Meeting Title: Team Allocation and Strategy Discussion Date: 2025-09-30 Meeting participants: Uttam Kumaran, Justin Breshears
WEBVTT
1 00:04:56.340 ⇒ 00:04:58.450 Justin Breshears: Hey, I’m sorry about that.
2 00:05:00.250 ⇒ 00:05:02.420 Uttam Kumaran: You are fine, no problem.
3 00:05:02.780 ⇒ 00:05:06.989 Justin Breshears: Sure, you had a hundred other things to occupy your mind.
4 00:05:06.990 ⇒ 00:05:15.859 Uttam Kumaran: No, you know what, I just… I just started, like, needed to get something on the stove to eat, so I was just, like, cutting a bunch of stuff, and I’m making a little…
5 00:05:16.170 ⇒ 00:05:19.039 Justin Breshears: The real question is late lunch or early dinner?
6 00:05:19.040 ⇒ 00:05:22.449 Uttam Kumaran: Late lunch. I guess it’ll be both, technically, because…
7 00:05:22.630 ⇒ 00:05:27.900 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, it’ll… it’s a little bit of a late lunch, and then it’ll… it’ll keep me through dinner, basically.
8 00:05:27.900 ⇒ 00:05:34.059 Justin Breshears: I was scared of that answer, because I’m like, that means it’s just been, like, a back-to-back day for you.
9 00:05:34.060 ⇒ 00:05:40.580 Uttam Kumaran: Well, I just, I just felt… I’ve been feeling a little bit sick since going back, so it’s kind of been a weird, like…
10 00:05:40.980 ⇒ 00:05:47.299 Uttam Kumaran: haven’t felt so hungry. You know, when you’re sick, you sometimes don’t feel, like, super hungry, so I’ve just been trying to, like, chug water.
11 00:05:47.580 ⇒ 00:05:54.190 Justin Breshears: Well, I was… I was wondering, because I… yesterday, you didn’t seem fully yourself, which I haven’t known you that long.
12 00:05:54.190 ⇒ 00:05:55.180 Uttam Kumaran: Too soon.
13 00:05:55.180 ⇒ 00:05:57.170 Justin Breshears: I’d like your little… little rundown of.
14 00:05:57.170 ⇒ 00:06:05.909 Uttam Kumaran: I was okay, yeah, really, I mean, it’s… I feel like it’s… I just get tired sooner, so… like, yesterday I slept at, like, 9 o’clock.
15 00:06:06.040 ⇒ 00:06:09.730 Uttam Kumaran: But, today’s been really good, like…
16 00:06:09.880 ⇒ 00:06:12.400 Uttam Kumaran: Again, the… even the days where, like.
17 00:06:12.870 ⇒ 00:06:28.400 Uttam Kumaran: I get to give a lot of feedback I feel really positive about, and so I think yesterday we made some great decisions. Today, like, you know, I think we were… we’re continuing to make some decisions, and there’s still some good amount of friction, so I feel pretty good.
18 00:06:28.500 ⇒ 00:06:30.470 Uttam Kumaran: I mean, I think,
19 00:06:30.740 ⇒ 00:06:41.739 Uttam Kumaran: kind of biggest thing, just wanted to make sure that we still talk, you know, daily as much as possible. I think it’s been really helpful, and I actually took some time, you know, 20-30 minutes today to, like.
20 00:06:42.900 ⇒ 00:06:56.910 Uttam Kumaran: you know, put together, like, two documents based on our conversations last week, one sort of on allocation, which I think maybe that can be the theme of today, is, like, how we do allocation, and then also started chipping away at, like, okay, what is, like, our…
21 00:06:57.100 ⇒ 00:07:02.820 Uttam Kumaran: sort of PM, even our delivery org structure, and one of the things that I,
22 00:07:03.130 ⇒ 00:07:05.809 Uttam Kumaran: talked to Robert a lot about today is
23 00:07:06.170 ⇒ 00:07:12.560 Uttam Kumaran: you know, moving certain people more, like, I think we’re… we’re almost thinking about it
24 00:07:12.950 ⇒ 00:07:21.129 Uttam Kumaran: kind of, like, in 3 separate roles in our delivery org, which is engineers, PMs, and almost, like, strategists.
25 00:07:21.300 ⇒ 00:07:26.440 Uttam Kumaran: I think, in a classic delivery organization, you have Like…
26 00:07:26.970 ⇒ 00:07:32.069 Uttam Kumaran: Engineers that are specific to a certain type of engineering.
27 00:07:32.250 ⇒ 00:07:37.339 Uttam Kumaran: You also kind of have, like, tech leads, and then you have an AE, and then you have a project manager.
28 00:07:37.890 ⇒ 00:07:47.630 Uttam Kumaran: I think given the size of our projects, we kind of want to collapse it, but also continue, like, to raise the bar, and so we almost want to have this, like, role for, like, a strategist.
29 00:07:47.840 ⇒ 00:07:52.730 Uttam Kumaran: which is someone that’s kind of in between. Like, they do a little bit of, like.
30 00:07:53.090 ⇒ 00:08:03.499 Uttam Kumaran: A little bit of selling in terms of, like, in a client, but they also can wrap the output up and actually, like, present it to a client, versus…
31 00:08:03.510 ⇒ 00:08:16.410 Uttam Kumaran: I feel like the engineers, I think it’s all purely on execution, and then just the project management is all on organization and communication. You know, ideally, we collapse even further, but I think what we’ve struggled with.
