Meeting Title: Brainforge Q2 Planning and Leadership Discussion Date: 2026-03-18 Meeting participants: Johnathan’s iPhone, Uttam Kumaran
WEBVTT
1 00:10:36.190 ⇒ 00:10:37.360 Uttam Kumaran: Hey, sir, good morning.
2 00:10:38.000 ⇒ 00:10:39.490 Johnathan’s iPhone: Warren, no worries.
3 00:10:39.860 ⇒ 00:10:40.990 Uttam Kumaran: Hey, how are ya?
4 00:10:41.600 ⇒ 00:10:42.600 Johnathan’s iPhone: Good, how are you?
5 00:10:42.880 ⇒ 00:10:43.670 Uttam Kumaran: Good.
6 00:10:44.000 ⇒ 00:10:46.279 Uttam Kumaran: Where are you, where you off to this morning?
7 00:10:48.430 ⇒ 00:10:52.999 Johnathan’s iPhone: I got a couple client meetings, and then I gotta do a couple performance reviews with some people, so…
8 00:10:54.310 ⇒ 00:10:56.209 Johnathan’s iPhone: It’s always nice to do them in person.
9 00:10:56.760 ⇒ 00:10:57.340 Uttam Kumaran: Great.
10 00:10:58.010 ⇒ 00:11:00.600 Uttam Kumaran: No, I appreciate you taking the time. We’re,
11 00:11:01.910 ⇒ 00:11:09.480 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, we’re just planning out, like, sort of next quarter, we’ve… we… a lot had a lot… we’ve grown a lot, things are moving faster.
12 00:11:09.870 ⇒ 00:11:17.539 Uttam Kumaran: And, I don’t know, I was, like, just thinking about… again, I continue to think about our delivery team, and I continue to think about
13 00:11:17.680 ⇒ 00:11:34.890 Uttam Kumaran: where our needs are, and one of the things that was really apparent to me this, quarter was that we did a… we tried to put… so our team has traditionally been just a group of, like, engineers, just put it simply. We promoted some people into, sort of, more consulting-y.
14 00:11:35.040 ⇒ 00:11:51.539 Uttam Kumaran: leadership roles, like, delivery leadership roles. For example, we don’t have formal… we don’t have project managers, we don’t have account managers, we’ve leveraged AI to actually do some of that work, but we’ve actually promoted some engineers into basically leading clients or leading service lines.
15 00:11:51.800 ⇒ 00:12:10.289 Uttam Kumaran: One of the difficulties, though, is, like, I think that was really positive. I think clients love working directly with the people that are… that are… have technical knowledge that are building, and that’s sort of, like, when we first talked, that was, like, a lot of the roles that we were filling out as just more folks like that. Now, I’m sort of in a little bit of a…
16 00:12:10.440 ⇒ 00:12:15.249 Uttam Kumaran: point where, like, I just think some of the folks that…
17 00:12:15.340 ⇒ 00:12:20.889 Uttam Kumaran: We have right now, leading some projects, are just lacking the, like.
18 00:12:20.940 ⇒ 00:12:40.170 Uttam Kumaran: enterprise consulting sort of, like, poise, execution, presentation, discipline. And, you know, one thing that’s become apparent is, as we’ve moved from SMB to mid-market now to, like, large companies and moving… moving a lot faster towards enterprise.
19 00:12:40.280 ⇒ 00:12:45.199 Uttam Kumaran: That becomes, like, the majority of the game. You know, I think…
20 00:12:45.290 ⇒ 00:13:04.339 Uttam Kumaran: we are really, really good at engineering, and our whole company’s built on great engineering, which is great, because I feel like a lot of the times, those bigger clients don’t often get great engineering, but what we are lacking right now is that emphasis on really clear communication.
21 00:13:04.960 ⇒ 00:13:07.609 Uttam Kumaran: Really clear, like, project planning.
22 00:13:07.710 ⇒ 00:13:11.980 Uttam Kumaran: Like, coming to the table with, like, risks and issues.
23 00:13:12.250 ⇒ 00:13:13.619 Uttam Kumaran: And,
24 00:13:14.550 ⇒ 00:13:25.619 Uttam Kumaran: I think to put it a different way, also, like, my time is sucked in, like, 10 different directions. You know, for leading the company, for a whole host of reasons.
25 00:13:25.620 ⇒ 00:13:40.059 Uttam Kumaran: And so, I don’t know, I’m just sort of, like, in a moment where we’re thinking about what we could do going into next quarter, and the rest of this year to sort of solve a little bit of that… about that problem. I know I didn’t… it was, like, a little bit of, like.
26 00:13:40.240 ⇒ 00:13:43.860 Uttam Kumaran: abroad, so happy to answer any questions, or… Yeah.
27 00:13:45.650 ⇒ 00:13:48.229 Johnathan’s iPhone: No, you’re good. I think, I mean.
28 00:13:49.190 ⇒ 00:13:57.530 Johnathan’s iPhone: there’s a lot of great examples, I would say, where, you know, with rapid growth, the scalability of infrastructure.
29 00:13:57.820 ⇒ 00:14:04.849 Johnathan’s iPhone: Oversight, right? So, you know, I think back to the greatest example is, you know, Apple.
30 00:14:05.680 ⇒ 00:14:06.070 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.
31 00:14:06.070 ⇒ 00:14:13.870 Johnathan’s iPhone: garage, and then you grow slowly, but once you hit that point where you grow fast, it’s kind of hard to…
32 00:14:13.980 ⇒ 00:14:16.439 Johnathan’s iPhone: Keep up with the market while also
33 00:14:16.720 ⇒ 00:14:21.529 Johnathan’s iPhone: Keeping control, enough control that it doesn’t go off in the wrong direction, so…
34 00:14:21.530 ⇒ 00:14:23.759 Uttam Kumaran: And the quality, the quality of the product, right?
35 00:14:24.330 ⇒ 00:14:25.070 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.
36 00:14:25.070 ⇒ 00:14:30.580 Johnathan’s iPhone: Right, right, and that’s always… that’s always a challenge, and, you know.
37 00:14:30.850 ⇒ 00:14:32.980 Johnathan’s iPhone: what I would say would be…
38 00:14:33.200 ⇒ 00:14:35.599 Johnathan’s iPhone: And I know you didn’t ask me, right, but…
39 00:14:36.390 ⇒ 00:14:39.320 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, I’m asking, I’m asking. Yeah, sure.
