Meeting Title: Uttam <> Pranav: Discuss SOW Date: 2026-02-10 Meeting participants: Pranav, Uttam Kumaran
WEBVTT
1 00:03:50.420 ⇒ 00:03:51.970 Uttam Kumaran: NBA clearance.
2 00:03:51.970 ⇒ 00:03:53.420 Pranav: Hey, I can hear you. How’s it going?
3 00:03:53.420 ⇒ 00:03:54.759 Uttam Kumaran: I have double.
4 00:03:55.890 ⇒ 00:03:57.639 Uttam Kumaran: Ugh, we need to hire.
5 00:03:59.340 ⇒ 00:04:01.690 Uttam Kumaran: We need more people badly.
6 00:04:01.690 ⇒ 00:04:06.199 Pranav: What were you just doing? Some, like, CSO stuff, EP stuff?
7 00:04:06.200 ⇒ 00:04:11.249 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, I mean, it’s just CSO stuff, like…
8 00:04:11.250 ⇒ 00:04:11.780 Pranav: Yeah.
9 00:04:12.120 ⇒ 00:04:29.600 Uttam Kumaran: The problem is, is, like, one of the things that we like to do is just be available for clients, right? So, like, the stuff I’ve mentioned to you, which is just, like, no client wants to talk, like, I’m free, it’s hard, like, when we’re… I’m involved in, like, 4 or 5, because a lot of my time is booked, right? And…
10 00:04:29.780 ⇒ 00:04:33.170 Uttam Kumaran: I’m trying to sort of balance that. It’s tough, though, like, so…
11 00:04:33.260 ⇒ 00:04:50.110 Uttam Kumaran: my job is, like, okay, selectively dropping and pushing things, but more essentially, like, we need more… we really need more CSOs, like, I can actually plan pretty effectively and do that for a bunch of people, I don’t mind that. CSO stuff is a bit harder.
12 00:04:50.420 ⇒ 00:04:55.269 Uttam Kumaran: And so… I think that’s, like, where we need a lot more help.
13 00:04:55.390 ⇒ 00:05:01.420 Uttam Kumaran: Because… Fundamentally, like, some of our work can’t be done without meeting the client.
14 00:05:01.550 ⇒ 00:05:03.169 Uttam Kumaran: And that’s where I’m getting jammed.
15 00:05:06.460 ⇒ 00:05:08.630 Uttam Kumaran: Well, yeah, figuring it out, you know.
16 00:05:09.200 ⇒ 00:05:11.259 Pranav: Yeah, makes sense, makes sense.
17 00:05:11.520 ⇒ 00:05:15.360 Pranav: Yeah, I mean, before we hop into this too, I think you mentioned…
18 00:05:15.630 ⇒ 00:05:23.200 Pranav: like… oh, actually, I guess it might be related to this, like, is this, like, a client that I might be splitting my time with, in the future?
19 00:05:23.200 ⇒ 00:05:27.440 Uttam Kumaran: Can you open that SOW? I don’t even remember what it was.
20 00:05:27.440 ⇒ 00:05:28.090 Pranav: Yeah.
21 00:05:28.090 ⇒ 00:05:30.529 Uttam Kumaran: But I got sent it,
22 00:05:31.100 ⇒ 00:05:33.359 Uttam Kumaran: Like, a day or two ago, so…
23 00:05:35.250 ⇒ 00:05:37.110 Pranav: Yeah, let me find it real quick.
24 00:05:44.750 ⇒ 00:05:46.540 Uttam Kumaran: It’s in the CSO channel.
25 00:05:46.730 ⇒ 00:05:48.209 Pranav: Oh, right, right, yep, I see it.
26 00:06:04.580 ⇒ 00:06:05.290 Pranav: Yup.
27 00:06:16.560 ⇒ 00:06:17.770 Pranav: You can see it, right?
28 00:06:17.770 ⇒ 00:06:18.500 Uttam Kumaran: Yes.
29 00:06:18.920 ⇒ 00:06:19.820 Pranav: Okay, cool.
30 00:06:25.820 ⇒ 00:06:29.040 Uttam Kumaran: Or, like, one of our friends, who actually…
31 00:06:35.600 ⇒ 00:06:36.740 Pranav: Oh, you just cut out.
32 00:06:40.370 ⇒ 00:06:41.549 Uttam Kumaran: Can you hear me now?
33 00:06:41.980 ⇒ 00:06:43.250 Pranav: I can hear you now, yeah, just…
34 00:06:43.250 ⇒ 00:06:47.999 Uttam Kumaran: Sorry, I’m just at… yeah, I’m just at the library, I’m just getting out of this place.
35 00:06:48.240 ⇒ 00:06:49.240 Pranav: Oh, gotcha.
36 00:06:50.680 ⇒ 00:06:55.790 Uttam Kumaran: One of our friends… The proper group, like, you know the proper hotel?
37 00:06:56.210 ⇒ 00:06:57.050 Pranav: Yeah, yeah.
38 00:07:04.850 ⇒ 00:07:06.539 Pranav: I think it cut out again.
39 00:07:10.350 ⇒ 00:07:11.490 Uttam Kumaran: Am I back?
40 00:07:11.810 ⇒ 00:07:12.989 Pranav: Yeah, you’re back, you’re back.
41 00:07:13.270 ⇒ 00:07:20.409 Uttam Kumaran: Okay, sorry, this Wi-Fi keeps coming in and out. I’m just leaving the parking garage, so if it’s annoying for a sec, then…
42 00:07:20.740 ⇒ 00:07:22.939 Uttam Kumaran: Might just get out of here. But.
43 00:07:23.350 ⇒ 00:07:24.130 Pranav: Gotcha, gotcha.
44 00:07:24.290 ⇒ 00:07:32.179 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, so… so he… he is trying to see whether he can bring us on, for a few tasks.
45 00:07:32.300 ⇒ 00:07:44.879 Uttam Kumaran: One of which is this SOW that we’re sending him. So, there’s two parts to this. I think one of it is data, one of it is sort of like an AI lead researcher task.
