2026-03-27_brainforge_weekly_sync_and_planning

Meeting Title: Brainforge Weekly Sync and Planning Date: 2026-03-27 Meeting participants: Greg Stoutenburg, Brylle Girang, Pranav, Uttam Kumaran

WEBVTT

1 00:00:38.320 ⇒ 00:00:39.400 Brylle Girang: Hello!

2 00:00:40.280 ⇒ 00:00:42.450 Greg Stoutenburg: Hey, B! Happy Friday, how’s it going?

3 00:00:42.860 ⇒ 00:00:44.380 Brylle Girang: Happy Friday!

4 00:00:44.660 ⇒ 00:00:46.120 Brylle Girang: Going great!

5 00:00:47.280 ⇒ 00:00:48.759 Greg Stoutenburg: That’s the energy I want to hear.

6 00:00:50.410 ⇒ 00:00:58.359 Brylle Girang: Oh, Greg, I might need your help maybe next week, once you have free time, to go through the learning curriculums that I have prepared.

7 00:00:58.360 ⇒ 00:00:59.570 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah, thank you.

8 00:01:00.250 ⇒ 00:01:01.410 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah, I’m…

9 00:01:01.720 ⇒ 00:01:20.460 Greg Stoutenburg: my Slack, my Slack activity notification is up to… we’re in the mid-30s now, so, sorry, sorry. I had set a reminder to get back to you on that today. I was like, alright, this doesn’t sound like a… this sounds important, but not urgent, so I’m gonna give it, give it a minute, but now, you know, the minute has come.

10 00:01:21.390 ⇒ 00:01:27.910 Brylle Girang: Yeah, no worries, yeah, I know that you have been, you know, juggling both and elements, so… totally fine.

11 00:01:28.080 ⇒ 00:01:35.900 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah, cool. Alright, let me… Find… something.

12 00:01:35.900 ⇒ 00:01:43.899 Brylle Girang: Well, I think the plan is good. I might send more resources over to you, and I’m going to share it.

13 00:01:44.470 ⇒ 00:01:52.230 Brylle Girang: after, which includes the actual curriculum, like, what are we actually training them for? What are the… Yes, good. What I’m actually…

14 00:01:52.600 ⇒ 00:01:54.279 Brylle Girang: Trying for them to learn.

15 00:01:54.440 ⇒ 00:01:59.370 Brylle Girang: So I think that’s where… You can give me the best insights.

16 00:02:00.390 ⇒ 00:02:04.430 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah, that sounds… that… that sounds great. Happy to do that.

17 00:02:04.630 ⇒ 00:02:07.610 Greg Stoutenburg: Sorry, one second.

18 00:02:08.680 ⇒ 00:02:09.690 Pranav: What’s up, guys?

19 00:02:10.280 ⇒ 00:02:11.270 Greg Stoutenburg: Hey, what’s up, Rob?

20 00:02:11.270 ⇒ 00:02:12.040 Brylle Girang: enough.

21 00:02:12.430 ⇒ 00:02:14.270 Pranav: Nothing much, nothing much.

22 00:02:29.750 ⇒ 00:02:32.630 Greg Stoutenburg: This is one of those days where, like, I open my Slack DMs.

23 00:02:33.090 ⇒ 00:02:44.019 Greg Stoutenburg: And I go to click on one, but it’s such a busy day that by the time… in the amount of time it takes me to do this motion, like, a new one has come in, and I clicked the wrong thing, like, no! Go back!

24 00:02:44.520 ⇒ 00:02:45.710 Pranav: That’s crazy.

25 00:02:45.710 ⇒ 00:02:47.149 Greg Stoutenburg: Slow down, people!

26 00:02:47.950 ⇒ 00:02:51.060 Pranav: Where… who’s, who’s pushing those threads?

27 00:02:51.330 ⇒ 00:02:55.169 Greg Stoutenburg: This is stakeholders at default right now.

28 00:02:55.170 ⇒ 00:02:56.070 Pranav: Okay.

29 00:02:56.070 ⇒ 00:03:04.260 Greg Stoutenburg: And I told Amber that if I take too long to reply to something in the client channel, to DM me. So she’s doing what I asked.

30 00:03:05.190 ⇒ 00:03:07.889 Greg Stoutenburg: But it is resulting in some DMs.

31 00:03:07.890 ⇒ 00:03:08.410 Pranav: Yeah.

32 00:03:08.410 ⇒ 00:03:12.120 Greg Stoutenburg: Where did this go? There it is, okay. Demolade.

33 00:03:15.470 ⇒ 00:03:18.190 Greg Stoutenburg: 9 AM Wednesday, can we do it? Can we do it?

34 00:03:20.180 ⇒ 00:03:21.100 Greg Stoutenburg: No.

35 00:03:35.500 ⇒ 00:03:40.430 Greg Stoutenburg: Putting in a 12 on Wednesday… Confirmed.

36 00:03:43.420 ⇒ 00:03:45.089 Greg Stoutenburg: Do you guys have weekend plans?

37 00:03:47.920 ⇒ 00:03:48.315 Pranav: Oh.

38 00:03:50.460 ⇒ 00:03:52.630 Brylle Girang: We’re gonna watch Project Hail Mary.

39 00:03:53.350 ⇒ 00:03:54.659 Pranav: I just saw that last weekend.

40 00:03:54.660 ⇒ 00:03:57.819 Uttam Kumaran: I’m trying to read the book before I… before I watch it.

41 00:03:58.270 ⇒ 00:03:59.759 Uttam Kumaran: Try to, like, speed read the book.

42 00:04:00.220 ⇒ 00:04:02.580 Greg Stoutenburg: Oh, yeah, give me the,

43 00:04:02.840 ⇒ 00:04:05.629 Greg Stoutenburg: Give me the gist of it. I’m a Ryan Gosling fan.

44 00:04:06.120 ⇒ 00:04:07.990 Uttam Kumaran: Don’t give me the gist of it.

45 00:04:09.030 ⇒ 00:04:09.950 Greg Stoutenburg: Spoil it.

46 00:04:09.950 ⇒ 00:04:12.840 Uttam Kumaran: It’s a space move, it’s like the… probably like The Martian, or some type of…

47 00:04:12.840 ⇒ 00:04:13.440 Pranav: Yeah.

48 00:04:13.770 ⇒ 00:04:16.679 Greg Stoutenburg: Best cursor to summarize the last 15 minutes of the movie.

49 00:04:18.500 ⇒ 00:04:26.210 Brylle Girang: A lot of good reviews, though, so they’re saying that the visuals and the emotions are… are up top.

50 00:04:26.540 ⇒ 00:04:34.290 Brylle Girang: Well, if you’re speed… if you want to speedrun it, maybe get an audiobook and then have it run two times, right?

51 00:04:34.290 ⇒ 00:04:42.460 Greg Stoutenburg: You know, I hear about people doing things like that, and it’s like, let’s not use technology to just suck every bit of joy out of our lives, you know?

52 00:04:44.070 ⇒ 00:04:51.580 Greg Stoutenburg: I remember when I worked at Stack Overflow, the CPO was like, oh yeah, I’m a big reader, I get through about 400 books a year.

53 00:04:52.170 ⇒ 00:04:56.780 Greg Stoutenburg: I was thinking, well, you’re not… not by reading them, surely.

54 00:04:56.780 ⇒ 00:05:02.839 Uttam Kumaran: It seems like too much, like, I don’t like when people go too far on, like, like, for example, like.

55 00:05:03.350 ⇒ 00:05:07.679 Uttam Kumaran: I’ve… I could… I used to run a lot. I don’t like marathons. It’s like…

56 00:05:08.350 ⇒ 00:05:12.350 Uttam Kumaran: Who are you trying to prove what to? Like, I don’t want to be around a lot of people.

57 00:05:12.620 ⇒ 00:05:19.239 Uttam Kumaran: like, I’ve used to run, like, 10-15 miles, just run and come home, like, what do we gotta do this whole thing? Don’t take it to, like…

58 00:05:19.550 ⇒ 00:05:22.829 Uttam Kumaran: Don’t take it to some weird level. Just do the…

59 00:05:22.830 ⇒ 00:05:23.210 Greg Stoutenburg: work.

60 00:05:24.070 ⇒ 00:05:25.930 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, I think it’s going to…

61 00:05:25.930 ⇒ 00:05:26.590 Greg Stoutenburg: work, like.

62 00:05:26.800 ⇒ 00:05:32.290 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, it might not be, how much are you running, or how much are you running a week? Dude, I don’t know.

63 00:05:32.760 ⇒ 00:05:36.780 Uttam Kumaran: I don’t know. I just don’t… it doesn’t matter. Who cares?

64 00:05:36.780 ⇒ 00:05:37.950 Greg Stoutenburg: I’m winded when I go up the stairs.

65 00:05:37.950 ⇒ 00:05:39.630 Uttam Kumaran: Are you my boss? Like…

66 00:05:39.630 ⇒ 00:05:42.369 Greg Stoutenburg: Right. What’s your KPI for your.

67 00:05:42.370 ⇒ 00:05:49.170 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, I know, they’re like, oh, I’m running, I’m training for this, training for that. I’m like, you need friends, or, like, a hobby.

68 00:05:49.400 ⇒ 00:05:52.119 Uttam Kumaran: Like, running is not a hobby.

69 00:05:52.120 ⇒ 00:05:52.560 Greg Stoutenburg: Yup.

70 00:05:52.560 ⇒ 00:05:59.420 Pranav: People are literally, like, hobbling after, like, getting an IV, and I’m just like, you’re actually killing yourself. That’s what you’re doing.

71 00:05:59.420 ⇒ 00:06:09.430 Uttam Kumaran: It’s actually, like, really not good for you, is what they’re finding. It’s like, actually, just, like, walking on the treadmill at max incline is, like, way better.

72 00:06:09.710 ⇒ 00:06:12.079 Greg Stoutenburg: And just, like, with a weighted bag or something like that, yeah.

73 00:06:12.080 ⇒ 00:06:15.170 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, yeah, like, doing, like, a ruck… rucking or something.

74 00:06:15.250 ⇒ 00:06:16.220 Pranav: Yeah. Yeah.

75 00:06:16.220 ⇒ 00:06:17.000 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.

76 00:06:18.960 ⇒ 00:06:21.419 Uttam Kumaran: Okay, I mean, I feel like the company, like…

77 00:06:22.030 ⇒ 00:06:28.020 Uttam Kumaran: grew this week, like, in learning. I don’t know how you guys feel. I feel like I learned a lot.

78 00:06:28.190 ⇒ 00:06:30.840 Uttam Kumaran: I… I think I… I feel…

79 00:06:31.020 ⇒ 00:06:33.199 Uttam Kumaran: I’m really excited, I feel like I’ve…

80 00:06:33.500 ⇒ 00:06:36.530 Uttam Kumaran: Still late on a couple things, but… I’ve…

81 00:06:37.190 ⇒ 00:06:43.920 Uttam Kumaran: tried to push as much towards this, like, new sort of sense of delivery. I hope for you guys, it seems like there’s…

82 00:06:44.400 ⇒ 00:06:48.579 Uttam Kumaran: at least now… I mean, to put it one other way.

83 00:06:49.000 ⇒ 00:07:03.440 Uttam Kumaran: there is now at least patience around, like, hey, this thing wasn’t right, and here’s how the path is to getting it right. I think that was something that wasn’t there before, and I totally take responsibility. And I think, like, really in the past 3 weeks.