40 00:14:39.320 ⇒ 00:14:45.370 Johnathan’s iPhone: You know, I would say kind of the next steps are, So…
41 00:14:45.710 ⇒ 00:14:50.859 Johnathan’s iPhone: There’s typically, like, a leadership summit where we sit down and we look at, okay, hey.
42 00:14:51.050 ⇒ 00:15:07.860 Johnathan’s iPhone: You know, what are the 2- to 3-5 year goals, 6-month goals, and you said it yourself, where you’re identifying the risks and the capabilities that you need to enable in order to execute, just managing the company at your level.
43 00:15:08.140 ⇒ 00:15:27.239 Johnathan’s iPhone: So, you know, and you know this, right? At every level, there’s a different requirement for reporting and quality controls. You don’t necessarily need to know how many lines of code are happening, but if those key leaders throughout the development life cycles aren’t
44 00:15:27.400 ⇒ 00:15:43.049 Johnathan’s iPhone: aggregating and collecting that data, because either they don’t know about it, or it doesn’t matter to them, doesn’t matter, right? You need the information. So, typically, you know, the establishment of things that are on an enterprise side, it doesn’t have to be
45 00:15:43.990 ⇒ 00:16:00.439 Johnathan’s iPhone: I would say there’s a lot of different ways that you can go about doing it, because one thing that engineers always hate is, if I’m an engineer, you hire me to be an engineer, you need to let me be an engineer and get out of my way with all of your PM and oversight, right? I don’t care about that stuff.
46 00:16:00.760 ⇒ 00:16:09.269 Uttam Kumaran: And I will say, and I will say, like, to give you our SKU, like, our… my background is in engineering, and so this is, like, a super, super engineering-friendly company.
47 00:16:09.280 ⇒ 00:16:26.720 Uttam Kumaran: You know, and because I used to be a product manager, I know that a lot of that job can be a lot of, like, what did you work on today? When is this thing coming out? So I’m very aware of that, because I used to get asked stuff like that, and we also… I would say I’m proud of the people we have, because a lot of them have a self…
48 00:16:26.720 ⇒ 00:16:30.410 Uttam Kumaran: like, they’re able to self-reflect and self-govern. They’re not just, like.
49 00:16:30.450 ⇒ 00:16:36.609 Uttam Kumaran: I’m just gonna take whatever ticket’s on the board and work on it, you know? And so… but the.
50 00:16:36.610 ⇒ 00:16:36.960 Johnathan’s iPhone: Yeah.
51 00:16:36.960 ⇒ 00:16:50.280 Uttam Kumaran: I think the problem is, like, when they transition to leading a client and client engagement and sort of building client empathy and that poise, there are gaps. There’s some folks that have shown promise.
52 00:16:50.590 ⇒ 00:17:05.349 Uttam Kumaran: But I think what’s happening is because we all understand the fundamentals of great engineering, I don’t think the crew understands the fundamentals of, like, excellent client service, especially as we’ve changed from working with, like, people that may have been less sensitive to that.
53 00:17:05.430 ⇒ 00:17:13.600 Uttam Kumaran: To now folks that are very, very sensitive to that, where it’s… it’s risking the project, basically, because we’re… we’re not, like, poised enough.
54 00:17:13.690 ⇒ 00:17:16.839 Uttam Kumaran: And, sorry, just to fill out a little bit of the gap there.
55 00:17:17.150 ⇒ 00:17:19.189 Johnathan’s iPhone: No, and that makes sense.
56 00:17:19.359 ⇒ 00:17:21.489 Johnathan’s iPhone: So I’m curious, you know.
57 00:17:22.480 ⇒ 00:17:34.060 Johnathan’s iPhone: on your top, you know, top 5 priorities to develop through, right, are you looking at, you know, trying to get those specific individuals plugged into…
58 00:17:34.190 ⇒ 00:17:43.920 Johnathan’s iPhone: you know, development programs or plans or something like that, just to kind of… I mean, you know, polishing what you need them to be polished at.
59 00:17:44.180 ⇒ 00:17:49.279 Johnathan’s iPhone: I would say more times than not, it sounds like you’ve got the right attitude and aptitude.
60 00:17:49.420 ⇒ 00:17:51.810 Johnathan’s iPhone: You just gotta, you know, help…
61 00:17:52.010 ⇒ 00:18:00.590 Johnathan’s iPhone: Get them, enough one-on-one experience for them to kind of accelerate their development from that,
62 00:18:00.980 ⇒ 00:18:03.660 Johnathan’s iPhone: enterprise delivery standpoint.
63 00:18:03.660 ⇒ 00:18:09.520 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, I… I would say my initial, like, my initial point was.
64 00:18:09.630 ⇒ 00:18:18.350 Uttam Kumaran: maybe we don’t have the right people, and I think that was too shallow, and I’m usually not… I don’t usually feel like that, but I… I’ve seen such a gap on some clients.
65 00:18:18.370 ⇒ 00:18:36.629 Uttam Kumaran: especially as we’ve moved to some clients that are, like, half a billion dollars, we have line of sight into companies that are a few billion, like, there is a gap on just people’s expectations for themselves, but then this is where I try to say, like, hey, where did we not set the expectations right, or the standards right, or where did we
66 00:18:36.730 ⇒ 00:18:46.780 Uttam Kumaran: Like, where do I miscommunicate, right? And I think it’s easy to just blame people and be like, you don’t know what you’re doing. And so, instead, I’m like, okay, let me look at
67 00:18:46.870 ⇒ 00:19:01.219 Uttam Kumaran: did we set this… did we set any standards? And I think that’s where we found, on the engineering side, because, like, we have great, strong engineering leadership, there are actually standards for clean code, for quality code, for pace, and…
68 00:19:01.340 ⇒ 00:19:16.460 Uttam Kumaran: I would say all of our folks are extremely fast, they’re, like, own their shit, but we didn’t… there isn’t… those are… some of those are unspoken, some of those are spoken, but on the client communication, client management side, a lot of it’s unspoken.
69 00:19:16.480 ⇒ 00:19:22.080 Uttam Kumaran: And so, I think the first job for me is, and it’s kind of what I’m trying to do right now, is…
70 00:19:22.140 ⇒ 00:19:25.460 Uttam Kumaran: set those standards. Like, from the range of, like.