46 00:07:45.020 ⇒ 00:07:57.349 Uttam Kumaran: But, like, this is sort of… our SOWs are actually gonna get more and more undefined as we go, meaning, like, a true SOW actually shouldn’t have a ton of…
47 00:07:59.040 ⇒ 00:08:00.190 Uttam Kumaran: It would work.
48 00:08:02.280 ⇒ 00:08:04.260 Pranav: A ton of what work? Sorry, cut out again.
49 00:08:24.620 ⇒ 00:08:25.490 Pranav: Hello?
50 00:08:39.150 ⇒ 00:08:40.340 Uttam Kumaran: Can you hear me? Did I cut out?
51 00:08:40.870 ⇒ 00:08:42.630 Pranav: You’re bad, yeah, you’re back now, yeah.
52 00:08:42.630 ⇒ 00:08:46.640 Uttam Kumaran: Okay, okay. So I just wanted to share, like, that’s what’s potentially, like, coming down the…
53 00:08:46.890 ⇒ 00:08:49.230 Uttam Kumaran: the pipe on the… on the client side.
54 00:08:51.060 ⇒ 00:08:53.120 Pranav: Oh, you cut out for a while, actually.
55 00:08:53.120 ⇒ 00:08:55.959 Uttam Kumaran: Oh, really? Okay, okay. Tell me where I cut out.
56 00:08:56.230 ⇒ 00:09:04.290 Pranav: You were saying that, there’s, like, two different types of work that they’re looking for. One, like.
57 00:09:04.630 ⇒ 00:09:13.439 Pranav: AI researcher type role. And then, actually, no, you were saying, the SOWs are gonna start becoming more undefined, and then it cut out.
58 00:09:14.270 ⇒ 00:09:26.270 Uttam Kumaran: Yes. Yes, okay, so I’m just leaving the garage, so signal should be fine, but, yeah, like, the SOWs are gonna become more like, hey, you told us about a cube.
59 00:09:28.460 ⇒ 00:09:31.010 Uttam Kumaran: We agree on, like, a budget, you know?
60 00:09:32.820 ⇒ 00:09:35.809 Pranav: It just cut out again. Wait, so that just, like, last sentence.
61 00:09:36.100 ⇒ 00:09:52.860 Uttam Kumaran: Like, the SOW is gonna become more like, hey, here’s… here are the projects that you told us about. Gotcha. Like, these are, like, the two kind of themes. Are we good to just, like, start putting, like, a budget toward these, and so we can start executing? And so…
62 00:09:52.950 ⇒ 00:10:01.920 Uttam Kumaran: The top one is something that I think is, like, sort of squarely in, like, the AI world, which is, like, a lead researcher. So, really, my main goal here is just to make sure that you’re…
63 00:10:02.250 ⇒ 00:10:08.419 Uttam Kumaran: you’re informed that, like, this is gonna come down the pipe. And then, also talk a little bit to you about, like.
64 00:10:08.660 ⇒ 00:10:19.360 Uttam Kumaran: Robert came to me and was like, hey, can you have a look over of this and give me some suggestions? I actually think that over time, like, he can… sales can go directly to you for some of that.
65 00:10:19.480 ⇒ 00:10:21.049 Uttam Kumaran: It’d be like, hey.
66 00:10:21.260 ⇒ 00:10:27.419 Uttam Kumaran: here’s, like, here’s what I heard from the client, like, is there anything else you should add, or anything we should consider, you know?
67 00:10:27.780 ⇒ 00:10:28.420 Pranav: Yeah.
68 00:10:28.630 ⇒ 00:10:32.160 Pranav: Okay, that’s cool. Yeah, I would love that, yeah, to be involved in that.
69 00:10:32.360 ⇒ 00:10:37.319 Pranav: So yeah, let me just read the worksho number 1 real quick.
70 00:10:41.600 ⇒ 00:10:42.460 Pranav: Okay.
71 00:10:42.920 ⇒ 00:10:46.680 Pranav: Seems pretty straightforward. Yeah, so, and you’re saying, like.
72 00:10:47.620 ⇒ 00:10:53.049 Pranav: kind of, like, stepping back a second, too, like, when you’re talking about SOWs and them being kind of just, like.
73 00:10:53.390 ⇒ 00:11:04.999 Pranav: you know, just, like, a short summary of, like, what they’re looking for, but then we kind of fill in, like, exactly what, like, the product looks like. A true SOW is what? It’s, like, more so, like.
74 00:11:05.300 ⇒ 00:11:11.750 Pranav: Predefined, like, features, and it’s, like, less wiggle room from, like, whoever’s going to implement it?
75 00:11:13.660 ⇒ 00:11:16.009 Uttam Kumaran: Exactly. Okay.
76 00:11:16.270 ⇒ 00:11:23.899 Uttam Kumaran: So this is where, like, your role, I think, at Brainforge will kind of… you can think about it, like, it’ll get kind of closer and closer to just, like.
77 00:11:24.160 ⇒ 00:11:36.340 Uttam Kumaran: you’re gonna be running the clients, still doing some high-level work and technical work, but, like, I’m gonna start to try to fill more people under you, under your service, right? Yeah. And so…
78 00:11:36.460 ⇒ 00:11:44.060 Pranav: partially, like, this is actually where Sam was filling in, and then before that, this is where, like, I used to fill in. You know, and so…
79 00:11:44.060 ⇒ 00:11:55.530 Uttam Kumaran: part of this is, like, cool, anytime there’s an AI SOW, I want to make sure you’re looped in, at minimum, so that you know that it’s coming. But ultimately, I want you to start to be able to help the salespeople
80 00:11:55.580 ⇒ 00:12:09.930 Uttam Kumaran: frame these, like, come to those meetings, and so this is an example of one where I got tagged. And so, if you… one thing to look… kind of look at is, like, I went through, like, what the proposal covered, and Robert was like, hey, go leave some comments.