84 00:07:03.830 ⇒ 00:07:08.679 Uttam Kumaran: I was like, you’re… I was sort of like, yeah, I don’t think we’ve ever said, like, what right looks like.

85 00:07:09.100 ⇒ 00:07:12.939 Uttam Kumaran: sometimes, like, Robert and I, because we’ve seen it so many times, we’re almost like…

86 00:07:13.190 ⇒ 00:07:15.880 Uttam Kumaran: That was wrong, it should be this way, but instead.

87 00:07:16.220 ⇒ 00:07:30.149 Uttam Kumaran: and really, this is the fact, because you guys are on the team, I have now… my time needs to shift towards, like, let’s do it together, or did you consider this feedback? Or here’s the… here’s what you need to hit and, like, work with your team to accomplish it, and I feel like we’ve…

88 00:07:30.450 ⇒ 00:07:38.019 Uttam Kumaran: being… working with you guys this week, I feel a lot more confident that we have a path towards that. Like, even Greg, seeing, like.

89 00:07:38.150 ⇒ 00:07:46.350 Uttam Kumaran: the VetLink stuff, like, I think a couple weeks ago, I would have seen that message, and been actually like, damn, we like lost it. I’m like, actually, I think we like…

90 00:07:46.650 ⇒ 00:07:54.780 Uttam Kumaran: we, like, got better. Like, I feel like we… there’s… I think we got good feedback from sales. I think I have some good feedback on… yeah, like, I think…

91 00:07:55.320 ⇒ 00:08:08.080 Uttam Kumaran: we could have, instead of just being like, what did we do? Maybe we refer back to the original SOW, maybe we also just, like… there’s a couple of things I learned on, like, how we should run this process with sales, and it’s fun, because I can go to Robert and be like, you…

92 00:08:08.080 ⇒ 00:08:17.529 Uttam Kumaran: my job, and I’m gonna help this team give you as many DSOs, like, Delivery Source Opportunity as possible this quarter, and I feel like we’re…

93 00:08:17.660 ⇒ 00:08:21.460 Uttam Kumaran: Where we have, like, I feel like there’s a good path to that, you know?

94 00:08:21.830 ⇒ 00:08:24.630 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah, yeah, I do feel right now, like.

95 00:08:25.360 ⇒ 00:08:31.980 Greg Stoutenburg: enablement has… has started to come along, and I started to feel it some this week, between…

96 00:08:31.980 ⇒ 00:08:33.080 Uttam Kumaran: What do you mean? What do you mean, yeah.

97 00:08:33.080 ⇒ 00:08:52.710 Greg Stoutenburg: like, like, between you clearing out my calendar, because I was like, I was like, I don’t know when I would get to do this work. You know, like, some relief there, and then, like, just increased clarity about the different roles and responsibilities of, like, CSO versus SL versus IC. That has really helped a lot, and because…

98 00:08:52.710 ⇒ 00:09:10.509 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah, yeah, I’d have days where I’d look at the calendar and just be like, oh my god, like, what am… like, when am I supposed to do all this work? And, like, no, the answer is I’m supposed to ticket it out for Mustafa, and then review the output, and I’m supposed to take it out for Amber, and review the output, or just, like, say, like, hey, here’s what I want you to do in Slack, and you ticket it out, and…

99 00:09:10.510 ⇒ 00:09:13.519 Uttam Kumaran: And it’s actually, it’s an exchange of services, like, they need you.

100 00:09:13.820 ⇒ 00:09:14.350 Greg Stoutenburg: Right.

101 00:09:14.350 ⇒ 00:09:17.830 Uttam Kumaran: And then I need you, and it’s, like, it’s actually, like…

102 00:09:18.060 ⇒ 00:09:23.820 Uttam Kumaran: I feel like I can see the different parts of the machine leaning on each other versus, like…

103 00:09:23.820 ⇒ 00:09:24.430 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah.

104 00:09:24.590 ⇒ 00:09:33.900 Uttam Kumaran: And it makes sense, because, guys, we used to just be, like, 5 people, 6 people, like, and I’m like, it’s just in the ether, I’m like, now it’s like, that’s, like, one team, and so…

105 00:09:33.900 ⇒ 00:09:34.300 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah.

106 00:09:34.300 ⇒ 00:09:50.719 Uttam Kumaran: I feel like I’m bummed that I… I didn’t, like, do this earlier, but that’s usually how I feel, and so I feel like any time is good as now to, like, sort of refine this, and it is… it is giving me a lot of hope and a lot of, like, space as well, because…

107 00:09:50.960 ⇒ 00:09:59.020 Uttam Kumaran: I am like, okay, how do I manage the portfolio? I’m like, how do I give all of you guys clarity? How do I help set goals

108 00:09:59.420 ⇒ 00:10:10.839 Uttam Kumaran: and tie money to that, and help you achieve that, right? It’s all I’m thinking about. And it’s hard to do that with, like, an hour or two a day at, like, 9 o’clock. So that’s also where I’m, like.

109 00:10:11.260 ⇒ 00:10:20.119 Uttam Kumaran: if, like, if I know, like, default’s going well, if I know Element’s going well, I think, for now, this week, I feel so much more confident on Andy. I think I’ll be looking into, like.

110 00:10:20.320 ⇒ 00:10:25.650 Uttam Kumaran: seeing the same thing on Eden. Like, I really get peace of mind to go, like.

111 00:10:26.230 ⇒ 00:10:28.969 Uttam Kumaran: Think about, like, the future, and again, like.

112 00:10:29.210 ⇒ 00:10:39.159 Uttam Kumaran: I’m also like, okay, if we can do this, then I’m like, okay, we can work with a contract 3 times our size, how does that change things? You know, and so I… that’s how, like.

113 00:10:39.310 ⇒ 00:10:43.130 Uttam Kumaran: Me getting freed up is also, like, coming back to help the company, you know?

114 00:10:44.000 ⇒ 00:10:45.250 Greg Stoutenburg: Yes. Yes.

115 00:10:45.420 ⇒ 00:10:51.920 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah, fully agree. How do you think… how do you think Element is doing?

116 00:10:53.210 ⇒ 00:10:58.099 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, I mean, so Robert spent some time with her yesterday. I think the way we’re gonna go…

117 00:10:58.220 ⇒ 00:11:04.269 Uttam Kumaran: is that I basically said this is actually, like, a primary… primarily a strategy project.

118 00:11:04.380 ⇒ 00:11:16.749 Uttam Kumaran: Like, what’s… but if you look at our original SOW, it didn’t read that way. Like, what we… what she wanted us to come do is come and do discovery and come land the first data and build the first models. Quickly.

119 00:11:16.990 ⇒ 00:11:21.520 Uttam Kumaran: she… we realized that, like, I don’t think she has much context on that, or cares about that.

120 00:11:21.700 ⇒ 00:11:27.499 Uttam Kumaran: And so, actually, this is a project that squarely is needs to be driven by the strategy team. So.

121 00:11:27.770 ⇒ 00:11:39.840 Uttam Kumaran: in terms of that, like, what… couple things that I want to change. One, there’s a hot chance that Robert comes in and, like, kind of leads this longer term, or basically Robert slash Jasmine, primarily Jasmine.

122 00:11:40.020 ⇒ 00:11:41.409 Uttam Kumaran: Because…

123 00:11:41.620 ⇒ 00:11:58.570 Uttam Kumaran: all Shivani cares about is the appearance, and the strategy, and the actual end-state analytics, and then I’ll… me and Awash and whoever will just keep cruising. Because actually, we’ve done a… like, I called Robert, I said, yo, we crushed this. Literally, it’s been me and Awash, we developed so much shit.

124 00:11:58.690 ⇒ 00:12:00.339 Uttam Kumaran: Like, this is the b- like…

125 00:12:00.740 ⇒ 00:12:15.530 Uttam Kumaran: I, like, blew this out of the water. It’s except for, like, the fact that I don’t think she has appreciation for that, and then there’s all this communication gap, which I said, fine. But, like, that’s not my service. Like, I was like, Robert, like, you or guys are strategy analytics.

126 00:12:15.620 ⇒ 00:12:23.530 Uttam Kumaran: So, you guys are now also the next biggest team, so I think with Jasmine joining, I don’t know, did you guys talk to Garrett at all?

127 00:12:24.510 ⇒ 00:12:25.230 Pranav: Yup.

128 00:12:25.230 ⇒ 00:12:26.969 Greg Stoutenburg: I think yesterday was the first time I saw that name.

129 00:12:27.140 ⇒ 00:12:33.319 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, so Garrett, is also, this guy, one of Kayla’s referrals,

130 00:12:33.680 ⇒ 00:12:42.869 Uttam Kumaran: like, another, like, a data project manager from Disney, so he’ll be joining and sort of coming on this project. So we’re gonna… basically gonna give her, like.

131 00:12:43.420 ⇒ 00:12:46.820 Uttam Kumaran: Give them what they want, which is a lot of people at the strategy level.

132 00:12:46.820 ⇒ 00:12:47.470 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah.

133 00:12:47.470 ⇒ 00:12:48.030 Uttam Kumaran: The…

134 00:12:48.240 ⇒ 00:12:53.100 Uttam Kumaran: Greg, the modeling and shit is so easy, like, this is stuff, like, I just could do in my sleep.

135 00:12:53.510 ⇒ 00:12:54.080 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah.

136 00:12:54.080 ⇒ 00:13:04.219 Uttam Kumaran: I just, like, wish I could just go do that. Like, Awash is doing this, doing all that with, like, one arm, you know? And so, it’s great, it’s great. So, we’re gonna stack the top.

137 00:13:04.320 ⇒ 00:13:12.569 Uttam Kumaran: we’re gonna stack the strategy team a lot more, and then… yeah, and then it’s… yeah, I think it’s gonna be good. And it’s also, like.

138 00:13:14.240 ⇒ 00:13:18.869 Uttam Kumaran: basically what I call robber is, like, this is a huge distraction, like, this is not worth…

139 00:13:19.170 ⇒ 00:13:20.130 Uttam Kumaran: This is, like.

140 00:13:20.310 ⇒ 00:13:27.460 Uttam Kumaran: I’ve probably… the company’s probably lost hundreds of thousands of dollars in me getting distracted with, like, getting these phone calls.

141 00:13:27.910 ⇒ 00:13:32.399 Uttam Kumaran: figuring this out. And this is a $15,000 contract until now.

142 00:13:32.700 ⇒ 00:13:37.879 Uttam Kumaran: this can’t happen, because ultimately, if this is a distraction, I will go find us another element.

143 00:13:38.150 ⇒ 00:13:38.470 Greg Stoutenburg: Right?

144 00:13:38.470 ⇒ 00:13:47.840 Uttam Kumaran: Like, in the time that this person’s calling on the phone. Like, that’s actually, like, now it’s kind of interesting, because I have to really think about my time

145 00:13:47.950 ⇒ 00:13:57.099 Uttam Kumaran: Like, just like a battering ram in some direction. So, I also just only have, like, let’s say… let’s say on a great day, I have…

146 00:13:57.150 ⇒ 00:14:16.320 Uttam Kumaran: the 10 hours that I’m working. That’s it, right? And, like, that’s just, like, 50 a week, and, like, the company needs me to go fucking ham in some direction. Throw all our weight and, like, open up a door, open up a company, open up an industry. Like, I cannot be…

147 00:14:16.510 ⇒ 00:14:27.210 Uttam Kumaran: on the… like, it’s just not a good use for the whole company for me to be there. And it’s even weird for me to say that, but I’m noticing that. I’m like, if I’m on a call and this is not worth my time, like…

148 00:14:27.750 ⇒ 00:14:33.449 Uttam Kumaran: like, I’m gonna go, because I’m… in an hour or two, I may go find us another 10, 20 grand somewhere, sitting somewhere.

