Meeting Title: Mariane Cequina’s Zoom Meeting Date: 2025-05-27 Meeting participants: Mariane Cequina, Megan Murray, Uttam Kumaran
WEBVTT
1 00:02:10.300 ⇒ 00:02:11.770 Megan Murray: Hello.
2 00:02:21.890 ⇒ 00:02:22.940 Megan Murray: hey?
3 00:02:23.320 ⇒ 00:02:26.339 Megan Murray: Can you hear me? Okay, I think you’re muted. Yeah.
4 00:02:27.150 ⇒ 00:02:27.660 Mariane Cequina: Awesome.
5 00:02:27.660 ⇒ 00:02:28.709 Megan Murray: How are you doing.
6 00:02:28.950 ⇒ 00:02:30.020 Mariane Cequina: I’m doing fine.
7 00:02:30.730 ⇒ 00:02:38.730 Megan Murray: Good. What’s the what’s the time difference between us? Just for like, what’s your typical like? Working hours? Your time.
8 00:02:39.430 ⇒ 00:02:46.239 Mariane Cequina: I. Usually I work around 9 pm, my time. So right now, it’s currently one am my time, and that’s it.
9 00:02:46.240 ⇒ 00:02:47.360 Megan Murray: Oh, wow!
10 00:02:47.360 ⇒ 00:02:48.539 Mariane Cequina: Yeah, yeah.
11 00:02:48.710 ⇒ 00:03:12.569 Megan Murray: You know, I’ve got someone on my team, Kelly. She lives in Spain, and she’s got 2 small kids, and she’s just naturally a night owl, and, you know, always struggled with like, you know, the corporate 8 to 5 kind of schedule just years ago. And so, even though we have a 7 h time difference between the 2 of us. It works out. It works out great for both of us, because it’s like
12 00:03:12.630 ⇒ 00:03:19.549 Megan Murray: I can send her something, you know, at the end of day my time, and I know that she’ll look at it before I log in the next day, and then
13 00:03:19.760 ⇒ 00:03:21.680 Megan Murray: I don’t know. It just seems to
14 00:03:21.990 ⇒ 00:03:27.419 Megan Murray: work out pretty well. It’s like anything you get used to. Whatever schedule you’re on.
15 00:03:27.600 ⇒ 00:03:29.901 Mariane Cequina: Yeah, definitely, you get used to it.
16 00:03:30.660 ⇒ 00:03:31.600 Megan Murray: Yeah. Hey?
17 00:03:31.600 ⇒ 00:03:32.749 Uttam Kumaran: Hey? How’s it going.
18 00:03:32.750 ⇒ 00:03:33.600 Megan Murray: I have.
19 00:03:34.140 ⇒ 00:03:37.308 Uttam Kumaran: It was good. Yeah, it was relaxing. It was
20 00:03:37.920 ⇒ 00:03:43.349 Uttam Kumaran: just nice to get out of Austin for a bit. So yeah, it was good energizing.
21 00:03:44.000 ⇒ 00:03:49.380 Megan Murray: Good, do you? Was this friends that the wedding you went to, or family, or what was? How do you know.
22 00:03:49.707 ⇒ 00:04:12.629 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah. So it was. It was actually so you may have seen in our records this guy named Nicholas Sukari. He’s used to be a project manager here, and he he’s now product manager, another company. But he invited us to the wedding, so he used to work for Brainforge and then I went down and saw him a few months ago. And then.
23 00:04:12.988 ⇒ 00:04:19.440 Uttam Kumaran: yeah, he just was like you should come to my wedding. And I was like, Okay, cool, I’ll be there. So it was really really nice.
24 00:04:20.290 ⇒ 00:04:24.530 Megan Murray: That’s really cool. I didn’t realize that was who it was. So I remember.
25 00:04:24.530 ⇒ 00:04:35.594 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, I told him he. I told him. He doesn’t need to. He doesn’t need to do that, you know, but he was really. He’s like he actually was really, really tremendous for our business. He was the 1st project manager we had, and
26 00:04:36.499 ⇒ 00:04:43.120 Uttam Kumaran: Help me get out of stuff for for a moment there. So we can build a business.
27 00:04:44.290 ⇒ 00:04:49.389 Uttam Kumaran: so yeah, everybody who who joins us I feel like for the most like some of the contractors.
28 00:04:49.550 ⇒ 00:04:59.220 Uttam Kumaran: like some of the engineering contractors, I would say some people have like come in and out and haven’t really built a lot of relationship with. But for the most part everyone that’s joined the company, even if they leave.
29 00:04:59.350 ⇒ 00:05:04.510 Uttam Kumaran: it’s like, never been on like non amicable terms. It’s usually people are.
30 00:05:04.630 ⇒ 00:05:16.699 Uttam Kumaran: They just like they wanted to do agency work for a bit. And Miko wanted to go more do software product, and so people wanted to. They just like, we’re like, I want to go into a real software company and but everyone
31 00:05:17.210 ⇒ 00:05:28.359 Uttam Kumaran: stays a fan of the company which has been really really special. All the companies I left was were not as nice as that. So I feel.
32 00:05:28.360 ⇒ 00:05:28.750 Megan Murray: Wow!
33 00:05:28.750 ⇒ 00:05:38.859 Uttam Kumaran: That I can try to make that more common, you know I don’t. I tell people to just leave, at least let me help you get somewhere? Good. So yeah.
34 00:05:38.860 ⇒ 00:05:54.189 Megan Murray: Well, you’re you’re very lucky, I mean, that’s a that’s a Testament to you, really as a leader and manager, because I’ll tell you just that is not common, like I’ve seen teams that are significantly smaller than yours that have like so much drama, even from like
35 00:05:54.200 ⇒ 00:06:20.579 Megan Murray: people. They knew a lot like a lot of times. I think what’s common is like startups. You know, it’s typically like someone’s had experience elsewhere. Corporate experience. They’ve been really really like, you know, known for building a niche of experience somewhere, and then you know, that kind of leads them to start a business in that niche. Well, they know people in that niche, and usually that 1st round of hires is people they worked with in corporate. Well, it’s a it’s a big
36 00:06:20.610 ⇒ 00:06:30.309 Megan Murray: shock coming from like corporate corporate world, hundreds, thousands of employees to startup where, like your accountability levels just different, like.
37 00:06:30.310 ⇒ 00:06:33.339 Uttam Kumaran: So much higher, it’s so much higher. Yeah.
38 00:06:33.340 ⇒ 00:06:45.170 Megan Murray: Yeah, so that’s I you’d think that like, oh, it would be pretty easy to make that switch. But like I see more people struggle with that aspect of it, and then that kind of snowballs, a whole bunch of other.
39 00:06:45.170 ⇒ 00:06:53.949 Uttam Kumaran: No, and it’s not something you expect to be a problem. And the reason why I started the business is because I got kind of pissed off at how bad
40 00:06:54.220 ⇒ 00:07:10.029 Uttam Kumaran: startups are run and how bad they treat their team. And like we’re not really. We’re not a venture backed Startup, right like our goals are. We’re not here to like change the world. But there’s just things easy things you can avoid through clear expectations, and I don’t think like I don’t.
41 00:07:10.160 ⇒ 00:07:18.618 Uttam Kumaran: People ask me like how my life is. It can be. I can describe it as crazy, but I immediately say, like nobody else in the company should be describing their stuff as crazy like
42 00:07:18.860 ⇒ 00:07:19.270 Megan Murray: Yeah.
43 00:07:19.270 ⇒ 00:07:39.154 Uttam Kumaran: Right. And that’s not the type of environment we’re trying to run. And there’s trade offs right. There is trade offs like those folks may see like fast ramp, but then tons of attrition for us, we may have to find other ways to optimize and move quicker. But I don’t know. I don’t think there’s any need to like run businesses like that.
44 00:07:39.850 ⇒ 00:07:57.889 Uttam Kumaran: I think you end up paying for it in one way or another, like you churn through your team or partners, and then, of course, they end up being references down the line for for people to come, work for us, and, like it comes back to you. So you just try to play like long term games, you know.
45 00:07:59.250 ⇒ 00:08:10.639 Uttam Kumaran: and I know it could be stressful like, I always. I’m clear with the fact that, like we don’t have everything figured out, there is gonna be paying for a lot longer. Expectations aren’t like I’m I’m actually totally fine
46 00:08:10.910 ⇒ 00:08:34.120 Uttam Kumaran: saying that out loud. I don’t. I don’t have any fear of that. That’s what it is like. Some people they they don’t like, they? I don’t. It’s not that I like that. We have those things. I don’t like that, but I’ve been there. And so this is what it is, and so we can all accept that like, hey, for a while it’s gonna be touch and go. We’re gonna start to like, get the spread bigger and bigger and bigger.
47 00:08:34.240 ⇒ 00:08:53.089 Uttam Kumaran: and like I told people like it where we were now is not where we were 3 months ago, 3 months before that. So it’s getting a lot. It’s a lot lot better like I’m able. I’m I’m here in Dallas today gonna do some content with some folks for like top of funnel, and like I didn’t. When was last time I had like a half day to drive and take meetings on the phone. And
48 00:08:53.210 ⇒ 00:08:56.255 Uttam Kumaran: and you know, so things are getting a lot better.
49 00:08:56.820 ⇒ 00:09:18.869 Megan Murray: Nice. Yeah, well, that’s a good segue into fin ops. Let’s talk about how we can really just get some good process in place for our financial operations, just so that we’ve got a good understanding of exactly who does what, who needs what and just what the process overall looks like I can take that away to
50 00:09:19.243 ⇒ 00:09:36.570 Megan Murray: you know, kind of formalize, just like a reference sheet which we’ll use to kind of build out workflows between between Mary Ann support, and then my team, so that we can just you know, not have like these like shuffles, or last minute questions about like.
51 00:09:36.620 ⇒ 00:09:49.627 Megan Murray: oh, is the contract signed like, when do we invoice it? I know we’ve we’ve cleared a lot of that up over slack, but I think just having it somewhere in a living document that we can use just to kind of like, alter over time.
