Meeting Title: Client Project Status and Staffing Sync Date: 2025-08-14 Meeting participants: Robert Tseng, Uttam Kumaran
WEBVTT
1 00:05:40.310 ⇒ 00:05:41.550 Uttam Kumaran: Hello!
2 00:05:44.930 ⇒ 00:05:45.580 Robert Tseng: Hey.
3 00:05:47.450 ⇒ 00:05:48.860 Uttam Kumaran: Crazy week, dude.
4 00:05:49.260 ⇒ 00:05:49.960 Robert Tseng: Yeah.
5 00:05:50.320 ⇒ 00:05:55.229 Robert Tseng: Do you feel… do you feel okay? ….
6 00:05:57.170 ⇒ 00:06:00.629 Uttam Kumaran: Crazy, we got a lot going on.
7 00:06:01.130 ⇒ 00:06:05.000 Robert Tseng: Oh, yeah, I, I was… I was kind of, ….
8 00:06:05.000 ⇒ 00:06:06.080 Uttam Kumaran: projecting.
9 00:06:06.510 ⇒ 00:06:08.680 Robert Tseng: No, no, I… yesterday, I…
10 00:06:09.010 ⇒ 00:06:17.729 Robert Tseng: I… I… those Wednesday afternoons are kind of when I… I crash, and I’m glad I don’t take meetings on Wednesdays, like, I… I just need to….
11 00:06:17.940 ⇒ 00:06:18.580 Uttam Kumaran: Okay.
12 00:06:18.580 ⇒ 00:06:28.610 Robert Tseng: Reset. Thursdays, I’m usually good, and then Friday, I’m, like, fizzling out again, but that’s kind of how it is. I feel like I’m running from, like, Sunday through Wednesday.
13 00:06:28.900 ⇒ 00:06:34.189 Robert Tseng: And then… I take a little… I, like, I snooze a little bit, and then….
14 00:06:34.190 ⇒ 00:06:34.690 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.
15 00:06:34.690 ⇒ 00:06:39.530 Robert Tseng: I try to finish off the week strong and recover over the weekend. That’s just the grind right now.
16 00:06:40.500 ⇒ 00:06:43.059 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, this week in particular, I felt like
17 00:06:43.760 ⇒ 00:06:45.279 Uttam Kumaran: I needed to take a little bit.
18 00:06:45.280 ⇒ 00:06:46.780 Robert Tseng: I mean, for you, because…
19 00:06:47.410 ⇒ 00:06:54.170 Robert Tseng: Yeah, I mean, you had to make some tough decisions, and obviously it was good that you got to celebrate with Jess, but, like, yeah, I’m sure it’s, ….
20 00:06:54.320 ⇒ 00:06:59.450 Uttam Kumaran: It’s just, like, very up and down, and I’m getting used… I’m getting used to, like.
21 00:06:59.570 ⇒ 00:07:09.489 Uttam Kumaran: like, tough decisions on people and stuff like that. Look, all I think about is… is you and everybody in the company, and I… and I… I am… put my, like.
22 00:07:09.840 ⇒ 00:07:23.019 Uttam Kumaran: what I would do as a person aside with, like, what’s best for the business, but it… you have to kind of… I have to really, really remind myself of that, and whatever awkwardness or thing comes with it, that’s what we have to deal with.
23 00:07:23.040 ⇒ 00:07:26.129 Robert Tseng: Yeah. And, you know, I also think a lot about, like.
24 00:07:26.130 ⇒ 00:07:31.919 Uttam Kumaran: Look, how much attention we put into the people that aren’t doing well versus the people that are…
25 00:07:33.540 ⇒ 00:07:44.580 Uttam Kumaran: Well, right? And I think we… Yeah. For all the, you know, unluck… unluckiness we’ve had on people that have not done so well, like, dude, like, Mustafa, I found off Discord.
26 00:07:44.730 ⇒ 00:07:55.920 Uttam Kumaran: Like, I… and he’s an absolute maniac, like, he’s the best. And Sam also came in through Jacob, right? And he’s doing really well, and …
27 00:07:56.530 ⇒ 00:08:05.960 Uttam Kumaran: like, we’re starting to get new opportunities, like, Magah hit us today with stuff, like, I don’t know, it’s always, like, up and down. It’s just, I think.
28 00:08:06.120 ⇒ 00:08:09.879 Uttam Kumaran: It’s almost like context switching on, like, on, like, …
29 00:08:10.000 ⇒ 00:08:22.049 Uttam Kumaran: dread and, like, extreme happiness, so… because we’re signing $2.50 an hour, but at the same time, like, people can’t do basic shit, and yeah, like, what’s going on?
30 00:08:22.610 ⇒ 00:08:23.270 Robert Tseng: Yeah.
31 00:08:24.900 ⇒ 00:08:25.840 Robert Tseng: That’s funny.
32 00:08:30.980 ⇒ 00:08:33.230 Uttam Kumaran: Chad about was just, …
33 00:08:34.179 ⇒ 00:08:50.510 Uttam Kumaran: like, what’s this… I guess we could just kind of rattle through, like, core clients, especially the core new clients. I want to make sure that you’re supported in terms of people, for them. You know, top of mind, again, is, like, Insomnia, README,
34 00:08:50.670 ⇒ 00:09:09.639 Uttam Kumaran: I’m just gonna rattle, I don’t know complete status, but Nit, Spark Plug, and then now Ellie, and then Remo, right? So, those are, what, 5 or 6? Like, would like to just, like, go down the list, and I want to make sure that you have good people, and then that you have structure from PM Team, or I can start to hit them up to give you that.
35 00:09:10.450 ⇒ 00:09:13.669 Robert Tseng: Okay, yeah, let’s talk, let’s talk about them. …
36 00:09:13.770 ⇒ 00:09:28.199 Robert Tseng: So, I’ll start with Insomnia first, because I’ve actually been more involved there. I mean, I feel like, you know, we’ve got one more week left with them. I want to make sure that that one’s going well, so I want to put a lot of my time… over the weekend, I’m going to spend a lot of time on Insomnia.
37 00:09:29.140 ⇒ 00:09:34.209 Robert Tseng: I mean, I think… So the status there is, …
38 00:09:34.770 ⇒ 00:09:38.060 Robert Tseng: Yeah, it’s just a lot, a lot of politics in big companies, you know? So…
39 00:09:38.420 ⇒ 00:09:43.479 Robert Tseng: Yeah, their… their head of… their… their head of data is just, like, is basically their…
40 00:09:43.600 ⇒ 00:09:59.220 Robert Tseng: former software engineer or whatever, and he… I think he’s gatekeeping a lot, so he’s kind of keeping us out of systems. That’s why we’re still waiting on permissions for stuff, which is, like, kind of frustrating. I think the teams are really good trying to, like, get around things.
41 00:09:59.220 ⇒ 00:10:15.009 Robert Tseng: So, like, Awash came up with a great solution to, like, bypass what we needed on Google Ads to get the automation set up. So, you know, I just want to push some demos. I want to share it with the marketing team. I want the CMO to know that, like, hey, we’re delivering engineering, like, work
42 00:10:15.290 ⇒ 00:10:31.639 Robert Tseng: that their IT team has just been, like, heckling them on for 6 months, and if she can pressure them, then I think things will move, and if that unlock getting us more into their systems, is gonna open up, you know, more opportunities for us.
43 00:10:32.030 ⇒ 00:10:33.000 Robert Tseng: …
44 00:10:33.190 ⇒ 00:10:42.559 Robert Tseng: Yeah, and then, I think, obviously, there’s, like, this maintenance thing on the existing reporting, which really sucks, but, you know, Casey, I think, is, you know, Casey did a great job.
45 00:10:42.560 ⇒ 00:10:46.310 Uttam Kumaran: Those guys are fixers, dude. Yeah, those two are fixers, so…
46 00:10:46.490 ⇒ 00:10:52.469 Uttam Kumaran: I think, like, in any doubt, if we have a problem with, like, literally anything, we bring in
47 00:10:52.650 ⇒ 00:10:57.059 Uttam Kumaran: those two, and things will get figured out. So, I know Mustafa did the original spike.
48 00:10:57.170 ⇒ 00:11:02.409 Uttam Kumaran: Casey executed, like, they won’t… they won’t say a word, so I’m really happy.
49 00:11:02.810 ⇒ 00:11:16.679 Robert Tseng: Yeah, so I feel good about, like, the core responsibility, but I do feel like I need more in order to sell… to sell higher, so, I mean, yeah, otherwise, we’re gonna get to a month in, and they’re just gonna keep me at the same page, so….
50 00:11:16.680 ⇒ 00:11:31.070 Uttam Kumaran: core, like, like, long-term, is it, like, more dashboarding? Like, where do you think it is? And I’ll also tell you a little bit about this conversation I had with Allegro, but yeah, tell me, like, what’s the sort of, like, bigger picture? What’s the upsell?
51 00:11:31.800 ⇒ 00:11:46.379 Robert Tseng: Yeah, so, I mean, I… I do want to… the BI is not… doesn’t seem like it’s a huge priority. Like, they’re in Power BI, so, I mean, having a Power BI contract or whatever would… would be helpful. There is already one.