149 00:14:34.040 ⇒ 00:14:37.669 Uttam Kumaran: So, in that sense, we are beefing up the…

150 00:14:38.170 ⇒ 00:14:41.549 Uttam Kumaran: One, you guys are seeing how much we’re recruiting, we’re beefing up the team a lot.

151 00:14:42.110 ⇒ 00:14:46.689 Uttam Kumaran: I… I think one thing I can… I would want to tell you guys there is keep a really high bar.

152 00:14:46.880 ⇒ 00:14:49.640 Uttam Kumaran: I have a feeling we are moving…

153 00:14:49.890 ⇒ 00:14:53.000 Uttam Kumaran: People… we are moving too many people to final round.

154 00:14:53.450 ⇒ 00:15:00.159 Uttam Kumaran: It’s not a… it’s not like a… it’s a hit on us culturally to really be like, is this person, like, impressive?

155 00:15:00.460 ⇒ 00:15:03.639 Uttam Kumaran: Right? Versus, is this person okay?

156 00:15:03.720 ⇒ 00:15:22.490 Uttam Kumaran: And it’s… this is a… it’s a demeanor change for us, and I also am not good at that, like, I… I tend to be like, okay, this person has signs that they could get there, let’s go, versus we just have… we have to actually flip it completely. So the… the first and second interviews, I’m gonna be pushing Kayla to say, like, if…

157 00:15:23.000 ⇒ 00:15:34.900 Uttam Kumaran: If, like, 50% of the people make it through those, like, that’s not a strict enough interview, because our supply side is increasing. Kayla is really good at going and finding people, and there’s a lot of people on the market, which means the funnel just has to be, like.

158 00:15:34.900 ⇒ 00:15:35.310 Greg Stoutenburg: No.

159 00:15:35.310 ⇒ 00:15:42.910 Uttam Kumaran: super tight. So that’s the thing on the recruiting side. These are all people that are gonna be working for you, or on your team, or with you, like, you’re not impressed by them.

160 00:15:43.610 ⇒ 00:15:44.370 Uttam Kumaran: Bye.

161 00:15:44.860 ⇒ 00:15:46.890 Uttam Kumaran: Say no, who cares, whatever, it’s…

162 00:15:47.260 ⇒ 00:15:58.250 Pranav: how much leeway can we have, like, on these interviews? We’re just asking, like, what we feel like we want to ask, because I know there’s, like, a rubric of, like, certain topics,

163 00:15:58.550 ⇒ 00:16:00.079 Pranav: sometimes I’m like…

164 00:16:00.540 ⇒ 00:16:06.920 Pranav: is that the best thing to be asking right now? And, like, I’ve kind of formed, like, my own interview where I’m, like, asking them specific.

165 00:16:06.920 ⇒ 00:16:09.820 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, Greg, what do you… what do you think about that before I go?

166 00:16:09.820 ⇒ 00:16:11.630 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah, I started, so…

167 00:16:11.730 ⇒ 00:16:25.820 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah, I mean, initially, I was… I was pretty by the book, just answering the questions that were tied to the job description, because I thought, like, alright, you know, I’m being asked for my opinion, but also to work through this process, so fine. Yeah. And now I go… I mean, I make sure to ask, like, a couple of those questions, but then…

168 00:16:25.980 ⇒ 00:16:42.680 Greg Stoutenburg: I just start asking for more clarification, pointing to the things that I think sound like their strengths to hear more about it, asking about things that I think might be weaknesses to hear more about it. So, I’ve started going off-script more, and it’s been… I think I’ve gotten more insight from it, and it’s also been more fun. So…

169 00:16:42.860 ⇒ 00:16:43.720 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah.

170 00:16:43.720 ⇒ 00:16:45.919 Pranav: Yeah, yeah, yeah, and… Yeah, ultimately, I think…

171 00:16:45.920 ⇒ 00:16:52.530 Uttam Kumaran: But, like, if I… yeah, if I could say the most drastic part of that is, like, if you guys remember interviewing me, I call and I just sort of, like.

172 00:16:52.740 ⇒ 00:16:53.840 Uttam Kumaran: See what’s up.

173 00:16:54.110 ⇒ 00:17:02.630 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah. And, like, but that’s because, like, I was the only one in the process, and so I am, like, trying to hit at different angles.

174 00:17:03.330 ⇒ 00:17:09.470 Uttam Kumaran: And then, if I don’t hit the technical angle, then I’m like, okay, someone, can you talk about that? If it’s only technical, then I’m like, someone do the… but…

175 00:17:09.540 ⇒ 00:17:24.270 Uttam Kumaran: I was so, like, all over the place, that now the big thing, I think, to think about is, like, I don’t mind people having their own interview process, but the way I will ground you is you should see the thing, the principles we are trying to find out about them.

176 00:17:24.270 ⇒ 00:17:24.800 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah.

177 00:17:24.800 ⇒ 00:17:38.630 Uttam Kumaran: Reading the questions verbatim are just suggestions. In fact, if that’s, like, distracting, then we should remove them, but those… those things, and actually, I think we’ll start to morph our standards into the interview process, are the things you’re looking for. However you get there, what we’re looking for is, like.

178 00:17:38.630 ⇒ 00:17:47.000 Uttam Kumaran: did we try… how many of these did we qualify them? And, like, what is your perspective, right? But ultimately, like, you don’t want to leave an interview with a…

179 00:17:47.430 ⇒ 00:17:48.800 Uttam Kumaran: Like, a maybe.

180 00:17:49.320 ⇒ 00:17:50.820 Uttam Kumaran: Alright, that’s tough.

181 00:17:50.820 ⇒ 00:17:51.140 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah.

182 00:17:51.140 ⇒ 00:17:54.429 Uttam Kumaran: Because then… then, if it comes down to a tiebreaker or something, you’re like.

183 00:17:54.830 ⇒ 00:18:08.060 Uttam Kumaran: Shit, I don’t know. So, part of it is, like, if you have your own process, like, do it, and I come to a… come to a conclusion that you can defend, because ultimately, like, it may be two weeks later where you’re like, hey.

184 00:18:08.160 ⇒ 00:18:11.079 Uttam Kumaran: We’re still debating this person, and if you’re like,

185 00:18:11.420 ⇒ 00:18:13.950 Uttam Kumaran: I don’t know, I, like, my notes are generic.

186 00:18:14.360 ⇒ 00:18:17.230 Uttam Kumaran: kind of feel like I don’t really remember that person, then we sh…

187 00:18:17.450 ⇒ 00:18:19.480 Uttam Kumaran: You know, they may… they may be lost.

188 00:18:20.600 ⇒ 00:18:21.210 Pranav: Yeah.

189 00:18:24.250 ⇒ 00:18:28.739 Pranav: how I’m kind of thinking about how I can also maybe start thinking about it, too, is like…

190 00:18:29.020 ⇒ 00:18:36.780 Pranav: how did they fit, like, on our current delivery team? And I think with our questions, they’re very generic, you know? So they don’t really think about, like.

191 00:18:36.900 ⇒ 00:18:41.129 Pranav: who did they compare to? Like, if I’m like, oh, this person, like, seems like…

192 00:18:41.640 ⇒ 00:18:54.909 Pranav: they remind me a lot in, like, their technical acumen of, like, Casey, and just also, like, with the responsiveness of Casey, or, like, Mustafa, or, like, they have, like, the SL-type knowledge.

193 00:18:54.910 ⇒ 00:18:55.280 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.

194 00:18:55.280 ⇒ 00:18:55.880 Pranav: Excellent.

195 00:18:56.070 ⇒ 00:19:01.450 Pranav: Or even maybe another thing is just like, oh, this is a gap that I’m seeing in the delivery team.

196 00:19:01.840 ⇒ 00:19:03.800 Pranav: And then, painting it out.

197 00:19:04.540 ⇒ 00:19:12.759 Pranav: it’s almost like I already make my decision of, like, if I like them or not, and I think they should move on to the final round, and then I kind of fill out the rubric, you know?

198 00:19:12.760 ⇒ 00:19:13.570 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah.

199 00:19:13.570 ⇒ 00:19:14.140 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.

200 00:19:14.140 ⇒ 00:19:24.479 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah, yeah. I sometimes feel bad, like, I don’t want to be too subjective and just go, like, is this someone who would appear in… is this someone I would hang out with? But I actually think that

201 00:19:24.650 ⇒ 00:19:27.379 Greg Stoutenburg: Feeling an amount of, like, clicking with a.

202 00:19:27.380 ⇒ 00:19:27.840 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.

203 00:19:27.840 ⇒ 00:19:31.629 Greg Stoutenburg: You know? Yeah. So yeah.

204 00:19:31.630 ⇒ 00:19:35.669 Uttam Kumaran: Like, there’s a lot of assholes in this world that are really good at their job. Doesn’t mean they have to work here.

205 00:19:35.670 ⇒ 00:19:39.089 Greg Stoutenburg: Right. They would get fives on all the… every part of the scorecard.

206 00:19:39.090 ⇒ 00:19:43.950 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, there’s other companies for those people, you know? That’s… so that’s the thing, everything matters.

207 00:19:44.380 ⇒ 00:19:44.880 Greg Stoutenburg: And…

208 00:19:44.880 ⇒ 00:20:00.710 Uttam Kumaran: this is, like, as you guys can see, like, there’s sometimes these longer things, and then there’s sometimes these, like, yo, we all kind of need to be on the same page and care. I think it all matters. I think, really, it’s just, like, having the defensibility. Sometimes you won’t be able to put a pin in, like, what it is.

209 00:20:00.880 ⇒ 00:20:12.419 Uttam Kumaran: But… but again, it’s like, that person’s interviewing to work here, too. It’s not just, like, us trying to, like, save them. So part of it is, like, you’re gonna see, we’re gonna have a lot of people wanna work here, and…

210 00:20:12.490 ⇒ 00:20:22.119 Uttam Kumaran: ideally, our funnel should work in a way that just the best survive, you know? And that’s what I want to see. Like, I want to see that if people make it to the top.

211 00:20:22.250 ⇒ 00:20:25.110 Uttam Kumaran: most of those people are getting in, right? Like…

212 00:20:25.110 ⇒ 00:20:25.690 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah, I know.

213 00:20:25.690 ⇒ 00:20:30.940 Uttam Kumaran: We should qualify faster, because it’s, like, 5-10 hours, you know, for every single person, you know, sometimes.

214 00:20:31.030 ⇒ 00:20:32.100 Pranav: Yeah.

215 00:20:32.100 ⇒ 00:20:35.750 Uttam Kumaran: Cool.

216 00:20:35.750 ⇒ 00:20:38.260 Pranav: One thing that, Greg was talking about before with, like.

217 00:20:38.430 ⇒ 00:20:50.149 Pranav: finding when he can, like, hand things off to KZ, hand things off to Amber, like, I’m noticing that with me, too, this week, like, okay, this is where I’m like, okay, Sam, this is you. Or like…

218 00:20:50.150 ⇒ 00:20:50.800 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah.

219 00:20:50.800 ⇒ 00:20:51.160 Pranav: Yeah.

220 00:20:51.160 ⇒ 00:20:55.000 Uttam Kumaran: How are you tracking, like, follow-ups on that stuff, though? That’s where I have trouble, is I’m like.