81 00:12:10.010 ⇒ 00:12:25.350 Uttam Kumaran: roughly, like, when I… when I think about this, I’m like, cool, this seems like lead researcher, when it comes to AI, something that a lot of people always talk about, right? Like, hey, prepare me for my sales meeting, like, take the email of the person I’m gonna meet with, look them up, produce, like, a…
82 00:12:26.180 ⇒ 00:12:28.290 Uttam Kumaran: Like, basically a document, like…
83 00:12:28.290 ⇒ 00:12:30.920 Pranav: Hey, this is who this person is, here’s what we can sell them.
84 00:12:31.090 ⇒ 00:12:39.950 Uttam Kumaran: there’s… I feel like thinking about that seems pretty straightforward, something that we can build, and you can see that that’s basically what he scoped. The nice thing about this is that
85 00:12:39.990 ⇒ 00:12:56.229 Uttam Kumaran: they have data in Salesforce, their calendars are probably hooked up there, they also have probably a clear guideline on what the report should look like, and the only feedback I gave, if you scroll down, you’ll see there’s a little piece that’s, like, I put my name and I put feedback, is,
86 00:12:56.940 ⇒ 00:13:05.060 Uttam Kumaran: just, like, a couple things on, like, how we could do it, right? So I’m like, one, there’s a thing they wanted to do, which is basically, like, hey, can you CC an agent?
87 00:13:05.570 ⇒ 00:13:08.310 Uttam Kumaran: To an email thread, and then it responds with…
88 00:13:08.820 ⇒ 00:13:23.920 Uttam Kumaran: the… some… like, the research report, right? So, one thing that I was reading about this month was this… this, like, company called Agent Mail. It’s basically, like, an email API for agents. I was like, we could probably use this.
89 00:13:24.340 ⇒ 00:13:37.429 Uttam Kumaran: You know, because they’re solving a lot of these, like… because otherwise, we would have to set up an agent that talks to Google, and then trigger something, and, like, handle deliverability, like, whatever these guys seem to have done. The second thing is, like.
90 00:13:37.590 ⇒ 00:13:47.039 Uttam Kumaran: Okay, any search use cases, we could just use Exalabs. It’s just, like, a really great, like, web search API. So, and then the last piece is, like.
91 00:13:47.200 ⇒ 00:13:48.990 Uttam Kumaran: Depending on, like.
92 00:13:49.310 ⇒ 00:13:56.469 Uttam Kumaran: the types of customers, if they don’t have all the enrichment data, we can use Clearbit or Apollo or something to get that data.
93 00:13:56.610 ⇒ 00:14:09.519 Uttam Kumaran: So that’s really, like, all the things that I mentioned. However, the other things that I’m looking for, right? One, I’m looking for, like, what is the timeline that sales pitched? So you can see that here they pitched basically a 2-4 week pilot. Okay, that seems pretty reasonable, like.
94 00:14:09.860 ⇒ 00:14:11.570 Pranav: Yeah. CC an email.
95 00:14:11.930 ⇒ 00:14:25.319 Uttam Kumaran: get… we do some lookup in Salesforce, we pull some data from search, and then we hand them, like, a report. Two to four weeks, seems reasonable. Like, so that’s… that’s kind of it. That’s all I’m kind of doing at this… at this stage, too, you know?
96 00:14:26.760 ⇒ 00:14:39.429 Pranav: Gotcha, so you kind of… those are two things. Add some notes about, like, what the implementation would look like, and then also just, like, look at what sales pitched, and just, like, double-check that, like, it’s, like, it makes sense.
97 00:14:39.690 ⇒ 00:14:56.659 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, and this is where, like, I’m not doing, like, I’m not going so far on the technical implementation side. More of what I’m looking at, I’m like, what are some other things that sales can use to show our depth? Like, hey, we could try out this new endpoint, or we just did this for this customer, here are the details.
98 00:14:56.740 ⇒ 00:15:01.590 Uttam Kumaran: That way, when Robert is going back to the customer, he has, like.
99 00:15:02.100 ⇒ 00:15:15.360 Uttam Kumaran: he has as much ammo as we can give him, you know, which is like, here’s some more clarity on how we would do the email piece. He can send that to Pius, well, look at that. Pius is the customer, he’ll be like, okay, cool, these guys clearly, like.
100 00:15:15.590 ⇒ 00:15:18.719 Uttam Kumaran: They have a path to doing this, they’re not just, like, making this up.
101 00:15:18.880 ⇒ 00:15:38.230 Uttam Kumaran: Those are the kinds of things that I’m basically doing. And then I’m also like, look, if Robert comes in and he’s like, yeah, we can deliver this in one week, I’m gonna be like, no way. And it’s usually not… usually it’s not that far, it’s usually, like, some… Robert will be like, oh, this will take one to two months, and I’m like, look, I don’t know how long this is gonna take until we get to X point. And, like, those are the discussions that we’re having.
102 00:15:38.860 ⇒ 00:15:47.020 Pranav: Gotcha. So it’s, like, basically just, like, my… I can use my technical expertise and my, just, like, understanding of…
103 00:15:47.120 ⇒ 00:15:52.400 Pranav: like, the landscape of tools out there to just, like, help with the sales process. Exactly.
104 00:15:52.400 ⇒ 00:15:53.780 Uttam Kumaran: Exactly, yes.
105 00:15:53.780 ⇒ 00:15:54.320 Pranav: Perfect.
106 00:15:54.910 ⇒ 00:16:07.139 Uttam Kumaran: So that’s, like, sort of what goes into these, like, SOW reviews. The natural next step, though, and this is what I… this is what I can propose to, Robert, is that, like, if you want to go with him.