52 00:11:46.770 ⇒ 00:11:54.779 Robert Tseng: He’s just, like, he just moves very slowly, so if there’s, you know, if there’s room for us to kind of, at some point, be able to
53 00:11:55.810 ⇒ 00:12:05.669 Robert Tseng: take, kind of, pieces of that away from him. I think that’s an expansion opportunity. I think the higher leverage stuff is, like, just doing…
54 00:12:06.230 ⇒ 00:12:12.980 Robert Tseng: work with the CMO directly, more, like, kind of reporting or automation.
55 00:12:13.160 ⇒ 00:12:20.070 Robert Tseng: That’s not, like, in BI necessarily, but just, like, building, like, our own… …
56 00:12:21.890 ⇒ 00:12:36.999 Robert Tseng: Yeah, like, I don’t know if we need a full-on data warehousing and modeling. I mean, I want to win that dbt work. I want to show them that what they’re having right now is just, like, really slow and not good, but I just… I don’t think I’ve been able to build up that use case yet.
57 00:12:37.300 ⇒ 00:12:38.350 Robert Tseng: …
58 00:12:38.650 ⇒ 00:12:48.739 Robert Tseng: Yeah, so, I mean, they have two BI tools. They have something called Holistics, something called Power BI, or basically Power BI. I basically want to spend this weekend kind of, like, looking at….
59 00:12:48.740 ⇒ 00:12:50.379 Uttam Kumaran: Oh, they have holistics!
60 00:12:50.380 ⇒ 00:12:51.130 Robert Tseng: They do.
61 00:12:52.670 ⇒ 00:12:56.710 Uttam Kumaran: Dude, I just called the Holistic CEO yesterday. Me and I used to talk to him.
62 00:12:56.970 ⇒ 00:12:58.379 Robert Tseng: Oh, what, really? Oh.
63 00:12:58.380 ⇒ 00:13:01.570 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah. I mean, the product is okay.
64 00:13:01.900 ⇒ 00:13:03.410 Uttam Kumaran: I mean, it looks like….
65 00:13:03.460 ⇒ 00:13:06.060 Robert Tseng: not… I mean, it looks like a bad…
66 00:13:06.190 ⇒ 00:13:11.040 Robert Tseng: I mean, it’s a more complicated reel, like, I don’t really know what it is. Like, it’s, like, kind of BIS code.
67 00:13:11.040 ⇒ 00:13:16.050 Uttam Kumaran: I… I was basically considering them as an alternative for, like, Metabase.
68 00:13:16.450 ⇒ 00:13:20.730 Uttam Kumaran: if we weren’t gonna go with real. But yeah, the product is very complicated, but…
69 00:13:20.980 ⇒ 00:13:27.750 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, that’s kind of crazy. So, yeah, I mean, I literally called that guy, he gave us a demo of the product, and I told the way, I’m like, this is kind of mad, complicated.
70 00:13:28.140 ⇒ 00:13:28.780 Uttam Kumaran: Bye.
71 00:13:28.780 ⇒ 00:13:34.659 Robert Tseng: I see. Yeah, they have Holistics, Real, and Power BI. So, I mean, yeah, so, like.
72 00:13:34.660 ⇒ 00:13:41.329 Uttam Kumaran: They have Real also? Oh, sorry, not Real, … Oh. I said Metabase. Metabase, oh.
73 00:13:41.530 ⇒ 00:13:44.700 Uttam Kumaran: Let me ping this guy about, …
74 00:13:45.230 ⇒ 00:13:48.380 Uttam Kumaran: Insomnia, and just see what he says, yeah, okay.
75 00:13:49.070 ⇒ 00:13:49.720 Robert Tseng: Okay.
76 00:13:49.950 ⇒ 00:14:07.600 Robert Tseng: Yeah, so, I mean, I base… I mean, they’re not giving me access to the Power BI, or no, the… I’m fumbling all my words, into Azure, so, like, I kind of have to look at the schema from these BI tools, but each one of them are pulling different models, so, I don’t have a good read of, like.
77 00:14:08.070 ⇒ 00:14:21.099 Robert Tseng: how many models there are, what’s not being used, and whatever, but I kind of want to do that audit, and I want to tell… I want that to be part of, like, my… my one month in, and be like, hey, I think there’s a lot of stuff here that we could do.
78 00:14:21.230 ⇒ 00:14:24.020 Robert Tseng: … But yeah, I think…
79 00:14:24.220 ⇒ 00:14:37.540 Robert Tseng: that’s kind of… the quick wins are in the automation, I think, and the longer-term plan is in the modeling and trying to, like, convince them that they shouldn’t let this, like, IT dude own data, because…
80 00:14:37.730 ⇒ 00:14:42.069 Robert Tseng: I don’t know what… like, she has no roadmap, like, no…
81 00:14:42.830 ⇒ 00:14:48.729 Robert Tseng: like, yeah, he just doesn’t take any requests from people, he just… I don’t know what he’s doing. So, he’s…
82 00:14:49.080 ⇒ 00:14:53.490 Robert Tseng: I think it’s a great use case for us to just go and, like.
83 00:14:53.600 ⇒ 00:14:58.589 Robert Tseng: become their data team, frankly, but, like, I just… I don’t know who the…
84 00:14:59.130 ⇒ 00:15:04.740 Robert Tseng: I’m… like, I… I don’t know who I need to talk to in order to kind of get there, so I’m trying to.
85 00:15:04.740 ⇒ 00:15:06.739 Uttam Kumaran: Who’s above this marketing person?
86 00:15:07.710 ⇒ 00:15:12.790 Robert Tseng: Well, she’s the CMO, but, like, she doesn’t… she’s not… I need to talk to the…
87 00:15:12.910 ⇒ 00:15:17.419 Robert Tseng: the head of IT’s boss, who’s the chief data officer, but, like.
88 00:15:17.870 ⇒ 00:15:31.210 Robert Tseng: So I feel like I need to get him on my side somehow, but, like, I haven’t had a conversation with him, so I’m trying to, like, get up to him through finance, so I’m making friends on the finance side, talking to their finance analysts, and then.
89 00:15:31.210 ⇒ 00:15:31.829 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, exactly.
90 00:15:31.830 ⇒ 00:15:32.150 Robert Tseng: Awesome.
91 00:15:32.150 ⇒ 00:15:35.240 Uttam Kumaran: Technical, then you should bring me in to talk to that guy.
92 00:15:35.670 ⇒ 00:15:44.949 Robert Tseng: Yeah, so I’m like, you know, that’s how I feel like I’m spending my time, on… on insomnia. I’m just trying to, like, find the right
93 00:15:45.760 ⇒ 00:15:56.929 Robert Tseng: make… get the right intros to people, and… and meet with them, and… and just kind of share, like, what I’m… what I’m hoping to do there, and … yeah, so… I feel like I kind of…
94 00:15:57.500 ⇒ 00:16:08.060 Robert Tseng: the meeting… the number of meetings definitely dropped off this week. I only took two meetings this week, so I just need to try to schedule a bunch of calls with their team, and I think that’ll help me to…
95 00:16:08.410 ⇒ 00:16:09.070 Robert Tseng: Could…
96 00:16:09.240 ⇒ 00:16:15.210 Robert Tseng: to build a better… better plan, but this definitely has been going slower than I wanted it to. Like, I’m not…
97 00:16:15.470 ⇒ 00:16:22.479 Robert Tseng: I wouldn’t feel confident putting together a deck, there’s no roadmap, like, I just feel like everything has been pretty slow on this client, so….
98 00:16:23.530 ⇒ 00:16:24.110 Uttam Kumaran: Okay.
99 00:16:24.300 ⇒ 00:16:24.910 Robert Tseng: Yeah.
100 00:16:25.050 ⇒ 00:16:38.459 Robert Tseng: So I think right now there’s no need for staffing changes. I think what we have is good. Yeah, I just… I just feel like I need to press harder to find the right allies on that side.
101 00:16:38.960 ⇒ 00:16:39.530 Uttam Kumaran: Okay.
102 00:16:40.110 ⇒ 00:16:40.700 Robert Tseng: Yeah.
103 00:16:42.250 ⇒ 00:16:47.059 Robert Tseng: So, that’s… that’s that. And then, with README, I think…
104 00:16:47.370 ⇒ 00:16:55.919 Robert Tseng: Yeah, there’s… there’s some… there’s, like, a round of edits that I will do for them for, early, you know, by early next week.
105 00:16:56.060 ⇒ 00:17:07.270 Robert Tseng: And then, yeah, I think at that point, we would just need a product analyst. Like, they’re 30 hours, basically $150 an hour, like, yeah, just, I just need an analyst with me on that one.
106 00:17:07.390 ⇒ 00:17:08.380 Robert Tseng: Okay.
107 00:17:09.550 ⇒ 00:17:22.820 Robert Tseng: I did tell Phoebe we could put a PM and an analyst on it, she was fine with that. I don’t know if Amber has any capacity… has more capacity to do one more, but, like, if not, that’s fine. Like, I don’t really need a PM for that.
108 00:17:23.480 ⇒ 00:17:27.600 Robert Tseng: But yeah, at that point, we don’t have someone who can do amplitude analysis, so….