52 00:09:49.980 ⇒ 00:09:50.700 Megan Murray: so yeah, the.
53 00:09:50.700 ⇒ 00:10:10.880 Uttam Kumaran: It’s also not gonna be me for hopefully, very much longer. Right? So a. As soon as I figure it out, other people then take on the work, because then I can explain to them what they need to do. For example, there will be some other people, or the project. Managers will then interact directly and say, like, this contract is available for signing or things like that. So
54 00:10:11.120 ⇒ 00:10:23.309 Uttam Kumaran: for me, it’s like I’m happy to to like get thrown at the deep end to then see how it works, and then certainly, I think it’ll. It’ll quickly become other people that that start to interface as well. So.
55 00:10:23.880 ⇒ 00:10:26.849 Megan Murray: Yeah, that’s that’s awesome, I think, especially
56 00:10:27.268 ⇒ 00:10:38.750 Megan Murray: like what’s been super helpful for me is both of you helping put together that payroll summary, just like, just so I can get organized on like, oh, who’s paid on a fixed monthly rate?
57 00:10:39.160 ⇒ 00:10:50.719 Megan Murray: Versus, you know, who’s more like hourly and kind of what the terms were. The people located like that was pretty relevant just with the recent analysis. So I think for some of those like
58 00:10:51.187 ⇒ 00:11:10.739 Megan Murray: like, especially to the extent that you could probably manage Amber or Annie more for that execution, cause they’re they’re already on fixed rates. So to me, that’s a great like, hey? No additional incremental dollar cost like I would push it. Push as much of that. Yes.
59 00:11:10.840 ⇒ 00:11:24.950 Megan Murray: to them as you can, because it takes work off of your plate, and then you know the process that we decide on to them. It’s just an Fyi. Hey? Here’s how we’re managing this. So for thought.
60 00:11:25.240 ⇒ 00:11:37.899 Megan Murray: But yeah, so primarily want to talk about the so I guess, like the most timely is, we got kicked off August. So we need a solution there and then, generically, like.
61 00:11:37.900 ⇒ 00:12:00.230 Megan Murray: regardless which solution we go with which I think we can talk through what my recommendation is, but also just what the alternatives are. Just so you’re aware, regardless of that, there’s some like baseline documents that we want to make sure we have on file for everybody, both us and international, and then just the overall workflow for what happens.
62 00:12:00.230 ⇒ 00:12:14.340 Megan Murray: You know who’s responsible for getting a contract signed? What happens with signed and you know who’s responsible for the follow up ongoing. So those are the 3 primary things I wanted to go through today. But was there anything else that either of you had.
63 00:12:14.590 ⇒ 00:12:16.180 Megan Murray: in addition to that.
64 00:12:19.830 ⇒ 00:12:21.300 Uttam Kumaran: Marianne? Anything.
65 00:12:22.057 ⇒ 00:12:30.670 Mariane Cequina: Since we’re moving out from gusto because we actually make just migrated there on onboarding. So would it be just better if if it will be using like linear.
66 00:12:30.950 ⇒ 00:12:34.970 Mariane Cequina: like all the onboarding processes. I think there will be.
67 00:12:34.970 ⇒ 00:12:35.459 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, I think.
68 00:12:35.460 ⇒ 00:12:36.460 Mariane Cequina: Just there.
69 00:12:37.030 ⇒ 00:12:41.659 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, that’s probably a good question. I think as soon as we’re able to get a clear document of like
70 00:12:41.990 ⇒ 00:12:49.320 Uttam Kumaran: new onboarding new client, just the steps. We can then make sure that as part of our project management workflow ends up there.
71 00:12:49.460 ⇒ 00:13:08.469 Uttam Kumaran: the second tier will look to is like once we have that documented, we can leverage our team to help even automate some of that stuff, for example, moving clockify hours into something digestible that the team can then, Bill, or pay against that is something that I, our team, can whip together something pretty quickly. But I just need
72 00:13:08.720 ⇒ 00:13:20.079 Uttam Kumaran: it would be if if I was to go tell them, and then and then y’all are the the users of it. There will be a disconnect right? So it’s like 1st do, seeing all the manual processes, and then we’ll start to isolate what we can
73 00:13:20.320 ⇒ 00:13:22.920 Uttam Kumaran: sort of automate and and help assist with. So
74 00:13:23.427 ⇒ 00:13:35.560 Uttam Kumaran: I think the most important thing. For me is yeah, to make a decision on on the on ramp and or the the new tool. And then, yeah, I kind of want to.
75 00:13:36.040 ⇒ 00:14:03.880 Uttam Kumaran: All I think about every day is just looking through all of my tasks and finding out who else in the company is equipped to to take that on as much of my time that can go to sales or that can go to nurturing clients, or that can go to our team. Those are those. That’s what I spend my day on in that order. And so that’s I think that’s where I have the highest leverage. So for me, it’s just making sure that
76 00:14:05.020 ⇒ 00:14:22.979 Uttam Kumaran: as we’re selling, there’s a clear process to execute against those contracts and move people into the client stage and then also, like we can, we’re able to close months and quarters out and then starting to do hopefully some longer term planning as soon as we get to that stage. So those are the things that are on my mind.
77 00:14:23.790 ⇒ 00:14:29.300 Megan Murray: Yeah, no, those are those are great things for sure. I think, like.
78 00:14:29.430 ⇒ 00:14:49.580 Megan Murray: you guys are using linear. It seems like everyone who would need to be actively using that is already on it. So I think it makes sense that we can. We can streamline the onboarding because even when I looked in gusto. A lot of the onboarding was like schedule, a like intro call, just kind of like an orientation like onboarding.
79 00:14:49.580 ⇒ 00:14:50.070 Uttam Kumaran: Yes.
80 00:14:50.070 ⇒ 00:15:18.939 Megan Murray: So like that we don’t really for contract like. So really, everybody is contractors, you know. So that’s how we look at people. Which which means that there’s a lot less compliance burden that we have to document, and we want to keep it that way just with the current state of the business and then evaluate ftes. Once we get to the C Corp level. So that’s how I’m approaching everything. And
81 00:15:19.370 ⇒ 00:15:47.229 Megan Murray: And so with that, I think like a lot of that orientation related things we can. The the really, the only things we need documented from an Hr perspective for the contractors is the contracts, the agreements you want to make sure your your ndas already have IP assignment language in them. So those are the primary things that we work with and then A. W. 9, if it’s a Us. Based employee
82 00:15:47.230 ⇒ 00:16:00.760 Megan Murray: or I said employee. But you know what I mean. Like a us person. There’s there’s 2 other forms. If they’re international to date. I don’t know. Have you guys been collecting the W. 8 or W. 8 BEN.
83 00:16:01.350 ⇒ 00:16:05.640 Uttam Kumaran: Unless it’s unless it’s gone through gusto. We haven’t been doing anything manually.
84 00:16:06.190 ⇒ 00:16:15.420 Megan Murray: Okay, yeah, it’s just a, it’s pretty much an international version of A. W. 9. It honestly doesn’t really mean anything other than like.
85 00:16:15.530 ⇒ 00:16:42.240 Megan Murray: you know that you’re doing? It’s just like an extra level of due diligence to say that, like, Hey, this person doesn’t need a 1099 from us at the end of the year. That’s the only real purpose it serves. But it’s since we’re, you know, trying to operationalize some of these things and make an onboarding check. I think that that’s an easy thing that we can do. There’s 2 different versions, one’s intended for an employee and another one. I know we’ve got some people who pretty much have their own
86 00:16:42.576 ⇒ 00:16:52.999 Megan Murray: country specific Llc, based sort of thing for Brazil or some of these other countries. So there’s like 2 different forms, that we can just send them a blank version of
87 00:16:53.090 ⇒ 00:17:11.069 Megan Murray: depending if they’re an individual, or if they have, like an Llc equivalent that they run to super easy. I can make sure that Marianne’s got all of that, both blank W. 9 and the international equivalents, and then that could just sort of be like wrapped into the the workflow.
88 00:17:12.240 ⇒ 00:17:12.880 Megan Murray: And
89 00:17:13.680 ⇒ 00:17:19.440 Megan Murray: So so then I I think like, and then, when or if you need
90 00:17:19.839 ⇒ 00:17:41.650 Megan Murray: us to weigh in like on any anything else like. I’ll run this by Tina to from my team as Hr. Manager, just to make sure there’s nothing else we need to add in. And then I can get that over to you. And that should be pretty easy just to, because most of most of what you’re gonna be really onboarding them into is brain forge processes.
91 00:17:42.010 ⇒ 00:17:42.600 Uttam Kumaran: Hello!
92 00:17:42.840 ⇒ 00:17:44.390 Megan Murray: Yeah, so.
93 00:17:44.390 ⇒ 00:17:55.090 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah. And that’s somewhere we’re already taking care of, which is like getting them accounts. Everything stuff like that. I just wanna make sure all of our compliance related stuff is taken care of, and then also it’s like.
94 00:17:55.230 ⇒ 00:18:20.910 Uttam Kumaran: if we need to add them to like the spreadsheet, for example, like what are the other like? Sort of operational tasks beyond, just like executing contracts that we want to do and that’s not only on new contract that’s also on like rate changes for people. Or address changes. Those are things that are just gonna happen the longer for like role changes.
95 00:18:21.238 ⇒ 00:18:31.460 Uttam Kumaran: Right? That’s that’s just gonna happen the longer we have. So I just wanna make sure that, for example, it’ll be like me talking to someone saying, okay, cool. Someone’s up for promotion. They have a rate change.
96 00:18:31.910 ⇒ 00:18:37.159 Uttam Kumaran: And then I can indicate to Marianne this is the new process. This is the new thing, and she has a clear
97 00:18:37.350 ⇒ 00:18:39.899 Uttam Kumaran: step of action to take to document that.