107 00:16:07.140 ⇒ 00:16:16.859 Uttam Kumaran: to that sales call, like, it’s up to him if he needs you. Right. But potentially, like, if you want to go with him, like, and he needs… and he needs the assistance, like, that could…
108 00:16:17.220 ⇒ 00:16:19.860 Uttam Kumaran: That could be great, but otherwise, like…
109 00:16:20.740 ⇒ 00:16:25.269 Uttam Kumaran: It’s gonna sort of depend on what he wants to do. He may already have this sort of locked up.
110 00:16:25.770 ⇒ 00:16:40.689 Pranav: Right. I think, yeah, just going forward, I’ll probably just, like, write a bunch of notes, and then just be, like, you know, happy to, like, go into further depth on this, or, you know, I can just… there’s gonna be probably, like, some things that I won’t even expect them to ask, and I can’t write
111 00:16:40.690 ⇒ 00:16:46.419 Pranav: all those notes down, like, I can… I can pop into the meeting, too, if that makes you feel more comfortable. So…
112 00:16:46.640 ⇒ 00:16:47.700 Uttam Kumaran: Exactly.
113 00:16:48.210 ⇒ 00:16:52.790 Pranav: Okay, cool. Specifically for… yeah.
114 00:16:52.790 ⇒ 00:16:53.770 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, go ahead, go ahead.
115 00:16:53.980 ⇒ 00:16:58.590 Pranav: I was just gonna say, like, yeah, specifically for this SOW,
116 00:16:58.980 ⇒ 00:17:02.150 Pranav: Yeah, so you said you did, like, some stuff here. Is this kind of just, like.
117 00:17:02.430 ⇒ 00:17:06.849 Pranav: you’re just kind of, like, showing me, like, what I could do in the future, or is there still more stuff to do?
118 00:17:06.859 ⇒ 00:17:09.769 Uttam Kumaran: Well, one… well, one, no, no, I think this is kind of it, but…
119 00:17:09.770 ⇒ 00:17:10.460 Pranav: Yeah.
120 00:17:10.460 ⇒ 00:17:19.110 Uttam Kumaran: I do want you to just check this out, and if there’s anything that, like, you’re like, hey, that doesn’t make any sense, we still have time, like, we can change this.
121 00:17:19.109 ⇒ 00:17:20.960 Pranav: But part of, part of this was, like.
122 00:17:21.040 ⇒ 00:17:25.259 Uttam Kumaran: We’re gonna try to sell this, and if this goes through, this will be…
123 00:17:25.890 ⇒ 00:17:30.539 Uttam Kumaran: probably the next project. We have, like, 2 or 3 others that are in our SOW form.
124 00:17:30.700 ⇒ 00:17:34.379 Uttam Kumaran: So as these kind of get to this point, I’ll just…
125 00:17:34.550 ⇒ 00:17:46.109 Uttam Kumaran: send them to you. Ideally, you get involved earlier if it’s needed. I mean, a lot of these… we have so much in the platform that, like, sales can actually develop these without much guidance, which is great.
126 00:17:46.110 ⇒ 00:17:46.740 Pranav: Bye-bye.
127 00:17:46.740 ⇒ 00:17:53.699 Uttam Kumaran: But, like, I want our brain to help them get it over the line, you know, which is, like.
128 00:17:53.830 ⇒ 00:18:04.540 Uttam Kumaran: hey, here’s, like, 5 different ways we could do the email thing that, like, they would have never thought of, or like, oh, we actually did this for a client. For example, there’s gonna be clients that are gonna ask us for, like, similar things we built for Leela.
129 00:18:04.590 ⇒ 00:18:18.880 Uttam Kumaran: So there’s kind of two pieces there. One, I’m like, okay, anytime we see something like that, we should reference what we just did. Second, like, one thing I’m telling… I’m gonna tell Luke and the marketing team is, like, hey, you guys need to call Pranav and, like, basically…
130 00:18:19.080 ⇒ 00:18:33.130 Uttam Kumaran: have him note down all the different core features and start to build case study off of those, right? And, like, they have a process to do that. For example, like, I want them to start to market, like, hey, we were able to build sort of a,
131 00:18:33.130 ⇒ 00:18:41.799 Uttam Kumaran: a data analyst, like… like, Luke called me this morning, he was like, hey, I’m thinking about marketing, going after some marketing agencies, and I was like, dude, you should pitch them on what we did for Lilo.
132 00:18:41.870 ⇒ 00:18:42.840 Uttam Kumaran: And so…
133 00:18:43.160 ⇒ 00:18:56.250 Uttam Kumaran: that gap is where I’m like, hey, you should go talk to the client, talk to the CSO on that project, he’ll tell you what we did, and then we have a pretty streamlined approach to, like, writing case studies, so he’ll just interview you for, like, 5 minutes, then sort of write the case study.
134 00:18:56.750 ⇒ 00:18:57.320 Pranav: Yeah.
135 00:18:57.320 ⇒ 00:18:58.230 Uttam Kumaran: That’s, like…
136 00:18:58.530 ⇒ 00:19:11.480 Uttam Kumaran: again, I’m trying to get you… get the CSOs who are open to it a little bit closer to the sales and marketing team, because then you also get a purview on, like, what’s coming down the pike. And if you… if you see something on your team where you’re like, yo, there’s a great…
137 00:19:11.600 ⇒ 00:19:14.829 Uttam Kumaran: This is something that we could just copy-paste for a lot of people.
138 00:19:14.960 ⇒ 00:19:20.550 Uttam Kumaran: Like, why aren’t we marketing this more? And I’m like, there’s probably no reason apart from we should, you know?
139 00:19:20.840 ⇒ 00:19:24.800 Pranav: Yeah, it’ll probably give the sales team, like, better…
140 00:19:25.080 ⇒ 00:19:29.689 Pranav: I don’t know, it’s probably, like, a bacon… Prioritize certain clients.
141 00:19:29.690 ⇒ 00:19:30.290 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.
142 00:19:30.290 ⇒ 00:19:35.399 Pranav: stuff of, yeah, our experience, because, you know, it might be an easier… easier win for us.
143 00:19:35.450 ⇒ 00:19:36.300 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.