221 00:20:55.000 ⇒ 00:20:55.979 Greg Stoutenburg: That is hard.

222 00:20:56.210 ⇒ 00:20:58.269 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, so I don’t know, like, what you guys…

223 00:20:58.660 ⇒ 00:21:01.900 Uttam Kumaran: This is something that, like, I was gonna try to talk about next week, but, like.

224 00:21:02.290 ⇒ 00:21:09.790 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, it’s tough, like, I’m… I feel like I’m just always, like, I did follow up on this, and I look back, and I’m like, I guess I just didn’t send a second message.

225 00:21:10.080 ⇒ 00:21:26.910 Uttam Kumaran: I feel like if I… my solve is, like, just to try to… for me to get so much deeper into linear, and, like, almost just, like, run my whole day out of linear. Like, literally, being cursor and, like, tell me what I should follow up on. Anytime there’s something that comes up, make sure there’s a ticket.

226 00:21:26.970 ⇒ 00:21:33.580 Uttam Kumaran: like, I’m not doing a good enough job of spending enough time in linear, like, I’m setting it up, and I feel good about it, but then…

227 00:21:33.760 ⇒ 00:21:41.819 Uttam Kumaran: I’m not running my day-to-day out of it, because I’m kind of, like, spazzing all over the place. I think that’s what I need to do, but I don’t know, I’m interested, like, what you guys think.

228 00:21:43.090 ⇒ 00:21:46.009 Greg Stoutenburg: I agree, and that’s something I’ve been thinking about, because, like.

229 00:21:46.670 ⇒ 00:22:00.970 Greg Stoutenburg: you know, this is joking to me when this… this, this meeting started, and I’m like, at the start of this meeting, I had, like, 35 activity notifications in Slack, and this is… I mean, this is, like, Amber over here on Element Stuff, and Advait replying, and then, you know, over here.

230 00:22:00.970 ⇒ 00:22:01.300 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.

231 00:22:01.300 ⇒ 00:22:04.449 Greg Stoutenburg: There’s, you know, God knows what, you know?

232 00:22:04.450 ⇒ 00:22:05.120 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

233 00:22:05.120 ⇒ 00:22:14.960 Greg Stoutenburg: And I feel like I’m going through the day just, like, clicking through threads and thinking, oh, I had just started on something in this thread, and then there was a call, and now I need to go find it again, but in the meantime, I get interrupted by something else.

234 00:22:15.120 ⇒ 00:22:30.010 Greg Stoutenburg: And I’m thinking, okay, as of right now, you know, and I said in a private channel, right, like, I’m, like, over capacity with these four things, and I know a lot of it is just, like, a certain kind of disorganization that I can get a grasp on, but it’s gonna have to require

235 00:22:30.010 ⇒ 00:22:35.939 Greg Stoutenburg: I can’t just rely on my memory and Slack, because, it’s all over the place, and there’s new things.

236 00:22:35.940 ⇒ 00:22:36.370 Uttam Kumaran: Yes.

237 00:22:36.370 ⇒ 00:22:36.860 Greg Stoutenburg: all the time.

238 00:22:36.860 ⇒ 00:22:39.689 Uttam Kumaran: Yes, and this is where, like, I think you can rely

239 00:22:39.900 ⇒ 00:22:59.109 Uttam Kumaran: like, to put, like, my platform team hat on, I’m gonna do my best to make it easier, but ultimately, we only have a certain amount of threads as, like, humans, and I’m telling you, like, if you are not doing a good job, like, muting channels that you don’t care about, or you don’t ever contribute to, and, like.

240 00:22:59.340 ⇒ 00:23:01.729 Uttam Kumaran: If you’re not doing a good job at, like.

241 00:23:01.980 ⇒ 00:23:19.930 Uttam Kumaran: basically trying to turn off Slack for, like, either 30-minute chunks at a time. Like, I’m telling you, these are all… and then… and then the second… last piece is, like, trying to operate everything out of linear, like, always being like, where’s that ticket? What is it? Yeah. It’s gonna be really hard, and I learned this just through, like, years and years of startups.

242 00:23:19.930 ⇒ 00:23:25.299 Uttam Kumaran: that run on Slack, that do this type of shit, it’s like, you can find that your days just go by.

243 00:23:25.460 ⇒ 00:23:26.569 Uttam Kumaran: And I…

244 00:23:26.690 ⇒ 00:23:31.690 Uttam Kumaran: unfortunately for me, like, you guys see how fast I am on Slack, because there are some things that…

245 00:23:31.960 ⇒ 00:23:34.359 Uttam Kumaran: Really, like, the fact that we are quick.

246 00:23:34.510 ⇒ 00:23:42.029 Uttam Kumaran: on certain things is our edge, but, like, I… but there’s also… I also mute a lot of channels, like, heard how, like, the Andy stuff is going well, I’m like, cool.

247 00:23:42.350 ⇒ 00:23:57.639 Uttam Kumaran: Until it doesn’t go well, it’s gonna stay muted. And then, like, I do… I do those sorts of things. Also, like, I… I mean, I don’t really get FOMO about missing stuff. I can see how people maybe want to get tapped in on other things. I think just pick. Just pick, like, hey, I want to stay in tune with how sales is going.

248 00:23:57.800 ⇒ 00:24:00.620 Uttam Kumaran: But ultimately, You could just also be like.

249 00:24:01.170 ⇒ 00:24:10.310 Uttam Kumaran: hey, I would love to get a review from the sales team once a week, or something, or, you know, I’ll bring that to you. So, your attention is, like, really your currency right now. It’s gonna get worse and worse.

250 00:24:10.530 ⇒ 00:24:14.569 Uttam Kumaran: So, like, we use AI, and AI starts sending notifications, like, just really…

251 00:24:15.270 ⇒ 00:24:21.539 Uttam Kumaran: just really try to focus on that. And that’s something… one of the presentations I wanted to give is sort of, like, how to do…

252 00:24:21.680 ⇒ 00:24:30.510 Uttam Kumaran: sort of time management in, like, this, like, sort of, like, hyper-notification work style. It’s something I thought about for, like, my whole career.

253 00:24:30.950 ⇒ 00:24:33.409 Uttam Kumaran: It’s really tough, though. You have to really manage.

254 00:24:33.640 ⇒ 00:24:40.539 Uttam Kumaran: So, you tell me how, like, I can help, whether it’s, like, maybe every month we, like, as a group, like, turn shit off.

255 00:24:40.870 ⇒ 00:24:45.940 Uttam Kumaran: Like, I don’t… yeah, or whatever. I’m trying also, you know?

256 00:24:46.830 ⇒ 00:25:00.579 Greg Stoutenburg: Something I know I need to do is, I think as… I think where I’m CSO, I just need to set clear expectations for the team, and just be like, you know, here’s the sort of thing I’m going to assign out, here’s the kind of response I want back.

257 00:25:00.580 ⇒ 00:25:09.729 Greg Stoutenburg: Here’s the kind of summary I want, you know, whether… like, for example, every day, and it doesn’t even need to be a big lift, just, like, Amber’s good about this already, for example. Like…

258 00:25:09.810 ⇒ 00:25:17.139 Greg Stoutenburg: At the end of the day, I want to see what you completed, what’s in progress, and what, you need to do tomorrow.

259 00:25:17.250 ⇒ 00:25:17.859 Greg Stoutenburg: For example.

260 00:25:17.860 ⇒ 00:25:18.400 Uttam Kumaran: Yes.

261 00:25:18.400 ⇒ 00:25:36.019 Greg Stoutenburg: Because I can’t chase all of these threads. There’s just… there are just too many threads, and so… and the more in the weeds I am about it, the less I can answer basic client questions like, how’s that ARR dashboard coming along, right? And that’s the thing that’s gonna make me look like an idiot in the weekly call, like, I don’t know, I thought,

262 00:25:36.400 ⇒ 00:25:53.249 Greg Stoutenburg: I don’t know, it gets mentioned a lot, so I think it’s good, right? That’s obviously not a satisfactory answer. And yeah, I’m being a little hyperbolic, but I think you know what I mean. I think that’s something that I just need to step into. And I’m reminded of, like, the old shooting metaphor, slow is smooth and smooth is fast.

263 00:25:53.550 ⇒ 00:25:59.910 Greg Stoutenburg: Right? Like, let’s just, like, get, like, actually zoom out a little bit, and, yeah.

264 00:25:59.910 ⇒ 00:26:03.039 Uttam Kumaran: No, you see, a lot of the urgency is… is artificial.

265 00:26:03.040 ⇒ 00:26:03.960 Greg Stoutenburg: It is.

266 00:26:03.960 ⇒ 00:26:09.530 Uttam Kumaran: But this is where, also, I’ll tell you guys, like, when I worked at Flowcode,

267 00:26:09.700 ⇒ 00:26:15.280 Uttam Kumaran: for all of the difficulties of, like, the CEO… so the CEO, he used to… he used to be the CEO of AOL.

268 00:26:15.720 ⇒ 00:26:22.349 Uttam Kumaran: Aol famously sold to Verizon for, like, a huge amount. He’s, like, this big guy, big personality.

269 00:26:22.550 ⇒ 00:26:31.029 Uttam Kumaran: And it was, like, so crazy, because he would go to one meeting, he’d be like, I agree with you, go to another meeting, he’d be like, yeah, that’s totally wrong.

270 00:26:31.610 ⇒ 00:26:37.359 Uttam Kumaran: And he did it so many times, and some people in the company, they would just kind of be always with their heads on fire, like…

271 00:26:37.740 ⇒ 00:26:41.499 Uttam Kumaran: Tim said this, Tim went and did this, or like, this is changing.

272 00:26:42.050 ⇒ 00:26:49.400 Uttam Kumaran: I’m like, what the fuck is this? Like, after, like, a year, I’m like, what the fuck is this guy? And I had, like, a good relationship with him, and I was like, yo, like…

273 00:26:49.850 ⇒ 00:26:56.050 Uttam Kumaran: what is, like, what is this move? He was like, no, you have to, you have to do… you have to, like, create some, like…

274 00:26:56.150 ⇒ 00:27:06.399 Uttam Kumaran: chaos sometimes. You have to get people to really challenge what’s right, and… and I think part of that was really not great, like, it led to a really brutal work space, but…

275 00:27:06.510 ⇒ 00:27:08.679 Uttam Kumaran: One thing that I did like was…

276 00:27:08.960 ⇒ 00:27:22.790 Uttam Kumaran: yes, like, I… there’s a difference between urgency and, like, chaos. And so that’s why I want to use that words. I think about these words really carefully, which is, like, we have a sense of urgency. Like, Greg, like, Caitlin sends something, I’m like.

277 00:27:23.120 ⇒ 00:27:25.840 Uttam Kumaran: Hey, Mustafa, I saw this first.

278 00:27:25.840 ⇒ 00:27:26.450 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah.

279 00:27:26.450 ⇒ 00:27:27.910 Uttam Kumaran: You know how busy I am?

280 00:27:28.070 ⇒ 00:27:29.490 Uttam Kumaran: WTF.

281 00:27:29.690 ⇒ 00:27:30.120 Greg Stoutenburg: Right.

282 00:27:30.120 ⇒ 00:27:31.640 Uttam Kumaran: You know? And so…

283 00:27:31.800 ⇒ 00:27:38.850 Uttam Kumaran: I’m like, we’re urgent. And you also don’t even have to do it in the next hour. Just say, heard, ticketed, I’ll be honest.