32 00:08:16.410 ⇒ 00:08:16.840 Justin Breshears: Check.
33 00:08:16.840 ⇒ 00:08:24.370 Uttam Kumaran: And sort of what we saw with Treya is just, like, sense of ownership in wanting to make sure that we
34 00:08:24.790 ⇒ 00:08:30.109 Uttam Kumaran: drive everybody towards that sort of ownership mentality, and then also, I think.
35 00:08:30.290 ⇒ 00:08:39.530 Uttam Kumaran: Strategist actually covers, kind of, like, what we were thinking about, of like, okay, what is the benefits of a classic management consulting, is you just get thrown into whatever fire, and
36 00:08:39.870 ⇒ 00:08:48.260 Uttam Kumaran: one of the things we realize is, like, when customers talk to me or Robert, they just feel like they have, like, a peer in the room, and, like, we’re the authority figure.
37 00:08:48.480 ⇒ 00:08:51.810 Uttam Kumaran: So we’re like, okay, like, what is the feeling, really, that we’re…
38 00:08:51.940 ⇒ 00:08:58.249 Uttam Kumaran: We have, and we… I think we’re noticing it a little bit with Zoron. I think Henry has a little bit of the…
39 00:08:58.770 ⇒ 00:09:05.140 Uttam Kumaran: Feeling that we’re gonna… we can find that in him, but, like, that’s kind of, like, what we were spending a little bit of today thinking about.
40 00:09:05.560 ⇒ 00:09:06.329 Justin Breshears: For sure.
41 00:09:06.530 ⇒ 00:09:08.140 Justin Breshears: Yeah, I mean, those are…
42 00:09:08.270 ⇒ 00:09:18.510 Justin Breshears: definitely unicorns, they’re not… not grown on trees, but, they can… you’re talking about, like, return on an employee, they probably have your highest rate.
43 00:09:19.320 ⇒ 00:09:34.030 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, and so that’s where, like, for me, I’m… if that’s what we’re going for, fine, like, I… you can leave it to me to figure out, okay, how do we actually recruit and find those people? But I would rather… like, we have churned so many people because of just the fact that, like.
44 00:09:34.460 ⇒ 00:09:40.710 Uttam Kumaran: people are like, well, I do this role, and they come in, and I’m like, you have to stretch a little bit, and we’re not finding it, so…
45 00:09:40.760 ⇒ 00:09:43.530 Justin Breshears: Right. Ideally, there’s, like, two motions. One, we take.
46 00:09:43.540 ⇒ 00:09:54.690 Uttam Kumaran: the people we have, and we sort of bucket them. We have, like, PMs, we have engineers, and we have some people that are strategists. The second piece is we, go out and find people that
47 00:09:54.900 ⇒ 00:10:03.529 Uttam Kumaran: We’re very clear with that why… what they’re coming on to do, and yes, we’re… we actually are okay with the fact that many people are not going to fit that category.
48 00:10:03.720 ⇒ 00:10:05.090 Justin Breshears: Right. And.
49 00:10:05.280 ⇒ 00:10:08.570 Uttam Kumaran: I don’t know, the sort of strategist role seems to be the…
50 00:10:09.040 ⇒ 00:10:28.819 Uttam Kumaran: culmination of just, like, okay, what… who is this, like… what is this, like, third role? And ideally, that person… and I did a lot of writing on this, so that… that person is able to go identify the client, identify the problems within the client, and then… but really, they’re able to hand off the bulk of, like, the coordination to, like, the project manager, and then they’re also able to
51 00:10:28.880 ⇒ 00:10:43.159 Uttam Kumaran: hand off most of the execution to an engineer. However, this isn’t, like, someone who’s just, like, straight MBA. Like, the reason I think, you know, myself and Robert and folks like Henry and Zoran are good at it is because we did
52 00:10:43.300 ⇒ 00:10:46.280 Uttam Kumaran: We were on the ground building this stuff ourselves.
53 00:10:46.410 ⇒ 00:10:52.789 Uttam Kumaran: So, like, our authority comes from just doing it, so authority comes partly from experience, and from doing it, and so…
54 00:10:52.970 ⇒ 00:10:58.730 Uttam Kumaran: It’s kind of like, okay, we just need to find the engineers who want to get there, or the project managers who want to get there, and sort of
55 00:10:58.890 ⇒ 00:11:02.360 Uttam Kumaran: Promote them into that position, but that’s sort of…
56 00:11:02.790 ⇒ 00:11:06.579 Uttam Kumaran: Like, kind of, like, a little bit of, like, what I was thinking about over the last hour or so.
57 00:11:07.130 ⇒ 00:11:11.769 Justin Breshears: Yeah, that makes sense. We had that… that role, Kayla.
58 00:11:11.770 ⇒ 00:11:14.190 Uttam Kumaran: Oh, really? Okay. Yeah. Tell me about it.
59 00:11:14.590 ⇒ 00:11:19.319 Justin Breshears: I mean, it’s very similar to what you’re talking about, and it was really just, like.
60 00:11:19.770 ⇒ 00:11:31.499 Justin Breshears: you had all those different types of people. You had the people that were just, you know, execution engineers, but, like, don’t ask them to speak in front of a client. And, you know, they had their role, for sure.