144 00:19:36.670 ⇒ 00:19:37.390 Uttam Kumaran: Totally.
145 00:19:38.040 ⇒ 00:19:39.549 Pranav: Okay, that’s… that sounds great.
146 00:19:42.230 ⇒ 00:19:49.089 Uttam Kumaran: Cool. I feel like I sent you another note, I don’t know if we… or we could talk about, like, Lilo stuff.
147 00:19:50.240 ⇒ 00:19:53.580 Pranav: Yeah, happy to talk about Lilo stuff, too. Like, you sent over…
148 00:19:53.800 ⇒ 00:20:01.009 Pranav: The main note that I remember you sending over was just, that 15-minute call that I already set up with, Zach and Bobby to kind of…
149 00:20:01.210 ⇒ 00:20:04.500 Pranav: Yeah, go over next 30 days, and then,
150 00:20:04.800 ⇒ 00:20:09.280 Pranav: They mentioned, like, the… like, regrouping based on, like, the updated fee.
151 00:20:10.620 ⇒ 00:20:20.559 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, so kind of, like, for that call, like, and again, for me, it’s just great, because, like, I’m sort of trying to loop in as many CSOs to these things as possible, so…
152 00:20:20.560 ⇒ 00:20:23.210 Pranav: That way you guys kind of see how we’re, like, negotiating.
153 00:20:23.210 ⇒ 00:20:34.110 Uttam Kumaran: I mean, part of this is, like, my first question, it could be, like, is… I wanna… I asked… this is why… the way I sort of teed this up is kind of all about our conversation from yesterday, which is, like, we’re on the front foot here, so…
154 00:20:34.170 ⇒ 00:20:53.090 Uttam Kumaran: I sort of, like, almost, like, tried to alley-oop it off the backboard, and I was like, hey, are you guys happy with the speed at which we’re going? And they were like, yeah, and I’m like, awesome, I would love to sort of take a moment to chat about, like, next steps, what do you think? And they were like, for sure, like, let’s do that. So, I mean, of course, like.
155 00:20:53.170 ⇒ 00:21:10.560 Uttam Kumaran: if they could pay… if they could pay us $0 to do the work that we’re doing, I think they’d be happy. Nothing in life… nothing in life is free. So my first thing is to think… is to find out, like, okay, are they happy? Or, like, do they… do they want… are they okay with this budget, or do they want to lower it?
156 00:21:10.970 ⇒ 00:21:28.180 Uttam Kumaran: So, from that message they sent me, I’m not sure. Like, I feel like he’s gonna be like, well, what are we getting? And so, the first part that I want to come prepared with is, like, just to give a sense of, like, how many hours we’re putting into Lilo. So, my one ask for you is, like, if you can…
157 00:21:28.280 ⇒ 00:21:40.639 Uttam Kumaran: pull that from Clockify, or work with the operations team to pull that. Yeah. That would be a great thing that we should have on hand going to that meeting, to sort of demonstrate how many hours are going into this work.
158 00:21:40.680 ⇒ 00:21:41.830 Pranav: Yup.
159 00:21:42.000 ⇒ 00:21:51.850 Uttam Kumaran: The second piece is for us to… I want to come to the table with some suggestions on, like, what we can build next, and sort of put the roadmap in front of them.
160 00:21:52.070 ⇒ 00:22:08.480 Uttam Kumaran: the thing, if we were to say, like, hey, do you like this or not? Do you want us to keep going? They may be like, well, I guess, like, yeah, we could probably, like, slow down a bit, but if you show people, like, hey, there’s actually, like, these 10 features that we’re trying to get out, and we think that we can get them out pretty quickly.
161 00:22:09.040 ⇒ 00:22:19.190 Uttam Kumaran: should we get them out? Like, their answer may change, you know? And so that’s where, like, I kind of want us to get to a little bit here, is like, can we just put a short list together of, like.
162 00:22:19.650 ⇒ 00:22:31.209 Uttam Kumaran: what the next 90 days of features could look like. And so that’s sort of my question, is, like, I wonder, what do you… what do you think? Like, we have some features that are currently…
163 00:22:32.620 ⇒ 00:22:38.390 Uttam Kumaran: Planned out, but maybe me and you could brainstorm briefly, like, what else we think we could build for them.
164 00:22:38.950 ⇒ 00:22:40.629 Uttam Kumaran: Or what else they’ve already mentioned.
165 00:22:41.500 ⇒ 00:22:43.560 Pranav: Yeah,
166 00:22:44.550 ⇒ 00:22:51.320 Pranav: So there’s certain ad hoc things that keep on getting added, that I know that they’re interested in,
167 00:22:51.600 ⇒ 00:22:57.190 Pranav: I think they have, like, probably a lot of ideas for different dashboards, so…
168 00:22:57.330 ⇒ 00:23:04.490 Pranav: just leveraging the data that we have in the data warehouse, and just, like, being able to spin up more and more dashboards.
169 00:23:04.780 ⇒ 00:23:13.050 Pranav: I think… That is probably gonna be interesting to them. Now… How do we…
170 00:23:13.730 ⇒ 00:23:15.279 Pranav: Now, that’s kind of just, like…
171 00:23:16.080 ⇒ 00:23:30.909 Pranav: it would be kind of like, what type of dashboards would they want? So we’d just go in and be like, what kind of dashboards are you interested in? And then… so I don’t know if I like that question as much as, like, coming in with, like, oh, we can build you this because it’ll provide you X, Y, and Z.
172 00:23:31.220 ⇒ 00:23:31.570 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.
173 00:23:31.570 ⇒ 00:23:35.399 Pranav: might be interested, too. So yeah, I need to think a little bit.
174 00:23:35.540 ⇒ 00:23:37.010 Pranav: One thing that… Yeah, I mean, like…
175 00:23:37.010 ⇒ 00:23:38.539 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, I would say…
176 00:23:38.670 ⇒ 00:23:51.370 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, the brain… the brain that’s probably more valuable here is, like, the dream state of things, right? Like, I think those we’re going to do, and we should note down, but it’s sort of like, okay, if we were, like, literally gonna put ourselves in their shoes.