71 00:19:25.460 ⇒ 00:19:26.120 Johnathan’s iPhone: Yeah.
72 00:19:26.270 ⇒ 00:19:33.900 Uttam Kumaran: Goldman Sachs or Booz Allen to, like, Freelancer, where are we? You know?
73 00:19:33.900 ⇒ 00:19:34.220 Johnathan’s iPhone: Yeah.
74 00:19:34.220 ⇒ 00:19:41.660 Uttam Kumaran: And make that really clear to everybody, so there is, like, a understanding of, like, what the expectation is. So I think that’s one piece.
75 00:19:41.770 ⇒ 00:19:51.280 Uttam Kumaran: Second is, we’ve been so strapped that because I… I’m doing both the standard setting, a lot of the client execution, and the mentorship.
76 00:19:51.350 ⇒ 00:20:04.580 Uttam Kumaran: There’s just, like, it’s hard to hold people accountable, because we couldn’t do it, like, some of these people I couldn’t risk losing, and so I think I just didn’t have enough of a toolbox for, like, accountability, and there wasn’t a separation of interests.
77 00:20:04.750 ⇒ 00:20:21.740 Uttam Kumaran: you know, I was almost playing, like, 3 or 4 people at a time. We have a little bit more of that now. But I think that first part is actually, like, the most important. And then we need exactly what you said, which is, like, can we… for me, the way… again, I think about it in a very structured way, I’m like.
78 00:20:21.740 ⇒ 00:20:41.280 Uttam Kumaran: look at the standards, put everybody’s name upon a board, who’s missing what standard, and what is their path towards enabling that standard. Like, thankfully, at the company, like, we… we don’t have a ton of people. Everybody here is, like, actually fairly experienced, and is totally capable of learning those things.
79 00:20:41.610 ⇒ 00:20:49.009 Uttam Kumaran: I think where the constraint comes in is totally on my time, and totally on, like, a separation of powers between, like.
80 00:20:49.120 ⇒ 00:20:55.000 Uttam Kumaran: The standard setting and, like, the mentorship, accountability, day-to-day enforcement of it.
81 00:20:55.300 ⇒ 00:20:57.840 Uttam Kumaran: And I think that’s where…
82 00:20:57.840 ⇒ 00:20:58.570 Johnathan’s iPhone: Right.
83 00:20:58.570 ⇒ 00:21:02.419 Uttam Kumaran: Ultimately, there’s a… there’s a gap right now. Yeah.
84 00:21:05.860 ⇒ 00:21:11.359 Johnathan’s iPhone: Because how many, maybe… I’m not…
85 00:21:13.670 ⇒ 00:21:17.609 Johnathan’s iPhone: Any, account slash delivery managers do you have?
86 00:21:18.800 ⇒ 00:21:30.919 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, I mean, right now we have about, like, 10 clients, and so our structure internally is we have what we call, like, client success owners. So these are people that are, like, one-to-one matched with
87 00:21:31.030 ⇒ 00:21:47.219 Uttam Kumaran: a client, and they’re basically the point person for that client. And then we also have, like, service leads. These folks are more cross-cutting, they own, like, a service area, right? So they own, like, how work gets done within a service. They’re helping with resourcing and recruiting for that service.
88 00:21:47.220 ⇒ 00:22:00.700 Uttam Kumaran: And sort of standard setting for that service. The tough part about this business is that those people aren’t, like, full-time in that, like, leadership skew. They’re… everybody’s working, still, significantly. And so…
89 00:22:00.920 ⇒ 00:22:19.090 Uttam Kumaran: that’s… that’s the sort of place where go. Right now, we don’t have any… there’s me sort of leading delivery, and then there’s one… there’s one person right hand to me that’s sort of just helping smooth out a ton of logistics items, delivery enablement, automations, things like that. We’re the only two people that are overseeing
90 00:22:19.470 ⇒ 00:22:22.250 Uttam Kumaran: You know, a crew of about, like, 15…
91 00:22:22.770 ⇒ 00:22:25.150 Uttam Kumaran: Or 16, and then probably a smaller, like.
92 00:22:25.460 ⇒ 00:22:29.090 Uttam Kumaran: More leadership crew of, like, 7? 6 or 7?
93 00:22:30.080 ⇒ 00:22:30.750 Johnathan’s iPhone: Okay.
94 00:22:30.900 ⇒ 00:22:32.379 Johnathan’s iPhone: Do you have,
95 00:22:32.560 ⇒ 00:22:47.450 Johnathan’s iPhone: And I mean, one of the biggest things that everyone wants to know is, one, you know, are they doing their job effectively? And I think that’s… it sounds like that’s pretty straightforward, because if not, right, we’d be losing clients. But also.
96 00:22:47.530 ⇒ 00:22:53.970 Johnathan’s iPhone: You know, when it’s tied to… not necessarily performance reviews, but kind of tied to performance reviews.
97 00:22:54.090 ⇒ 00:23:01.490 Johnathan’s iPhone: you know, people are making sure that they’re capturing things. Are you considering,
98 00:23:03.420 ⇒ 00:23:09.980 Johnathan’s iPhone: Well, let me ask it this way. Yeah. What type of standards would you say, aside from…
99 00:23:10.900 ⇒ 00:23:12.650 Johnathan’s iPhone: You know, in…
100 00:23:13.110 ⇒ 00:23:19.619 Johnathan’s iPhone: I would say just the development standards, right? You know, if you’re looking at setting milestones and trying to get
101 00:23:21.040 ⇒ 00:23:21.870 Johnathan’s iPhone: risks.
102 00:23:22.070 ⇒ 00:23:33.789 Johnathan’s iPhone: there’s the high-level enterprise, delivery standards, right, where we want to be growing year over year, 3 or 4%, right? I’m not gonna… that’s just arbitrary numbers.
103 00:23:33.950 ⇒ 00:23:51.009 Johnathan’s iPhone: Whereas, you know, on delivery team, you want to make sure that, you know, you know the current 3 milestones for the delivery team, for the client whose, you know, forecasted growth looks like, you know, if we can hit this first 90 days or 6 months.
104 00:23:51.010 ⇒ 00:23:51.510 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.
105 00:23:51.510 ⇒ 00:23:55.699 Johnathan’s iPhone: You know, the potential revenue change can go up by 10%.