61 00:11:31.500 ⇒ 00:11:44.319 Justin Breshears: But then you had, depending on the project type, like, you know, let’s take this AI ideation and strategy projects. Like, those were led by strategists, because it wasn’t about implementing anything, really. It was about
62 00:11:44.480 ⇒ 00:11:49.830 Justin Breshears: Understanding the business and coming up with their strategy in the context, the lens of…
63 00:11:50.000 ⇒ 00:12:06.889 Justin Breshears: you know, AI and what they get used for. So those were very strategist-led, very… the deliverables were decks and strategies and things like that. So they’re… they’re valuable, and they can open up the door to a lot of different projects, and quite frankly, like.
64 00:12:08.010 ⇒ 00:12:18.710 Justin Breshears: We’re missing that piece between you and Robert and the rest of the org. Don’t have that piece, so it’s requiring you and Robert to spend more time with clients post-sales than you should.
65 00:12:19.170 ⇒ 00:12:25.679 Justin Breshears: I take Insomnia as the example for that, with Robert. Like, without Robert on Insomnia, we’d be cooked.
66 00:12:25.760 ⇒ 00:12:26.820 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.
67 00:12:26.880 ⇒ 00:12:32.539 Justin Breshears: And that’s not great, because Robert’s time is very hard. Like, I… I tried to meet with him today.
68 00:12:32.740 ⇒ 00:12:39.409 Justin Breshears: couple of times, I haven’t been able to, just on the, like, issues that we’re seeing with insomnia, so…
69 00:12:39.420 ⇒ 00:12:41.250 Uttam Kumaran: That’s tough.
70 00:12:41.420 ⇒ 00:12:47.529 Justin Breshears: Because you need somebody that doesn’t have 14 other things going on in their day like y’all do. Yeah.
71 00:12:47.740 ⇒ 00:12:49.739 Justin Breshears: So it’s, it’s, I think…
72 00:12:49.890 ⇒ 00:12:57.390 Justin Breshears: Valuable, and at our size, and especially if we want to run, like, a very lean organization, then you do need those jack-of-trades kind of people.
73 00:12:58.120 ⇒ 00:13:02.280 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, so I think what… previously, what we’ve done is… my mental model is, like.
74 00:13:02.710 ⇒ 00:13:09.890 Uttam Kumaran: A typical engineering team, which is like, okay, we have these fixed roles, and so let me go find those fixed people.
75 00:13:11.550 ⇒ 00:13:19.260 Uttam Kumaran: But the pushback is, like, we just can’t afford to, and so one of the ways is, like, okay, we’re, like… I just don’t think we’ve… we’ve…
76 00:13:19.970 ⇒ 00:13:26.890 Uttam Kumaran: I don’t think we’ve collapsed, like, the delivery structure in this way, in that we, like, know, okay, we…
77 00:13:26.990 ⇒ 00:13:46.400 Uttam Kumaran: we… okay, there’s engineers, okay, there’s, like… and then for those, okay, we’re still holding them to a high bar, like, I want all the engineers to be at least, like, 2 or 3 disciplines heavy, like, we’re not gonna have someone, like, for example, ideally, you have, like, a Mustafa, or a Casey, or a Sam, or a Wish, who you can just kind of throw, and they’ll figure it out.
78 00:13:46.760 ⇒ 00:14:03.169 Uttam Kumaran: And they have specialties, but they’ll generally be like, yes, I’ll figure it out, right? You also have… and then I think on the PM side, it’s… I would say it’s really just you, in terms of, like, someone who has seen… and again, like, I’ve… I’ve sort of also seen project management, but
79 00:14:03.170 ⇒ 00:14:12.549 Uttam Kumaran: if you negate me out of all this, it’s really just you who have seen it at the best level. And then on the strategy side is really where I think
80 00:14:13.350 ⇒ 00:14:26.359 Uttam Kumaran: what we’ve found is, like, yes, Robert and I are doing it, but okay, who else in the company? And I think we’ve identified, sort of, Henry has the ability to do that, Zoran has been doing a good job doing that.
81 00:14:26.580 ⇒ 00:14:29.700 Uttam Kumaran: And so we’re roughly trying to figure out, like, okay.
82 00:14:30.140 ⇒ 00:14:32.599 Uttam Kumaran: We have tried to fill that gap with, like.
83 00:14:32.860 ⇒ 00:14:41.739 Uttam Kumaran: turn one of us into three parts, and then try to fill each three, but instead, I think we should just go after those unicorns, and then I just have to keep the bar
84 00:14:41.950 ⇒ 00:14:46.790 Uttam Kumaran: Way higher, because the level of effort it’s taking to
85 00:14:47.480 ⇒ 00:14:49.949 Uttam Kumaran: Find people, turn them into that.
86 00:14:50.440 ⇒ 00:14:57.410 Uttam Kumaran: Is really brutal, and we’ve gotten better at, like, identifying it quicker and moving people out, but
87 00:14:57.660 ⇒ 00:15:01.770 Uttam Kumaran: I don’t know, I just think maybe I have to suck it up and just say, like.
88 00:15:01.940 ⇒ 00:15:05.489 Uttam Kumaran: we’re gonna go after those unicorn people, and until I find them, we don’t…
89 00:15:06.100 ⇒ 00:15:10.299 Uttam Kumaran: We just don’t… we’re not, like, putting band-aids on stuff.