98 00:18:40.550 ⇒ 00:19:01.809 Megan Murray: Yeah, for sure. You know the. So you know. Let’s assume we’re moving forward with ramps so pretty much the way that would it would work is that every ramp is what we would use to execute the payments. We can also use that to store things like contracts. We’ll definitely use it to store their W. 9 or W. 8,
99 00:19:02.130 ⇒ 00:19:13.279 Megan Murray: just because that’s related to their payments. So so we’ll use it for that. You know, it’s really up to you if you want to have the contracts in there, or if
100 00:19:13.280 ⇒ 00:19:34.500 Megan Murray: managing like. Right now, we’ve got a lot of that up to date in the spreadsheet as it is today is a good view and good reference point for me. To do it that way. I think it’ll help with the forecasting, too. But that’s just the summary. So I guess, like for the actual contracts we can put in ramp. We can put it in somewhere. That’s more
101 00:19:34.500 ⇒ 00:19:37.439 Megan Murray: intuitive for you. But.
102 00:19:37.440 ⇒ 00:19:49.070 Uttam Kumaran: I would. I would rather have it in both place. We have it in drive, as like our source of truth. And then I would, I would add it to ramp. Just added that as a step like I’m totally fine with that to have that in both places.
103 00:19:49.870 ⇒ 00:19:53.279 Megan Murray: Yeah, yeah, we can, we can do that, too. So.
104 00:19:53.280 ⇒ 00:19:53.720 Uttam Kumaran: Sure.
105 00:19:53.720 ⇒ 00:19:54.095 Megan Murray: Oh.
106 00:19:54.740 ⇒ 00:20:04.779 Megan Murray: yeah, I think like knowing that, like, maybe Google Drive is sort of the source of truth, because that’s gonna have anything expired. And then maybe we just add new things into ramp as they get signed.
107 00:20:04.890 ⇒ 00:20:24.529 Megan Murray: But ramp has some cool workflows where they’ll they’ll basically give you an email address. And you can just forward Pdfs to that email address. And it goes into a queue that someone reviews. And then either, oh, this is a document. Let me attach that to this person’s profile, or this is an invoice, you know. So as far.
108 00:20:24.530 ⇒ 00:20:25.940 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, that would be great, too.
109 00:20:26.870 ⇒ 00:20:27.730 Megan Murray: Very expensive.
110 00:20:27.730 ⇒ 00:20:38.010 Uttam Kumaran: And for all sorts of random stuff. I I read about it, you know I was expecting us to get on ramp at some point for like expense management to what everybody said is like sort of world class there. So
111 00:20:38.200 ⇒ 00:20:45.120 Uttam Kumaran: that’d be that’d be helpful, as we have some people that are buying like educational materials and things like that for them to just send it.
112 00:20:45.120 ⇒ 00:20:46.080 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.
113 00:20:46.390 ⇒ 00:21:07.219 Megan Murray: Yep, and so it can. It can definitely support expense reimbursements. As I was kind of looking at, like all the things that we need to like replace gusto with it pretty much, does all of that. I don’t believe it does like the hourly like tracking, but you’re using clockify, anyway. So we’re gonna have some sort of manual.
114 00:21:07.630 ⇒ 00:21:09.565 Megan Murray: So for that
115 00:21:10.210 ⇒ 00:21:13.149 Uttam Kumaran: But it’s not so many people like again. It’s only like
116 00:21:13.710 ⇒ 00:21:28.340 Uttam Kumaran: 1015 people, and only a handful of those are by monthly. So as long as we have, like a monthly closeout process, we’re moving those hours in, and then I’m pretty confident that at some like soon once we do that manually for a bit.
117 00:21:28.440 ⇒ 00:21:38.369 Uttam Kumaran: We can help streamline like, pull the data out of clock. If I put in one place, it’s clear we have. We can build that pretty easily in like a few hours, and that’ll be easy for this team.
118 00:21:38.990 ⇒ 00:21:45.420 Megan Murray: Yeah, that that would actually be hugely helpful for my perspective from the
119 00:21:46.520 ⇒ 00:21:56.559 Megan Murray: cause cause ramp can, like, you know, load anything that’s sent as a Pdf, so if everyone’s hour, if they’re on hourly, it’s like.
120 00:21:56.560 ⇒ 00:21:57.190 Uttam Kumaran: I see.
121 00:21:57.210 ⇒ 00:22:03.399 Megan Murray: Like, you see, like a summary can be sent. That just has all of that, you know.
122 00:22:03.400 ⇒ 00:22:07.940 Uttam Kumaran: If you can give me an example of either. Yeah, that’s like a
123 00:22:08.080 ⇒ 00:22:15.530 Uttam Kumaran: I mean, honestly, I if if it’s like, Hey, I need a Csv with like bi-weekly
124 00:22:15.830 ⇒ 00:22:20.350 Uttam Kumaran: or by monthly. So twice a month, with everybody’s hours and the dates.
125 00:22:20.730 ⇒ 00:22:25.850 Uttam Kumaran: And like, that’s what we need. And I can have our team basically run an automation that does that sends it to an email.
126 00:22:27.450 ⇒ 00:22:32.230 Uttam Kumaran: I think I would just need from this team just to know what that what that output needs to look like.
127 00:22:32.520 ⇒ 00:22:35.250 Uttam Kumaran: And then we can. We can build that for sure.
128 00:22:36.160 ⇒ 00:22:48.660 Megan Murray: I can. I can help with that. I can put together like a format of just just something that kind of almost looks like a monthly invoice, because that’s typically what we would see otherwise is like, typically contractors are.
129 00:22:48.660 ⇒ 00:22:49.900 Uttam Kumaran: Would invoice us
130 00:22:50.260 ⇒ 00:23:02.492 Uttam Kumaran: right. But it’s kind of like, you know. A lot of people are like, well, I’m already having them put their hours into this system. Not also gonna make them send me an invoice. So you kind of just choose your poison right?
131 00:23:02.770 ⇒ 00:23:15.799 Uttam Kumaran: I’m down. I’m gonna take that because clock, if I the reason we chose is they have a pretty good Api. So I knew at some point we would just pull that out of there automatically. So if you just can, if you tell me the format that’s working for ramp.
132 00:23:15.950 ⇒ 00:23:21.480 Uttam Kumaran: then I will just we’ll. We’ll build that and and hopefully have that run.
133 00:23:22.400 ⇒ 00:23:46.529 Megan Murray: Okay, yeah, that should be pretty straightforward then. And then for for ramp, I can work with Mary Ann just to get everybody who’s active, so we’ll need to set up everybody as a new like. Invite them as a new person. Reauthorize their bank information. We’ll use that to collect the W. 9 like I’m just gonna assume it’s not on file for anybody. We’ll just get it now
134 00:23:46.730 ⇒ 00:24:03.975 Megan Murray: and and then for those who are us based at the end of the year. We’ll just have like we. We do need to send 1099 forms to them, so it’ll be just a combination of what they received on gusto what they received on ramp. And hopefully, we don’t have any more than just those 2 sources.
135 00:24:04.750 ⇒ 00:24:31.118 Megan Murray: we don’t need to send 1099 for anyone who’s international. But so we will have that. So I’m already kind of tracking that as it’s due as we get later in the year. So for ramp. Specifically, it’s actually looking pretty good for the team members you have like, I was actually so surprised that they can support Usd payments to Pakistan cause that one can be a little touchy.
136 00:24:32.280 ⇒ 00:24:53.560 Megan Murray: but we it looks like we’re good for Pakistan, Philippines, and Egypt. It’s just Brazil, Brazil, and Nigeria are the 2 that are not currently supported on ramp. So so we have a little bit of a gap there, just for so that is.
137 00:24:53.780 ⇒ 00:24:58.580 Megan Murray: and I’m not familiar with Wise. So I think so. This would be
138 00:24:58.950 ⇒ 00:25:01.369 Uttam Kumaran: Even. I think the fees were pretty
139 00:25:01.860 ⇒ 00:25:05.920 Uttam Kumaran: like small. To be honest, it’s like a few dollars to to.
140 00:25:06.210 ⇒ 00:25:06.790 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.
141 00:25:06.790 ⇒ 00:25:07.520 Megan Murray: Yeah.
142 00:25:07.840 ⇒ 00:25:20.509 Megan Murray: Well, I mean, it’s even cheaper than that. It’s free. If you use the international fx, which is I I know that there were some people who you’d mentioned like. Oh, it takes them forever to get paid, and that was.
143 00:25:20.510 ⇒ 00:25:21.300 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.
144 00:25:21.300 ⇒ 00:25:22.760 Megan Murray: Rails. This would.
145 00:25:22.760 ⇒ 00:25:23.280 Uttam Kumaran: Yes.
146 00:25:23.280 ⇒ 00:25:30.129 Megan Murray: Sends them Usd. And foreign currency, so it get deposited into their accounts a lot faster.
147 00:25:30.350 ⇒ 00:25:30.880 Megan Murray: So it’s free.
148 00:25:30.880 ⇒ 00:25:31.750 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, that’s what we’re.
149 00:25:31.750 ⇒ 00:25:32.410 Megan Murray: Faster!
150 00:25:32.410 ⇒ 00:25:34.190 Uttam Kumaran: That’s what we’re noticing. Yeah.
151 00:25:34.930 ⇒ 00:25:41.199 Megan Murray: So that’s a no brainer. And then the Usd. Payments for Pakistan being 20 bucks
152 00:25:41.776 ⇒ 00:25:46.240 Megan Murray: we’ve got 2 people that are paid monthly, those contracts.
153 00:25:46.240 ⇒ 00:25:50.710 Megan Murray: I’m sorry, even active still. So that’s 40 bucks.
154 00:25:51.190 ⇒ 00:25:55.800 Megan Murray: and then ramp has a. They have a free tier
155 00:25:55.830 ⇒ 00:26:18.089 Megan Murray: that I think the primary difference between the free tier and the paid tier is approvals and a couple of other things. But if we and even then like, I think it’s only 15 bucks per month per user. Me and my team do not count towards that. Or I think we count as one person, because I have, like an advisor, console
156 00:26:18.090 ⇒ 00:26:26.319 Megan Murray: relationship. And there’s also a discount. I can get you that I forget what it is. But it’s just like something, some sort of upfront incentive.