109 00:17:27.609 ⇒ 00:17:28.099 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
110 00:17:28.099 ⇒ 00:17:31.809 Robert Tseng: I can’t even do the spark plug stuff, which I think is easier than README, so….
111 00:17:31.810 ⇒ 00:17:38.390 Uttam Kumaran: Well, so that’s what I’m gonna… that’s what I was gonna ask you about. So, okay, so read me, it makes sense, so tell me about, like, what’s happening in Sparkplug.
112 00:17:39.090 ⇒ 00:17:58.519 Robert Tseng: Yeah, so Spark Plug, it was kind of like, okay, there was one more ask that the CEO had, like, I went at it for, you know, I put, like, what, 2 hours into it, and that kind of got us away there, but I think it’s not a complete analysis. I basically… I needed to spend, like, 3… if I spend 3 more hours, I’ll finish it, but I basically let a…
113 00:17:58.850 ⇒ 00:18:10.390 Robert Tseng: Last Friday, I coached Annie, like, I did a screen share walkthrough with her, she was telling me about her coaching with Brian, how it didn’t really help her with the product analytics work, so I was like, fine, let’s just spend 15 minutes.
114 00:18:10.630 ⇒ 00:18:24.499 Uttam Kumaran: They didn’t fucking ask him about the product analytics, they talked about dbt, and I was like, why did you talk about dbt? Like, the fuck are you doing doing DBT? I said, show him what tasks you have on your plate, and then ask him how to do the tasks.
115 00:18:24.910 ⇒ 00:18:25.460 Uttam Kumaran: like.
116 00:18:25.460 ⇒ 00:18:30.840 Robert Tseng: Yeah, she’s telling me, like, oh, I don’t think he can help me apart from data modeling,
117 00:18:30.840 ⇒ 00:18:32.899 Uttam Kumaran: You’re… you’re out, you’re high out of your mind.
118 00:18:33.130 ⇒ 00:18:40.259 Uttam Kumaran: Like… but that’s what I told… I was like, dude, literally, whatever your tickets are.
119 00:18:40.410 ⇒ 00:18:44.050 Uttam Kumaran: go to him with, these are the tickets I have, how should I do them?
120 00:18:44.260 ⇒ 00:18:47.839 Uttam Kumaran: But, like, that’s all I can do, like, you know?
121 00:18:47.840 ⇒ 00:18:48.360 Robert Tseng: Yeah.
122 00:18:48.610 ⇒ 00:18:49.420 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.
123 00:18:50.750 ⇒ 00:18:55.270 Uttam Kumaran: I mean, I texted both of them. I told Annie, and I told Brian, I said.
124 00:18:55.560 ⇒ 00:19:05.719 Uttam Kumaran: come with what tasks you have on your plate, go one by one on the stuff that you’re blocked on, or the stuff that’s due immediately, and ask them, how do I do this?
125 00:19:05.960 ⇒ 00:19:07.730 Uttam Kumaran: Like, yeah.
126 00:19:10.490 ⇒ 00:19:15.069 Uttam Kumaran: That’s what I would do, right? If you were sitting at me, I’d be like, pull up every single thing, let’s go one by one.
127 00:19:15.170 ⇒ 00:19:19.640 Uttam Kumaran: That’s it. Like, I don’t have a choice, so… But, okay.
128 00:19:19.890 ⇒ 00:19:22.069 Uttam Kumaran: So I’ve given her 2 weeks.
129 00:19:22.070 ⇒ 00:19:31.529 Robert Tseng: to figure… figure it out, and she’s just not… she hasn’t said anything. So, I think I’m ready to move on from… from her on product analytics. Yeah, so….
130 00:19:31.530 ⇒ 00:19:35.450 Uttam Kumaran: So, so, I’m talking to… So there’s a lot of….
131 00:19:35.450 ⇒ 00:19:36.850 Robert Tseng: Afrea or something?
132 00:19:37.200 ⇒ 00:19:41.880 Robert Tseng: But is she full… is she gonna be full-time? And she’s Bay Area, she seems like she’ll be expensive.
133 00:19:42.360 ⇒ 00:19:48.139 Uttam Kumaran: I haven’t asked about price yet, but she seems really good, dude. What are you talking about this week?
134 00:19:48.540 ⇒ 00:19:53.770 Robert Tseng: No one sent anything to me on my calendar, and… yeah.
135 00:19:54.150 ⇒ 00:19:57.930 Robert Tseng: Okay, I’ll nudge her again. Okay.
136 00:19:57.930 ⇒ 00:20:00.470 Uttam Kumaran: She seems like she could do….
137 00:20:00.500 ⇒ 00:20:03.520 Robert Tseng: A lot of different things, and it’s probably, like.
138 00:20:03.720 ⇒ 00:20:08.550 Uttam Kumaran: The point person you need for This type of stuff, like…
139 00:20:08.730 ⇒ 00:20:14.410 Uttam Kumaran: I don’t know, I just… I… I think she could come on and basically, like, run that type of engagement.
140 00:20:14.600 ⇒ 00:20:15.360 Uttam Kumaran: ….
141 00:20:15.360 ⇒ 00:20:15.970 Robert Tseng: Yeah.
142 00:20:16.590 ⇒ 00:20:22.480 Uttam Kumaran: Like, you could stay on as account executive, and she would just run it. Yeah, I think she’s going to be…
143 00:20:22.790 ⇒ 00:20:27.120 Uttam Kumaran: like, kind of expensive. I mean, I don’t know, let’s see. …
144 00:20:27.580 ⇒ 00:20:32.139 Uttam Kumaran: But she’s… she, like, loves what we’re doing, and I think she could be…
145 00:20:32.440 ⇒ 00:20:35.129 Uttam Kumaran: Like, she’s really strong. Otherwise, I’m….
146 00:20:35.130 ⇒ 00:20:37.479 Robert Tseng: Hey, Annie, what, like, 1.30 or something?
147 00:20:37.920 ⇒ 00:20:38.650 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.
148 00:20:38.940 ⇒ 00:20:40.900 Robert Tseng: Yeah, okay. If she’s….
149 00:20:40.900 ⇒ 00:20:47.370 Uttam Kumaran: We pay Annie $130, and she can’t… she can only do… Barely.
150 00:20:47.370 ⇒ 00:20:50.010 Robert Tseng: She’s overpaid for one thing, yeah.
151 00:20:50.430 ⇒ 00:20:51.350 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, so….
152 00:20:51.350 ⇒ 00:20:51.870 Robert Tseng: Yeah.
153 00:20:51.870 ⇒ 00:20:55.699 Uttam Kumaran: I mean, at this point, like, I’m sort of bringing in other people, and then…
154 00:20:55.920 ⇒ 00:20:59.790 Uttam Kumaran: we’re rooting out this class of people, like, that’s kind of where I’m at, so….
155 00:20:59.790 ⇒ 00:21:00.180 Robert Tseng: Yeah.
156 00:21:01.340 ⇒ 00:21:07.929 Uttam Kumaran: So, kind of, I’m also… we’ve also kicked off my LinkedIn product analyst thing, so I’m meeting with someone who’s a product analyst at Bumble.
157 00:21:08.100 ⇒ 00:21:11.870 Uttam Kumaran: Next week. I also…
158 00:21:12.240 ⇒ 00:21:15.310 Uttam Kumaran: I… yeah, Shreya is on the hook, and then…
159 00:21:15.640 ⇒ 00:21:21.789 Uttam Kumaran: There’s one other person I just talked to today, another guy who’s ex-Shopify, …
160 00:21:22.100 ⇒ 00:21:28.500 Uttam Kumaran: he worked on a bunch of stuff on Shopify on instrumentation and higher-level product analytics, so…
161 00:21:29.240 ⇒ 00:21:32.220 Uttam Kumaran: Like, he’s down for 20 hours part-time.
162 00:21:33.010 ⇒ 00:21:42.629 Robert Tseng: Okay. One other person that I can’t… one of my… one of my new classmates, he’s a data scientist out of a job, and I was like, well, maybe he should….
163 00:21:43.910 ⇒ 00:21:44.410 Uttam Kumaran: It’s a decent deal.
164 00:21:45.300 ⇒ 00:22:02.079 Robert Tseng: Well, yeah, he was like, oh, shoot, well, I’m gonna go get a paralegal job, because I don’t want to recruit right now, but I’m like, well, I think I was gonna have a conversation with him this weekend, or tomorrow, and just kind of understand his skill set, but he’s worked for… he’s worked at streaming companies, so he was like.
165 00:22:02.120 ⇒ 00:22:14.659 Robert Tseng: at Peacock as a product analyst, and then he went to data scientists at some other media network, so, like, a couple… it seems like entertainment or streaming analytics is his jam. But, like, I don’t know, like, maybe… I mean.
166 00:22:15.200 ⇒ 00:22:25.290 Robert Tseng: Yeah, I’m not sure if his… if his range of skills is enough, like, I worry that he’ll just be another specialist, like Danny is, but, yeah.
167 00:22:25.290 ⇒ 00:22:27.640 Uttam Kumaran: I don’t want to make it awkward for you if he sucks.