90 00:15:12.300 ⇒ 00:15:17.890 Justin Breshears: Kind of a chicken and egg thing, though, that, like, we run into, where it’s like, those people are gonna cost a lot more money.
91 00:15:17.890 ⇒ 00:15:22.280 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, so the… kind of the way I’m thinking about it is, like, those…
92 00:15:23.450 ⇒ 00:15:29.260 Uttam Kumaran: Those are gonna be the primary folks that get access to the… variable comp.
93 00:15:29.420 ⇒ 00:15:43.890 Uttam Kumaran: And, like, that’s how I’m thinking about structuring it, is that it should be… that’s gonna be the pull from anyone on the PM side and the engineering side to want to get into strategy, because those are gonna be the only folks that are gonna be offered
94 00:15:44.080 ⇒ 00:15:50.740 Uttam Kumaran: variable, and I’m… we’re… and again, this is just all, like, sort of thinking through today, but that’s sort of, like, how we’re…
95 00:15:50.930 ⇒ 00:15:59.350 Uttam Kumaran: we’re thinking about, okay, and then, again, like, I… I was talking to Henry, and Henry’s kind of someone like us, where he’s, like, a call… he’s like, just, if you can give me the
96 00:15:59.510 ⇒ 00:16:07.629 Uttam Kumaran: the upside, then he was like, we’ll go… I’ll go make it happen, and it’s almost like I want to attract those type of people, you know?
97 00:16:07.940 ⇒ 00:16:21.470 Uttam Kumaran: And so, maybe that’s the North Star, is like, if you’re in a strategy role, you get access to the renewal or upsells. You can also start to assist on the sales side. Like, if you come in and
98 00:16:21.470 ⇒ 00:16:30.949 Uttam Kumaran: maybe we need your expertise in an intro call, or you do a demo, or you come in on the close, like, there’s opportunity there. But again, like, I want to make sure that’s
99 00:16:30.980 ⇒ 00:16:43.719 Uttam Kumaran: that is a small pool of people that has access to that, who we can just continue to pile things onto. And as an engineer or PM, you want to grow into that, because you’re currently going to handle, basically.
100 00:16:44.370 ⇒ 00:16:49.800 Uttam Kumaran: basically, that strategist should be able to do a PM, should be able to kind of do
101 00:16:50.110 ⇒ 00:17:00.700 Uttam Kumaran: engineering, but they… they… they shouldn’t do it because their time is most valuable as a sort of glue person. And, like, I don’t know, it’s kind of, like, what we’re thinking. So they have to have some commercial sense.
102 00:17:00.880 ⇒ 00:17:04.959 Uttam Kumaran: They have to have, definitely, like, some type of, you know, engineering sense.
103 00:17:07.200 ⇒ 00:17:11.549 Uttam Kumaran: And then rely on the support systems to kind of execute the vision.
104 00:17:11.770 ⇒ 00:17:18.959 Uttam Kumaran: They have to be very opinionated, right? Because we come into these clients, and we’re very opinionated on
105 00:17:19.210 ⇒ 00:17:21.209 Uttam Kumaran: What needs to happen and why?
106 00:17:21.470 ⇒ 00:17:22.670 Justin Breshears: Yeah.
107 00:17:22.810 ⇒ 00:17:23.890 Uttam Kumaran: Versus just, like.
108 00:17:23.890 ⇒ 00:17:26.399 Justin Breshears: They can’t hire us if they had all the answers.
109 00:17:26.400 ⇒ 00:17:26.950 Uttam Kumaran: Yes.
110 00:17:26.950 ⇒ 00:17:28.039 Justin Breshears: Provide those, like.
111 00:17:28.040 ⇒ 00:17:33.739 Uttam Kumaran: But think about it, if we, like, put on a traditional delivery team, and there’s just people in these roles, there is no, like.
112 00:17:34.190 ⇒ 00:17:36.759 Justin Breshears: Yeah, they’re taking direction, they’re not giving direction.
113 00:17:36.760 ⇒ 00:17:37.900 Uttam Kumaran: Yes, yeah.
114 00:17:37.900 ⇒ 00:17:42.030 Justin Breshears: Yeah, so, like, in the case of default, She asks us.
115 00:17:42.250 ⇒ 00:17:46.129 Justin Breshears: Find us your recommendation on who we should use, right?
116 00:17:46.400 ⇒ 00:17:53.860 Justin Breshears: So… Yeah, we’re… that’s all coming from us. Like, we’re building the criteria, we’re rating them, we’re comparing them.
117 00:17:55.790 ⇒ 00:18:02.560 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, so… Yeah, I think that’s just kind of, like, what we’re… what we’re thinking about.
118 00:18:03.330 ⇒ 00:18:05.479 Uttam Kumaran: a bit, and yeah, I’m just gonna have to…
119 00:18:06.110 ⇒ 00:18:10.279 Uttam Kumaran: Think through how we find, you know, those people.
120 00:18:11.190 ⇒ 00:18:16.509 Uttam Kumaran: Or at least, like, anyone who I bring into PM or engineering, they have the…
121 00:18:17.100 ⇒ 00:18:19.820 Uttam Kumaran: The feeling that they could get there one day.