177 00:23:51.370 ⇒ 00:23:51.930 Pranav: Yeah.
178 00:23:51.930 ⇒ 00:23:55.309 Uttam Kumaran: what would we build? What would we ask Brainforge to build for us, you know?
179 00:23:55.610 ⇒ 00:24:04.969 Pranav: Yeah, and I think what I… I feel like I have a little bit of a read on… they really want adoption within their agency on this tool.
180 00:24:05.230 ⇒ 00:24:09.099 Pranav: And so… We haven’t really thought about…
181 00:24:09.350 ⇒ 00:24:12.239 Pranav: Really thinking of, like, product design for.
182 00:24:12.240 ⇒ 00:24:12.980 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.
183 00:24:12.980 ⇒ 00:24:28.179 Pranav: for Stitch, for the Stitch platform. I actually would say, like, you know, we have a lot of cool features, but we haven’t really methodically thought about what the product should look like. So, one thing that I think we’re under-leveraging is Slack, the integration with Slack. So…
184 00:24:28.530 ⇒ 00:24:30.440 Pranav: I think everybody, you know.
185 00:24:30.550 ⇒ 00:24:36.830 Pranav: they… they live with Slack, you know? It’s like, whether they like it or not, like, they are on it all the time. If we can…
186 00:24:37.240 ⇒ 00:24:40.620 Pranav: be a little bit more integrated with Slack, and
187 00:24:41.040 ⇒ 00:24:50.210 Pranav: like, a quick win could be just, like, that chat functionality could happen directly within Slack, instead of having to go into that chat interface.
188 00:24:50.610 ⇒ 00:24:51.200 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.
189 00:24:51.630 ⇒ 00:24:58.410 Pranav: That’s… that’s one win, I can see. Let’s see…
190 00:25:03.500 ⇒ 00:25:04.130 Pranav: Yeah.
191 00:25:04.130 ⇒ 00:25:08.919 Uttam Kumaran: I think more deeper integration with Slack, I think also potentially, like.
192 00:25:09.740 ⇒ 00:25:15.719 Uttam Kumaran: More leaderboards on, like, who’s using it, and like… More analytics on that.
193 00:25:17.620 ⇒ 00:25:22.250 Pranav: analytics on using the platform itself, yeah. Yeah. Makes sense. Yeah.
194 00:25:24.970 ⇒ 00:25:25.820 Pranav: Yeah.
195 00:25:26.260 ⇒ 00:25:31.019 Pranav: I sometimes think about features like that as, like.
196 00:25:31.440 ⇒ 00:25:33.659 Pranav: It’s not… it’s almost just like…
197 00:25:34.400 ⇒ 00:25:43.840 Pranav: I feel like you kind of want to bake that in, and I don’t know, I would probably defer to you on this, like, but just, like, bake that into something that’s, like, a more…
198 00:25:44.530 ⇒ 00:25:48.320 Pranav: like, sexy feature, I guess? Like, something that…
199 00:25:49.560 ⇒ 00:25:59.619 Pranav: Like, something like reporting, something like a dashboard, because, like, that is going to, like, provide them insights onto their, like, their core business, and not just onto, like…
200 00:25:59.800 ⇒ 00:26:01.449 Pranav: The thing that we’re building for them.
201 00:26:01.870 ⇒ 00:26:05.419 Pranav: Does that make sense, or am I kind of thinking about that wrong, would you say?
202 00:26:06.000 ⇒ 00:26:08.099 Uttam Kumaran: No, that makes sense. Okay.
203 00:26:09.480 ⇒ 00:26:19.930 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, I mean, I think, like, that may not be, like… Yeah, like, I think another piece… I mean, you could also start to talk to them about some of the things we’re building internally, like…
204 00:26:19.930 ⇒ 00:26:20.300 Pranav: Yeah.
205 00:26:20.300 ⇒ 00:26:27.269 Uttam Kumaran: for example, we’re starting to, like, another good way to expand scope here is to be, like.
206 00:26:28.260 ⇒ 00:26:32.809 Uttam Kumaran: Apart from, like, the stuff that you’re… what is, like, what are other things internally
207 00:26:32.950 ⇒ 00:26:39.769 Uttam Kumaran: That you’re about to hire for, or that you’re currently, like… The teams as underwater.
208 00:26:40.090 ⇒ 00:26:44.960 Uttam Kumaran: that you want us to attack. So, it’s almost, like, beyond platform, right? Like.
209 00:26:44.960 ⇒ 00:26:45.480 Pranav: Yeah.
210 00:26:45.480 ⇒ 00:26:58.669 Uttam Kumaran: think of a workstream that has nothing to do with the platform. So that’s another way to think about this, is like, what else is bothering you where AI could be helpful? Because then they’re gonna start thinking about us as not only the platform people, but then, like.
211 00:26:59.020 ⇒ 00:27:02.389 Uttam Kumaran: Oh, these guys can actually help reduce our operating expenses, you know?
212 00:27:02.880 ⇒ 00:27:03.630 Pranav: Yeah.
213 00:27:03.850 ⇒ 00:27:04.620 Pranav: Yup.
214 00:27:06.870 ⇒ 00:27:08.749 Pranav: I, yeah, I really like that. It’s just, like.
215 00:27:08.910 ⇒ 00:27:18.939 Pranav: Their place that they do all business, not just, for… Specifically, like, their… their service, I guess.
216 00:27:18.940 ⇒ 00:27:19.670 Uttam Kumaran: Yes.
217 00:27:19.840 ⇒ 00:27:20.510 Pranav: Yeah.
218 00:27:23.530 ⇒ 00:27:27.749 Pranav: Yeah, that sounds… that sounds interesting. I’ll, because then, yeah, we can definitely…
219 00:27:27.750 ⇒ 00:27:32.589 Uttam Kumaran: Because part of this is, like, right now, it’s sort of like, they’re spending money on us, they’re getting this platform.