168 00:22:27.860 ⇒ 00:22:31.469 Robert Tseng: Yeah, that’s true, too. So, I mean, that’s not a priority for me. I just thought it was like, well.
169 00:22:31.470 ⇒ 00:22:32.490 Uttam Kumaran: Okay.
170 00:22:32.490 ⇒ 00:22:33.130 Robert Tseng: Yeah.
171 00:22:33.300 ⇒ 00:22:40.249 Uttam Kumaran: No, I’m gonna get you a product, we’re gonna have someone, if it’s Shreya or this guy, Keith, they’re both really good. I would like to….
172 00:22:40.250 ⇒ 00:22:48.469 Robert Tseng: I meant to go back and talk to my old product analyst from Pungo, who’s now at TikTok. She’s great. She’s probably the best analyst I’ve ever had, and I….
173 00:22:48.470 ⇒ 00:22:50.110 Uttam Kumaran: Is she? Yeah, she’s in LA?
174 00:22:50.290 ⇒ 00:23:02.699 Robert Tseng: Yeah, she’s… she went… she went to TikTok, and whatever, but I know she hates it there, and I don’t know, just gonna see if I can convince her otherwise. But they pay her, like, 180 or whatever, so it’s kind of hard to get her.
175 00:23:03.240 ⇒ 00:23:03.980 Uttam Kumaran: Okay.
176 00:23:05.200 ⇒ 00:23:15.979 Uttam Kumaran: Okay, so let me text Shreya, and then, yeah, I’m gonna meet with probably one or two other people. On the… on the, like, sort of dashboarding side, so I talked to these guys, Allegro. They’re kind of, like.
177 00:23:16.160 ⇒ 00:23:21.839 Uttam Kumaran: probably a little bit smaller than us, but, like, this one guy, Nathan, I think he…
178 00:23:22.110 ⇒ 00:23:28.209 Uttam Kumaran: like, he met this other woman, I don’t remember his name, Melanie or something, or Megan,
179 00:23:28.330 ⇒ 00:23:44.430 Uttam Kumaran: she was running this, like, small data analytics consultancy, like, they were just doing dashboards. She’s, like, an ex… I don’t know, CFO or, like, some sort of VP of finance, so all they do is, like, dashboard shit. I’m kind of gonna… I’m gonna ask them for two things. One.
180 00:23:44.550 ⇒ 00:24:04.270 Uttam Kumaran: I think there’s opportunities for them to come on and actually, like, they do the whole… they’re basically, like, everything around dashboards. So, they do training, onboarding, design, development, and then, like, maintenance. But, like, they’re just focused on, like, building sick dashboards. So, if we have a client where that is, like, the linchpin.
181 00:24:04.370 ⇒ 00:24:10.600 Uttam Kumaran: we should consider bringing them in. I told them we could either do things, like, where it’s hourly, or
182 00:24:10.710 ⇒ 00:24:17.200 Uttam Kumaran: if there’s opportunities to expand, we should just do a rev share. I think they’re the first sort of, like, firm where I actually…
183 00:24:17.720 ⇒ 00:24:31.900 Uttam Kumaran: feel like they could actually take some of his shit on. Like, Kite’s side, I didn’t feel like it was it, so… I don’t know. I want to see there. The other thing, I’m just gonna ask them if, like, they can give us a Power BI resource. What other clients do we need
184 00:24:32.160 ⇒ 00:24:35.220 Uttam Kumaran: like, dashboard stuff for.
185 00:24:36.610 ⇒ 00:24:43.579 Robert Tseng: Well, I mean, I think Insomnia might have a good… I mean, their Power BI is… looks, like, looks terrible. It was made by, like, a… like, a.
186 00:24:43.580 ⇒ 00:24:49.279 Uttam Kumaran: That was what I was gonna… that’s what I told them I was… I told them I was gonna put that scope in front of them.
187 00:24:49.860 ⇒ 00:24:53.789 Robert Tseng: Yeah, I don’t know how to pitch them, though. Like, how would I… I don’t know, like, so….
188 00:24:53.790 ⇒ 00:24:55.640 Uttam Kumaran: No, they’re under us, they’re under us.
189 00:24:56.310 ⇒ 00:24:56.980 Robert Tseng: Okay.
190 00:24:57.720 ⇒ 00:24:58.370 Uttam Kumaran: So….
191 00:24:58.370 ⇒ 00:25:01.720 Robert Tseng: I’m saying, like, yeah, okay, well, I….
192 00:25:01.720 ⇒ 00:25:07.870 Uttam Kumaran: So, like, for example, if the insomnia thing expands, or if it’s, like, extended another month, I’m gonna say, hey, like.
193 00:25:08.060 ⇒ 00:25:08.920 Uttam Kumaran: you have…
194 00:25:09.260 ⇒ 00:25:17.610 Uttam Kumaran: 2K budget, or 3… or two and a half budget, or 3K budget, to, like, handle every single task. Let’s agree on the scope, and then….
195 00:25:17.610 ⇒ 00:25:18.070 Robert Tseng: I see.
196 00:25:18.070 ⇒ 00:25:18.780 Uttam Kumaran: That’s it.
197 00:25:19.100 ⇒ 00:25:20.250 Uttam Kumaran: Okay.
198 00:25:20.530 ⇒ 00:25:24.239 Uttam Kumaran: The other thing is I want to ask them for, like, just some sort of, like.
199 00:25:24.380 ⇒ 00:25:27.640 Uttam Kumaran: Visualization person for 20 hours a week.
200 00:25:27.860 ⇒ 00:25:30.420 Uttam Kumaran: That can flow across anywhere we need.
201 00:25:32.920 ⇒ 00:25:36.280 Robert Tseng: Okay. Yeah, I mean, I feel like as we get some of these more…
202 00:25:37.740 ⇒ 00:25:46.869 Robert Tseng: What is a spark… so, well, I mean, it’s… visualization’s not… it’s… it has to be a mix of visualization and analysis. That’s why Annie struggles with it.
203 00:25:47.180 ⇒ 00:25:58.619 Robert Tseng: Because with these product analytics tools, it’s not enough to just, like, build… everything you build has to be rebuilt. Like, it’ll… you build something, and it leads to another question, and it’s more of, like, this…
204 00:25:58.900 ⇒ 00:26:06.119 Robert Tseng: kind of, how do you drill down into… like, how do you take an open-ended question, like, why are my… why are my users dropping? Like, you know.
205 00:26:06.430 ⇒ 00:26:11.220 Robert Tseng: And, like, why is your zero engagement down? And she can’t break that down into, like.
206 00:26:11.430 ⇒ 00:26:12.590 Robert Tseng: Which I already did.
207 00:26:12.590 ⇒ 00:26:13.569 Uttam Kumaran: I just can’t play.
208 00:26:13.570 ⇒ 00:26:27.969 Robert Tseng: I took one angle, looked at the users, and I did a bunch of different cuts across user behavior, and it’s like, okay, well, users are not… are all, like, what’s going to impact user behavior is, I mean, since this is a three-sided marketplace.
209 00:26:27.970 ⇒ 00:26:42.670 Robert Tseng: there’s, like, there’s retailers, like the weed shops that actually engage their users or whatever, so we need to do a parallel analysis on that perspective. And, like, I tried to tell her to just run with that, and she hasn’t been able to do it. So, …
210 00:26:42.740 ⇒ 00:26:50.440 Robert Tseng: Yeah, I… I think it’s not so much, like, it’s not a tooling issue. These tools are hella easy to use. They’re, like, I think it’s, you know.
211 00:26:50.440 ⇒ 00:26:52.690 Uttam Kumaran: No, no, no, it’s just… yeah, it’s….
212 00:26:52.690 ⇒ 00:26:57.720 Robert Tseng: Yeah, so it’s not really, like, a visualization specialist I need there, I just need somebody who can, like.
213 00:26:58.500 ⇒ 00:27:03.680 Uttam Kumaran: I’m gonna ask them if they have, like, a business analyst. Yeah. If not, we’re gonna… I’m still gonna find somebody.
214 00:27:04.100 ⇒ 00:27:05.090 Uttam Kumaran: …
215 00:27:05.560 ⇒ 00:27:13.200 Uttam Kumaran: But, yeah, I think across a couple of these, we need, like, we just need that business analyst role that we talked about. Okay.
216 00:27:14.310 ⇒ 00:27:23.369 Robert Tseng: Yeah, it’s just… I feel like the spike is somebody who knows experimentation, like, who knows how to measure, like, point… point change… like, changes.
217 00:27:23.530 ⇒ 00:27:39.950 Robert Tseng: when… when new features, like, data outages, like, you know, all… anything that causes, like, some sort of, like, change in the data, and be able to root cause it. Like, I think that’s… that’s a skill set that’s missing on our team, yeah.
218 00:27:40.620 ⇒ 00:27:41.650 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, okay, okay.
219 00:27:41.650 ⇒ 00:27:42.220 Robert Tseng: Yeah.
220 00:27:49.690 ⇒ 00:27:59.509 Robert Tseng: For Ellie, Ellie is gonna be just, like… I think it’s just gonna be a product analytics kind of thing for now, so it’ll be me. It’s another amplitude thing.