106 00:23:55.740 ⇒ 00:24:12.750 Johnathan’s iPhone: Right? You want to keep track on that one, right? Where… what are the milestones, what are the risks? How can I help you? I don’t need to know every detail, I just need to know when you need me to help you, and when you need me to, you know, idly stand by, or readily stand by.
107 00:24:12.860 ⇒ 00:24:17.430 Johnathan’s iPhone: Is that something that is kind of floating around in the brain space as well, or is that.
108 00:24:17.430 ⇒ 00:24:20.209 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, so let me tell you how I’m thinking about that. So…
109 00:24:20.370 ⇒ 00:24:26.520 Uttam Kumaran: in terms of the company P&L, I am so confident that if we are just to…
110 00:24:26.760 ⇒ 00:24:43.490 Uttam Kumaran: maintain a high level of service. We are… we are… because of the level of automation that we’re doing, and because of, like, the quality of our work, we are doing really, really well on both, like, getting good margins off-rip.
111 00:24:43.540 ⇒ 00:25:00.590 Uttam Kumaran: and expanding clients, purely on the basis of, like, the quality of the work we’re doing. I don’t think we’re, like, amazing at the project planning and, like, forward planning and communication, but the work is sort of speaking for itself, and so I actually am less concerned with
112 00:25:01.240 ⇒ 00:25:03.540 Uttam Kumaran: Team members, like.
113 00:25:04.090 ⇒ 00:25:19.389 Uttam Kumaran: I think… I guess to put it that… put it one way, it’s… it’s actually more about, like, I think there has to be behavior and communication changes that will ladder up into those… into those milestones, because I’ve seen how far we’ve gone lacking a lot of that
114 00:25:19.390 ⇒ 00:25:32.159 Uttam Kumaran: higher level poise, and so I know that if we… and I actually know that that is the reason we are… we are actively losing renewals, or have lost clients in the past. And so, simply starting at, like.
115 00:25:32.400 ⇒ 00:25:33.690 Uttam Kumaran: leveling up.
116 00:25:33.940 ⇒ 00:25:43.249 Uttam Kumaran: the existing delivery team to X out, like, a lot of those things for the reasons we’ve lost deals is, like, gonna be a great place to start.
117 00:25:43.360 ⇒ 00:26:02.060 Uttam Kumaran: yes, I would… I would 100% love people who own a client to be able to have a clear line into revenue growth and margin expansion, and quality increases, and, like, kind of for them to have a microcosm of, like, what I’m keeping in my head for just their client, you know? And for… at any moment, for them to be able to articulate
118 00:26:02.060 ⇒ 00:26:06.190 Uttam Kumaran: What is this week, this month, this quarter, like, this year?
119 00:26:06.190 ⇒ 00:26:12.499 Uttam Kumaran: Right? And say it really, really confidently, that would be an absolute dream.
120 00:26:12.530 ⇒ 00:26:14.440 Uttam Kumaran: And…
121 00:26:14.540 ⇒ 00:26:28.570 Uttam Kumaran: our… like, me and our sales team, we’re doing a great job bringing in clients that we can totally expand, getting into new service areas, recruiting top talent. So, the, like.
122 00:26:28.890 ⇒ 00:26:43.010 Uttam Kumaran: the platform around, like, the people in the company is doing really well. Like, we’re getting shots, really good shots on goal, we have great partnerships, we are, like, recruiting better and better, because people want to work at, like, sort of this… an AI data company.
123 00:26:43.020 ⇒ 00:26:52.559 Uttam Kumaran: But it is the… I think this transition of, like, the client service team that has to change. And I think there’s two things that are happening. We’re, one, we’re hiring people, and so…
124 00:26:53.470 ⇒ 00:27:01.580 Uttam Kumaran: I don’t want them to come into an environment where they see, like, lackadaisical expectations, and then it impacts them.
125 00:27:01.730 ⇒ 00:27:13.239 Uttam Kumaran: The second piece is… so that’s… that’s one thing where, okay, we can… we’re… we have a clear onboarding structure, we have some training, but, like, that’s one piece. The second piece, though, is the… the folks that are already here.
126 00:27:13.300 ⇒ 00:27:30.689 Uttam Kumaran: And it’s sort of… I’m in a jam, because I have to do both at the same time. You know, I have to think about both at the same time. I… I am… I am willing… like, I do want… I do believe that everybody we have on our team can make that jump into either leading
127 00:27:30.700 ⇒ 00:27:34.500 Uttam Kumaran: A client account, or leading a service line.
128 00:27:34.700 ⇒ 00:27:35.950 Uttam Kumaran: I, I think…
129 00:27:36.230 ⇒ 00:27:51.160 Uttam Kumaran: So, with that belief, I think that there has to be some type of program that we set for folks to show that they can do that, and then if they’re not able to do that, then we have a different conversation about where they land. But that’s sort of where we are, and then for the new people.
130 00:27:51.160 ⇒ 00:28:03.050 Uttam Kumaran: It’s really… they come in with no understanding about the way we do things, which is perfect, which means yesterday and how we did last month is totally not… doesn’t have to be how we do things going forward.
131 00:28:03.050 ⇒ 00:28:03.500 Johnathan’s iPhone: to…
132 00:28:03.500 ⇒ 00:28:06.060 Uttam Kumaran: And so I want them to walk in with, like, a…
133 00:28:06.500 ⇒ 00:28:19.320 Uttam Kumaran: with, like, such an expectation of the way we… we perform, and in… in data and AI and IT service broadly, like, I’m interested in your perspective, but it’s not…
134 00:28:19.410 ⇒ 00:28:36.730 Uttam Kumaran: like, that intense of an environment, like, I’ve worked with a lot of finance teams, I’ve worked with bankers, a lot of friends in, like, in high consulting, like, it could get very, very stressed, and very, very hostile, and very, very tense. That is not the environment here, which means, like.
135 00:28:36.810 ⇒ 00:28:42.120 Uttam Kumaran: okay, I feel really confident that we can just ratchet up the expectations pretty fairly.
136 00:28:42.260 ⇒ 00:28:49.520 Uttam Kumaran: And it’s like, actually, like, I feel like the culture… it’s… it’s okay, like, we are pretty lax. We are too lax.
137 00:28:49.740 ⇒ 00:28:52.299 Uttam Kumaran: And that is causing us to have…
138 00:28:52.720 ⇒ 00:28:57.039 Uttam Kumaran: you know, these impacts on client, and ultimately impacts on the P&L.