220 00:27:32.740 ⇒ 00:27:39.949 Uttam Kumaran: But, for example, let’s say they’re about to hire somebody, and we’re like, hey, why don’t we build a set of tools that allows that team
221 00:27:40.320 ⇒ 00:27:45.160 Uttam Kumaran: to actually just, like, prevent this hire, then it pays for itself, right? So…
222 00:27:45.270 ⇒ 00:27:53.210 Uttam Kumaran: You sort of try to find these, like, good win-win situations where it’s really clear that they can see the money going to us and the money that they’re saving.
223 00:27:53.830 ⇒ 00:27:56.700 Uttam Kumaran: So that’s another way to kind of frame it up, is like.
224 00:27:57.130 ⇒ 00:28:07.839 Uttam Kumaran: where are some ways that you’re gonna invest, but you don’t want to, because it sort of just, like, doesn’t directly go to affect your clients, right? Some of this we’re doing, which is a speed and, like.
225 00:28:08.200 ⇒ 00:28:20.259 Uttam Kumaran: Some of this new technology stuff, but also, again, they may be like, yo, we’re about to hire, like, another operations person, and we’re like, okay, why don’t we go talk to that team, write down all the things that they’re doing, and see if we can pick off 50% of it.
226 00:28:20.850 ⇒ 00:28:22.130 Pranav: Yeah.
227 00:28:22.130 ⇒ 00:28:22.819 Uttam Kumaran: You know?
228 00:28:22.950 ⇒ 00:28:29.409 Uttam Kumaran: And what would that be worth? And we could easily measure, like, you’re gonna spend another $70,000 on an operations person.
229 00:28:29.750 ⇒ 00:28:32.790 Uttam Kumaran: Well, let’s say if… let’s see if we can just, like.
230 00:28:32.990 ⇒ 00:28:35.739 Uttam Kumaran: Basically, do what they’re gonna do.
231 00:28:36.320 ⇒ 00:28:38.730 Uttam Kumaran: You know, in, like, two sprints worth of work.
232 00:28:39.320 ⇒ 00:28:40.040 Pranav: Right.
233 00:28:43.240 ⇒ 00:28:44.030 Pranav: Yeah.
234 00:28:44.260 ⇒ 00:28:47.930 Pranav: And there’s also… A few, or at least
235 00:28:48.490 ⇒ 00:28:55.649 Pranav: two other agencies… actually, I’ll say maybe there’s at least one other agency that they’re working with that…
236 00:28:56.830 ⇒ 00:29:00.840 Pranav: Is making them, like, Google Sheets, like, dashboards?
237 00:29:02.970 ⇒ 00:29:10.080 Pranav: And so I can, like, look into that a little bit more, like, Bobby has sent, like, a few of their materials, and I can just be like, okay, what are they doing?
238 00:29:10.380 ⇒ 00:29:13.090 Pranav: This… there’s probably something better to, like…
239 00:29:13.360 ⇒ 00:29:19.739 Pranav: to Google Sheets, or just, like, integrated within Stitch Platform, so it’s not, like, you’re going to two different places for insights.
240 00:29:20.360 ⇒ 00:29:23.280 Pranav: Yeah, okay.
241 00:29:23.610 ⇒ 00:29:34.000 Pranav: And they’re also pulling in the data of that agency from somewhere, I don’t know how, if they’ve set up their own data warehouse, or they’re using, like, API calls, or maybe they’re just…
242 00:29:34.250 ⇒ 00:29:39.469 Pranav: paying for it in a different way? Not sure, so, like… I can get to know…
243 00:29:39.820 ⇒ 00:29:49.649 Pranav: where’s their double work being done across these agencies? You know, if you’re using… if you’re using us, you’re also using, like, another place for pulling in similar data.
244 00:29:49.790 ⇒ 00:29:51.890 Pranav: You’re kind of wasting money.
245 00:29:53.320 ⇒ 00:29:54.550 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah. So…
246 00:29:54.550 ⇒ 00:29:55.430 Pranav: Yeah.
247 00:29:56.700 ⇒ 00:30:07.399 Uttam Kumaran: So that’s the thing, is like, I think I don’t… I want the conversation to partly go… like, their goal tomorrow is for the conversation to go beyond Stitch.
248 00:30:08.260 ⇒ 00:30:12.659 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah. Right? Because then you sort of expand, they’re like, well, look, we didn’t budget for, like.
249 00:30:12.830 ⇒ 00:30:16.749 Uttam Kumaran: hundreds of… we didn’t budget, like, 100K just for a stitch, so, like, at some point.
250 00:30:16.930 ⇒ 00:30:27.619 Uttam Kumaran: We… I can tell that they want to start developing and pushing things. Maybe we go in maintenance mode and just help them do that. Okay, but, like, where else in your business can we be helpful, basically?
251 00:30:28.160 ⇒ 00:30:28.850 Pranav: Yeah.
252 00:30:28.850 ⇒ 00:30:29.570 Uttam Kumaran: You know?
253 00:30:32.150 ⇒ 00:30:44.510 Uttam Kumaran: So that’s… that’s maybe something that I can… I can tee up tomorrow, and then maybe, like, I think if we can just tag-team it in the meeting, again, you… we want to kind of, like, vision… basically, like, vision board with them.
254 00:30:45.030 ⇒ 00:30:45.690 Pranav: Yeah.
255 00:30:45.690 ⇒ 00:31:04.959 Uttam Kumaran: Ideally. Look, there’s also a chance they come to the meeting, like, look, we’re paying you guys 20K, we originally, like, only budgeted for $10, like, we wanna just see what we can get done in the next month, and then wind down. At that point, I’m also… I’m gonna say, look, that’s perfect, that’s fine, like, we’re gonna…
256 00:31:05.390 ⇒ 00:31:07.850 Uttam Kumaran: Like, here’s what we can do in that time.