221 00:27:59.700 ⇒ 00:28:06.749 Robert Tseng: So… except they’re more heavily relying on amplitude, so it’ll be more advanced than README is.
222 00:28:07.030 ⇒ 00:28:11.779 Uttam Kumaran: Why don’t you try to bring this guy, Zoran, into that? Because I don’t have…
223 00:28:11.880 ⇒ 00:28:13.890 Uttam Kumaran: I don’t have another person
224 00:28:14.120 ⇒ 00:28:19.889 Uttam Kumaran: for you right now, and I don’t want to bring Henry into more shit for him to drop.
225 00:28:20.840 ⇒ 00:28:23.060 Robert Tseng: You don’t think he’s turned it around on default?
226 00:28:24.950 ⇒ 00:28:41.960 Uttam Kumaran: I’m like a… I don’t… I don’t tend… like, I tend to, like… I just… dude, I’ve just been disappointed too many times. Fool me once? What did… what did George Bush say? Fool me once, right? So, I don’t know, man. I… I would rather…
227 00:28:42.740 ⇒ 00:28:45.060 Uttam Kumaran: I’d rather you try this guy, Zoran.
228 00:28:45.850 ⇒ 00:28:46.540 Robert Tseng: Okay.
229 00:28:47.750 ⇒ 00:28:48.759 Robert Tseng: Yeah, I’d rather….
230 00:28:48.760 ⇒ 00:28:52.959 Uttam Kumaran: isolate him to one… I’d rather isolate Henry to just do one client, right?
231 00:28:53.990 ⇒ 00:28:54.510 Uttam Kumaran: MS.
232 00:28:54.510 ⇒ 00:28:59.690 Robert Tseng: I think he’s doing better on Eden, so I… I didn’t know, but I don’t know about on the default side, so….
233 00:28:59.690 ⇒ 00:29:05.209 Uttam Kumaran: He’s doing better, but, like, these are sometimes, like, Short-term side effects of…
234 00:29:05.520 ⇒ 00:29:09.240 Uttam Kumaran: harsh feedback, like, you need… we need to know… I need to know a little bit, like.
235 00:29:09.460 ⇒ 00:29:11.480 Uttam Kumaran: I need to check back in in 4 weeks.
236 00:29:11.690 ⇒ 00:29:13.079 Robert Tseng: Yeah, okay, that’s fair.
237 00:29:13.080 ⇒ 00:29:13.660 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.
238 00:29:15.130 ⇒ 00:29:16.030 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.
239 00:29:16.030 ⇒ 00:29:16.480 Robert Tseng: Thank you, Brian.
240 00:29:16.480 ⇒ 00:29:18.729 Uttam Kumaran: this guy Zoran with you, and you see what happens.
241 00:29:19.630 ⇒ 00:29:26.700 Robert Tseng: Yeah, sorry, I didn’t look as though on the resume. I mean, just, like, get a… do you know his skill set? Like, he’s… if he’s GTM, like…
242 00:29:27.620 ⇒ 00:29:29.550 Robert Tseng: Right? Is that what he is?
243 00:29:30.140 ⇒ 00:29:30.840 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.
244 00:29:32.480 ⇒ 00:29:33.270 Robert Tseng: I’m sorry.
245 00:29:34.870 ⇒ 00:29:41.710 Uttam Kumaran: But look at his, yeah, look at his resume, and then also, I’ll forward you, …
246 00:29:42.200 ⇒ 00:29:52.470 Uttam Kumaran: Can you… if you go… here, let me find this… can you go into Notion… … Interesting.
247 00:29:58.570 ⇒ 00:30:00.809 Robert Tseng: Whoa, snow on. Okay.
248 00:30:01.420 ⇒ 00:30:12.589 Robert Tseng: Digital Marketer… AdWords, JA Consultants… tracking integrations….
249 00:30:22.350 ⇒ 00:30:29.600 Uttam Kumaran: If… can you look in Notion? There’s this document called Project Marketing, Tagging, and Tracking.
250 00:30:31.460 ⇒ 00:30:31.910 Robert Tseng: Sure.
251 00:30:31.910 ⇒ 00:30:33.380 Uttam Kumaran: It’s so generic, but….
252 00:30:33.380 ⇒ 00:30:34.290 Robert Tseng: project.
253 00:30:34.290 ⇒ 00:30:36.870 Uttam Kumaran: Colon, marketing, tagging, and tracking.
254 00:30:37.180 ⇒ 00:30:37.790 Robert Tseng: Yeah.
255 00:30:39.470 ⇒ 00:30:40.459 Robert Tseng: Yeah, I see it.
256 00:30:41.220 ⇒ 00:30:45.220 Uttam Kumaran: So he… so we sent this to him, and we’re like, Leave your feedback.
257 00:30:46.520 ⇒ 00:30:47.180 Robert Tseng: Yeah.
258 00:30:47.180 ⇒ 00:30:51.909 Uttam Kumaran: and… Read through that. That’s what kind of, like, convinced me, because it seemed like he…
259 00:30:54.080 ⇒ 00:30:56.309 Uttam Kumaran: Could do a fair bit of it, or at least figure it out.
260 00:30:57.980 ⇒ 00:31:04.780 Robert Tseng: Well, look, like, I think if we end up moving forward with Remo, and they need to set up all the telemetry, he should be the guy to do it from the ground up. Like…
261 00:31:04.950 ⇒ 00:31:12.390 Robert Tseng: That’s… that’s an easy one for me. I think for now, I don’t know how much Andrew is billing us, I kind of wanted to ask, repo it, but…
262 00:31:12.510 ⇒ 00:31:20.100 Robert Tseng: you know, assuming he’s being honest about it, like, I feel like he should be under 5 hours a week. And, I… I mean, right now.
263 00:31:20.220 ⇒ 00:31:21.050 Robert Tseng: I mean…
264 00:31:21.520 ⇒ 00:31:31.680 Robert Tseng: he… Andrew manages the communications the best with the client, to be honest. Like, people actually respect him as a subject matter expertise, even though I don’t really know what he does.
265 00:31:31.680 ⇒ 00:31:34.709 Uttam Kumaran: I think you should… I think leave Andrew, …
266 00:31:34.850 ⇒ 00:31:39.099 Uttam Kumaran: like, until I can find you and Andrew, leave Andrew, but, like, we’ll get out…
267 00:31:39.770 ⇒ 00:31:43.889 Uttam Kumaran: I think if you… see if you can bring this guy in with you onto Sparkplug.
268 00:31:44.270 ⇒ 00:31:46.830 Uttam Kumaran: He’s certainly gonna take some of this work that
269 00:31:46.960 ⇒ 00:31:50.369 Uttam Kumaran: Because I called Amber yesterday, and Amber’s like, I can’t get updates
270 00:31:50.530 ⇒ 00:31:53.650 Uttam Kumaran: from Henry on some of this Eden work.
271 00:31:54.020 ⇒ 00:31:54.820 Uttam Kumaran: Or he says.
272 00:31:54.820 ⇒ 00:31:55.140 Robert Tseng: It’s true.
273 00:31:55.140 ⇒ 00:31:59.520 Uttam Kumaran: busy. And I said, okay, well then hand it to Zoran. If he starts doing it, then we have an answer.
274 00:31:59.790 ⇒ 00:32:00.810 Uttam Kumaran: ….
275 00:32:00.910 ⇒ 00:32:01.780 Robert Tseng: Okay.
276 00:32:01.780 ⇒ 00:32:02.780 Uttam Kumaran: So….
277 00:32:04.410 ⇒ 00:32:06.979 Robert Tseng: Okay, sure, I’m fine with that.
278 00:32:07.510 ⇒ 00:32:11.350 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, I mean, look, I just don’t know… I don’t know what other option we have.
279 00:32:12.000 ⇒ 00:32:14.849 Uttam Kumaran: Just can’t rely on people that, like, are gonna…
280 00:32:15.070 ⇒ 00:32:22.420 Uttam Kumaran: fuck this up. I do think that I… I’ll text Shreya, I do think her, or this guy, Keith.
281 00:32:22.540 ⇒ 00:32:28.130 Uttam Kumaran: are gonna be our answers here. They’re… they’re really, I think, are, like, they’re, like, pretty… they seem pretty good.
282 00:32:28.380 ⇒ 00:32:33.850 Uttam Kumaran: And then I’m interviewing more product analysts, so… and then I’m gonna get us a…
283 00:32:34.460 ⇒ 00:32:37.449 Uttam Kumaran: I mean, I guess at least I’m gonna just do dashboarding.
284 00:32:37.690 ⇒ 00:32:42.349 Uttam Kumaran: From them, and then… More of a business analyst, it’ll have to be…
285 00:32:42.830 ⇒ 00:32:45.479 Uttam Kumaran: probably Shreya, or I’ll find someone else.
286 00:32:45.630 ⇒ 00:32:47.569 Uttam Kumaran: But that’s… that’s a neck strong.
287 00:32:48.340 ⇒ 00:32:48.980 Robert Tseng: Yeah.
288 00:32:49.530 ⇒ 00:32:54.989 Robert Tseng: Yeah, I wonder if I should just go into my LinkedIn, look up second-degree product analysts, and just start going….