157 00:26:26.843 ⇒ 00:26:30.700 Megan Murray: So I can set all that up and
158 00:26:31.930 ⇒ 00:26:56.780 Megan Murray: and then like. But but if we wanted to set up in the future like some sort of workflow where either. Marianne’s loading the hours. Well, Marianne’s probably gonna load the hours for the 1st couple of months at least, until we get any sort of automation in place. And even then it’s probably good to have someone review it periodically if we wanted to like just as an extra set of eyes say, like Marianne inputs it.
159 00:26:56.780 ⇒ 00:27:11.090 Megan Murray: Tom approves it, or Amber approves it, or somebody else like, just for a second set of eyes. That’s when that 15 bucks a month would kick in, and it would just be for your users, which I can’t imagine would be more than 3 or 4 people.
160 00:27:11.300 ⇒ 00:27:38.139 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, I would prefer. If it’s just like, for example, we’re gonna have some sort of hourly approval process. Like, for example, put in your hours the project manager of the client, that which you’re billing to has to approve, and then it goes. So whether that happens at the Ramp stage, or whether that’s like before. If if Ramp facilitates that nicely, then we should just do that in ramp. And then, yeah, right now it’ll just be.
161 00:27:38.290 ⇒ 00:27:41.581 Uttam Kumaran: It’ll just be me and amber
162 00:27:42.260 ⇒ 00:27:45.160 Uttam Kumaran: and we’re doing that in clockify now, where every
163 00:27:45.603 ⇒ 00:28:00.579 Uttam Kumaran: every month, like towards the end of the month, we look at the months hours we plan the next one, and we sort of flag anything that’s like fluctuating so in this would just be like as we, bill I would just have. Whoever is in the middle of that
164 00:28:00.760 ⇒ 00:28:02.330 Uttam Kumaran: be set as an approver.
165 00:28:03.710 ⇒ 00:28:20.899 Megan Murray: If if they’re already using clockify for that, because the second we start taking data out of clockify, we’re gonna lose detail right? And so if clockfies already got sort of that process for that approval mechanism, maybe there’s a way that we can either like leverage.
166 00:28:20.900 ⇒ 00:28:27.340 Uttam Kumaran: That team does it there and then. And then this team is just more like, takes that as source of truth. Okay, yeah.
167 00:28:27.840 ⇒ 00:28:33.989 Megan Murray: I think so cause otherwise, like, I don’t wanna create too many like, you know, access points.
168 00:28:33.990 ⇒ 00:28:51.780 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, I don’t. I don’t. I don’t really feel like people. Yeah, I I hear you. So I don’t. I think. Let’s let’s handle that and clockify, and then we’ll just make sure that this team gets the output format in the way they need to, and we are already reminding everyone to lock in their hours.
169 00:28:52.229 ⇒ 00:28:58.409 Uttam Kumaran: You know, at least at the end of every week. Yeah. So people are doing a good job of that.
170 00:28:59.159 ⇒ 00:29:00.899 Uttam Kumaran: So that’s fine.
171 00:29:01.840 ⇒ 00:29:02.290 Megan Murray: Yeah.
172 00:29:03.470 ⇒ 00:29:11.750 Megan Murray: So the that leaves us with the gap of Brazil. Kyle Velasco, I think.
173 00:29:11.750 ⇒ 00:29:12.570 Uttam Kumaran: Yes.
174 00:29:14.063 ⇒ 00:29:22.359 Megan Murray: I believe so. I actually didn’t see that we had any hours booked for that.
175 00:29:22.540 ⇒ 00:29:24.299 Megan Murray: Is that mistaken.
176 00:29:26.000 ⇒ 00:29:27.570 Uttam Kumaran: He’s in clockify.
177 00:29:28.360 ⇒ 00:29:33.070 Megan Murray: Okay, so we have paid them. I might have oh.
178 00:29:33.810 ⇒ 00:29:38.012 Megan Murray: I might need to re pull it, because I think he was one that I had flagged
179 00:29:39.530 ⇒ 00:29:44.640 Megan Murray: because he had a different name that I couldn’t match. But now I figured it out, and I don’t see that.
180 00:29:45.480 ⇒ 00:29:58.180 Megan Murray: So yeah, let me double. I’ll I’ll re pull his info, because I do want to make sure it’s all in the right place. But so, anyway, so we still would need to figure out a way to pay him. And then demi log
181 00:30:00.750 ⇒ 00:30:05.660 Megan Murray: demo lade in Nigeria. So.
182 00:30:07.010 ⇒ 00:30:09.679 Uttam Kumaran: For both of them. I can ask about wise
183 00:30:11.900 ⇒ 00:30:21.799 Megan Murray: Yeah. And I’m just not familiar with Wise. I haven’t used it myself. So but just by looking at it, it’s really just those 2.
184 00:30:22.100 ⇒ 00:30:29.520 Megan Murray: So everything I’ve heard about, wise though, is a lot of those like country specific. They let they can pretty much send payment to anybody.
185 00:30:29.900 ⇒ 00:30:30.670 Megan Murray: So.
186 00:30:30.670 ⇒ 00:30:38.780 Uttam Kumaran: What’s been the case, I think, for a lot of our folks in the Philip, I I really just focus on centralizing and gusto. Just so it’s in one place.
187 00:30:39.540 ⇒ 00:30:40.110 Megan Murray: Hmm.
188 00:30:40.350 ⇒ 00:30:52.139 Uttam Kumaran: But if it’s like wise or ramp, and we’re sort of good with that, then I will buy us towards ramp for as many people as we can do, and if there’s edge cases we’ll do it in wise. Wise is has been pretty easy for us.
189 00:30:53.900 ⇒ 00:30:55.119 Megan Murray: Yeah, I think
190 00:30:55.350 ⇒ 00:31:04.859 Megan Murray: I I think workflow wise. And the fact it’s already set up that’s good. And this is 2 people who are paid on a monthly basis. I can’t imagine that being
191 00:31:04.990 ⇒ 00:31:31.696 Megan Murray: difficult to support. I do think that the the one area that we’ll want to just make sure that Mary Ann and I are aligned when it comes. Time to process payments is just the bank balance, because I know this has been an issue in the past. We really want to avoid service fees, overdraft fees. I mean, gusto feels off as a direct result of that. So I just don’t want to see that happen again.
192 00:31:32.030 ⇒ 00:31:37.499 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah. So that’s probably the biggest thing for me, too, is like what options we have. I mean.
193 00:31:37.680 ⇒ 00:31:44.490 Uttam Kumaran: like we we have about. So we have like 20 K. And late we have another like
194 00:31:44.970 ⇒ 00:31:51.149 Uttam Kumaran: 30 K. And outstanding, and then June first, st another, probably like
195 00:31:51.670 ⇒ 00:31:54.530 Uttam Kumaran: 20 or 30 K. Will get kicked off
196 00:31:54.910 ⇒ 00:31:57.910 Uttam Kumaran: for payments in the 15 days. So that’s why I’m kind of like.
197 00:31:58.570 ⇒ 00:32:04.830 Megan Murray: I’ve got. I’m tracking at like 48.5 K. Expected for June.
198 00:32:05.410 ⇒ 00:32:05.750 Uttam Kumaran: Okay.
199 00:32:05.750 ⇒ 00:32:14.062 Megan Murray: So that’s what I’m forecasting. That includes off the record, which is the invoice that will get issued today.
200 00:32:14.700 ⇒ 00:32:18.129 Megan Murray: but just based on the open contracts and what I’ve got
201 00:32:18.490 ⇒ 00:32:24.580 Megan Murray: that’s that’s what I’m tracking towards. So I think that this is kind of like there’s the light.
202 00:32:24.580 ⇒ 00:32:29.700 Uttam Kumaran: Is that, including the is that, including the the late, the 2 late ones.
203 00:32:30.320 ⇒ 00:32:35.530 Megan Murray: So I’ve got Mattermore at 12 K. For June
204 00:32:36.100 ⇒ 00:32:39.090 Megan Murray: pool parts to go at 10 K. For June.
205 00:32:40.801 ⇒ 00:32:45.760 Megan Murray: Let’s see Pongo 10 K. That’s just the standard one.
206 00:32:45.870 ⇒ 00:32:51.789 Megan Murray: And then the recently signed Urban stems, 13.5 and off the record 3 K.
207 00:32:52.650 ⇒ 00:32:53.670 Megan Murray: So that’s.
208 00:32:53.670 ⇒ 00:32:54.760 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah. So we’ll have.
209 00:32:54.760 ⇒ 00:32:55.220 Megan Murray: Alan.
210 00:32:55.220 ⇒ 00:32:58.999 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, and we’ll also have ABC, which is 6.5.
211 00:33:01.080 ⇒ 00:33:01.409 Megan Murray: That one.
212 00:33:01.410 ⇒ 00:33:02.580 Uttam Kumaran: Hasn’t signed it up.
213 00:33:03.400 ⇒ 00:33:07.330 Uttam Kumaran: No, no, that’s been signed like last month.
214 00:33:08.160 ⇒ 00:33:11.519 Uttam Kumaran: So that’s 6.5 for 12 months. For 6 months.
215 00:33:13.440 ⇒ 00:33:18.100 Megan Murray: I don’t have. I think that. Oh, you know, I think that was one.
216 00:33:18.370 ⇒ 00:33:24.460 Megan Murray: Yeah, let me make sure that’s updated. I think that was the one that Kelly sent when I was out last week.
217 00:33:24.460 ⇒ 00:33:25.720 Uttam Kumaran: Yes, that’s correct.
218 00:33:25.720 ⇒ 00:33:33.510 Megan Murray: Just didn’t get updated on the spreadsheet. So yeah, let me look for that contract and just get this updated.
219 00:33:34.590 ⇒ 00:33:40.060 Uttam Kumaran: And then we have, we have this, we have this, yeah, we have. ABC, so that’s 6.5 K,
220 00:33:40.600 ⇒ 00:33:47.329 Uttam Kumaran: and then that was 6 months, and then we have read me, which also closed.