284 00:27:38.890 ⇒ 00:27:40.050 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah, we’re on that.

285 00:27:40.050 ⇒ 00:27:42.520 Uttam Kumaran: Some of the folks on our team don’t have that…

286 00:27:42.780 ⇒ 00:27:48.910 Uttam Kumaran: mentality, and it’s… it’s… it’s so fucked up. I’m like, yo, just say something, like…

287 00:27:49.060 ⇒ 00:27:53.679 Uttam Kumaran: You know, and I think this is partly, like, it’s an engineering kind of stigma, it’s whatever, but…

288 00:27:53.680 ⇒ 00:27:54.510 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah. Yeah, yeah.

289 00:27:54.510 ⇒ 00:28:12.570 Uttam Kumaran: We’re never gonna lose our sense of urgency, because urgency doesn’t mean action, urgency doesn’t mean we close… it’s just like, I’m here for you, right? It’s like, when you’re talking to American Airlines support chat, and, like, they don’t respond back for, like, 15… you’re like, dude, this is horrible. Right. You know? And so, part of it is there’s a sense of urgency, but that doesn’t mean, like.

290 00:28:12.870 ⇒ 00:28:30.299 Uttam Kumaran: chaos. And so, I would like us to lean on the systems as much as possible. I would like you guys to try to lean on linear, use cursor with linear, be like, what should I follow up on? What’s blocked? And maybe as a group, like, I do that, like, I literally am like, what tickets are stale? What’s blocked? What should I follow up on?

291 00:28:30.480 ⇒ 00:28:30.900 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah.

292 00:28:30.900 ⇒ 00:28:32.910 Uttam Kumaran: There’s also a Slack MCP now.

293 00:28:33.040 ⇒ 00:28:38.499 Uttam Kumaran: So I encourage you guys to install that, I can send that to you guys. Try to use the AI to be, like.

294 00:28:38.990 ⇒ 00:28:43.080 Uttam Kumaran: hey, look through my Slack channels for Element, like, what did I miss, or what should I follow up on?

295 00:28:43.310 ⇒ 00:28:45.940 Uttam Kumaran: But ultimately,

296 00:28:46.200 ⇒ 00:28:58.650 Uttam Kumaran: push the team. Like, the folks on your team should have the same… they should have the pressure that you have without, like, the accountability, ultimately, right? So whatever pressure you feel under, translate it to them.

297 00:28:58.780 ⇒ 00:29:13.589 Uttam Kumaran: Right. And I want us to start to raise their level, but ultimately, you’re… it’s an exchange… in exchange for them grinding, like, you’re taking on the account management. You’re coming in and doing the presenting and things like that, right?

298 00:29:13.590 ⇒ 00:29:14.820 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah. So… Yeah.

299 00:29:15.520 ⇒ 00:29:22.509 Pranav: I think what’s also important, too, is, like, making sure they’re grinding on the right thing right now, because part of what I think of, like, chaos is, like, okay.

300 00:29:22.510 ⇒ 00:29:23.160 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah.

301 00:29:23.160 ⇒ 00:29:28.039 Pranav: they think that they need to work on these other things, but I’m like, no, that’s not the priority. Yeah.

302 00:29:28.530 ⇒ 00:29:40.669 Pranav: And some things can wait, some things can’t wait, and then they just have to understand that. And I think as CSOs, we need to be the ones to, like, set that priority list for them.

303 00:29:40.670 ⇒ 00:29:45.050 Uttam Kumaran: But what Greg said, which is just, like, wake up and tell me what you’re working on, I think that’s totally fair.

304 00:29:45.230 ⇒ 00:29:58.139 Uttam Kumaran: Right? Until you and your team are, like, kind of, like, have the same brain. Like, me and Awash, for example, same brain. I know he’s not working on, like… I really… I rarely am I like, yo, what are you working on? I know that he’s usually one step ahead.

305 00:29:58.240 ⇒ 00:30:13.259 Uttam Kumaran: But that’s because we’ve worked for a while together. But if you’re, like, sussed out, and you’re like, I don’t know whether the team is, like, waking up, be like, yo, send me the tickets you’re working on. That’s gonna force them to look through Linear, pick the tickets, and do that. Just say, we’re gonna do this for two weeks. We’ll see how things change.

306 00:30:13.260 ⇒ 00:30:15.080 Greg Stoutenburg: I’m gonna do it right now, actually. I’m gonna set a.

307 00:30:15.080 ⇒ 00:30:20.280 Uttam Kumaran: That’s more than fair, and I think Advait’s doing this, Amber’s doing this. I think that’s more than fair.

308 00:30:20.280 ⇒ 00:30:21.260 Greg Stoutenburg: Like… Yeah.

309 00:30:21.260 ⇒ 00:30:35.290 Uttam Kumaran: I… I… yeah, and… and… but I think what you got… what you guys owe them is… owe them making sure your linear is clean, like, making sure that, like, what they should be assigned to is good. And then again, if this is, like, a habitual, like, hey, spend an hour, like.

310 00:30:35.710 ⇒ 00:30:39.840 Uttam Kumaran: Sunday night, or spend an hour early Monday, and just, like, just, like, make sure, like.

311 00:30:40.090 ⇒ 00:30:42.919 Uttam Kumaran: This cycle is, like, in a decent spot.

312 00:30:43.290 ⇒ 00:30:46.309 Uttam Kumaran: I think you could rip that with AI pretty quickly, but…

313 00:30:46.860 ⇒ 00:30:53.879 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah. I think it’s more than fair to be like, where did I… where… what am I working on today? Where did I end up?

314 00:30:54.740 ⇒ 00:30:57.260 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, and yeah.

315 00:30:57.640 ⇒ 00:30:59.959 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah, I’m doing it right now, that’s a good idea.

316 00:31:01.320 ⇒ 00:31:06.769 Uttam Kumaran: And then leave a gap, because you may want to send something to the client, so if that comes in at 5 and you don’t have time, so…

317 00:31:06.880 ⇒ 00:31:16.490 Uttam Kumaran: By 3 o’clock, most people are, like, kind of either in the middle of their day in the SF, or they’re kind of, like, at the end of the day in New York. 3, I usually say 3, because then I can take all that and send it.

318 00:31:16.760 ⇒ 00:31:28.199 Uttam Kumaran: client, right? But then you’re having them work for you. If you’re like, hey, I want to try to start sending out daily updates to the client, okay, guys, like, codify everything, I’ll take that, I’ll take a little of my stuff, and I’ll send it out.

319 00:31:29.000 ⇒ 00:31:35.639 Uttam Kumaran: And then, similarly, like, start a day, if you get something in the morning, and you’re like, hey, this is a good update, I want to send something out today, you can send that as well.

320 00:31:37.600 ⇒ 00:31:44.759 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, and then… and then… and then that’s… I think that’s a great way of building, sort of, rapport, giving them clear expectations on what to do.

321 00:31:44.980 ⇒ 00:31:49.300 Uttam Kumaran: That way, it’s also when you, in, in the, in the…

322 00:31:49.450 ⇒ 00:31:54.819 Uttam Kumaran: When a timeline is slipping and it’s a technology problem, you can clearly point it out.

323 00:31:55.090 ⇒ 00:31:58.230 Uttam Kumaran: And then you can… you can escalate to the SLs, you know?

324 00:31:58.650 ⇒ 00:31:59.320 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah.

325 00:32:02.470 ⇒ 00:32:04.059 Greg Stoutenburg: I really am doing it right now.

326 00:32:04.060 ⇒ 00:32:04.770 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.

327 00:32:07.460 ⇒ 00:32:10.109 Greg Stoutenburg: Let’s see if this is a good format. Here, I’ll just share my screen.

328 00:32:13.920 ⇒ 00:32:22.280 Greg Stoutenburg: I’m doing this, I’m just putting this in Eden to start, and I’m just gonna have this go up every Friday at 9.

329 00:32:22.920 ⇒ 00:32:29.040 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah, stroke, share an end of week update, free log off, da-da-da-da-da.

330 00:32:29.370 ⇒ 00:32:32.810 Greg Stoutenburg: Wait, I don’t need that to go to Eden. That’s not what I meant to say. Anyway.

331 00:32:36.820 ⇒ 00:32:37.710 Greg Stoutenburg: Cool.

332 00:32:41.060 ⇒ 00:32:49.900 Uttam Kumaran: I would even say, like, Fill out the following template, like… Right.

333 00:32:56.150 ⇒ 00:32:57.140 Greg Stoutenburg: Yep.

334 00:32:59.530 ⇒ 00:33:00.630 Greg Stoutenburg: There we go.

335 00:33:02.310 ⇒ 00:33:03.250 Greg Stoutenburg: Cool.

336 00:33:06.420 ⇒ 00:33:10.519 Greg Stoutenburg: Have a great weekend. Okay, that’s more me.

337 00:33:12.740 ⇒ 00:33:14.839 Greg Stoutenburg: There it is. We’ll start with…

338 00:33:15.470 ⇒ 00:33:18.220 Greg Stoutenburg: Element. Well, no, let me go to default, actually.

339 00:33:20.800 ⇒ 00:33:22.310 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah, I’m tired. Okay.

340 00:33:23.160 ⇒ 00:33:24.750 Greg Stoutenburg: Done.

341 00:33:31.600 ⇒ 00:33:32.599 Greg Stoutenburg: Is it done?

342 00:33:33.110 ⇒ 00:33:35.130 Greg Stoutenburg: I think it’s done. I think it’s done.

343 00:33:35.270 ⇒ 00:33:36.050 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah.

344 00:33:36.360 ⇒ 00:33:38.070 Greg Stoutenburg: I don’t know why they would land me here.

345 00:33:38.320 ⇒ 00:33:38.890 Greg Stoutenburg: Cool.

346 00:33:38.890 ⇒ 00:33:43.999 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, so try that, lean on linear. I think one thing I also want to show you guys that I have, like…

347 00:33:45.060 ⇒ 00:33:51.450 Uttam Kumaran: Again, sort of my… my productivity on, like, everything else really lives and dies by, like, client work.

348 00:33:51.700 ⇒ 00:33:55.459 Uttam Kumaran: So I crushed through a lot of this, and I just didn’t finish it out, but…

349 00:33:55.840 ⇒ 00:33:59.480 Uttam Kumaran: I will do it today, is, like, everything around allocation.

350 00:33:59.910 ⇒ 00:34:16.160 Uttam Kumaran: So I, like, cleaned up all of operating, like, I matched up HubSpot names to the operating, to linear, like, this… basically, if someone’s like, what are we working on in the delivery team? There’s one doc where they can see everything.

351 00:34:16.400 ⇒ 00:34:29.249 Uttam Kumaran: So, like, I haven’t yet done… these are… these are all… these are just, like, kind of some of the existing clients. I started with them, and then I’ll layer in everything else. So, ABC, Default, Eden, Magic Spoon.

352 00:34:29.350 ⇒ 00:34:36.959 Uttam Kumaran: kind of… we’ll think about the formatting, but I wanted you to easily be able to go to the linear team, go to the HubSpot, or go to the operating-related

353 00:34:37.760 ⇒ 00:34:47.860 Uttam Kumaran: client. The service leads are gonna be in charge of operating allocations, so, like, they’re gonna be looking at who’s… where are people allocated to, what hours are they spending there.