257 00:31:08.010 ⇒ 00:31:18.329 Uttam Kumaran: I also want to tell them, like, hey, we do a lot of other things, including, like, internal automation, agentic solutions for operations and for…
258 00:31:18.490 ⇒ 00:31:21.130 Uttam Kumaran: Tasks that would directly affect your expenses.
259 00:31:21.330 ⇒ 00:31:31.199 Uttam Kumaran: Is there… is there any way that you guys… is there… are there anything… is there anything you need help with on the operations side that any of our AI use cases can support as well?
260 00:31:31.350 ⇒ 00:31:33.349 Uttam Kumaran: And then we’ll see what they say.
261 00:31:33.350 ⇒ 00:31:33.890 Pranav: Yep.
262 00:31:34.130 ⇒ 00:31:48.100 Uttam Kumaran: like, again, the worst thing people can say is, like, no, and we go, but I do think that they’re happy with our pace, I do think that they’re happy with, like, kind of, like, how we attack things, and I feel like it’s a good opportunity for us to say, like.
263 00:31:48.290 ⇒ 00:31:53.610 Uttam Kumaran: hey, I know this is winding down, but, like, we can continue to add value. Where else do you need help?
264 00:31:56.340 ⇒ 00:31:58.210 Pranav: Yeah, I agree.
265 00:31:58.720 ⇒ 00:32:09.999 Pranav: I think what I’ll do tonight is, like, yeah, I’ll get a bunch of that info that they’ll likely be talking about, like, you know, getting that Clockify info, and then…
266 00:32:10.500 ⇒ 00:32:11.410 Uttam Kumaran: Okay.
267 00:32:11.410 ⇒ 00:32:15.639 Pranav: Also, yeah, just coming up with other features as well. I’ll do that.
268 00:32:16.110 ⇒ 00:32:17.200 Pranav: And…
269 00:32:17.570 ⇒ 00:32:32.410 Pranav: from there, we can maybe hop into another call before that meeting to just, like, discuss, like, okay, I want to attack this, or I’ll just, you know, we can talk over Slack if, like, you’re busy or something like that. And then… yeah, but I think, you know, it’s only a 15-minute call, I can extend it, if you’d like.
270 00:32:32.570 ⇒ 00:32:35.320 Pranav: But…
271 00:32:35.640 ⇒ 00:32:47.729 Pranav: Yeah, I think, this makes… this makes sense to me. Like, I can… I have a better understanding of, like, what this call is for as well. At first, I wasn’t sure if it’s just, like, a project check-in, or if it’s… but now it’s like, okay.
272 00:32:48.000 ⇒ 00:32:53.199 Pranav: we can kind of talk beyond the scope of Stitch Platform, like, beyond this phase.
273 00:32:53.810 ⇒ 00:32:58.809 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, and that’s why I wanted to sort of give it, like, ideally you want to have these conversations a month.
274 00:32:59.240 ⇒ 00:32:59.930 Pranav: Yeah.
275 00:33:00.460 ⇒ 00:33:14.799 Uttam Kumaran: before, right? And so, like, the worst thing that can happen is, like, what’s happening with Magic Spoon, which is, like, we’re, like, kind of messed up, and we’re just gonna resolve it, but we also, like, are a past contract, and so I have to sort of, like.
276 00:33:15.160 ⇒ 00:33:16.440 Uttam Kumaran: I have to sort of, like.
277 00:33:16.620 ⇒ 00:33:19.829 Uttam Kumaran: Basically, like, clean up the mess, and be like.
278 00:33:20.150 ⇒ 00:33:22.830 Uttam Kumaran: Not that the mess is clean, like, what else can we do? It’s like…
279 00:33:23.410 ⇒ 00:33:23.790 Pranav: Yeah.
280 00:33:24.110 ⇒ 00:33:24.580 Pranav: Right.
281 00:33:24.580 ⇒ 00:33:26.760 Uttam Kumaran: Instead, what you want to do is, like, we’re crushing it.
282 00:33:27.110 ⇒ 00:33:31.030 Uttam Kumaran: We’re a month out, like, how can we crush it more for you, you know?
283 00:33:31.240 ⇒ 00:33:33.109 Pranav: Right. Right.
284 00:33:33.270 ⇒ 00:33:36.219 Uttam Kumaran: So yeah, I mean, you’ll see how it goes. Again, like.
285 00:33:36.330 ⇒ 00:33:40.560 Uttam Kumaran: I think part of this is the sort of dance that we’ll start to do with customers.
286 00:33:40.640 ⇒ 00:33:58.019 Uttam Kumaran: But yeah, tomorrow, I think I… I want to quickly align on, like, hey, how things are going, like, sort of put together, like, this is what we’re planning for March, and beyond March, where do you guys need help, and are any of… where do you need help broadly in the company, and are any of those areas that we can be helpful with, you know?
287 00:33:59.280 ⇒ 00:34:03.750 Pranav: Yeah. Okay. Yeah. No, this’ll be really helpful for me, just to, like.
288 00:34:03.990 ⇒ 00:34:14.380 Pranav: listen in on, contribute where I can, but, like, I will… I’ll write up a couple notes for you, just to, like, hopefully that helps you kind of, like, brainstorm further, like, what we’ll talk about in that call.
289 00:34:14.590 ⇒ 00:34:15.630 Uttam Kumaran: Perfect. Okay.
290 00:34:15.889 ⇒ 00:34:16.449 Pranav: Yeah.
291 00:34:16.839 ⇒ 00:34:17.749 Pranav: Awesome.
292 00:34:18.790 ⇒ 00:34:21.459 Uttam Kumaran: Okay. Alright. Thank you, dude. Appreciate it.
293 00:34:21.820 ⇒ 00:34:22.959 Pranav: Thank you. Talk later.
294 00:34:22.969 ⇒ 00:34:23.949 Uttam Kumaran: Okay, alright, bye.