122 00:18:19.820 ⇒ 00:18:20.709 Justin Breshears: Yeah. You know?
123 00:18:21.100 ⇒ 00:18:31.859 Justin Breshears: Well, I think it goes back to a conversation we had, where it was like, would you rather hire all these, like, specialists or hire, like, a rock star and give them, like, an admin to do that? Yeah. Like, I think that…
124 00:18:32.630 ⇒ 00:18:36.169 Justin Breshears: Would be, like, the better way to, like, think about, like.
125 00:18:36.300 ⇒ 00:18:40.369 Justin Breshears: adding to, like, PM specific. Okay. Like, let’s…
126 00:18:40.600 ⇒ 00:18:49.840 Justin Breshears: bring in these rock stars, these strategists, and then give them coordinators, basically. Yeah. Because a lot of, like, the PMing
127 00:18:50.820 ⇒ 00:18:51.550 Justin Breshears: like…
128 00:18:52.260 ⇒ 00:19:03.950 Justin Breshears: you actually really don’t need, like, a ton of coordination on those projects. Like, there’s not a lot of, like, moving parts in these. Yes. You need the consultants on this project.
129 00:19:03.950 ⇒ 00:19:04.450 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.
130 00:19:04.450 ⇒ 00:19:11.720 Justin Breshears: So, like… eventually, like, you need someone like me to take over Robert’s role on Insomnia.
131 00:19:12.260 ⇒ 00:19:12.750 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.
132 00:19:12.750 ⇒ 00:19:17.369 Justin Breshears: But you don’t necessarily need me to spend 10 hours a week.
133 00:19:17.800 ⇒ 00:19:24.970 Justin Breshears: doing… Project management things on that project, because it’s very just, like, ad hoc, stuff like that.
134 00:19:25.180 ⇒ 00:19:33.890 Justin Breshears: So, that’s where I think, like, it should be… I don’t think we need to just, like, hire PMs proportionate to the revenue growth, right?
135 00:19:33.890 ⇒ 00:19:34.580 Uttam Kumaran: Okay.
136 00:19:34.580 ⇒ 00:19:41.809 Justin Breshears: I think we hire those strategists that you’re talking about, and then we, like, Have a coordinator support them.
137 00:19:42.090 ⇒ 00:19:43.789 Justin Breshears: Across their accounts.
138 00:19:45.090 ⇒ 00:19:47.699 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, like, for Urban Stems, for example.
139 00:19:48.110 ⇒ 00:19:52.209 Uttam Kumaran: if it… if I… if I was more honest, I would be like, look, me…
140 00:19:52.390 ⇒ 00:19:57.640 Uttam Kumaran: Demolade and away should just run that… no process.
141 00:19:57.810 ⇒ 00:20:01.669 Uttam Kumaran: Because it’s going… that’s kind of, like, close to where it is right now.
142 00:20:01.950 ⇒ 00:20:02.969 Uttam Kumaran: Meaning I can…
143 00:20:02.970 ⇒ 00:20:08.400 Justin Breshears: with that on probably most of your projects currently. It’s more just, like, When you’re.
144 00:20:08.400 ⇒ 00:20:08.880 Uttam Kumaran: Should you?
145 00:20:08.880 ⇒ 00:20:10.359 Justin Breshears: now doubled.
146 00:20:10.360 ⇒ 00:20:10.820 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.
147 00:20:10.820 ⇒ 00:20:13.149 Justin Breshears: You won’t be able to get away with that.
148 00:20:13.220 ⇒ 00:20:14.090 Uttam Kumaran: For sure.
149 00:20:19.120 ⇒ 00:20:19.980 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.
150 00:20:22.170 ⇒ 00:20:30.939 Justin Breshears: It’s the right way to think about it, though. I think that’s the right direction to head, because you don’t want to blow up your organization with just, like, thousands of headcount.
151 00:20:31.200 ⇒ 00:20:32.429 Justin Breshears: You wanna think about?
152 00:20:32.780 ⇒ 00:20:41.399 Justin Breshears: how can I deliver that amount of revenue that a thousand headcount consultancy could deliver, but could I do it with 500 people?
153 00:20:42.290 ⇒ 00:20:49.599 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, like, you know, like, probably, like, Zoran, Away, Shenri, they’re the only people that, like, if I was, like.
154 00:20:50.450 ⇒ 00:20:54.499 Uttam Kumaran: Hey, a client is kicking off in the next 30 minutes, can you come with me?
155 00:20:55.070 ⇒ 00:20:57.999 Uttam Kumaran: and I don’t say anything, they’re probably only people where I’m like.
156 00:20:58.150 ⇒ 00:21:01.340 Uttam Kumaran: on the technical side, they would… they would totally bow. They’d be great.
157 00:21:01.830 ⇒ 00:21:05.649 Uttam Kumaran: Because it doesn’t matter what they say, it’s just like, we’re gonna… we’ll figure it out, just like…
158 00:21:05.650 ⇒ 00:21:06.030 Justin Breshears: Hmm.
159 00:21:06.030 ⇒ 00:21:10.669 Uttam Kumaran: we riff and we figure it out, but again, those are the only people in the org that I think…
160 00:21:11.170 ⇒ 00:21:21.399 Uttam Kumaran: are sort of closer to fitting that bill. And then for them, it’s like, okay, how can I enable them to strategize and to, like, work with the PM to groom, hand it off to engineering?