354 00:34:47.980 ⇒ 00:34:51.150 Uttam Kumaran: When a new SOW comes in,

355 00:34:51.929 ⇒ 00:35:03.350 Uttam Kumaran: you have a client, and SOW is associated to a… to a project. Linear is just going to be a client. In operating, you’re going to have multiple projects per SOW. In here, you’re gonna see, like, there’s an active project.

356 00:35:03.490 ⇒ 00:35:10.039 Uttam Kumaran: There’s gonna be… the service line is gonna say, like, what is the amount of hours per deliverable, and then…

357 00:35:10.510 ⇒ 00:35:22.489 Uttam Kumaran: you’re gonna be able to see, like, who’s allocated on this project. This whole thing is gonna, like, basically sync with operating, so I have a skill that, like, looks and sees, like, who’s allocated.

358 00:35:22.600 ⇒ 00:35:33.439 Uttam Kumaran: I also cleaned up all the roles, so every client is gonna have a CSO and a service lead, and then everybody else is IC. Some clients right now, like Magic Spoon, there’s, like, Demi, sort of, too, but…

359 00:35:33.810 ⇒ 00:35:37.339 Uttam Kumaran: figure that out. So, this should be, like.

360 00:35:37.450 ⇒ 00:35:41.939 Uttam Kumaran: Hopefully, on a quarterly basis, if you want to go see, like.

361 00:35:42.430 ⇒ 00:35:47.180 Uttam Kumaran: The sort of picture of, like, delivery teams, portfolio, it’s this doc.

362 00:35:47.320 ⇒ 00:35:52.100 Uttam Kumaran: Versus, like, in linear, in HubSpot, or in operating.

363 00:35:52.430 ⇒ 00:36:05.359 Uttam Kumaran: Because there will be a time where, like, I don’t know, we may, like, even get rid of operating, we may get rid of HubSpot, and, like, I want to create, like, one page that has all the information. So there shouldn’t be a question on, like, who’s on this client.

364 00:36:05.720 ⇒ 00:36:09.980 Uttam Kumaran: How many hours do they have on this client? Where else is this person staffed?

365 00:36:10.310 ⇒ 00:36:14.190 Uttam Kumaran: Like, where’s a project plan for this client? Where’s the hubs, you know.

366 00:36:14.750 ⇒ 00:36:21.250 Uttam Kumaran: just wanna, like, be like, check this stock. So… Almost done.

367 00:36:21.910 ⇒ 00:36:22.630 Greg Stoutenburg: Oh my god.

368 00:36:24.190 ⇒ 00:36:27.180 Uttam Kumaran: So this is almost done.

369 00:36:28.370 ⇒ 00:36:39.039 Uttam Kumaran: And then, B, do you want to maybe present to the, like, I think, I don’t know, Greg, you must have seen B’s proposal on the L&D team, but I don’t know, do you want to just share, like, 2 minutes.

370 00:36:39.040 ⇒ 00:36:39.529 Greg Stoutenburg: That’s upbeat.

371 00:36:39.530 ⇒ 00:36:43.969 Uttam Kumaran: on, like, for Pranav, like, what we’re thinking about doing on the L&D team, and then we can…

372 00:36:44.630 ⇒ 00:36:47.710 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah, and then also, can we talk about Global VetLink, even for, like, 5 minutes?

373 00:36:47.710 ⇒ 00:36:48.880 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

374 00:36:50.780 ⇒ 00:36:52.520 Brylle Girang: Okay, can you see my screen?

375 00:36:52.890 ⇒ 00:36:53.260 Pranav: Yup.

376 00:36:53.260 ⇒ 00:36:53.800 Greg Stoutenburg: Yup.

377 00:36:54.370 ⇒ 00:37:10.849 Brylle Girang: Yeah, okay. So this is the L&D program plan that we have created for Quahu 2 onwards. I have explained here why we’re deciding to create, like, the L&D department now, and this mainly revolves around the problems that we’re seeing when it comes to AI adoption.

378 00:37:10.850 ⇒ 00:37:20.859 Brylle Girang: When it comes to understanding our standards, and when it comes to our revenue blocking problems, we don’t get to close many partnerships because our people are not certified.

379 00:37:20.950 ⇒ 00:37:36.650 Brylle Girang: People are not upskilling enough, people are not trying to learn more outside of their current scope. So those are the main problems that you want to solve via a structured route through the L&D team, or the L&D department.

380 00:37:37.400 ⇒ 00:37:52.060 Brylle Girang: Again, this is grounded on the delivery standards, so what me and Otam have discussed is that all teams, all departments, all goals should be related to our delivery standards, because everything revolves around delivery of our other clients.

381 00:37:52.260 ⇒ 00:38:07.090 Brylle Girang: The initiatives here, and you can see that this follows, like, the linear plan mapping that we’re doing, and the initiatives here will be considered as our objectives. And our main objective here is to enable revenue-driven learning.

382 00:38:07.350 ⇒ 00:38:13.760 Brylle Girang: So, one of the main things that we’re doing here is making sure that L&D is not just, like, a glorified

383 00:38:13.840 ⇒ 00:38:26.679 Brylle Girang: LMS inside… inside Brainforge, and L&D in the future will definitely help us secure better and more revenue, and that is, in my… in our opinion, through this to Unlocks.

384 00:38:26.680 ⇒ 00:38:39.930 Brylle Girang: So if we unlock enough certifications for our ICs, for our CSOs, for our SLs, we get more leads, which leads to more revenue, right? Imagine how many more clients we could get if

385 00:38:39.960 ⇒ 00:38:47.769 Brylle Girang: Amber, Mustafa are all dbt Omni Snowflake certified people, and that should also improve our delivery work.

386 00:38:47.980 ⇒ 00:38:51.850 Brylle Girang: And the second piece, which is what I’m really excited about, is…

387 00:38:51.930 ⇒ 00:38:58.779 Brylle Girang: Imagine if L&D, or learning and development, can be a new service line offering for our clients.

388 00:38:58.780 ⇒ 00:39:12.630 Brylle Girang: We have seen how many clients, how many companies fail to, like, implement AI in their companies, fail to implement, or to actually adopt AI into their workflows, and what if we could actually

389 00:39:12.700 ⇒ 00:39:16.500 Brylle Girang: Move into offering that as a service, instead of

390 00:39:16.680 ⇒ 00:39:22.440 Brylle Girang: A free, a free courtesy, free courtesy call for our clients, right?

391 00:39:22.930 ⇒ 00:39:39.529 Brylle Girang: So that is the first main objective, and then the next objective focuses on helping the company, helping the business and our people understand our standards and understand how AI can help us achieve those standards, which is the Spring for Standards Literacy Initiative.

392 00:39:39.860 ⇒ 00:39:56.979 Brylle Girang: And the other two initiatives are about, you know, ensuring that we have a good change management and feedback loop within the business, where each new offerings, each new updates are actually distributed in bite-sized pieces to our

393 00:39:56.980 ⇒ 00:40:09.039 Brylle Girang: business. So this is related to your feedback, Greg, where we are shipping amazing things, and then we don’t teach people how to use them. That’s going to be a major part of this.

394 00:40:09.040 ⇒ 00:40:26.860 Uttam Kumaran: So, so, so the L&D team is the voice of, like, my platform team, which is, like, I can’t… it’s… I can’t do both, I’m also not good at both. I’m only good at getting this… this stuff out there. So I’m, like, L&D thinks about, in what way does this affect the team, the change management, and the training?

395 00:40:27.070 ⇒ 00:40:42.750 Uttam Kumaran: like, skills, everything, and then what my team is, like, unlocking, basically, capabilities, right? And I think that’s, like, a huge piece of this. And then, broadly, going back a step, like, part of this is, like, on… there’s two, kind of.

396 00:40:42.810 ⇒ 00:41:01.519 Uttam Kumaran: audiences here. One is, like, everyone that’s new to Brainforge, which, like, congrats to them, they’re gonna be walking into, like, a great L&D team. It’s also for everybody that’s already here, and I don’t… I was really purposeful on, like, I don’t want to disregard that. Like, we need to almost, like, reset with everybody and get everybody

397 00:41:01.550 ⇒ 00:41:03.179 Uttam Kumaran: Onto the same page.

398 00:41:03.400 ⇒ 00:41:20.689 Uttam Kumaran: I have some… I want people to walk in the door, clear understanding of, like, how we work, clear understanding of how we’re gonna invest in them. Similarly for everybody else at Brainforge, through certifications, through internal certifications, through, like, you know, learning about how to use all the AI tools.

399 00:41:20.700 ⇒ 00:41:26.980 Uttam Kumaran: You know, it’s something that we’re… I really wanted to pressure test, so yeah, sorry, B, that… I just wanted to highlight that.

400 00:41:27.680 ⇒ 00:41:28.330 Brylle Girang: Yeah.

401 00:41:28.780 ⇒ 00:41:35.519 Brylle Girang: Yeah, the platform team will be the builders and will be the sellers of our features.

402 00:41:35.640 ⇒ 00:41:48.849 Brylle Girang: The last objective here is service cell enablement, which is, basically us ensuring that each service line has the tools that they need, and has the processes that they need to ensure that delivery is

403 00:41:49.440 ⇒ 00:42:02.919 Brylle Girang: at the top, right? And, I think we have started this by shipping, like, the cursor skills, but this will evolve into a much larger scope in the future. We’re imagining that maybe Amber or Mustafa

404 00:42:02.980 ⇒ 00:42:16.049 Brylle Girang: can deploy specific skills for each service lines under their own buckets. So imagine if you could, you know, build dashboards at one prompt, and they will be helping us out with that.

405 00:42:16.720 ⇒ 00:42:22.119 Brylle Girang: So, yeah, this plan dives more into, like, how this fits long-term.

406 00:42:22.120 ⇒ 00:42:39.270 Brylle Girang: Revolving around how we can, you know, generate more revenue when we have a good learning and development plan. At the same time, this follows, like, the linear plan that we’re doing with the projects, with the milestones. And the most exciting piece here

407 00:42:39.410 ⇒ 00:42:53.680 Brylle Girang: The two most exciting pieces here, rather, are, one, so we’re going to launch, like, a leadership curriculum too, like a book club at first, that will evolve into us leaders actually empowering each other and actually upskilling

408 00:42:53.680 ⇒ 00:43:02.380 Brylle Girang: Personally, reading books would be a great first step for that. And then the second one is that we’re going to be launching Build-A-Thons.

409 00:43:02.380 ⇒ 00:43:06.080 Brylle Girang: For each service line, maybe by month, or maybe by quarter.

410 00:43:06.080 ⇒ 00:43:15.489 Brylle Girang: It would be like, you know, a hackathon where, hey, we have this one problem within the data service team where it’s really hard to model things, model stuff, right?

411 00:43:15.770 ⇒ 00:43:28.279 Brylle Girang: We give you 30 days, build stuff out, whoever wins gets a prize, and whoever wins gets to own that specific workflow for 30 days, until it gets used and used and used by the business.

412 00:43:28.500 ⇒ 00:43:39.540 Brylle Girang: So part of this is learning, but I would say a major part of this is actually reforming our habits and our culture when it comes to training and when it comes to actually learning stuff.

413 00:43:40.300 ⇒ 00:43:47.330 Brylle Girang: Yeah, I would love Pranav and Greg, if you could check this out, and let us know if you have any feedback and comments.

414 00:43:47.630 ⇒ 00:43:48.990 Pranav: Yeah, definitely.

415 00:43:49.410 ⇒ 00:43:58.330 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah, I like the vision. I’ll give it a read before we talk next week. But yeah, I like it. I like where it’s going. And I like… I like the… just, like.