289 00:32:54.990 ⇒ 00:32:55.310 Uttam Kumaran: I should.
290 00:32:55.310 ⇒ 00:32:56.550 Robert Tseng: Like, I… yeah.
291 00:32:57.490 ⇒ 00:33:03.670 Uttam Kumaran: Dude, what you should… you know what you should do? We have the data team. I can send you the blurb, like, you literally say.
292 00:33:03.670 ⇒ 00:33:04.760 Robert Tseng: I, like….
293 00:33:04.860 ⇒ 00:33:11.459 Uttam Kumaran: Like, love your… you just, like, schmooze, and you say, like, would love for you to… if you’re interested in applying, like, here’s our screening form.
294 00:33:11.800 ⇒ 00:33:17.930 Uttam Kumaran: Or you can just ask them to hop on the phone with you, but if they seem like they’re looking for a job, they can just go through the screening.
295 00:33:18.120 ⇒ 00:33:19.720 Uttam Kumaran: And send a lumen.
296 00:33:20.000 ⇒ 00:33:20.730 Robert Tseng: Okay.
297 00:33:23.850 ⇒ 00:33:28.869 Robert Tseng: Okay, yeah, maybe… yeah, I just want to ask Rico for that.
298 00:33:29.320 ⇒ 00:33:29.960 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.
299 00:33:30.350 ⇒ 00:33:31.210 Robert Tseng: Okay.
300 00:33:33.680 ⇒ 00:33:34.600 Robert Tseng: I’ll see.
301 00:33:46.490 ⇒ 00:33:53.549 Uttam Kumaran: The only, like, great business analyst I work with is Jamie at Shopify, and he’s the one who recommended these to Shopify people.
302 00:33:54.040 ⇒ 00:33:58.000 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah. So I… Yeah.
303 00:34:00.200 ⇒ 00:34:00.850 Robert Tseng: Okay.
304 00:34:15.239 ⇒ 00:34:18.600 Robert Tseng: You may look into this over the weekend. Better luck now. Okay.
305 00:34:18.909 ⇒ 00:34:21.070 Robert Tseng: What else, what else?
306 00:34:21.380 ⇒ 00:34:28.370 Robert Tseng: Yeah, so… … I think that covers all the clients, ….
307 00:34:30.630 ⇒ 00:34:35.560 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, the Remo… on the Remo stuff, yes, Surf will literally… Surf can do anything, so…
308 00:34:35.830 ⇒ 00:34:38.369 Uttam Kumaran: We just have to, like…
309 00:34:39.130 ⇒ 00:34:42.610 Uttam Kumaran: Get organized, and yeah, he can drive that forward.
310 00:34:42.940 ⇒ 00:34:48.209 Uttam Kumaran: Especially if it’s just going on the phone and talking to them, like, you’ll… That’d be great.
311 00:34:48.980 ⇒ 00:34:54.380 Robert Tseng: Okay. Yeah, I feel less… the least confident about my ability to, like, lead that project. Yeah, yeah.
312 00:34:54.389 ⇒ 00:34:57.189 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, that’s completely… that’s completely technical, but…
313 00:34:57.659 ⇒ 00:35:03.649 Uttam Kumaran: I would only do it if I had a surf, otherwise I wouldn’t have been able, like, we shouldn’t have taken… we wouldn’t have been able to take that.
314 00:35:04.270 ⇒ 00:35:04.810 Robert Tseng: Okay.
315 00:35:04.810 ⇒ 00:35:07.540 Uttam Kumaran: Like, Surf will be smarter than anybody on their backend.
316 00:35:07.870 ⇒ 00:35:08.590 Robert Tseng: I’m sure, yeah.
317 00:35:08.590 ⇒ 00:35:10.219 Uttam Kumaran: Indeed. Yeah, so…
318 00:35:10.580 ⇒ 00:35:16.100 Uttam Kumaran: And then what else? Yeah, ABC, dude, I think we have an opportunity to expand some scope.
319 00:35:16.680 ⇒ 00:35:21.639 Uttam Kumaran: … We’re… we’re… continue to dominate that project.
320 00:35:21.750 ⇒ 00:35:31.050 Uttam Kumaran: So I think we’re… we’re… they want me… they want us to build some, like, pretty interesting AI stuff. I’m gonna ask them for some more money to do that. …
321 00:35:31.780 ⇒ 00:35:35.900 Uttam Kumaran: And then… Interlude is fine. Default.
322 00:35:36.330 ⇒ 00:35:40.469 Uttam Kumaran: It’s sort of up to Henry, and if Henry can’t do it, then whoever’s up next will take that.
323 00:35:41.600 ⇒ 00:35:45.829 Uttam Kumaran: Like, not… and then the default also wants us to do their…
324 00:35:46.070 ⇒ 00:35:50.219 Uttam Kumaran: Like, just, like, they’re… basically build their warehouse for them, also.
325 00:35:50.330 ⇒ 00:35:56.469 Uttam Kumaran: So… Yeah. Just continuing to take that stuff on.
326 00:35:56.750 ⇒ 00:36:03.560 Uttam Kumaran: … Panna’s working on a new deck for HelloFresh.
327 00:36:04.280 ⇒ 00:36:07.710 Uttam Kumaran: … McGaw sent us something.
328 00:36:08.250 ⇒ 00:36:09.670 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, I saw that, mate.
329 00:36:09.790 ⇒ 00:36:12.580 Uttam Kumaran: Didn’t give me more info, but yeah, that should be cake.
330 00:36:14.120 ⇒ 00:36:15.440 Uttam Kumaran: …
331 00:36:22.720 ⇒ 00:36:23.730 Uttam Kumaran: Yep.
332 00:36:23.930 ⇒ 00:36:27.959 Uttam Kumaran: And then, yeah, they probably… maybe the only other thing, if you have…
333 00:36:28.110 ⇒ 00:36:32.340 Uttam Kumaran: 20 minutes is to go watch a couple… some of those looms for the mid-level PM.
334 00:36:33.250 ⇒ 00:36:33.920 Uttam Kumaran: ….
335 00:36:33.920 ⇒ 00:36:34.570 Robert Tseng: Okay.
336 00:36:35.740 ⇒ 00:36:41.570 Uttam Kumaran: like, we have probably, like, 6 or 7 people send in looms. I pre-screen them, meaning
337 00:36:41.690 ⇒ 00:36:54.669 Uttam Kumaran: because we had, like, 500 people apply to our LinkedIn thing. Out of that, I, like, picked the people that were, like, either from tech, or, like, former tech consultancy, or ideally data consultancy, and, like.
338 00:36:54.860 ⇒ 00:37:04.750 Uttam Kumaran: didn’t work on, like, some random shit, like, actually worked on some stuff similar to ours. I then had them submit a loom, and then the looms are all, like, 2-5 minutes, basically answering, like, what they did.
339 00:37:05.060 ⇒ 00:37:10.899 Uttam Kumaran: … So, if we can… if you can watch those, and Amber’s gonna do that too.
340 00:37:12.060 ⇒ 00:37:16.060 Uttam Kumaran: And then we can pick a couple to move to the next… to the next thing.
341 00:37:17.610 ⇒ 00:37:18.300 Robert Tseng: Okay.
342 00:37:20.310 ⇒ 00:37:26.800 Uttam Kumaran: … And it’s gonna do the same thing for the go-to-market.
343 00:37:29.980 ⇒ 00:37:35.820 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, I was gonna do the same thing for the go-to-market lead. Put up a job posting and then have people drive towards a loom.
344 00:37:36.270 ⇒ 00:37:37.549 Uttam Kumaran: For people that were good.
345 00:37:50.940 ⇒ 00:37:52.040 Robert Tseng: Yeah.
346 00:37:52.950 ⇒ 00:37:53.910 Robert Tseng: Okay.
347 00:37:55.510 ⇒ 00:38:00.150 Robert Tseng: Dude, I wonder… sorry, I was… okay, no, I got it. No, yeah? Okay.
348 00:38:02.020 ⇒ 00:38:02.770 Robert Tseng: Huh.
349 00:38:12.990 ⇒ 00:38:16.530 Robert Tseng: Sam was a former VFA guy, Venture for America guy, right?
350 00:38:17.010 ⇒ 00:38:17.650 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.
351 00:38:18.050 ⇒ 00:38:19.269 Robert Tseng: Nice. Alright.
352 00:38:19.820 ⇒ 00:38:24.640 Robert Tseng: I kind of like those. I like the Ventures of America folks, so maybe I’ll, …
353 00:38:24.750 ⇒ 00:38:29.450 Robert Tseng: Trying to recruit from them again. I’m seeing a list of, like, 10
354 00:38:29.710 ⇒ 00:38:35.700 Robert Tseng: data slash product analysts that are former VFA, alumni.
355 00:38:35.700 ⇒ 00:38:40.049 Uttam Kumaran: what you should do, you should see if Sam’s connected, or get Sam to ask.
356 00:38:41.650 ⇒ 00:38:42.260 Robert Tseng: Yeah.
357 00:38:43.810 ⇒ 00:38:44.600 Robert Tseng: phone call.