221 00:33:47.860 ⇒ 00:33:50.659 Uttam Kumaran: and that’s another 3 K.
222 00:33:51.410 ⇒ 00:33:52.689 Megan Murray: I’ve got that one.
223 00:33:52.850 ⇒ 00:33:54.760 Megan Murray: Yeah, through November.
224 00:33:55.140 ⇒ 00:33:56.015 Megan Murray: So
225 00:33:57.680 ⇒ 00:33:58.250 Uttam Kumaran: I don’t.
226 00:33:58.250 ⇒ 00:33:58.960 Uttam Kumaran: I think.
227 00:33:59.250 ⇒ 00:34:05.260 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, I don’t think readme is through November, though I think it’s just
228 00:34:06.340 ⇒ 00:34:09.110 Megan Murray: Oh, no, you’re right. It was just the 3 K. Sorry.
229 00:34:09.110 ⇒ 00:34:11.099 Uttam Kumaran: I think it’s just the 3 K.
230 00:34:11.590 ⇒ 00:34:12.149 Megan Murray: The record.
231 00:34:12.150 ⇒ 00:34:18.719 Uttam Kumaran: Off the record off. The record is, yeah. So this month is 1, 3 K. Next month, 3 K, and then it’s ad hoc.
232 00:34:19.060 ⇒ 00:34:21.170 Uttam Kumaran: hourly until November.
233 00:34:22.955 ⇒ 00:34:25.829 Uttam Kumaran: Pool parts. Yeah, I’m gonna
234 00:34:26.110 ⇒ 00:34:28.630 Uttam Kumaran: we’re we’re basically talking about the next
235 00:34:29.449 ⇒ 00:34:35.210 Uttam Kumaran: deal today. So we’ll kind of figure out what the next billing amount is, gonna be.
236 00:34:35.350 ⇒ 00:34:36.589 Uttam Kumaran: but there will be.
237 00:34:37.050 ⇒ 00:34:42.179 Uttam Kumaran: It’ll be some amount. And we worked. We’ve worked at least 30 or 40 h this month.
238 00:34:43.690 ⇒ 00:34:44.310 Megan Murray: Okay.
239 00:34:44.310 ⇒ 00:34:51.039 Uttam Kumaran: And then, yeah, I think they. And then, so I think, yeah, with
240 00:34:51.150 ⇒ 00:34:53.879 Uttam Kumaran: with those. And then, yeah, an additional.
241 00:34:55.100 ⇒ 00:34:59.190 Uttam Kumaran: yeah, the 20 K that we’re basically waiting on. Yeah, that’s probably it.
242 00:35:01.010 ⇒ 00:35:06.290 Megan Murray: Yeah, no, I I will say we’ll just if it’s at all possible just to kinda like
243 00:35:06.450 ⇒ 00:35:12.540 Megan Murray: pause on any new additions to the team member until we can get this under control. That would really help.
244 00:35:13.300 ⇒ 00:35:21.630 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, I don’t think we’re bringing on anyone else at all. Like, I’m basically waiting until we get the sort of like.
245 00:35:21.910 ⇒ 00:35:28.910 Uttam Kumaran: So it’s really really painful. I mean we, unfortunately or fortunately, we’re always interviewing. So I interview every day.
246 00:35:29.314 ⇒ 00:35:40.235 Uttam Kumaran: But we don’t pull, we don’t, we can’t. We just don’t pull the trigger until like, yeah, sort of known. And I will say, we’ve downsized a lot like we. We sort of moved or shifted a lot of contractors out and
247 00:35:40.630 ⇒ 00:35:41.200 Megan Murray: Yeah.
248 00:35:41.770 ⇒ 00:35:42.300 Uttam Kumaran: So, yeah.
249 00:35:42.340 ⇒ 00:36:04.330 Megan Murray: Went through a pretty thorough review of expenses which hopefully, we’ll start seeing the benefits of that like this month, and reflected financially. So I think so. All of the movements, I think, are positive, but it’s like we’re still kind of like just at that treading water stage. And this could be a good month with like.
250 00:36:04.470 ⇒ 00:36:08.260 Megan Murray: pretty much yeah, with like
251 00:36:08.760 ⇒ 00:36:15.100 Megan Murray: 50 K. Expected to come in June, plus the 20 K. We know that we’re owed from
252 00:36:15.750 ⇒ 00:36:21.519 Megan Murray: the various sources then, like that, hopefully can create some breathing room.
253 00:36:22.070 ⇒ 00:36:23.950 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah. And then the goal. I mean, we’re
254 00:36:24.130 ⇒ 00:36:26.320 Uttam Kumaran: yeah. The goal would be like, we have about
255 00:36:26.480 ⇒ 00:36:28.970 Uttam Kumaran: we have about 150 k
256 00:36:29.140 ⇒ 00:36:32.189 Uttam Kumaran: of Billings and pipeline right now.
257 00:36:32.310 ⇒ 00:36:38.410 Uttam Kumaran: So basically, that’s all like we’re hoping gravy, you know. And so
258 00:36:38.580 ⇒ 00:36:43.769 Uttam Kumaran: we’re hoping to close that in the next 2 3 weeks.
259 00:36:43.980 ⇒ 00:36:48.709 Uttam Kumaran: and then again, a lot of those as much as we could do are upfront net. 15.
260 00:36:48.940 ⇒ 00:36:56.319 Uttam Kumaran: So the next 2 weeks are sort of important, so that those can reflect in in June, hopefully.
261 00:36:57.640 ⇒ 00:37:10.539 Megan Murray: Yeah. And since we’ll be moving to more of like a like an Ap process for contractor payments as opposed to like a more traditional payroll, which is on kind of more strict timelines, like.
262 00:37:10.540 ⇒ 00:37:10.930 Uttam Kumaran: Okay.
263 00:37:10.930 ⇒ 00:37:25.239 Megan Murray: That that does give some more flexibility, because we’ll be loading in their activity for the month, and then we’ll, you know, between Mary and Ann and I just communicating about, you know. Is it safe to pull the trigger? Is it safe to.
264 00:37:25.240 ⇒ 00:37:25.720 Uttam Kumaran: Yes.
265 00:37:25.720 ⇒ 00:37:29.760 Megan Murray: Payments. Then we fire, and then.
266 00:37:29.760 ⇒ 00:37:30.280 Uttam Kumaran: Yes. Correct.
267 00:37:30.280 ⇒ 00:37:33.390 Megan Murray: Help us just more.
268 00:37:33.560 ⇒ 00:37:55.609 Megan Murray: But if we know that like, Hey, like, we’re gonna have 10 K. In the bank in 3 days, then maybe we postpone that payment for the 3 days. So so again the design, the end of the tunnel, and the other thing, Marianne, that I haven’t yet built out the process for. But cause. I wanted to have this game plan conversation first.st
269 00:37:56.156 ⇒ 00:38:05.633 Megan Murray: But really starting to dig into the the client level or project level profitability. So, for example, like
270 00:38:06.190 ⇒ 00:38:28.019 Megan Murray: you know, like the 6,500 ABC home, making sure that, like, we’re tracking to that from a profitability perspective, so that we can start to monitor really on a monthly basis. So we know that for the month of June, 6,500 when we have the full hours for June, making sure that like, okay, are we like.
271 00:38:28.080 ⇒ 00:38:48.019 Megan Murray: how much is the team spending on this, and even including like a fixed portion of time for the people who are on fixed like. We’ll just really refine those assumptions. So I think it would be awesome. Not that I expect you to do all of that. But just to help me like, pull together all of the data from clockify.
272 00:38:48.020 ⇒ 00:39:08.469 Megan Murray: Just so we can work through that to, you know. Just be more intentional around it, and that’ll just help us from a management perspective. And then, when you’re getting your monthly financials, we can, you know, evaluate any trends that we see to. Okay like this this month. We were more profitable here, less profitable here.
273 00:39:09.006 ⇒ 00:39:30.489 Megan Murray: And then, because of that, too, like the way that we’ll want to really work towards getting the financials prepared. Is that like there’s there’s 2. There’s 2 sides to it. So there’s the the cog side of it. So the percentage of time that’s directly correlated to revenue that goes on one line item and then all the other internal
274 00:39:30.860 ⇒ 00:39:52.359 Megan Murray: management or non billable time that goes on a like a below the line, so the combination of getting those in the right place will also help us get a better financial picture. Compared to what’s been previously, which is just everything in one line. It’s just not a great way to look at the business. So
275 00:39:52.829 ⇒ 00:40:09.070 Megan Murray: so more to come on that I think once since we’re so close to the end of May, then then I can put together just sort of like a template of what it what would be helpful to see for May? Now that.
276 00:40:09.130 ⇒ 00:40:22.780 Megan Murray: you know, we’re kind of filling in all the gaps. So now that I’ve got like a good view of which contracts were active for May, then I can say for these people I need to know which projects almost put together like a grid or something. So I think.
277 00:40:22.780 ⇒ 00:40:25.950 Uttam Kumaran: And the fixed people, by the way, are tracking their hours.
278 00:40:26.290 ⇒ 00:40:27.130 Uttam Kumaran: Yes.
279 00:40:27.130 ⇒ 00:40:29.609 Megan Murray: I know it’s great, which is good.
280 00:40:29.610 ⇒ 00:40:47.569 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, so we’re not losing that fidelity and then you’re exactly right. In fact, the crew we have now we can sustain another 2 or 3 clients without getting more billable people. The only role that that may stretch is we. We
281 00:40:47.680 ⇒ 00:41:00.429 Uttam Kumaran: amber is close to being like pretty slam on as a project manager, but on the engineering side, which will be the highest rate, we, we have capacity for another 2 or 3 projects, with no added.
282 00:41:00.670 ⇒ 00:41:19.920 Uttam Kumaran: with, just like the incremental hours from some folks, so I feel like the base expenses are like strong. They are high, but I don’t really expect us to add more like fixed headcount cost, except for one more project manager in the near future.