161 00:21:21.730 ⇒ 00:21:24.969 Uttam Kumaran: They kind of deliver it, get the next thing to work on.
162 00:21:25.120 ⇒ 00:21:29.110 Uttam Kumaran: And that… that’s the cycle. And we do that with 3 versus, like.
163 00:21:29.260 ⇒ 00:21:39.260 Uttam Kumaran: Again, if you have to have a tech, someone that’s just tech lead, and then engineering manager, an engineer, then a PM, an account executive.
164 00:21:39.600 ⇒ 00:21:43.559 Uttam Kumaran: it’s just not gonna work for us right now, you know? .
165 00:21:43.560 ⇒ 00:21:51.850 Justin Breshears: it’s hard to sell that to a client where you’re, like, selling a rate based on, like, well, I gotta pay all these four rolls, versus maybe you pay one roll that…
166 00:21:52.350 ⇒ 00:21:56.610 Justin Breshears: Like, at a higher rate, but it’s cheaper overall to the client.
167 00:21:56.610 ⇒ 00:21:56.950 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.
168 00:21:56.950 ⇒ 00:21:58.309 Justin Breshears: Perhaps paying one role.
169 00:22:00.980 ⇒ 00:22:01.610 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.
170 00:22:02.440 ⇒ 00:22:08.350 Justin Breshears: That’s where I would love to get to, but I need to get on the technical side, like, that’s what I’m lacking.
171 00:22:08.350 ⇒ 00:22:24.989 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, and even… I mean, that’s also… that’s also… like, I see your role in an even different than any one of those pieces. Like, I think you’ll… I think you could totally get into the more of the strategic side, but the thing is, it just… a lot of it is a bet on…
172 00:22:25.580 ⇒ 00:22:27.699 Uttam Kumaran: Experience, and, like, can you…
173 00:22:28.010 ⇒ 00:22:34.729 Uttam Kumaran: Can you be very decisive, given limited… like, can you almost run… like, you were in that business, and you were the operator.
174 00:22:34.880 ⇒ 00:22:44.469 Uttam Kumaran: So, it’s tough, because the… I don’t know, it’s just… it is a unique skill set, and, like, I don’t think I’ve been able to put my thumb on it, but…
175 00:22:44.640 ⇒ 00:22:51.109 Uttam Kumaran: That is it, and I think there are some engineers that can translate to that. I think there will be some…
176 00:22:51.980 ⇒ 00:23:04.370 Uttam Kumaran: like, this is the thing about, like, for the PM side, a lot of… like, we are making… there’s a lot of… it just depends on the client, like, if it is really technical, it’s gonna be very hard unless you’ve done that technical work on the ground.
177 00:23:04.370 ⇒ 00:23:12.519 Uttam Kumaran: to do that. But some of the work isn’t as technical, like, it’s marketing or business, and so there’s definitely opportunity to move from that way.
178 00:23:12.680 ⇒ 00:23:15.380 Uttam Kumaran: But I do think the strategist, yeah, yeah.
179 00:23:15.380 ⇒ 00:23:33.399 Justin Breshears: that’s why, like, when I was talking to you about, like, allocations and how we’re thinking about PMs, my first question was, like, well, what are you asking of the PMs? Because if you’re just asking for coordination and running, like, stand-ups and, like, scheduling meetings and doing weekly SaaS updates, whatever, like, you can stretch
180 00:23:33.640 ⇒ 00:23:37.699 Justin Breshears: each PM role, like, further across more projects.
181 00:23:38.030 ⇒ 00:23:45.070 Justin Breshears: But, you know, if you’re asking them to also have this, like, consulting lean, then you’re gonna have to, like, really, you know.
182 00:23:45.420 ⇒ 00:23:46.159 Justin Breshears: narrow the.
183 00:23:46.160 ⇒ 00:23:46.480 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.
184 00:23:46.480 ⇒ 00:23:48.020 Justin Breshears: lists of projects.
185 00:23:48.020 ⇒ 00:23:56.009 Uttam Kumaran: So that’s where I think we should not do, like, we have to carve it out as a separate thing, and make it a North Star, whereas a…
186 00:23:56.290 ⇒ 00:24:01.439 Uttam Kumaran: You can stay as a PM here, but ideally you want to move towards… the strategist is, like.
187 00:24:01.660 ⇒ 00:24:06.239 Uttam Kumaran: That’s where the coolest work you know, is, like, basically, I think we…
188 00:24:06.810 ⇒ 00:24:11.609 Uttam Kumaran: you know, Robert kind of mentioned it today, is like, I think we’re just better at running
189 00:24:11.710 ⇒ 00:24:27.559 Uttam Kumaran: existing teams, like, the normal way, and we’re… we’re just 30-40% better at that. Like, this is how I used to run… if you take, like, Eden, I used to run an Eden, the bigger team, in one company, right? Now we just do that for a bunch of companies, but we’re not innovating at all.
190 00:24:27.680 ⇒ 00:24:33.999 Uttam Kumaran: In, like, how does… how do we actually, like, execute faster with more communication with less people?
191 00:24:34.160 ⇒ 00:24:37.520 Uttam Kumaran: And, like, that’s our margin. And so…
192 00:24:37.760 ⇒ 00:24:43.479 Uttam Kumaran: For example, at any point, a client could be like, cool, we’re just gonna backfill you with internal people.