139 00:28:57.150 ⇒ 00:29:07.189 Uttam Kumaran: And then it also impacts on who we can recruit, right? I can’t go to the next person that’s a killer and say, come work on my team, and they look around, they’re like, I don’t wanna…
140 00:29:07.300 ⇒ 00:29:09.910 Uttam Kumaran: Like, this isn’t, like, the A+, you know?
141 00:29:10.060 ⇒ 00:29:12.520 Uttam Kumaran: And, yeah.
142 00:29:16.040 ⇒ 00:29:23.330 Johnathan’s iPhone: Yeah, and it sounds like… I kind of feel like you’re getting, like, 3 or 4 different things going on, so… One second real quick, I was just gonna…
143 00:29:23.550 ⇒ 00:29:24.639 Uttam Kumaran: Oh yeah, no problem, no problem.
144 00:29:26.000 ⇒ 00:29:36.479 Johnathan’s iPhone: Yeah, I’ll just take that quad shot, it’s fine. No worries, is it iced, or is it just the way that it comes? Hot is fine. I got you. Anything else? No, ma’am, thank you. 428, thanks. Thanks.
145 00:29:36.820 ⇒ 00:29:42.430 Johnathan’s iPhone: It sounds like you’re… you’ve got, like, 3 or 4 things that you’ve got,
146 00:29:42.580 ⇒ 00:29:59.499 Johnathan’s iPhone: That you’re trying to do, right? So, I like that you’re identifying that onboarding piece, right? Because the onboarding piece is actually one thing that Booz Allen had stepped away from doing, and then reinvested, so much so that we fly new people down to Virginia just to get them onboarded.
147 00:29:59.500 ⇒ 00:29:59.940 Uttam Kumaran: Wow.
148 00:29:59.940 ⇒ 00:30:19.430 Johnathan’s iPhone: You know, one of the challenges that face, even though we live in a digital, accessible space now, one of the things that is very real is when people see, feel, and touch something, they think its existence, is greater than just sitting behind a TV screen, or a monitor, and things like that. And that does matter, right?
149 00:30:19.430 ⇒ 00:30:19.750 Uttam Kumaran: Totally.
150 00:30:19.750 ⇒ 00:30:27.129 Johnathan’s iPhone: wants to bring their whole person, right? So I would say there’s a couple different things, and I’m sure BrainTorge is coming up with
151 00:30:27.220 ⇒ 00:30:42.409 Johnathan’s iPhone: you know, it’s philosophy on how you want employees to come to work, right? Yes. It doesn’t mean, like, hey, you know, you need to wear a suit and tie, right? Not the traditional way that an enterprise would definitely operate, but where you need to set a standard saying, hey, look.
152 00:30:42.410 ⇒ 00:31:02.309 Johnathan’s iPhone: If you’re coming in board shorts and flip-flops, that’s a problem, right? Yeah. Everybody’s gonna laugh and be like, oh, well, that makes sense. Well, no, it doesn’t make sense, because it’s never been communicated. And so, if I was to say, okay, cool, well, we finally had somebody that showed up in board shorts and flip-flops, I’m gonna hold that individual accountable, but what it also does is it creates
153 00:31:02.360 ⇒ 00:31:22.039 Johnathan’s iPhone: the standard for everybody else around them to say, okay, we’re leaders, or we’re not leaders, but we’re employees, and we’re gonna hold this individual accountable, too. So now you have this self-generating, momentum, where now you have a group of people that are ultimately holding each other to a standard where it removes the requirement from you.
154 00:31:22.120 ⇒ 00:31:33.329 Johnathan’s iPhone: So, setting those standards, coming through the door is a great way to do it. Doing it with those that exist, it’s gonna be a little bit tedious, but the great thing, and what I would tell you that I’ve done
155 00:31:33.360 ⇒ 00:31:46.219 Johnathan’s iPhone: personally, within nonprofits, as well as enterprises and new organizations that I step into, I’m really easy at being the bad guy. And it’s not because I’m a bad guy, but more because,
156 00:31:46.960 ⇒ 00:31:53.629 Johnathan’s iPhone: I don’t approach things with emotion, I approach it with logic, right? And especially with development and highly technical individuals.
157 00:31:53.630 ⇒ 00:32:11.120 Johnathan’s iPhone: If they can’t logically understand why something’s changing, then it doesn’t matter. They don’t care. And so, what I would presume is part of the challenge that you’re gonna face, or already are facing, is highly technical people take some time, you gotta explain to them 15 different ways before they really understand, hey, man, like.
158 00:32:11.120 ⇒ 00:32:14.830 Johnathan’s iPhone: The reason that I really need you to ensure that
159 00:32:14.930 ⇒ 00:32:32.159 Johnathan’s iPhone: you’re not blindsiding, you know, a client with, you know, a thousand lines of code, but you’re actually showing them, hey, here’s what I’m gonna show you, here’s why it’s important, here’s where it matters to you, and how it’s gonna improve your life. On a single slide, that’s a standard approach, right? That’s a pitch deck.
160 00:32:32.160 ⇒ 00:32:32.710 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.
161 00:32:33.010 ⇒ 00:32:39.480 Johnathan’s iPhone: That doesn’t… that doesn’t change the way you do your development. All it does is saying, hey, there is an extra step that needs to happen.
162 00:32:39.480 ⇒ 00:32:41.020 Uttam Kumaran: That’s a last mile problem.
163 00:32:41.180 ⇒ 00:32:41.970 Uttam Kumaran: Exactly.
164 00:32:42.350 ⇒ 00:32:43.690 Johnathan’s iPhone: Exactly, so…
165 00:32:44.000 ⇒ 00:32:55.779 Johnathan’s iPhone: you know, I feel like, one, you’ve got the standards, right, so making sure that everyone’s kind of taking the same Brain Forge image and putting it on there, the trademark, right?
166 00:32:55.780 ⇒ 00:33:06.329 Johnathan’s iPhone: Those type of quality controls that, you know, traditionally, on an enterprise that comes from a PMO, you don’t need a PMO if you only have 50 people, right? If you have 10 clients, it shouldn’t be…
167 00:33:06.330 ⇒ 00:33:19.859 Johnathan’s iPhone: that scale. Eventually, you’ll have to get there, right? And standing up a PMO is not as hard as people think it is. Creating the standards and enforcing the standards and accountability, that is a challenge.