358 00:38:45.330 ⇒ 00:38:53.120 Robert Tseng: So, Sam’s… He’s at more engineering, I see. Okay, never mind.
359 00:38:53.120 ⇒ 00:38:54.200 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
360 00:39:33.770 ⇒ 00:39:40.220 Robert Tseng: Oh, alright, I… I’m still trying to connect you to Jake, and I have to send out a couple more emails, …
361 00:39:42.910 ⇒ 00:39:56.219 Robert Tseng: Yeah, the, the Audrey thing… so, basically, the clinic is not opening in September, they’re opening in March. They want a strategy kind of consulting thing as they’re…
362 00:39:56.320 ⇒ 00:40:03.169 Robert Tseng: they work with this software called Healthy, I don’t know if you’ve heard of it. Maybe it works for us to go approach.
363 00:40:03.550 ⇒ 00:40:04.920 Robert Tseng: Yeah, healthy.
364 00:40:04.920 ⇒ 00:40:06.170 Uttam Kumaran: ….
365 00:40:07.580 ⇒ 00:40:18.780 Robert Tseng: We have not an EMR, we… Health… healthy is IE, so… Yeah, it’s like a… …
366 00:40:20.980 ⇒ 00:40:30.030 Robert Tseng: Yeah, it’s just… it’s… it’s kind of like what Remo is, but, like, it’s less about… it’s not an e-com tool, it’s really more for clinical resources.
367 00:40:30.620 ⇒ 00:40:34.039 Robert Tseng: … But yeah, I think…
368 00:40:34.480 ⇒ 00:40:53.340 Robert Tseng: seems like it’s a pretty complicated software. They… they need professional services, and people want to get data out of it. They seem pretty open with their developer APIs, that you can get a lot more out of it than you can with most other kind of health platforms, but, yeah, I think that… that could be… that could end up being a good… a good one.
369 00:40:55.660 ⇒ 00:41:09.200 Robert Tseng: But anyway, so I think they want to at least start with having me talk to Healthy and kind of figure out, like, what data we can get out of them that’s helpful for the… for the clinic. And then…
370 00:41:09.390 ⇒ 00:41:14.109 Robert Tseng: Yeah, I would say, like, more like 3 months out is when we will probably start building something.
371 00:41:14.360 ⇒ 00:41:19.320 Robert Tseng: I was telling them that even if they’re not live yet, you know, they should…
372 00:41:20.010 ⇒ 00:41:32.290 Robert Tseng: make sure that all their systems are working, we could do synthetic data projects, so I kind of referenced, like, you know, very lightly what we did with Mattermore, and they were like… and she was like, oh yeah, that’s a really good idea, like, she didn’t really…
373 00:41:32.480 ⇒ 00:41:40.440 Robert Tseng: just didn’t really know that that was, something that people did before they go… they go… they go live, so I think maybe that’s a…
374 00:41:40.640 ⇒ 00:41:42.779 Robert Tseng: That’s an angle that we can go in as well.
375 00:41:43.800 ⇒ 00:41:44.460 Uttam Kumaran: Okay.
376 00:41:44.800 ⇒ 00:41:53.810 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, like, for default, for example, they’re releasing, like, a whole new product, but I told them, like, they need to orchestrate events before that goes live, and, like.
377 00:41:54.120 ⇒ 00:42:02.910 Uttam Kumaran: So that’s what we’re kind of starting to do for them. We’re both adding just the basic events to their normal platform, and then also working on adding
378 00:42:03.010 ⇒ 00:42:07.140 Uttam Kumaran: Events for the next one. ….
379 00:42:08.900 ⇒ 00:42:12.669 Robert Tseng: if that’s a niche. Think about all the products out there that are, like, replatforming.
380 00:42:12.670 ⇒ 00:42:13.510 Uttam Kumaran: 100%.
381 00:42:13.510 ⇒ 00:42:14.210 Robert Tseng: or whatever.
382 00:42:14.210 ⇒ 00:42:14.590 Uttam Kumaran: 100.
383 00:42:14.590 ⇒ 00:42:19.780 Robert Tseng: And we’re like, hey, yeah, we help you get all your data, like, ready before you even make the switch.
384 00:42:21.110 ⇒ 00:42:24.420 Uttam Kumaran: No, this is 100%, like, a huge problem. …
385 00:42:24.550 ⇒ 00:42:42.099 Uttam Kumaran: like, because you have product teams that, like… because reporting is always, like, deprioed. Right? They just, like, ship it, whatever, and then day one comes, and people want to measure, and then they don’t have the data, so they scramble to, like, implement Mixpanel or something really quickly to see something.
386 00:42:42.340 ⇒ 00:42:47.659 Uttam Kumaran: But ideally, it has to be part of the roadmap, but commonly, if you have, like, a weak data team.
387 00:42:47.830 ⇒ 00:42:51.319 Uttam Kumaran: Or, if your product team, like, doesn’t care about data, it never gets done.
388 00:42:51.530 ⇒ 00:42:52.560 Uttam Kumaran: ….
389 00:42:53.390 ⇒ 00:43:03.760 Robert Tseng: Yeah, they’re just focused on doing maintenance of the existing stuff, and then the product teams are just, like, only thinking about what’s coming next, because I think that they’re gonna just trash whatever they’re moving on from.
390 00:43:04.250 ⇒ 00:43:06.880 Robert Tseng: Maybe we should, maybe we should hit, like….
391 00:43:07.060 ⇒ 00:43:10.019 Uttam Kumaran: I don’t know if we can see, like, new product
392 00:43:10.280 ⇒ 00:43:13.789 Uttam Kumaran: Launches, or, like, new platform launches, and be like.
393 00:43:14.070 ⇒ 00:43:18.349 Uttam Kumaran: hey, like, I have a feeling that, like.
394 00:43:18.600 ⇒ 00:43:27.130 Uttam Kumaran: Maybe your guys’ product analytics, like, hasn’t been set up, or… or, like, maybe we’re like, hey, we asked them, like, you guys feel good about your product analytics?
395 00:43:27.320 ⇒ 00:43:39.850 Uttam Kumaran: on for your new platform, like, we can all… typically, people skip this step, but I know you guys may struggle to report on it. Like, maybe there’s some opportunity there, and the… the trigger is, like, we look for people that have new product announcements.
396 00:43:40.480 ⇒ 00:43:41.100 Robert Tseng: Yeah.
397 00:43:41.560 ⇒ 00:43:46.100 Robert Tseng: I mean, even… we have to catch people even before then, too, somehow, because…
398 00:43:46.270 ⇒ 00:43:51.860 Robert Tseng: A lot of them aren’t announcing until, like, they’re, you know, they’ve already pretty much built it out.
399 00:43:53.000 ⇒ 00:43:58.610 Robert Tseng: But I think that’s still a good one to look into, because we’ll be able to see, like, How…
400 00:43:59.370 ⇒ 00:44:04.460 Robert Tseng: How many of these, potential leads are we seeing, actually, so….
401 00:44:05.860 ⇒ 00:44:10.560 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, can you just, like… can you just, like, write that somewhere? I’ll… Yeah.
402 00:44:10.710 ⇒ 00:44:19.020 Uttam Kumaran: Or, yeah, just write it somewhere in Slack, and then I’ll add it to the campaign list, and then… yeah, let me think about, like, if there’s a way for us to actually see…
403 00:44:19.980 ⇒ 00:44:25.489 Uttam Kumaran: Like, I don’t know, the only thing that comes to mind is, like, if we see people hire a lot more engineers.
404 00:44:25.770 ⇒ 00:44:35.110 Uttam Kumaran: Or, like… Maybe people raise a round of funding… But, like… Yeah…
405 00:44:35.980 ⇒ 00:44:37.879 Uttam Kumaran: Or, like, yeah, I don’t know.
406 00:44:39.510 ⇒ 00:44:40.660 Uttam Kumaran: It’s hard to feel more.
407 00:44:40.660 ⇒ 00:44:51.559 Robert Tseng: approach some of these, these, platforms and be like, well, they’re obviously going after, like, Healthy, for example, obviously going after clients, I mean, sure, new practices, but also
408 00:44:51.910 ⇒ 00:44:54.870 Robert Tseng: Old practices that are, like.
409 00:44:55.510 ⇒ 00:45:04.559 Robert Tseng: switching… that are… that need to switch platforms. So, their customer base is probably filled with people who, like, need this kind of stuff, and …
410 00:45:04.910 ⇒ 00:45:09.050 Robert Tseng: Whether they’re new or old. So it’s like opening a medical practice.
411 00:45:09.200 ⇒ 00:45:10.899 Robert Tseng: You know, there’s a lot of…
412 00:45:11.010 ⇒ 00:45:16.970 Robert Tseng: steps to that, and they can’t just… it’s not… they can’t just ship it. They gotta… …
413 00:45:17.170 ⇒ 00:45:22.580 Robert Tseng: Yeah, like, things can’t break. Like, the stakes are much higher than just, like, shipping a web app, so….
414 00:45:22.580 ⇒ 00:45:26.739 Uttam Kumaran: What’s the, … can you… how do you spell, or, like, what’s their website?
415 00:45:27.330 ⇒ 00:45:29.149 Robert Tseng: I’ll send it to you.
