeah.
167 00:27:40.690 ⇒ 00:27:41.110 Uttam Kumaran: Amazing.
168 00:27:41.110 ⇒ 00:27:47.540 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Introduction to Matthew earlier, so that you can while that’s happening in parallel. You know you can already start talking to him.
169 00:27:47.820 ⇒ 00:28:01.319 Uttam Kumaran: Perfect. And then for that person who’s learning dbt, if they have, if they are interested in like chatting with me, or I can, you know. Help guide them? Let me know. I mean I’d be interested. I don’t. I don’t. I haven’t met anyone recently that sort of learned
170 00:28:01.480 ⇒ 00:28:09.429 Uttam Kumaran: from scratch. So I’m I’m sort of curious on like, sort of what they’re picking up. Okay? And but I’ll definitely also send you
171 00:28:09.913 ⇒ 00:28:14.856 Uttam Kumaran: some resources on our side. That that, you know, were beneficial to me.
172 00:28:15.350 ⇒ 00:28:19.282 Uttam Kumaran: probably beyond. See if there’s anything else I can think of.
173 00:28:20.280 ⇒ 00:28:23.639 Uttam Kumaran: And then that way you can hand it to that person also. So.
174 00:28:24.320 ⇒ 00:28:45.510 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Okay, yeah, no, that that’ll be helpful. That’ll give me an idea, too. Of like, yeah. What? What these guys should be focusing on you know, especially if I do. If I start to bring in more of a pipeline of interns. You know the these are the types of tools that are, you know, actually going to be useful. So yeah, we’ll make it work
175 00:28:46.620 ⇒ 00:28:48.630 Jorrel Sto Tomas: cool. Okay, perfect.
176 00:28:49.110 ⇒ 00:29:05.879 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Yeah. Like, I said, I’m actually my side, I’ll I’ll make sure to make an introduction to you and Matthew. So you guys can chat and then I’ll give you kind of like a sample of like what our our agreements are with. Some of our clientele. Just so you know how much it might cost. Yeah.
177 00:29:06.450 ⇒ 00:29:09.042 Jorrel Sto Tomas: yeah, we can. We can go from there.
178 00:29:09.330 ⇒ 00:29:13.080 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Okay, perfect. How’s how’s business? Overall? Like, how’s the how did the trip end up
179 00:29:14.471 ⇒ 00:29:30.499 Jorrel Sto Tomas: this is really good. We’re expanding really quickly. There’s like a lot more because of this huge client that we we are servicing. We’re slated to become their lead partner next next month. So we’re expected to do a bunch of their system integration.
180 00:29:30.500 ⇒ 00:29:31.060 Uttam Kumaran: Nice.
181 00:29:31.060 ⇒ 00:29:53.159 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Forward. Which means, you know, in the same vein of like, when you’re doing a lot of contract work, you need more labor. That’s what we’re feeling right now is we? We don’t know if we can handle like 7 or 8 system integration contracts in one month with the current set of employees we have. So it’s it’s it’s it’s it’s picking up really fast.
182 00:29:53.160 ⇒ 00:30:06.929 Uttam Kumaran: No, it’s good, I mean. Look, it’s a challenge, that’s you know. That’s what I’ve you know me and Robert talk a lot, and for me. I’m like every day I’m like, these are the cheapest contracts we’ll have, like we need to be going for bigger and more complicated stuff.
183 00:30:07.030 ⇒ 00:30:22.509 Uttam Kumaran: You know, the problem is, of course, is this like getting people, one getting people handle the basic stuff. But also, I’m like, Look, I want to go prioritize either large scale. Dbt, my large migrations. And like more heftier data science stuff.
184 00:30:22.510 ⇒ 00:30:40.632 Uttam Kumaran: If they analyt. If the analytics, the basic analytics stuff is our way in, that’s fine. But we’re gonna start to go after larger and larger contracts. So even for me, I I’m like, I interview like 2 or 3 people a week just to like, have people sort of in the ether, because I get scared
185 00:30:40.970 ⇒ 00:30:46.524 Uttam Kumaran: cause if I was to go to market and hire some of my friends, really my background, there’s no way we would be able to afford them.
186 00:30:46.730 ⇒ 00:30:47.050 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Yeah.
187 00:30:47.050 ⇒ 00:30:51.450 Uttam Kumaran: And or for me to afford them. We need to be getting like bigger, bigger contracts, you know. So.
188 00:30:52.690 ⇒ 00:30:55.513 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Yeah. Yeah. Well, you know, that’s why that’s why I’m here.
189 00:30:56.120 ⇒ 00:31:04.150 Jorrel Sto Tomas: make it make it as as as as cheap as possible with with some of the highest quality you’ll you’ll ever see. So yeah, we’ll
190 00:31:04.300 ⇒ 00:31:11.070 Jorrel Sto Tomas: yeah. And you know that was kind of the goal with, I think you, as well as Robert is, is really, be able to have a deployable outsource.
191 00:31:11.070 ⇒ 00:31:11.650 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.
192 00:31:11.947 ⇒ 00:31:23.829 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Data team. So just, you know, like that that aligns with my interest and aligns with our mission. So yeah, more than happy to have as many of these folks on standby as as you want. So yeah.
193 00:31:25.070 ⇒ 00:31:26.229 Jorrel Sto Tomas: yeah, okay, so let’s.
194 00:31:26.230 ⇒ 00:31:32.529 Uttam Kumaran: So then I’ll look forward to that. And then, yeah, just connect me with with Michael. However, you you know.
195 00:31:32.690 ⇒ 00:31:33.350 Uttam Kumaran: whatever.
196 00:31:33.350 ⇒ 00:31:45.570 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Yeah. Matthew, Matthew, we we sync, yeah, we sync like, once a week, anyway. So I’ll just literally I’ll just tell him that. You guys want to talk. And I’ll I’ll set up an introduction email. And then you guys can take it from there.
197 00:31:45.570 ⇒ 00:31:46.760 Uttam Kumaran: Cool. Okay. Perfect.
198 00:31:48.080 ⇒ 00:31:56.060 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Great but anyway, send me on slack your email, and then I’ll that way that I I can share. I can.
199 00:31:56.060 ⇒ 00:31:58.930 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Yeah, introduction that way. I don’t think I have your email yet. So.
200 00:31:58.930 ⇒ 00:31:59.619 Uttam Kumaran: Okay, I definitely will.
201 00:32:01.420 ⇒ 00:32:04.079 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Alright! Great! Well, talk soon with Tom.
202 00:32:04.080 ⇒ 00:32:10.590 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, let’s have a safe flight home. And yeah, let me know again. Hope everything’s safe when you get there. So but yeah, enjoy the weekend.
203 00:32:10.770 ⇒ 00:32:14.299 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Oh, we’ll find out, my friend, we will find out so.
204 00:32:15.037 ⇒ 00:32:17.480 Uttam Kumaran: Not looking forward to it, but.
205 00:32:17.600 ⇒ 00:32:19.990 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Yeah, we’ll see you all right. Bye.