283 00:41:20.030 ⇒ 00:41:23.259 Uttam Kumaran: and and the on the on the marketing side as well
284 00:41:23.440 ⇒ 00:41:28.069 Uttam Kumaran: like this is probably gonna be it like, I don’t. We’re we’re actually scaling a lot of our stuff.
285 00:41:28.210 ⇒ 00:41:36.435 Uttam Kumaran: So I I feel pretty good at like our base level like expenses. Finally,
286 00:41:37.570 ⇒ 00:41:42.395 Uttam Kumaran: and we’re cutting out like, basically ruthlessly cutting out as much as we can.
287 00:41:42.890 ⇒ 00:41:49.370 Uttam Kumaran: So like, I I feel, okay, I really think that what’s like gonna be tremendous. We assign another 2 or 3 clients
288 00:41:49.510 ⇒ 00:41:53.600 Uttam Kumaran: which we have a lot in the pipeline that’ll give us that like breathing room.
289 00:41:53.820 ⇒ 00:41:56.570 Uttam Kumaran: and that that would be, you know, really, really great.
290 00:41:58.560 ⇒ 00:42:01.768 Megan Murray: Oh, yeah, I totally agree with you and
291 00:42:02.360 ⇒ 00:42:08.469 Megan Murray: I’m hopeful. I think we’ve got all the all the right mixings for all of that, too. So
292 00:42:09.090 ⇒ 00:42:14.609 Megan Murray: yeah, it’s just a matter of kind of just getting over that next little hump. And
293 00:42:14.650 ⇒ 00:42:40.589 Megan Murray: I’m not as worried from like a financial reporting perspective of like, because things have been on different schedules. It’s been cash basis and some of the little bit more mixed. But I think, like, you know, starting June one, and looking at like May and June. That is really what our baseline will be going forward, so May will have, like probably a little bit of a crossover, because it’s gonna be a mix of like
294 00:42:40.910 ⇒ 00:42:52.470 Megan Murray: cash payments that have gone out and like, so that one won’t be completely where I want to be but June, for sure. I think we’ll have everything sorted out by then. So.
295 00:42:53.020 ⇒ 00:43:01.110 Uttam Kumaran: Okay, yeah, I think probably the next level thing is what you mentioned maybe last month, which is looking at the overhead per employee.
296 00:43:01.320 ⇒ 00:43:02.200 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.
297 00:43:02.200 ⇒ 00:43:02.529 Uttam Kumaran: Yep.
298 00:43:02.860 ⇒ 00:43:23.719 Uttam Kumaran: So I think, after the project level profitability which Amber and away, who are like a wish, is an engineering manager. Amber is our project manager. They’re both talking about project level profitability every week. And so I would say, those are the stakeholders who can directly impact that number, but are probably not equipped to
299 00:43:23.950 ⇒ 00:43:40.180 Uttam Kumaran: get that figure themselves so for that exercise they’re the they are the key stakeholder, of course, like I’ll be this stakeholder for everything, but like they’re the folks that day to day can make moves to adjust that like they’re actively looking at hours. They’re going into projects.
300 00:43:40.549 ⇒ 00:43:48.590 Uttam Kumaran: And so it’d be helpful for them to both have what stuff is going? Well, I shouldn’t think about it from that perspective. And what stuff is are we struggling with?
301 00:43:50.360 ⇒ 00:43:54.709 Uttam Kumaran: And then I, yeah, after that, I want to sort of look, understand?
302 00:43:55.150 ⇒ 00:44:00.819 Uttam Kumaran: Just even if I have like a rough estimate of like for every person we bring on. There is
303 00:44:01.080 ⇒ 00:44:04.689 Uttam Kumaran: 300 bucks a month, or a thousand bucks a month of
304 00:44:04.930 ⇒ 00:44:13.921 Uttam Kumaran: software, or whatever overhead and like, what are those categories? Cause? Then I can make some vendor decisions and consolidate sign some
305 00:44:14.480 ⇒ 00:44:20.100 Uttam Kumaran: longer term deals with whatever our software is, you know, to get that even lower.
306 00:44:21.140 ⇒ 00:44:35.779 Megan Murray: Yeah, I mean, we can make some really simple assumptions on that just based on the total total business operating expenses divided by the number of active people. I mean, just to have like something sort of baked in there.
307 00:44:37.260 ⇒ 00:44:42.840 Megan Murray: And yeah, that’ll that’ll start to get us a lot closer to that full picture, for sure.
308 00:44:42.840 ⇒ 00:44:54.940 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah. And then on the expense side, the other thing that would be helpful for me to know. And and I’m going through the the information that you send is just like what expenses are tied to sales and marketing versus what’s tied to client execution
309 00:44:55.100 ⇒ 00:45:00.949 Uttam Kumaran: right like. So that way it gives me some budget of saying like, we’re gonna bring on an automation platform that helps us
310 00:45:01.080 ⇒ 00:45:02.970 Uttam Kumaran: with our go to market motion
311 00:45:03.120 ⇒ 00:45:12.059 Uttam Kumaran: is what? What’s what should we set up as budget for that. And what type of roi do we need to see for every dollar cause, for example, the foot, like like Hannah.
312 00:45:12.576 ⇒ 00:45:26.139 Uttam Kumaran: And Halim and Ryan. Those are all their folks on marketing design, meaning, that’s all budget, for that’s all sales related expenses. Right? That’s how I view them as like their work directly impacts our
313 00:45:26.290 ⇒ 00:45:48.069 Uttam Kumaran: marketing and our go to market. And then those convert to dollars where we also there’s software like clockify that. I mean clock, if I guess free. But like, there’s software like slack where that’s like we’re we’re using it for client execution, you know, or so bifurcating that and allowing us to really get it for me. Really, it’s a true understanding of like what is our acquisition cost?
314 00:45:48.860 ⇒ 00:45:50.960 Uttam Kumaran: To acquire a new customer.
315 00:45:51.130 ⇒ 00:45:51.805 Uttam Kumaran: And
316 00:45:53.060 ⇒ 00:45:58.010 Uttam Kumaran: that’s what’s yeah. That’s just an a fixed number. I I just want to kind of bake it to my head.
317 00:45:58.650 ⇒ 00:46:05.269 Megan Murray: I I would love to just break out from an expense level like if you even wanna give me a list of.
318 00:46:05.270 ⇒ 00:46:09.927 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah. Tell if tell me how I can do that, should I just go on that spreadsheet? And then like
319 00:46:10.600 ⇒ 00:46:15.880 Uttam Kumaran: should I just go into that and just look at. I just had the expense line items I could just market in there, or what’s
320 00:46:16.060 ⇒ 00:46:17.030 Uttam Kumaran: what’s helpful.
321 00:46:17.070 ⇒ 00:46:17.620 Megan Murray: Circling.
322 00:46:17.620 ⇒ 00:46:18.120 Uttam Kumaran: To do.
323 00:46:18.120 ⇒ 00:46:25.410 Megan Murray: It’s like 4, I mean, really like, because in quickbooks we classify everything at the payee level. So the vendor level.
324 00:46:25.410 ⇒ 00:46:25.900 Uttam Kumaran: Yes.
325 00:46:25.900 ⇒ 00:46:44.890 Megan Murray: So if you had like slack like to me, just hearing you talk like it. Seems like there’s kind of 3 obvious categories. There’s sales and marketing. It’s gonna be easiest if we just have like this vendor is this category? I know there can be some like crossover versus maybe slack is like
326 00:46:45.230 ⇒ 00:46:49.949 Uttam Kumaran: Give you the splits, too, I can tell you that it’s like slack is probably like
327 00:46:50.360 ⇒ 00:46:54.840 Uttam Kumaran: 70 30, right? Like, if we need to split it. I can. I can give you that
328 00:46:55.532 ⇒ 00:47:00.360 Uttam Kumaran: but yeah, if I can go through by payee and just basically mark as like
329 00:47:02.490 ⇒ 00:47:02.920 Megan Murray: Yeah.
330 00:47:02.950 ⇒ 00:47:04.690 Uttam Kumaran: Whatever.
331 00:47:05.260 ⇒ 00:47:15.060 Megan Murray: Yeah, I mean what? Whatever is helpful for you for running the business so sales and marketing client execution. And then just like kind of business overhead.
332 00:47:15.650 ⇒ 00:47:20.490 Megan Murray: probably the 3 primary buckets. And there’s like.
333 00:47:20.490 ⇒ 00:47:23.640 Uttam Kumaran: Business overhead. Is that like that would be like quickbooks.
334 00:47:23.780 ⇒ 00:47:25.690 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, see? For okay.
335 00:47:25.690 ⇒ 00:47:30.940 Megan Murray: Yeah, exactly that sort of thing. Yeah. And then like.
336 00:47:31.140 ⇒ 00:47:41.270 Megan Murray: and we have a separate category for insurance and everything like that. But really, it’s like the the gray area is always the software, the recurring like software expenses, like we know.
337 00:47:41.270 ⇒ 00:48:03.569 Uttam Kumaran: I know I could tell you exactly what it is. Yeah, I can tell you exactly what it’s used for. So the for me, the 1st 2 categories are the only the 1st 2 categories are really what I can impact. And and a lot of what I did was like, really slim down the OP. The client related like Billings like, cut a ton of people out of notion. Figma stuff like that. But then I want to look at
338 00:48:03.750 ⇒ 00:48:17.570 Uttam Kumaran: basically are all in sales and marketing expense. Which is like all the people. And then all of the software that goes into that, because then we can tie that directly to revenue, and then I get an understanding of like, what’s the cost per dollar
339 00:48:19.090 ⇒ 00:48:21.879 Uttam Kumaran: And then I could make a decision on like
340 00:48:22.200 ⇒ 00:48:40.289 Uttam Kumaran: I can then have a more informed decision on like, if we’re gonna bring on more resources there. And that goes to software versus that goes to people like that’s that’s my ability to have that conversation. And I mean for me, my ability to show like advisors and show people. If we’re gonna raise investment on like. Here’s how efficient we are
341 00:48:40.410 ⇒ 00:48:41.590 Uttam Kumaran: with our
342 00:48:42.090 ⇒ 00:48:48.070 Uttam Kumaran: sales and marketing resources. Right? I mean, it’s we’re not spending that much. I roughly did the math. It looks like
343 00:48:48.510 ⇒ 00:48:56.409 Uttam Kumaran: people wise, like software people and software wise. It’s like, kind of like 6 grand, 6 or 7 grand
344 00:48:57.393 ⇒ 00:49:02.020 Uttam Kumaran: salary and sort of sales and marketing related tools.