416 00:45:31.180 ⇒ 00:45:38.590 Robert Tseng: I met this, … oops, I send it to managers, whatever, but, …
417 00:45:41.230 ⇒ 00:45:43.989 Robert Tseng: That’s where I met this medical clinic.
418 00:45:44.660 ⇒ 00:45:45.380 Robert Tseng: ….
419 00:46:03.640 ⇒ 00:46:10.479 Uttam Kumaran: … okay, I just texted Shreya, she said she’s not seeing anything tomorrow. Is there a… do you have time tomorrow?
420 00:46:10.620 ⇒ 00:46:11.429 Uttam Kumaran: At all?
421 00:46:12.030 ⇒ 00:46:19.940 Robert Tseng: … Yeah, I can do tomorrow. I can do, you know, like, two… two to…
422 00:46:20.850 ⇒ 00:46:23.910 Robert Tseng: 3 to 4 p.m. Eastern, probably.
423 00:46:26.860 ⇒ 00:46:27.480 Uttam Kumaran: Okay.
424 00:46:34.420 ⇒ 00:46:37.330 Uttam Kumaran: Okay, I’ll ask her. Okay, healthy.
425 00:46:38.960 ⇒ 00:46:41.450 Uttam Kumaran: Let me ask someone about this.
426 00:46:43.090 ⇒ 00:46:46.460 Robert Tseng: Didn’t you have a doctor guy? ….
427 00:46:46.460 ⇒ 00:46:47.080 Uttam Kumaran: I do.
428 00:46:47.080 ⇒ 00:46:51.780 Robert Tseng: Yeah. What was this, like… Yeah, oh, UK, okay.
429 00:46:53.330 ⇒ 00:46:55.679 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, I would, but he’s… it’s like, yeah.
430 00:46:57.140 ⇒ 00:47:01.009 Robert Tseng: So, anyway, I just logged in, so… Let me ask, let me ask, ….
431 00:47:01.010 ⇒ 00:47:05.429 Uttam Kumaran: Let me ask David about these guys, too, superposition, because he worked in the health consulting.
432 00:47:06.250 ⇒ 00:47:06.910 Robert Tseng: Okay.
433 00:47:07.240 ⇒ 00:47:10.069 Uttam Kumaran: That’s all I did before this, is, like, healthcare consulting.
434 00:47:10.610 ⇒ 00:47:11.600 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.
435 00:47:11.600 ⇒ 00:47:31.439 Robert Tseng: I’m gonna… I do have a hard stop at 5, but I’m just quickly. So, the hip access, I’m just reintroducing the lead. So, this is, like, a specialty health clinic. They’re opening an office in West Village in New York City, or in fact, that’s well-funded, like, you know, they partner with Medicare. They have, like, a $20 million contract, so she has no problems throwing money at stuff.
436 00:47:31.740 ⇒ 00:47:37.829 Robert Tseng: I mean, first time opening a health clinic doesn’t really know what she’s doing, so I think it’s taking so long, but…
437 00:47:37.960 ⇒ 00:47:42.269 Robert Tseng: yeah, I think we’ve, you know, become friends, and she wants to actually, like, yeah.
438 00:47:42.270 ⇒ 00:47:45.330 Uttam Kumaran: Wait, but it’s healthier, just because healthy is like a platform, right?
439 00:47:45.330 ⇒ 00:47:50.059 Robert Tseng: Yeah, yeah, no, this is… this is the client… this is the lead that’s… that’s using Health.
440 00:47:50.060 ⇒ 00:47:50.770 Uttam Kumaran: They’re healthy.
441 00:47:50.770 ⇒ 00:47:57.520 Robert Tseng: customer, they don’t pay anything yet, because their clinic hasn’t been opened, and that’s kind of just the agreement they signed with Healthy.
442 00:47:57.620 ⇒ 00:48:14.689 Robert Tseng: But yeah, so they’re gonna… they’re gonna… they were supposed to open next month, but, you know, got set back by another 3 months, whatever, and… or 6 months, and, yeah, I’m just giving you the context that, like, that this clinic is, like, well, yeah, they’re gonna be using Healthy as their EMR, but, like, they don’t really know
443 00:48:15.270 ⇒ 00:48:27.260 Robert Tseng: what data they’ll be able to get out of Healthy. I see, I see. Like, they’re not developers, they don’t understand these API docs or whatever. They do know medical coding very well, they know exactly what they want, they’ve written out
444 00:48:27.260 ⇒ 00:48:44.120 Robert Tseng: you know, hundreds of SOPs already, because there’s a lot of operational, like, burden to, like, open a kind of specialty practice like this, which is great. I think it’s, like, well… way more well documented in terms of process than most organizations, especially for, you know, I mean, they’ve been trying to open for, like, over a year at this point, so…
445 00:48:44.730 ⇒ 00:48:46.270 Robert Tseng: I just think that, like.
446 00:48:46.770 ⇒ 00:49:03.550 Robert Tseng: Yeah, well, if you have all the stuff set up, then we might as well create a sandbox with you, with Healthy, with fake data. You’ll be able to see what data comes in and out of Healthy, and you can basically do trial runs while you’re… even though your opening date has been delayed, like, this is still something that you should invest in. Like, that’s the way I want to pitch it to her.
447 00:49:03.780 ⇒ 00:49:04.370 Robert Tseng: you know.
448 00:49:04.370 ⇒ 00:49:05.040 Uttam Kumaran: I see Blue Home.
449 00:49:05.040 ⇒ 00:49:06.769 Robert Tseng: Pass the strategy piece.
450 00:49:11.080 ⇒ 00:49:12.430 Uttam Kumaran: I see.
451 00:49:15.120 ⇒ 00:49:26.039 Robert Tseng: And so, that makes me think, well, there’s not just new clinics that are opening, but there are old clinics as well that are doing these system migrations, moving from an old EMR that doesn’t
452 00:49:26.540 ⇒ 00:49:37.710 Robert Tseng: that doesn’t share any data, to these new… these new ones, like a healthy, and, it’d be great if we could offer a similar offering to.
453 00:49:37.710 ⇒ 00:49:42.330 Uttam Kumaran: So there’s probably two things we can do. One is, like, we go, we talk to the healthy…
454 00:49:42.530 ⇒ 00:49:47.580 Uttam Kumaran: for a Remo, and we’re like, this is how we get your shit actually plugged in, I don’t know if that’s applied.
455 00:49:47.580 ⇒ 00:49:51.280 Robert Tseng: Ringo is too small, but, like, healthy is actually established, yeah.
456 00:49:51.540 ⇒ 00:49:58.320 Uttam Kumaran: Or you… or, for example, if you, like, whatever that clinic is, we can kind of reverse engineer, so I can try to see, like.
457 00:49:58.440 ⇒ 00:50:02.730 Uttam Kumaran: Could we have found that signal for that, like, that they were opening somewhere?
458 00:50:03.490 ⇒ 00:50:04.110 Robert Tseng: Yeah.
459 00:50:05.700 ⇒ 00:50:13.150 Robert Tseng: This is, like, a healthy, like, or a little amount. Series B funded, like, they’ve got some cash, like, they have some traction, like….
460 00:50:13.150 ⇒ 00:50:14.660 Uttam Kumaran: One medical type thing.
461 00:50:15.060 ⇒ 00:50:15.730 Robert Tseng: Yeah.
462 00:50:16.210 ⇒ 00:50:16.710 Robert Tseng: Exactly.
463 00:50:18.400 ⇒ 00:50:34.139 Uttam Kumaran: I mean, so that’s the thing, so maybe that’s another campaign, too, is, like, I can… so, like, if once we have a client, we can then reverse engineer and say, like, could we have gotten the signal from them? Like, had we… what campaign should we have run for them to have filtered up into that?
464 00:50:34.530 ⇒ 00:50:38.610 Uttam Kumaran: That’s what I just would go to Mustafa and be like, let’s go, like, spend an hour jamming on this.
465 00:50:39.580 ⇒ 00:50:47.040 Robert Tseng: I believe that there was, like, some news or some PR that they were opening in New York. Like, that was the only thing that I saw before. I don’t remember where it was.
466 00:50:47.490 ⇒ 00:50:48.230 Robert Tseng: Yeah.
467 00:50:50.440 ⇒ 00:50:50.930 Uttam Kumaran: Okay.
468 00:50:50.930 ⇒ 00:50:52.960 Robert Tseng: But… Yeah.
469 00:50:54.070 ⇒ 00:51:02.039 Uttam Kumaran: Alright, I’ll let you go. Yeah, she said she can do 3 Eastern tomorrow, so I’ll just have Rico book it with you.
470 00:51:02.370 ⇒ 00:51:03.630 Robert Tseng: Yeah, thanks.
471 00:51:03.800 ⇒ 00:51:04.800 Uttam Kumaran: Okay, alright.
472 00:51:04.930 ⇒ 00:51:05.840 Uttam Kumaran: Alright, dude.
473 00:51:06.100 ⇒ 00:51:07.180 Robert Tseng: Oh, see ya.
474 00:51:07.380 ⇒ 00:51:08.179 Uttam Kumaran: Okay, bye.