168 00:33:19.960 ⇒ 00:33:32.009 Johnathan’s iPhone: So, what I would, you know, I would presume is, one, you’ve got, obviously, you’ve got the growth that you have to maintain, i.e, new people getting onboarded,
169 00:33:32.010 ⇒ 00:33:47.480 Johnathan’s iPhone: as well as the potential onboarding for clients, right? You gotta be able to do that just as much as you do it for your people, because you want them to feel the same welcome, right? Yeah. So you’ve got that piece. You also have the piece for professional development at the account level.
170 00:33:47.480 ⇒ 00:33:55.920 Johnathan’s iPhone: You also have the piece for professional development at the leadership level. And then, you know, even in that, you’ve got two other pieces that I see
171 00:33:56.330 ⇒ 00:33:57.520 Johnathan’s iPhone: Good morning.
172 00:33:58.150 ⇒ 00:34:02.619 Johnathan’s iPhone: Thank you, ma’am. There we go. There we go.
173 00:34:04.220 ⇒ 00:34:21.620 Johnathan’s iPhone: you know, one of the other two pieces is, is, you know, the timing of everything. You know, when you’re trying to fly the plane while also build the plane at the same time, it never ends well for, leadership because, you know, you’re pulling extra hours trying to maintain.
174 00:34:22.040 ⇒ 00:34:22.790 Uttam Kumaran: 100%.
175 00:34:22.790 ⇒ 00:34:25.080 Johnathan’s iPhone: Right, well, also…
176 00:34:25.080 ⇒ 00:34:25.820 Uttam Kumaran: Yes.
177 00:34:26.030 ⇒ 00:34:30.769 Johnathan’s iPhone: Trying to steer the plane. Thank you, ma’am. Trying to fly the plane, so…
178 00:34:31.030 ⇒ 00:34:32.799 Uttam Kumaran: But I will say, like, one thing… They’re committed
179 00:34:32.800 ⇒ 00:34:46.919 Uttam Kumaran: is… is investing in solving the problem. Like, I think I’ve worked for many startups my career where it’s always like this, but they don’t… they, like, ex… they don’t… we strive for this to become a more defined
180 00:34:46.920 ⇒ 00:34:57.500 Uttam Kumaran: more simplified environment. Like, that’s all I want. I don’t want it to be crazy. Like, that is, like, a definition of a bad system, you know? So I’m very, like…
181 00:34:57.580 ⇒ 00:35:13.860 Uttam Kumaran: I’m very interested in this becoming a place where it is a well-defined system, you know, and people have, like, clear expectations. There’s still rigor, and there’s still an intensity, but, like, craziness, like, ambiguous environments, missed expectations is not…
182 00:35:13.900 ⇒ 00:35:17.730 Uttam Kumaran: Like, it’s not a feature of, like, a system that, like, I want to be part of, you know?
183 00:35:18.840 ⇒ 00:35:24.710 Johnathan’s iPhone: Yeah, and I think that’s fair enough. You know, it’s as simple sometimes as,
184 00:35:24.990 ⇒ 00:35:31.719 Johnathan’s iPhone: You know, you have a person, right, where… or a group of people like me that literally just asks, hey.
185 00:35:31.790 ⇒ 00:35:46.350 Johnathan’s iPhone: you know, what’s this number? I just need it, I need to put it in for you, right? It doesn’t stop the implementation and execution, and that’s 100%, easy enough to do. And then eventually it’s automatable, right? There’s nothing that…
186 00:35:46.540 ⇒ 00:35:52.349 Johnathan’s iPhone: That, you know, you’re talking about trying to develop, or work, or my brain’s thinking of, that
187 00:35:52.480 ⇒ 00:35:57.589 Johnathan’s iPhone: at some point, time is not going to be automated, so, I think that’s fair as well, so…
188 00:35:57.590 ⇒ 00:36:04.770 Uttam Kumaran: I mean, that’s… that’s our edge, and right? Like, I think about, like, why are we different? Like, we… I… I read a lot about…
189 00:36:04.800 ⇒ 00:36:23.050 Uttam Kumaran: the large consulting companies that have come before me and the way they do things, but I also think about what is our way, and the technology and the way we’re leveraging it internally is changing a lot of the ways that we can execute, and we can show up for clients, we can show up for our team, and it is…
190 00:36:23.130 ⇒ 00:36:42.330 Uttam Kumaran: it is… it is not just, like, okay, we… the numbers load faster on a dashboard, like, significant parts of the system can now get handed off to AI to do, and that is just today. That is not, like, next year and the year after. And that is… that happens to be also something that we sell, right? So it’s paramount that we use… We must say the same thing again.
191 00:36:42.330 ⇒ 00:36:42.769 Johnathan’s iPhone: It was literally…
192 00:36:42.770 ⇒ 00:37:00.519 Uttam Kumaran: We dog food everything. It’s the only reason we’re in that business is because I didn’t have any money for this business, and so we automate as much as we could so we could survive, and that just happened to be a great thing for business, you know, because it became the thing that everybody wants right now, and so…
193 00:37:00.570 ⇒ 00:37:06.970 Uttam Kumaran: We have growth in every single team, we are still trying to maintain, like, the standard and the culture.
194 00:37:07.230 ⇒ 00:37:20.759 Uttam Kumaran: And we’re, of course, just… we’re trying to win. Like, we’re very, very determined, you know, and we’re bringing on people that are… that want to come win. And so, yeah, that’s sort of, like, the… this is the sort of net-net of the challenge, but it’s all people, it’s all anthropology.
195 00:37:20.790 ⇒ 00:37:27.710 Uttam Kumaran: You know, it’s… it’s… it’s a… I… which is funny, because, you know, we’re doing this… the technical work is actually not that bad.
196 00:37:28.620 ⇒ 00:37:29.889 Johnathan’s iPhone: Sure, it never is, yeah.
197 00:37:29.890 ⇒ 00:37:39.669 Uttam Kumaran: It’s a lot, really, like, stuff we’ve been doing for a long time, and the stuff that our clients ask for is usually way easier than the stuff that we’re building for ourselves. So.