345 00:49:03.580 ⇒ 00:49:08.929 Uttam Kumaran: and so for me, I’m like, I wanna look at, how much is that versus how much new is coming in
346 00:49:09.110 ⇒ 00:49:16.630 Uttam Kumaran: per month, right like cause. That’s that’s not really necessary for servicing existing revenue that that I compare against new
347 00:49:17.260 ⇒ 00:49:19.089 Uttam Kumaran: net new revenue in the month.
348 00:49:20.400 ⇒ 00:49:22.357 Megan Murray: Yeah, yeah, it’s
349 00:49:24.610 ⇒ 00:49:35.099 Megan Murray: yeah. And then that’s also where, like the distinction of like, the contractor cogs versus contractor, internal work also becomes meaningful, too. So.
350 00:49:35.100 ⇒ 00:49:35.500 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.
351 00:49:35.500 ⇒ 00:49:44.190 Megan Murray: I think that’s the right way overall to structure things. So yeah, if you want to just go through like the list of the vendors because
352 00:49:44.190 ⇒ 00:49:45.800 Megan Murray: awesome. I will fine
353 00:49:45.970 ⇒ 00:49:53.020 Megan Murray: and let me know like. And and also let me know, what do you want those categories to be called like just those 3 specific ones?
354 00:49:53.020 ⇒ 00:49:59.570 Uttam Kumaran: That’s what we that’s what I actually wanted to ask about, too, is, if you’re flexible on that. I kind of have a good sense of like
355 00:49:59.680 ⇒ 00:50:02.450 Uttam Kumaran: what it would be great to see those breakouts by.
356 00:50:03.490 ⇒ 00:50:04.130 Megan Murray: Yeah.
357 00:50:04.450 ⇒ 00:50:12.002 Megan Murray: yeah, typically what we’ll see like sales. And marketing is a good one. And since we’ll be managing the
358 00:50:12.610 ⇒ 00:50:19.170 Megan Murray: people as like basically independent vendors, like, for example, know that the 2.
359 00:50:19.170 ⇒ 00:50:37.900 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, like, I’m interested in, like, who’s the people that are billable, the people that are not billable. And then the for the non billable. What category they sit in, or for the non billable hours. What category is that in, for example, we have some folks on the AI team that are billing against Brainforge, but that work is sort of
360 00:50:38.859 ⇒ 00:50:45.969 Uttam Kumaran: improving our internal processes or improving our internal efficiency. So I want, I don’t want. I want to see that as like a
361 00:50:46.280 ⇒ 00:50:50.980 Uttam Kumaran: that’s a separate, you know. Line item. You know. So.
362 00:50:51.770 ⇒ 00:51:03.109 Megan Murray: Yeah, we can. That really helps me think through, like, how we need to structure those invoice templates with the clockify info so that we can make sure that things get maps the right place and ramp.
363 00:51:03.110 ⇒ 00:51:06.049 Uttam Kumaran: So we have a brain forge client in clockify that.
364 00:51:06.050 ⇒ 00:51:07.269 Megan Murray: Yeah, yeah.
365 00:51:07.270 ⇒ 00:51:09.480 Uttam Kumaran: All of the internal people bill to.
366 00:51:09.800 ⇒ 00:51:13.320 Uttam Kumaran: Or if you’re working on internal project, you’re billing to that.
367 00:51:13.570 ⇒ 00:51:14.630 Uttam Kumaran: So.
368 00:51:14.990 ⇒ 00:51:15.440 Megan Murray: Yep.
369 00:51:15.440 ⇒ 00:51:18.100 Uttam Kumaran: That has been there historically as well.
370 00:51:20.200 ⇒ 00:51:27.520 Uttam Kumaran: so, okay, that’s that’s helpful. Yeah. And like, you know, the biggest thing is like for me with our leadership team.
371 00:51:27.710 ⇒ 00:51:36.579 Uttam Kumaran: every incremental dollar we spend in sales. I want to know what we should expect out, because that helps me say, for example, we’re considering bringing on someone help us with some brand stuff
372 00:51:37.170 ⇒ 00:51:50.899 Uttam Kumaran: I was kind of like, I don’t know, like I would rather we just. I’m I’m reading a book on brand like, let’s get everyone this book, and we’ll take action on what we find there. That that cost for that book is like a hundred bucks, and what can we expect versus? If we pay someone 3 grand a month.
373 00:51:51.040 ⇒ 00:51:52.730 Uttam Kumaran: we should expect
374 00:51:52.960 ⇒ 00:52:11.910 Uttam Kumaran: 30 grand or 50 grand worth of roi like that’s. And then I want to post the team. Do we think hiring this person for this much is going to give us 50? Grand? That’s that’s like very frankly the the tough conversation I wanna have versus versus I’m doing that math sort of in my brain. And for but for the billable people.
375 00:52:12.070 ⇒ 00:52:24.450 Uttam Kumaran: It makes sense, I know, like what I I know, what their cost is. I know what we’re bringing the money in at, and I can sort of. Do the math a little bit easier for sales and marketing. It’s based on future revenues. Right? So
376 00:52:25.420 ⇒ 00:52:29.350 Uttam Kumaran: it’s helpful for me to know what type of dollar per dollar roi.
377 00:52:29.520 ⇒ 00:52:37.480 Uttam Kumaran: We see now, and we want to see, for example, if I’m bringing on a brand person for 3 grand, I’m like that person needs to drive 60 grand in revenue.
378 00:52:37.670 ⇒ 00:52:41.400 Uttam Kumaran: Is that possible? Or is that 3 grand, better served somewhere else?
379 00:52:41.850 ⇒ 00:52:42.850 Uttam Kumaran: You know.
380 00:52:42.850 ⇒ 00:52:45.810 Megan Murray: Yeah, exactly. Well, and even like.
381 00:52:45.970 ⇒ 00:53:08.889 Megan Murray: for example, like we can, we can map those people. So on the P and L, if we just think about sales and marketing. For example, we can set up a sales and marketing section sales and marketing people that’s got Raymond and Ryan, and or whoever’s like designated marketing. And then we have sales and marketing software. And then those are. And then whatever other line items.
382 00:53:08.890 ⇒ 00:53:11.239 Uttam Kumaran: We’ll have events travel like.
383 00:53:11.820 ⇒ 00:53:12.430 Megan Murray: Traveling, yeah.
384 00:53:12.430 ⇒ 00:53:15.700 Uttam Kumaran: Or or conference related expenses.
385 00:53:16.078 ⇒ 00:53:38.390 Uttam Kumaran: That’s where like, when I go to some of our advisors, or you know, people that are running these business. I I asked them more about like their P. And L. Breakouts is like what percentage of your expenses and a lot of people said like it bias towards events. So like 6% of expenses should be towards events. Okay, so let me, is that true? Is that like what we’re aiming for? That’s how I it’ll help me
386 00:53:38.660 ⇒ 00:53:40.609 Uttam Kumaran: sort of direct our resources.
387 00:53:41.280 ⇒ 00:53:43.410 Megan Murray: Yeah, yeah, absolutely.
388 00:53:43.410 ⇒ 00:53:47.280 Uttam Kumaran: So I can give that those categories. I can go through the Payees and mark that.
389 00:53:49.010 ⇒ 00:53:50.240 Megan Murray: Yeah. Okay.
390 00:53:50.660 ⇒ 00:53:56.389 Megan Murray: Well, I think that’s a good. I think that’s a good plan. I think we’ve got enough of
391 00:53:56.680 ⇒ 00:54:03.219 Megan Murray: the pieces that the puzzle is starting to come together a lot more clearly, at least for me. So.
392 00:54:04.316 ⇒ 00:54:06.109 Uttam Kumaran: Me as well for me, as well.
393 00:54:06.110 ⇒ 00:54:32.549 Megan Murray: Yeah. Yeah. So I think as we get so I’m also a fan of like, yeah, let’s go through it manually to make sure that we’ve got the right pieces, so I’ll put together a template of what I think we’ll need for the May hours, and then work with Mary Ann just to get that pulled together so that we can get that managed for payment processes. Marianne also
394 00:54:32.550 ⇒ 00:54:43.630 Megan Murray: figure out how to get you set up so that we can get you just to start like getting all the right people who are active set up for payment. Info!
395 00:54:43.810 ⇒ 00:54:50.759 Megan Murray: We’ve got those 2 that we know we’ll need to work through wise. So, Marianne, do you have access to wise, too?
396 00:54:51.517 ⇒ 00:54:56.690 Mariane Cequina: No, actually. And I also wanted to add it. I for autumn that I don’t have the
397 00:54:57.180 ⇒ 00:55:01.380 Mariane Cequina: current information for those people who are already on boarded.
398 00:55:02.910 ⇒ 00:55:05.690 Uttam Kumaran: Oh, so I can give you. I’ll make sure you have.
399 00:55:06.040 ⇒ 00:55:08.079 Uttam Kumaran: I’ll get you into wise.
400 00:55:08.500 ⇒ 00:55:10.970 Uttam Kumaran: I think you should have everything in gusto.
401 00:55:11.140 ⇒ 00:55:15.549 Uttam Kumaran: and then you have all the contracts. I think you should have everything.
402 00:55:15.770 ⇒ 00:55:18.710 Uttam Kumaran: I’ll just. I could verify that today.
403 00:55:18.910 ⇒ 00:55:19.720 Mariane Cequina: Okay.