193 00:24:43.700 ⇒ 00:24:50.040 Uttam Kumaran: You know, and like, that’s where… It’s tough.
194 00:24:50.480 ⇒ 00:24:57.340 Justin Breshears: Yeah. So, I think about default, where it’s like, Kaylin is outsourcing what she said, her brain to us on this thing, but like…
195 00:24:57.340 ⇒ 00:24:58.040 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.
196 00:24:58.040 ⇒ 00:25:00.440 Justin Breshears: Eventually, she could just decide to do that work herself.
197 00:25:01.280 ⇒ 00:25:14.289 Uttam Kumaran: she could, but again, for them, speed, and she doesn’t know… like, she… I’ve just been in data for so long that I’ve… can do… I understand from the business context what they need to hear, and then I know enough to tell Mustafa.
198 00:25:14.430 ⇒ 00:25:20.239 Uttam Kumaran: how to… what to get. I mean, I’m, like, the glue, and then… but that’s the thing, it’s like…
199 00:25:21.900 ⇒ 00:25:27.060 Justin Breshears: I just need you without your CEO responsibilities. That’s what we need in this role.
200 00:25:27.770 ⇒ 00:25:33.600 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, and then it’s tough, you know, because it’s not that I haven’t tried to find those people
201 00:25:34.400 ⇒ 00:25:42.390 Uttam Kumaran: like, I have some of those people in my life, but they’re… They are expensive. You know?
202 00:25:42.390 ⇒ 00:25:43.210 Justin Breshears: they are.
203 00:25:43.390 ⇒ 00:25:44.200 Justin Breshears: Yep.
204 00:25:44.200 ⇒ 00:25:48.759 Uttam Kumaran: But again, like, I think about where I was a few years ago.
205 00:25:50.020 ⇒ 00:25:57.119 Uttam Kumaran: I didn’t get any variable comp upside type situation, you know? So, my hope is that
206 00:25:57.730 ⇒ 00:26:03.189 Uttam Kumaran: People see that. People like me, people like past me see that, and they come in, they call their shots.
207 00:26:03.310 ⇒ 00:26:05.180 Uttam Kumaran: And they win, you know?
208 00:26:07.560 ⇒ 00:26:12.439 Uttam Kumaran: And I think there are some people like me. Basically, I have to find someone like me that’s stuck somewhere.
209 00:26:14.610 ⇒ 00:26:33.289 Uttam Kumaran: It has the capability to play this game, like, within… play this type of game with a lot less people. And again, we… we get buy-in from day one. It’s not like you’re in a company. We don’t play any politics. We just have buy-in. Like, we’re getting paid, there’s no… it’s actually quite a bit easier than being internal in a company.
210 00:26:33.380 ⇒ 00:26:39.120 Uttam Kumaran: You don’t have to deal with any sort of, like, nonsense. It’s pure execution, you know? It’s a fun problem.
211 00:26:39.470 ⇒ 00:26:41.250 Uttam Kumaran: So…
212 00:26:43.820 ⇒ 00:26:52.809 Uttam Kumaran: I know we’re coming up on 4.30, I have to jump to this next thing. Can I have… can I at least show you how this operating thing, or… I don’t know if you have to jump as well.
213 00:26:52.810 ⇒ 00:27:02.769 Justin Breshears: Nope, I’m free, so it’s just up to you, but yeah, I know we started this a little bit late, but yeah, I do want to get, like, a handle on how we’re doing allocations currently.
214 00:27:02.770 ⇒ 00:27:12.659 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, so I think one thing that could be helpful is for maybe if you have time, you know, and I’ll be available on Slack, I just go into this marketing interview, but…
215 00:27:12.760 ⇒ 00:27:29.340 Uttam Kumaran: Basically, operating is where we’re sort of doing, like, allocations. We have our roles, we have the projects, and we’re looking at who’s allocated. So, I can send you over some materials, and they have… I think they have some helpful documentation.
216 00:27:29.350 ⇒ 00:27:33.080 Uttam Kumaran: But this is where we’re basically doing, like, okay, who is on ABC?
217 00:27:33.230 ⇒ 00:27:36.239 Uttam Kumaran: And for how long, so you can see that, like.
218 00:27:36.610 ⇒ 00:27:43.750 Uttam Kumaran: some of these aren’t updated, like, there’s some people here that no longer are here. So all you do is you basically go here, you say, Amber is…
219 00:27:43.930 ⇒ 00:27:45.850 Uttam Kumaran: 20% allocated.
220 00:27:46.330 ⇒ 00:27:59.899 Uttam Kumaran: between these days to this project. You click on somebody, you can actually look at their role on this client and who’s assigned, and then if you go to the person, you can actually click here and see
221 00:28:00.240 ⇒ 00:28:05.809 Uttam Kumaran: everything about how many hours they have, like, their capacity. You can also put in their rates here.
222 00:28:05.920 ⇒ 00:28:10.200 Uttam Kumaran: And then… Again, start to allocate them.
223 00:28:10.320 ⇒ 00:28:10.910 Uttam Kumaran: So…
224 00:28:10.910 ⇒ 00:28:11.570 Justin Breshears: Yeah.