198 00:37:40.100 ⇒ 00:37:44.200 Uttam Kumaran: I… for that reason, I feel, like, pretty clear. It’s just…
199 00:37:44.400 ⇒ 00:37:55.189 Uttam Kumaran: like, yeah, I mean, I think hearing the way you’ve articulated it, it gives me a lot of clarity. I mean, my ultimate question is, like, how interesting of a problem is that to you, you know? And, like…
200 00:37:55.500 ⇒ 00:37:59.969 Uttam Kumaran: what… I know you kind of spoke to some people internally, like.
201 00:38:00.120 ⇒ 00:38:04.360 Uttam Kumaran: I’m just kind of curious about hearing that, and hearing that as our current…
202 00:38:04.630 ⇒ 00:38:12.539 Uttam Kumaran: And probably, like, future set of issues on the delivery team, like, wondering just, like, what your perspective is.
203 00:38:15.540 ⇒ 00:38:19.600 Johnathan’s iPhone: Yeah, no, I’m… I’m definitely interested, you know, I think,
204 00:38:20.190 ⇒ 00:38:38.269 Johnathan’s iPhone: there’s a lot of opportunity for growth, obviously, and with it being a small business, you know, my background is a jack-of-all-trades, not necessarily, you know, having the depth of, of, you know, a single technology or anything like that, right? So…
205 00:38:38.430 ⇒ 00:38:45.230 Johnathan’s iPhone: I think the skill set would align, and the energy would definitely be there for myself within the organization.
206 00:38:46.270 ⇒ 00:38:58.910 Johnathan’s iPhone: you know, part of it is timing. I’m curious on what your timing looks like, how soon you’re looking to… it sounds like you’re getting ready to try and, you know, send out some stuff for Q2, which would put it in a pinch now.
207 00:38:59.390 ⇒ 00:39:11.119 Uttam Kumaran: That’s fine. We’re always… we’re… we’re always behind, and we’re always ahead, so I’m not… I’m not here to… I don’t… we won’t rush decisions on team, because that’s the worst, so…
208 00:39:11.240 ⇒ 00:39:15.050 Uttam Kumaran: it’s… whether it’s Q2, whether it’s, like, Q2 plus 1, like, it…
209 00:39:15.360 ⇒ 00:39:21.360 Uttam Kumaran: whatever. Like, I guess more… more… I’m starting to… I’ve… I feel confident that I’ve identified this.
210 00:39:21.690 ⇒ 00:39:23.509 Uttam Kumaran: And I think we’re gonna make…
211 00:39:23.950 ⇒ 00:39:33.950 Uttam Kumaran: we’re… one thing I’m gonna propose to our… to our leadership crew, and our leadership team is that, like, I wanted to take some steps towards addressing this. So…
212 00:39:34.210 ⇒ 00:39:47.539 Uttam Kumaran: I think one thing that maybe could be helpful, and it’s an exercise, because we have a lot of roles in the company that just didn’t exist previously, so we… we basically… one process that I like going through is, like, can we co-author, like, a JD for this?
213 00:39:47.570 ⇒ 00:40:01.779 Uttam Kumaran: And can… can I get your input on, like, what some of the objectives could look like, what some of the requirements could look like, what some of the milestones could look like? We collaborate on that, and then we kind of see, like, okay, is this something that…
214 00:40:01.860 ⇒ 00:40:21.180 Uttam Kumaran: like, we’d want to do together. I… I certainly am in no interest to, like, rush anything, but we also, in the same breath, I will say, we move really fast, so, like, I… I… it’s like, we make… try to make as many decisions with as much conviction, and, like.
215 00:40:21.340 ⇒ 00:40:33.299 Uttam Kumaran: respect as possible, especially when we go into… when we go into new areas. But also, like, we’re… like, this business is changing, like, every, like, 60 days. It’s like…
216 00:40:33.620 ⇒ 00:40:38.540 Uttam Kumaran: stuff is moving, and so it is what it is, you know? .
217 00:40:38.540 ⇒ 00:40:39.210 Johnathan’s iPhone: Sure.
218 00:40:39.210 ⇒ 00:40:39.970 Uttam Kumaran: So…
219 00:40:40.740 ⇒ 00:40:51.830 Johnathan’s iPhone: Yeah, no, and I’m interested. I think, I like the problem set, I definitely feel like it’s… it’s something that I’m really good at, that I’ve done it repeatedly, creating this type of…
220 00:40:52.170 ⇒ 00:40:58.239 Johnathan’s iPhone: Structure without it being overbearing. So, yeah, I’m interested.
221 00:40:58.500 ⇒ 00:41:04.049 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, and I think in particular, if I could ask you as something maybe to think about, is just, like.
222 00:41:04.080 ⇒ 00:41:15.189 Uttam Kumaran: let’s say you were to start fresh, and be able to do it, like, and lead it, like, what would you change compared to the environments that you previously are? I think that’s… that’s what I’m…
223 00:41:15.190 ⇒ 00:41:32.009 Uttam Kumaran: as I think we kind of co-author a scope, I think that’s what I’m most curious about, is like, let’s say you’re in the ultimate driver’s seat, because a lot of what you described, or what we discussed here, doesn’t exist. What are your expectations for me, and what are your expectations for yourself, and what are expectations for the team?
224 00:41:32.100 ⇒ 00:41:36.290 Uttam Kumaran: And, like, yeah, if you… considering you have a chance at, like.
225 00:41:36.410 ⇒ 00:41:46.090 Uttam Kumaran: molding this and owning this, like, how would you do things differently? I think that’s just a question maybe to mull over, and maybe that’s… that could be our next discussion, you know?
226 00:41:46.850 ⇒ 00:41:49.550 Johnathan’s iPhone: Yeah, no, I think, Len, I mean, I could tell you some things.
227 00:41:49.550 ⇒ 00:41:50.080 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, yeah.
228 00:41:50.080 ⇒ 00:42:00.139 Johnathan’s iPhone: But, you know, one, obviously when you’re talking about, you know, quality control and performance metrics, I’m sure they exist, right?
229 00:42:00.280 ⇒ 00:42:04.629 Johnathan’s iPhone: And that the data for those performance metrics are being collected.
230 00:42:04.810 ⇒ 00:42:09.970 Johnathan’s iPhone: But typically, you know, how I approach most situations like this is doing an assessment.
231 00:42:09.980 ⇒ 00:42:28.589 Johnathan’s iPhone: And the assessment is literally looking at, you know, current state, future state, identifying key gaps, and then any, risks, just like any problem that I do for, you know, project management, right? I’m gonna look at what the current state is, the future state, those risks.