404 00:55:22.120 ⇒ 00:55:26.579 Megan Murray: Yeah, the spreadsheet looks pretty up to date. I’ve got a couple of things I need to double check
405 00:55:27.165 ⇒ 00:55:41.949 Megan Murray: but but yeah, so just given where we’re at in the month. I think that’ll give us a couple of immediate to do’s. I’ll also work on getting ramp just up and running, so I’ll make sure both of you have access into that
406 00:55:42.040 ⇒ 00:56:09.479 Megan Murray: and and then, Marianne, yeah, I can schedule time with you separately, just to go through ramp and show you what needs to be done to get all the people on boarded for payments and then separate from that after after this week’s end. So sometime next week, then I’ll also work with you on like, Hey, here’s what we need for, and we can test it out and just make sure everything’s going to the right place.
407 00:56:09.830 ⇒ 00:56:11.019 Mariane Cequina: Okay. Sounds good.
408 00:56:12.970 ⇒ 00:56:13.330 Megan Murray: Think, that.
409 00:56:13.330 ⇒ 00:56:14.339 Uttam Kumaran: Should get us.
410 00:56:14.340 ⇒ 00:56:19.149 Megan Murray: Next 2 weeks at least, with plenty of activities.
411 00:56:19.910 ⇒ 00:56:21.260 Uttam Kumaran: Great. Okay. Perfect.
412 00:56:24.370 ⇒ 00:56:25.210 Megan Murray: Cool.
413 00:56:26.490 ⇒ 00:56:31.510 Megan Murray: Well, that was good. We covered a lot and then, I think, just to recap like the
414 00:56:31.640 ⇒ 00:56:49.800 Megan Murray: contract process. I think we’re pretty clear. You know. We want an executed agreement. It’s already, you know, like you’re already copied in the finance team inbox. That’ll kind of become the action item for me or my team to set up the recurring invoices or the templates. So.
415 00:56:49.800 ⇒ 00:56:54.410 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, and I don’t think we’ll. I don’t think long run. It’ll be like, we’ll need like
416 00:56:54.750 ⇒ 00:57:00.870 Uttam Kumaran: 2 days between execution and billing, like, I just think because we’re in crunch on the money
417 00:57:01.010 ⇒ 00:57:06.157 Uttam Kumaran: I’m like, okay, for as soon as we get assigned, let’s just get the get it outside.
418 00:57:06.620 ⇒ 00:57:09.100 Megan Murray: I get good. So I.
419 00:57:09.100 ⇒ 00:57:10.080 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, so.
420 00:57:10.080 ⇒ 00:57:10.510 Megan Murray: I was.
421 00:57:10.510 ⇒ 00:57:10.880 Uttam Kumaran: But like.
422 00:57:11.575 ⇒ 00:57:12.269 Megan Murray: Yeah.
423 00:57:12.270 ⇒ 00:57:14.549 Uttam Kumaran: So that’s that’s really why I’m like
424 00:57:14.740 ⇒ 00:57:19.059 Uttam Kumaran: following up and pushing, especially in the late ones. Because I’m like we’re owed the money like what
425 00:57:19.880 ⇒ 00:57:22.669 Uttam Kumaran: just press pay that would be.
426 00:57:22.670 ⇒ 00:57:23.030 Megan Murray: Yeah.
427 00:57:23.030 ⇒ 00:57:23.610 Uttam Kumaran: Right
428 00:57:24.630 ⇒ 00:57:25.660 Megan Murray: And they’ve.
429 00:57:25.660 ⇒ 00:57:31.030 Uttam Kumaran: They? They both agreed that they’re like we owe the money I’m like, just get me in touch with whoever
430 00:57:31.360 ⇒ 00:57:34.881 Uttam Kumaran: we could figure that out. But okay, so be it.
431 00:57:35.290 ⇒ 00:57:58.289 Megan Murray: Yeah, well, and typically, like, once, we’re kind of like settled into the right model. Then typically, my team will handle any sort of like immediate follow up. We, we tend to like we use system generated reminders. For while it’s current, and then after it’s current, then it’s like, Okay, well, are they even opening the invoices? Are they.
432 00:57:58.290 ⇒ 00:57:59.180 Uttam Kumaran: Yes.
433 00:57:59.180 ⇒ 00:58:22.420 Megan Murray: Is it bounced? Is the person the right contact, like we kind of go through that next triage and then try to reach out for those next 30 days. And we can adjust these timeframes based on your liking, too. So, but that’s typically what we do for others is like system generated for the 1st 30 days. We take a little bit more of an active like. Why are they not paying, or did
434 00:58:22.420 ⇒ 00:58:35.250 Megan Murray: they send a payment? But it hasn’t hit the bank account yet. Let’s maybe not send a reminder. And then anything beyond. Once it’s 30 days past due. Then we’re like, okay, Tom, we need some muscle here, so can you jump in.
435 00:58:35.250 ⇒ 00:58:58.440 Uttam Kumaran: For the most part a lot of our I mean a good amount of our clients now have their. We’re not directly working with the person who’s pressing pay. There’s a department. If it’s a department I’m like, just hit on nonstop, right? If it’s a person, then it’s more of like, okay, I I’ll pick up the phone and call somebody and and ask cause we’re all talking to one person. And like we’re not.
436 00:58:58.570 ⇒ 00:59:17.289 Uttam Kumaran: you know, it’s it’s like we’re, I’m actually not trying to work with many startups anymore. Both matter more and off. The record are like personal connections of mine who we’re doing work for and like, of course, like, I think, matter more is fine. But off the record it’s like, this is what happens when you deal with startups
437 00:59:17.420 ⇒ 00:59:29.368 Uttam Kumaran: is they delay contracts, they delay payments. There’s they redline things for like a hundred dollars. It’s like, not what I I’m like not interested in. We don’t. We don’t work with many startups
438 00:59:30.010 ⇒ 00:59:36.159 Uttam Kumaran: But like they’re just like they’re just really good friends. They helped our business a bunch. So
439 00:59:36.290 ⇒ 00:59:38.839 Uttam Kumaran: yeah, we we went with it, but you know.
440 00:59:39.200 ⇒ 00:59:41.607 Megan Murray: Totally understandable. So
441 00:59:43.670 ⇒ 01:00:01.969 Megan Murray: yeah. So, okay, well, I think that gives us a really good action plan going forward and I’ve got my to do’s most immediately, being, you know, execute on gain ramp set up, which I should be able to. They know it’s coming, so we should be able to get that turned around pretty quickly.
442 01:00:01.970 ⇒ 01:00:14.440 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, I don’t know whether if I was gonna ask about the discount, if, like, yeah, hopefully, they offer something good, especially because we’re switching off Costel. But I know we’re part of a bunch of partner networks, so in case I can help get a better discount, let me know.
443 01:00:15.450 ⇒ 01:00:25.139 Megan Murray: Yeah, I forget what it is, cause we’ll start on the free tier. But I think it’s like, I think it’s just an upfront like 100 bucks or something like that, so I’ll let.
444 01:00:25.140 ⇒ 01:00:27.600 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, maybe tell me what? Tell me what you’re seeing.
445 01:00:27.830 ⇒ 01:00:35.080 Uttam Kumaran: And then I might text some people who like, maybe they get a maybe through a referral. There’s like some beefier one or
446 01:00:35.710 ⇒ 01:00:44.469 Uttam Kumaran: I. Just usually whenever I sign up for a software, now that we have a business, I now text a lot of other friends. And I’m like, what’s the deal you’re getting?
447 01:00:44.680 ⇒ 01:00:46.910 Uttam Kumaran: Do you have a referral code? So.
448 01:00:46.910 ⇒ 01:00:47.330 Megan Murray: Alright!
449 01:00:47.330 ⇒ 01:00:57.050 Uttam Kumaran: Like for for linear we’re not. We’re not paying for 6 months. It’s about like 200 bucks a month. And because I I had Vixel applied for their
450 01:00:57.470 ⇒ 01:01:00.760 Uttam Kumaran: agents, for their like partnership network, as like a Vc.
451 01:01:00.910 ⇒ 01:01:04.619 Uttam Kumaran: So that we can then get their code of becoming being part of like their
452 01:01:04.800 ⇒ 01:01:06.429 Uttam Kumaran: their network. So there’s just like.
453 01:01:06.780 ⇒ 01:01:08.799 Uttam Kumaran: just try to find any way.
454 01:01:08.800 ⇒ 01:01:09.170 Megan Murray: Yeah.
455 01:01:09.170 ⇒ 01:01:10.070 Uttam Kumaran: So.
456 01:01:10.350 ⇒ 01:01:20.769 Megan Murray: But at least like the the financial side of things like, they tend to give the most like favorable referrals to people who are set up with accounting firms like like I have so.
457 01:01:20.770 ⇒ 01:01:21.140 Uttam Kumaran: Cool.
458 01:01:21.400 ⇒ 01:01:27.129 Megan Murray: Yeah, you’re right, like, on all the software stuff, absolutely like, I wouldn’t be able to help you out with those. But.
459 01:01:27.796 ⇒ 01:01:29.129 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, okay.
460 01:01:29.430 ⇒ 01:01:36.034 Megan Murray: But ramp. I’ll let you know. I just like it’s 1 of those things. It’s like a 1 time thing, and then I forget.
461 01:01:36.310 ⇒ 01:01:41.639 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, tell me what you’re seeing. And then I can ask around. And I just send a text to call people saying like.
462 01:01:41.780 ⇒ 01:01:45.799 Uttam Kumaran: just log into your rep. Tell me what you’re if you’re seeing a better referral discount. So.
463 01:01:46.850 ⇒ 01:01:47.250 Megan Murray: Okay.
464 01:01:48.350 ⇒ 01:01:49.390 Uttam Kumaran: Okay. Cool.
465 01:01:49.390 ⇒ 01:01:50.910 Megan Murray: Yeah, sounds good.
466 01:01:51.580 ⇒ 01:01:53.510 Megan Murray: Okay. Well, thank you. Guys, thank you.
467 01:01:53.940 ⇒ 01:01:55.340 Megan Murray: Talk soon.
468 01:01:56.430 ⇒ 01:01:57.520 Mariane Cequina: Thank you.
469 01:01:57.850 ⇒ 01:01:58.810 Megan Murray: I.