225 00:28:11.570 ⇒ 00:28:24.800 Uttam Kumaran: I think it’s… it’s really… and one thing that I worked on is I worked on a little bit of a doc on our, like, allocation framework that I sent in Slack, which is thinking about the 25, 50, 100. Like, I feel pretty comfortable
226 00:28:25.430 ⇒ 00:28:28.959 Uttam Kumaran: You know, making on something like that, but this is sort of…
227 00:28:29.140 ⇒ 00:28:35.170 Uttam Kumaran: again, I think this is the best hub to do all of that work, and then we’ll get reporting out of this, you know?
228 00:28:35.680 ⇒ 00:28:38.380 Justin Breshears: For sure, it needs to be documented somewhere, so this looks like a good time.
229 00:28:38.530 ⇒ 00:28:55.129 Uttam Kumaran: this is the place. We also have, like, I know the CEO well, so we have their ear in… in Slack, so I’ll make sure that you’re in that channel, and you can ask them any questions about the tool. And then this is where, again, we want to report on the average allocation.
230 00:28:55.420 ⇒ 00:29:11.290 Uttam Kumaran: hours per team, everything allocation is going to come from these, and these guys have pretty great APIs that we’re already pulling out from. They’re also rolling out time tracking and invoicing directly in the tool.
231 00:29:11.410 ⇒ 00:29:17.230 Uttam Kumaran: So… The nice thing is if, like, we find that we want to start to migrate to them.
232 00:29:17.400 ⇒ 00:29:21.780 Uttam Kumaran: we can also consider, they’ll build us features. They’re really, really helpful, so…
233 00:29:21.780 ⇒ 00:29:27.670 Justin Breshears: It would be nice to have all that together, because then you could, like, marry up your actuals versus your plans.
234 00:29:27.670 ⇒ 00:29:28.110 Uttam Kumaran: Yes.
235 00:29:28.110 ⇒ 00:29:30.179 Justin Breshears: I’m doing all the tracking right here.
236 00:29:30.530 ⇒ 00:29:38.640 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, and everybody can come in and just put in, like, how many hours… like, and you can see here, like, here’s my plan, right, because I’m allocated for…
237 00:29:39.170 ⇒ 00:29:41.309 Uttam Kumaran: 4 hours a week on urban staff.
238 00:29:41.310 ⇒ 00:29:42.360 Justin Breshears: That would be nice.
239 00:29:42.360 ⇒ 00:29:43.640 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah. It really does.
240 00:29:45.800 ⇒ 00:29:47.810 Justin Breshears: Okay, I can play around in this tool.
241 00:29:48.300 ⇒ 00:29:49.100 Uttam Kumaran: Okay.
242 00:29:49.710 ⇒ 00:29:51.390 Justin Breshears: One, real quick.
243 00:29:51.690 ⇒ 00:29:57.709 Justin Breshears: One question on time, though, is, like, currently still part-time, do we have the, like.
244 00:29:57.710 ⇒ 00:29:58.470 Uttam Kumaran: Oh, yeah.
245 00:29:58.470 ⇒ 00:29:59.080 Justin Breshears: I can figure it out.
246 00:29:59.080 ⇒ 00:30:04.590 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, let me just send a note over to Rico to get it all drafted right now.
247 00:30:04.740 ⇒ 00:30:19.220 Uttam Kumaran: The terms you sent were fine, so I’ll get… I’ll send that right now. And then, for, for Zelle, can you send me your… like, if you use Zelle, your Zelle email address? Yeah.
248 00:30:19.220 ⇒ 00:30:19.690 Justin Breshears: Sure, yeah.
249 00:30:20.430 ⇒ 00:30:26.469 Justin Breshears: I’ll say my email is, my personal one, but also my phone number works. I don’t speak to you right now.
250 00:30:26.790 ⇒ 00:30:27.400 Uttam Kumaran: Okay.
251 00:30:27.820 ⇒ 00:30:36.750 Justin Breshears: I appreciate you being willing to work with me or not. It’s, like, not something that you want to have to admit to anybody, especially not an employer.
252 00:30:36.750 ⇒ 00:30:39.060 Uttam Kumaran: No, that’s… I don’t like it.
253 00:30:39.330 ⇒ 00:30:48.829 Uttam Kumaran: I will tell you if I can’t… I’ll tell you if I can’t do it, but these are the things where, like, look, life is weird for us, too, so I… we will…
254 00:30:49.130 ⇒ 00:30:52.439 Uttam Kumaran: we’ll figure out what we can do. I appreciate you asking.
255 00:30:52.820 ⇒ 00:30:57.810 Justin Breshears: Alright, thanks for working with Billy. So yeah, I’ll send you… You’re welcome.
256 00:30:59.120 ⇒ 00:31:01.800 Justin Breshears: Okay, so we’re hoping to keep the lights on.
257 00:31:03.340 ⇒ 00:31:09.750 Justin Breshears: Alright, I won’t keep you, but, yeah, let’s… I’ll try and poke around with this, and then we can…
258 00:31:10.070 ⇒ 00:31:11.620 Justin Breshears: Revisit it tomorrow.
259 00:31:11.940 ⇒ 00:31:13.170 Uttam Kumaran: Okay, okay, perfect.
260 00:31:13.370 ⇒ 00:31:15.159 Uttam Kumaran: Alright, thank you, dude.