416 00:43:58.390 ⇒ 00:44:11.090 Greg Stoutenburg: broadly speaking, I like the approach of, there are people here now, there are people coming in, we’ve got all this tech that can do all this cool stuff, and, it really needs to be put into someone’s hands before they can see the power of it, like…

417 00:44:11.160 ⇒ 00:44:23.729 Greg Stoutenburg: And that’s something, I mean, I just keep seeing that over and over since I’ve been at Brainforge. I can’t believe how much more I know about what I can do with AI, like, on basically a weekly basis, but if it weren’t for the fact that examples keep getting put in front of me, I wouldn’t.

418 00:44:23.730 ⇒ 00:44:25.419 Uttam Kumaran: And I’m do- and I’m doing that, like.

419 00:44:25.900 ⇒ 00:44:27.820 Uttam Kumaran: I was doing that randomly, like…

420 00:44:28.110 ⇒ 00:44:28.500 Greg Stoutenburg: What’s your son?

421 00:44:28.500 ⇒ 00:44:29.979 Uttam Kumaran: sad, because I’m like.

422 00:44:30.560 ⇒ 00:44:45.670 Uttam Kumaran: fuck, I’m, like, I’m, like, 6 months ahead of where we… where you are, and I’m like, I just, like, want to pull you forward, but, like, it’s… but it’s… it’s so tough, and it’s not a one-person job, and so we wanted to establish this team, but the key thing that I think I loved

423 00:44:45.670 ⇒ 00:44:51.809 Uttam Kumaran: that B came to me, he was like, you know, actually, I think there is a revenue-generating angle for this team.

424 00:44:51.810 ⇒ 00:44:52.900 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah. And I said…

425 00:44:52.900 ⇒ 00:44:58.239 Uttam Kumaran: That’s it. Because it’s very tough for me to vote to establish more non…

426 00:44:58.510 ⇒ 00:45:01.730 Uttam Kumaran: cost center teams, right? Sure. And you can think about, like.

427 00:45:01.870 ⇒ 00:45:16.069 Uttam Kumaran: operations, finance, it’s kind of like those, but, like, even recruiting, okay, I actually think there’s a supply side to our business. I think that’s great. For you to be, like, at the end of Q2, we actually want to have a path towards establishing this as a new service. I think that’s, like.

428 00:45:16.210 ⇒ 00:45:36.129 Uttam Kumaran: a great way of thinking. It’s really cousins to, like, delivery source opportunity, whereas we’re not only delivering on the revenue, but we’re finding net new revenue, and I think that’s, like, a great way of thinking. In the Brainforge way, we run L&D for ourselves, see what sucks, and then we can go sell it, right? I think it’s great.

429 00:45:36.130 ⇒ 00:45:36.780 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah.

430 00:45:37.080 ⇒ 00:45:43.920 Brylle Girang: It would be a good first case study that we can multiply and replicate across all their clients, right?

431 00:45:47.790 ⇒ 00:45:48.410 Uttam Kumaran: Cool.

432 00:45:48.940 ⇒ 00:45:51.349 Uttam Kumaran: Okay, do you want to talk about, VetLink?

433 00:45:51.920 ⇒ 00:45:55.609 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah, just real quick, and then I should get some stuff done before I do an interview, but .

434 00:45:55.610 ⇒ 00:45:56.320 Pranav: Yeah.

435 00:45:56.320 ⇒ 00:45:56.720 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah, I’ll.

436 00:45:56.720 ⇒ 00:46:01.010 Pranav: I’m gonna stop right now, just, I need to prep for, Eden, but… Cool, okay.

437 00:46:01.010 ⇒ 00:46:08.720 Greg Stoutenburg: See you, Pranav. Real quick, Utam, maybe you could confirm this for me. I…

438 00:46:09.680 ⇒ 00:46:12.049 Greg Stoutenburg: I don’t think you can interact with…

439 00:46:12.180 ⇒ 00:46:16.670 Greg Stoutenburg: OmniMCP from within Slack. The Slack connector looks like it just schedules deliveries.

440 00:46:16.820 ⇒ 00:46:17.590 Uttam Kumaran: That’s correct.

441 00:46:17.590 ⇒ 00:46:19.449 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah, okay, that’s what I thought. Alright, just wanted to verify.

442 00:46:19.450 ⇒ 00:46:22.719 Uttam Kumaran: But, like, I’m thinking about building something for you.

443 00:46:22.930 ⇒ 00:46:27.720 Uttam Kumaran: You have to do it. I haven’t prioritized it. If you’re like, I would love that, I could do it.

444 00:46:27.990 ⇒ 00:46:32.539 Greg Stoutenburg: Well, I mean, I was thinking about, like, like, Caitlin’s request here. I’m thinking, like.

445 00:46:32.730 ⇒ 00:46:40.079 Greg Stoutenburg: It would be great to tell her, hey, you can just go… or even demonstrate just, at Omni.

446 00:46:40.260 ⇒ 00:46:43.500 Greg Stoutenburg: Can I get a list of customers that includes name, ACV, and C?

447 00:46:44.010 ⇒ 00:46:59.279 Greg Stoutenburg: Anyway, yeah, I mean, so Robert’s feedback was basically, like, share more about your insights on the business as a whole, and, speak to that for the pitch for GVL.

448 00:46:59.620 ⇒ 00:47:01.470 Greg Stoutenburg: I hear that.

449 00:47:03.380 ⇒ 00:47:20.210 Greg Stoutenburg: I also feel a little bit in a tough spot, given that the scope was sort of this narrow product analytics sprint, you know what I mean? Like, the data that’s in Pendo doesn’t in any very clear way, tell a story of business opportunity beyond

450 00:47:20.680 ⇒ 00:47:30.309 Greg Stoutenburg: you need to fix all this reporting stuff so that you can have business insights, and then learn where the opportunities are, you know what I mean? So, I guess that’s something I wanted to…

451 00:47:30.530 ⇒ 00:47:35.949 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, let me, let me, let me open the, the feedback again.

452 00:47:36.250 ⇒ 00:47:50.849 Uttam Kumaran: So, he said, you have the gritty recommendations and are good at bottoms-up roadmap building. I think you’d take that as a compliment. I think you… but you already know that. You need to represent top-down to VP levels. Fair. GV approach is appropriate, getting sign-off from head of tech.

453 00:47:51.110 ⇒ 00:47:55.219 Uttam Kumaran: But the business case… so this is where… so here’s a sample analysis outline.

454 00:47:55.660 ⇒ 00:48:07.240 Uttam Kumaran: But she wasn’t even den? Okay, yeah, so if I was to, pull this up… so let me walk through, like, how I… yeah, I think if it’s fair for me to just be like, I’m Greg, let me think about how I would think about this.

455 00:48:07.240 ⇒ 00:48:08.090 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah, nothing.

456 00:48:08.090 ⇒ 00:48:19.460 Uttam Kumaran: So, robert sent this, and then… okay, here’s the, pitch of this, so… oops.

457 00:48:21.450 ⇒ 00:48:22.310 Uttam Kumaran: Okay.

458 00:48:22.500 ⇒ 00:48:27.180 Uttam Kumaran: Let me just pull up this, doc.

459 00:48:27.840 ⇒ 00:48:31.950 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah, it’s just the doc we worked on yesterday. It’s just notes, it’s not a presentation.

460 00:48:31.950 ⇒ 00:48:48.640 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, so if I was to compare, if Robert was like, hey, this was good, this could be better, looking at this, I mean, one, like, I will say I take responsibility, I think I want to make sure that there is, like, a… there’s just a DSO, like, template, so, like, I’ll rip through that, that way it’s, like, just crystal clear, but I feel like, actually, like, this is fine.

461 00:48:49.180 ⇒ 00:48:58.979 Uttam Kumaran: I think where he articulated it well, and where I missed, is that we started with, do this work, to then do this work.

462 00:48:58.980 ⇒ 00:48:59.580 Greg Stoutenburg: Yes.

463 00:48:59.730 ⇒ 00:49:03.639 Uttam Kumaran: not… We could find you this much money.

464 00:49:03.890 ⇒ 00:49:11.249 Uttam Kumaran: And here’s how we’re gonna do that, right? So I think that’s where, if I was to take a step back, where we missed on is…

465 00:49:11.360 ⇒ 00:49:15.890 Uttam Kumaran: it was too focused on the work. I think, in fact, actually.

466 00:49:16.220 ⇒ 00:49:29.020 Uttam Kumaran: This is where most of our focus should have been, and my feedback in, like, looking at this, if you look at the right, understand what’s driving ongoing softness in own channel performance.

467 00:49:29.320 ⇒ 00:49:39.159 Uttam Kumaran: Okay, we’re gonna do these things, here’s what we want to know, and then here’s, like, the things, based on what we find, here’s what we can do, and then there are…

468 00:49:40.260 ⇒ 00:49:46.910 Uttam Kumaran: like, I don’t even think they really put together the, like, ROI, but if I was to show you,

469 00:49:47.610 ⇒ 00:49:54.990 Uttam Kumaran: like… the actual, like, insomnia, deck,

470 00:50:00.080 ⇒ 00:50:10.820 Uttam Kumaran: like, one thing I like about the way this… that team did these decks is they literally just led with, like, what is, like, the business-facing thing? So I think there’s something we could learn from this, which is, like.

471 00:50:11.050 ⇒ 00:50:23.300 Uttam Kumaran: what is the key question, or what is the key unlock out of each of these? So if I was to go back to this, like, basically what Robert said was, feel like your GVIL approach is appropriate for getting signed off from a tech?

472 00:50:23.690 ⇒ 00:50:32.869 Uttam Kumaran: Business case for expanding the working relationship. Here’s an outline, this is what I used to pitch, which we didn’t even do, but help articulate. Forces you to form a hypothesis around the business.

473 00:50:33.120 ⇒ 00:50:42.129 Uttam Kumaran: frame what you want to know to get more out of stakeholder calls, help you build the case for the what and why. And so, if I was to look in this, I think

474 00:50:42.830 ⇒ 00:50:48.819 Uttam Kumaran: I think he’s right. I think we… I think…

475 00:50:49.330 ⇒ 00:50:51.340 Uttam Kumaran: If I say one more step.

476 00:50:51.510 ⇒ 00:50:59.120 Uttam Kumaran: He’s like, put yourself in Cat’s shoes, right? Why did Kat originally spend money with us?

477 00:50:59.670 ⇒ 00:51:03.010 Uttam Kumaran: What are the questions that She had.

478 00:51:03.450 ⇒ 00:51:06.110 Uttam Kumaran: which ones did we answer? So those are, like, the wins.

479 00:51:06.600 ⇒ 00:51:13.880 Uttam Kumaran: And where is the, like, either we’re saving them money, or saving them time, or both, or making them more money? Which one?

480 00:51:14.240 ⇒ 00:51:14.570 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah.

481 00:51:14.570 ⇒ 00:51:19.230 Uttam Kumaran: make it crystal clear how much. Even if it’s just, like, a guest, right?

482 00:51:19.510 ⇒ 00:51:24.230 Uttam Kumaran: And so that’s… that’s, I think, something here that I think we could have done better on, is, like.

483 00:51:25.250 ⇒ 00:51:26.970 Uttam Kumaran: I think this is okay.

484 00:51:27.490 ⇒ 00:51:31.939 Uttam Kumaran: But, like, for example, what I like is… is, like, this is the…

485 00:51:32.320 ⇒ 00:51:35.959 Uttam Kumaran: Project plan, which is like, okay, our goal is to do this.