232 00:42:28.590 ⇒ 00:42:28.970 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.
233 00:42:29.080 ⇒ 00:42:41.989 Johnathan’s iPhone: And then I’m gonna prioritize those. So, within the first 30, 60, 90 days, every time I step on anything new, my goal is to do the assessment within, you know, a week or two, identify low-hanging fruit.
234 00:42:41.990 ⇒ 00:42:49.600 Johnathan’s iPhone: And that low-hanging fruit is something where, you know, you could call it a whiz gif, where it’s the lowest.
235 00:42:49.610 ⇒ 00:42:56.779 Johnathan’s iPhone: you know, lowest level of effort with the highest return. Those things are usually… I do a top 5.
236 00:42:57.400 ⇒ 00:43:11.699 Johnathan’s iPhone: find the top 5 and say, hey, of these top 5, how easy is it for us to implement across the effort? Is it, you know, really that big a deal, or are we just over-complicating something? But that’s usually done in a prioritization
237 00:43:11.700 ⇒ 00:43:30.170 Johnathan’s iPhone: conversation where it’s leaders across the board that have an invested interest, say, like, hey, is this something that we really want to do? No? Cool. Well, then we’re going to get rid of it. You know, and doing that grooming, on those prioritized pieces to reprioritize, but also potentially identify unidentified risks.
238 00:43:30.290 ⇒ 00:43:44.710 Johnathan’s iPhone: So within the first 90 days is to see the knowns and the unknown… the known unknowns. And then after that, usually I’d probably say, in your instance, I would say you’re not going to want to start implementing due to
239 00:43:44.780 ⇒ 00:44:02.129 Johnathan’s iPhone: change saturation. You don’t want to do too much change too quickly, and then people get burnt out from too much change. Yeah. So, developing that change management plan to say, hey, here’s the implementation we’re gonna do. We’re not gonna do everything tomorrow, right? It’s not all gonna add value tomorrow.
240 00:44:02.130 ⇒ 00:44:13.670 Johnathan’s iPhone: But it will add value 6 months from now, so we’re gonna do an incremental deployment of it, you know, over the next, you know, I don’t know, 90 days, or 180 days, to make sure that we’re getting, one.
241 00:44:14.190 ⇒ 00:44:29.100 Johnathan’s iPhone: it started, and we’re not waiting. So I’d say, you know, one, that assessment, on the front end, that 90, you know, 30, 60, 90-day plan, and then having… I develop roadmaps, really quickly,
242 00:44:29.200 ⇒ 00:44:45.200 Johnathan’s iPhone: and saying, hey, here’s the plan for the year, right? Because, you know, I find that if I can get out in front of it, and even if I have to change, people see, hey, you know, he’s got a roadmap for a year, then really what I have is,
243 00:44:46.090 ⇒ 00:44:58.710 Johnathan’s iPhone: I have their attention, and what they know to expect, right? So, usually that’s… that’s what I walk away with in the first, I would say, 30 days, is a roadmap. It’s a draft, right? I always say…
244 00:44:58.710 ⇒ 00:44:59.179 Uttam Kumaran: Yes, yes.
245 00:44:59.180 ⇒ 00:45:01.509 Johnathan’s iPhone: crap. But, yeah.
246 00:45:01.900 ⇒ 00:45:02.960 Johnathan’s iPhone: Yeah.
247 00:45:03.330 ⇒ 00:45:06.790 Johnathan’s iPhone: Okay. I would say, aside from a ramble, that’s, that’s…
248 00:45:06.790 ⇒ 00:45:07.290 Uttam Kumaran: Okay.
249 00:45:07.290 ⇒ 00:45:08.780 Johnathan’s iPhone: That’s how I approach everything.
250 00:45:09.490 ⇒ 00:45:29.070 Uttam Kumaran: maybe as a good next step, how about I just, like, take thoughts on this conversation and just throw it into a doc that we can collaborate on? I think the path towards, like, co-authoring a JD around this role, like, would be really, really helpful for me. I’m continuing to try to fill out as
251 00:45:29.300 ⇒ 00:45:33.929 Uttam Kumaran: as I can, all of those standards, so, so, you know.
252 00:45:34.220 ⇒ 00:45:50.250 Uttam Kumaran: like, the environment exists where there are those, and there’s a perspective on those. So, you know, the worst thing is if you have to come do both. And so, like, that’s my job, is to set, sort of, like, what the expectations are, give examples of good and bad.
253 00:45:50.250 ⇒ 00:45:59.810 Uttam Kumaran: And then, like, we can kind of work together to… to see how that all fits into a JD. That’s sort of what I’m working on right now. So, I think if that’s a good next step.
254 00:45:59.880 ⇒ 00:46:07.090 Uttam Kumaran: I mean, I would love to try to get that together. Maybe we can talk again next week, or I can try to send that over as soon as we can.
255 00:46:07.940 ⇒ 00:46:10.110 Johnathan’s iPhone: Yeah, the sooner the better. Cool.
256 00:46:10.490 ⇒ 00:46:15.529 Johnathan’s iPhone: I’m down to draft whatever you need to as well, like that. I do that all the time anyway, so…
257 00:46:15.640 ⇒ 00:46:18.830 Johnathan’s iPhone: Okay. Yeah.
258 00:46:19.650 ⇒ 00:46:20.260 Uttam Kumaran: Okay.
259 00:46:20.580 ⇒ 00:46:21.380 Uttam Kumaran: Perfect.
260 00:46:21.540 ⇒ 00:46:24.120 Uttam Kumaran: Thank you, sir, this is very, very helpful.
261 00:46:24.120 ⇒ 00:46:25.240 Johnathan’s iPhone: Yeah, definitely, man.
262 00:46:25.240 ⇒ 00:46:31.429 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, appreciate it. Okay, I’ll, I’ll shoot you a text for, sort of, next steps, and then, yeah, thank you again for the time today.
263 00:46:31.920 ⇒ 00:46:33.100 Johnathan’s iPhone: Definitely, thank you.
264 00:46:33.100 ⇒ 00:46:34.510 Uttam Kumaran: Okay, alright, talk to you soon.
265 00:46:34.840 ⇒ 00:46:35.470 Johnathan’s iPhone: Bye-bye.