486 00:51:36.190 ⇒ 00:51:43.640 Uttam Kumaran: Here’s how we’re gonna do it, here’s what we’re trying to find out, and here’s what happens if we… what we… based on what we find out.

487 00:51:43.820 ⇒ 00:51:48.440 Uttam Kumaran: To take one of these examples, The goal is…

488 00:51:49.150 ⇒ 00:51:55.480 Uttam Kumaran: Automating outreach based on unit user behavior. Our driving actions are gonna be

489 00:51:55.680 ⇒ 00:52:01.810 Uttam Kumaran: like, couple, like, basically, what’s the how. We’re gonna say, what do we want to know is, like.

490 00:52:02.060 ⇒ 00:52:02.790 Uttam Kumaran: like…

491 00:52:02.960 ⇒ 00:52:09.039 Uttam Kumaran: like, there’s a couple of things, probably, on what are we trying to find out? And then it’s like, what does this deliver? Like.

492 00:52:09.430 ⇒ 00:52:17.520 Uttam Kumaran: X person is gonna save 10 hours a week. Why? Like, X campaign should be 50% more efficient. I think that’s, like, what we probably…

493 00:52:17.830 ⇒ 00:52:18.600 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah.

494 00:52:18.600 ⇒ 00:52:20.120 Uttam Kumaran: Missed. A little bit.

495 00:52:20.140 ⇒ 00:52:21.070 Greg Stoutenburg: Bye. No.

496 00:52:21.070 ⇒ 00:52:23.369 Uttam Kumaran: I think your… and this is where, like, I actually think…

497 00:52:23.700 ⇒ 00:52:27.240 Uttam Kumaran: We did better than we ever have on outlining the what.

498 00:52:27.860 ⇒ 00:52:33.849 Uttam Kumaran: And then we creeped into the why, but didn’t… didn’t… didn’t finish the entire why, yeah.

499 00:52:33.870 ⇒ 00:52:34.410 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah.

500 00:52:34.410 ⇒ 00:52:37.719 Uttam Kumaran: Is that kind of like… do you think… do you think that’s, like, kind of accurate?

501 00:52:38.050 ⇒ 00:52:53.739 Greg Stoutenburg: I do think it’s accurate, yeah. I feel a little… I mean, I’ll have to dig in some. I feel a little stuck on how I’m going to get that additional information, because, like, I just don’t have this level of visibility that’s offered in the Omnia Insomnia example.

502 00:52:53.790 ⇒ 00:53:01.639 Greg Stoutenburg: Omnia. Gosh, it’s gonna give me nightmares, Omnia. so I do… I mean, I certainly… yes, I see…

503 00:53:01.640 ⇒ 00:53:06.120 Uttam Kumaran: So, but that’s a solvable problem. That’s a solvable… that’s a solvable problem. If you’re, like.

504 00:53:06.380 ⇒ 00:53:12.230 Uttam Kumaran: if you’re like, okay, I think we nailed the what can we do, I’m having trouble putting together the why.

505 00:53:12.400 ⇒ 00:53:23.769 Uttam Kumaran: then the goal is, like, okay, let’s go look back at their business. Let’s go look back on why they fuckin’ hired us in the first place. Right. Let’s go watch that first discovery called Robert. What did…

506 00:53:23.770 ⇒ 00:53:24.170 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah.

507 00:53:24.170 ⇒ 00:53:36.579 Uttam Kumaran: But Robert’s good, you’ll see his process, he’ll be like, this is your problem, you’ll, like, dig in. And, like, maybe we go watch that together, and then we’re like, okay, let’s see. They clearly said, we have this, this, this problem, it all needs to ladder back. That would have been the solve.

508 00:53:37.090 ⇒ 00:53:39.479 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, that’s a good call.

509 00:53:39.990 ⇒ 00:53:44.619 Uttam Kumaran: So if you want to do that, like, I could… we could do another pass at that, and, like, sometime next week.

510 00:53:44.730 ⇒ 00:53:49.299 Uttam Kumaran: like, I think that’s… it’s a good way… we could just basically review game tape, like, we’ll just watch…

511 00:53:49.300 ⇒ 00:53:49.900 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah.

512 00:53:49.900 ⇒ 00:53:51.990 Uttam Kumaran: that Robert call together, see how.

513 00:53:51.990 ⇒ 00:53:52.699 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah, you can pick.

514 00:53:52.700 ⇒ 00:53:53.420 Uttam Kumaran: out.

515 00:53:54.120 ⇒ 00:53:55.070 Uttam Kumaran: Why?

516 00:53:55.190 ⇒ 00:54:07.299 Uttam Kumaran: And, like, I think that’ll be positive. I think even when we… this is where, like, our new project… the way I’m thinking about it is our project review process should catch that understanding from you earlier.

517 00:54:07.300 ⇒ 00:54:17.369 Uttam Kumaran: Right? Like, if I’m the project review, and you were involved, and you put it together, I was like, how does these guys make money? What do they care about? And you didn’t know at that point, then at least we would have caught it there. So there’s still some…

518 00:54:17.600 ⇒ 00:54:22.870 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah. I think the new process, hopefully, will have attacked this, but…

519 00:54:23.500 ⇒ 00:54:27.730 Uttam Kumaran: I feel like that gap is actually totally solvable, it’s just a different brain. It’s like…

520 00:54:27.730 ⇒ 00:54:28.320 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah, yeah.

521 00:54:28.320 ⇒ 00:54:31.529 Uttam Kumaran: I think we’re good at this, and I think this is totally right, but…

522 00:54:32.550 ⇒ 00:54:34.129 Uttam Kumaran: to Robert’s point, he’s like.

523 00:54:34.550 ⇒ 00:54:40.009 Uttam Kumaran: They’re… they’re gonna… they may appreciate the detail, but they have no understanding of, like, the jump to…

524 00:54:40.150 ⇒ 00:54:47.790 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah, well, and one thing that he said today, sort of, like, made it crystal clear, he goes, we’re not going to renew with them for less than $15K.

525 00:54:47.900 ⇒ 00:54:59.030 Greg Stoutenburg: And I thought, like, alright, well, this is a company that bulked at 5. So, if they don’t see a pretty explicit ROI promise, the conversation’s just gonna die right away.

526 00:54:59.030 ⇒ 00:55:02.389 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, and this is also where, like, Robert can take…

527 00:55:02.630 ⇒ 00:55:09.379 Uttam Kumaran: We can take, like, a lot and get it there, but ultimately, the more we can give him on the delivery side.

528 00:55:09.780 ⇒ 00:55:22.499 Uttam Kumaran: Like, he can really create an awesome picture, and he’ll get us a 40. Like, you’ll watch, it’s really good. And so, that’s the thing, is like, now he has to be like, okay, let me do the through line. Instead, if we’re like, okay, we got him to, like, 90,

529 00:55:22.620 ⇒ 00:55:26.249 Uttam Kumaran: he’s gonna take that and run, you know, one step further, so…

530 00:55:26.580 ⇒ 00:55:27.060 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah.

531 00:55:27.060 ⇒ 00:55:29.730 Uttam Kumaran: Okay, I think it’s… I think this is clearer… clearer now, to me, too.

532 00:55:29.730 ⇒ 00:55:43.230 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah, I think so, yeah. I know what I need to do. I also just need to finish up their final deliverable. I thought the SOW didn’t make clear that they actually wanted a dashboard created, and so he was like, I think actually in the contract. I was like, oh, shoot, it does say it in the contract, so…

533 00:55:43.230 ⇒ 00:55:49.630 Uttam Kumaran: Another thing, I was like, I should have put… we should have pulled up the SOW when we looked at it, it’s another learning of mine, so…

534 00:55:49.630 ⇒ 00:55:56.920 Greg Stoutenburg: Well, actually, I mean, I think that we did meet the SOW, but it looks like maybe there was another step.

535 00:55:56.920 ⇒ 00:55:57.520 Uttam Kumaran: Oh, okay.

536 00:55:57.520 ⇒ 00:56:11.420 Greg Stoutenburg: But it said that we would actually do an initial dashboard. It should be easy, I’ve got an outline for it. And actually, their problem is that they track way too much stuff in Pendo, so actually, everything is creatable. So, but I just have to do it.

537 00:56:11.420 ⇒ 00:56:11.890 Uttam Kumaran: Okay.

538 00:56:11.890 ⇒ 00:56:24.529 Greg Stoutenburg: And then, yeah, and then I’ll take another look, and then maybe we try to schedule that call for, like, I don’t know, Wednesday or before, because their contract expire, is supposed to end on the 31st, and that’s Tuesday, so…

539 00:56:24.880 ⇒ 00:56:26.349 Uttam Kumaran: Okay. Okay, great.

540 00:56:26.350 ⇒ 00:56:31.850 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah, cool. Okay, I mean, and I think they’re impressed so far, so I think if we can frame it right.

541 00:56:32.070 ⇒ 00:56:36.189 Greg Stoutenburg: And their… their budget sensibility will allow, then…

542 00:56:36.310 ⇒ 00:56:38.079 Greg Stoutenburg: Hopefully, we get more business with them.

543 00:56:38.080 ⇒ 00:56:38.830 Uttam Kumaran: Cool. Okay.

544 00:56:38.830 ⇒ 00:56:51.039 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah. Cool. Alright, I’m gonna go interview someone, and then right after that, I’m gonna give a talk to the, Washington University of St. Louis philosophy department about jobs that you can get when your philosophy degree is over.

545 00:56:51.880 ⇒ 00:56:57.730 Uttam Kumaran: Dude, ask… tell us to raise your hand, anyone who cares gives half a shit about data, and submit them.

546 00:56:58.260 ⇒ 00:56:58.640 Greg Stoutenburg: Okay.

547 00:56:59.140 ⇒ 00:56:59.980 Greg Stoutenburg: That’s a great idea.

548 00:56:59.980 ⇒ 00:57:03.980 Uttam Kumaran: Seriously, or would be like, does anyone, like, actually really care about analytics or data.

549 00:57:03.980 ⇒ 00:57:04.420 Greg Stoutenburg: Rightly.

550 00:57:04.420 ⇒ 00:57:07.889 Uttam Kumaran: Like, yeah, they should, they should take a shot, or AI.

551 00:57:07.890 ⇒ 00:57:11.700 Greg Stoutenburg: I’m gonna… I’m gonna be raking in some finder’s fees in a couple of months from here.

552 00:57:11.700 ⇒ 00:57:13.679 Uttam Kumaran: I mean, look, I…

553 00:57:13.680 ⇒ 00:57:14.570 Greg Stoutenburg: referrals.

554 00:57:14.570 ⇒ 00:57:16.599 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, you should, 100%.

555 00:57:16.800 ⇒ 00:57:17.399 Greg Stoutenburg: Take a listen.

556 00:57:17.400 ⇒ 00:57:22.280 Uttam Kumaran: money. We’re trying to hire… we’re trying to hire friends only.

557 00:57:22.280 ⇒ 00:57:24.540 Greg Stoutenburg: Yeah, we’re trying to make a club.

558 00:57:24.540 ⇒ 00:57:25.230 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.

559 00:57:25.230 ⇒ 00:57:28.980 Greg Stoutenburg: Cool. Alright. Alright. Thanks, guys.

560 00:57:28.980 ⇒ 00:57:29.510 Uttam Kumaran: Okay, bye.

561 00:57:29.510 ⇒ 00:57:30.070 Greg Stoutenburg: Right.

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