#174 | A-Players, Task Monkeys, and the AI Reckoning w: Francis Brero (VP AI Strategy @HG Insights)

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Welcome to the Lemon Tech Leadership Podcast. My name is
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Alexander Leaminskam. I'm a former violinist turned management engineer, turned
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organizational psychologist, speaker and PCM leadership mentor and facilitator. In
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this space, everyone is invited to the table where we
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have real, eye opening conversations about tech leadership. Two keywords
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utility and real life implementation. Knowledge tools, frameworks, ways of working,
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dos and don'ts taken from my personal experiences as a
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leader in the experiences of others is what you are
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going to get from every single episode. This is the
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Lemon Tech Leadership Podcast. Okay, so let's go and take
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some action.
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Okay and real life. Thank you for being here with us.
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In another episode of the Lemon Tech Leadership Podcast, today,
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I have a very special guests, another amazing guy from
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Silicon Valley. So we are going to see how are
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the differences, how the differences will look like between different
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guests from Silicon Valley. Francis burrowers with me today. Hi, Francis,
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thank you for journey.
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Yeah, thank you for having me. I'm excited to offer
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the European who moved to Silicon Valley perspective.
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Yeah, Yeah, definitely, there's always super interesting to see how
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the stories look like. So what's possible and what kind
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of peoples you can actually do in your life and
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courage to see what is in there and just push
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yourself and to be the best version of yourselves yourself actually,
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so let's see how your story looks like. So, Francis,
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we always start the conversation with the question about your story.
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So as just started to talk about about your story,
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if you can just go back to the very beginning,
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what happens at the very beginning of your career journey,
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what held on over the way and for are you now?
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Yeah, so I think, I mean the journey has been
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It's never a straight liner when you look at it
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in retrospect. You can always like tie the dots together.
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But the funny thing is like, at least in my mind,
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the way I think about leadership, it started even before
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my work career. So back in college in particular, I
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was the captain of our handball team, very famous European sport,
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not very well known in the US, And it was
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a very interesting role because you had to represent the
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team in from the coach, the coach in from the
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team and really try and understand what was going on
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on the field, like what were things that were happening
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with the team, and like what we felt comfortable whether
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or not to help like form the strategy with the
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coach and make sure that the coach was bringing the
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right strategy to the game and not trying to, you know,
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force something onto the team. And so you're kind of
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a mediator of some sorts. And then like through my
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professional career, what's been very interesting is I've led teams
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of developers in Istanbul, in Manila, I had when we
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founded Kudu, our engineering team was in Paris. I had
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teams in the US, in Latin America, and it's been
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a humbling experience and it's just been incredible to see
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how a lot of things that we take for granted,
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especially on the cultural differences, can come to bite you.
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One of my favorite examples was again this like in college,
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but we had this group of students and we had
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a student from Tokyo Tech, so Japanese student in the
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winter in Paris not necessarily very warm, and so we
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had a runny nose and one of the other French
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students like kept on giving in tissues without realizing that
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blowing your nose in public is actually like really bad manners.
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In Japan, sniffing is actually the right thing to do,
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but in Europe that's actually really bad manners to just
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be sniffing in public. And it was really interesting to
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see that, like both of them were kind of offended
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by both gestures that were happening at the same time,
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and it took someone to kind of like, you know,
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ask them what was happening to realize, oh, actually, for
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this person, they think they're doing the right thing by sniffing.
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And the story around this, or part of the learning
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around this, is there's a book that's been misused, Like
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the most misused book I think in leadership in Silicon
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Valley is radical Candor, because we tend to use radical
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candor just to bash people openly and say, oh, like
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I'm bashing you, but I promise it's radical candor. The
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core component that people tend to forget about radical candor
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is the part that you have to care about the
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person you're giving feedback to. And so what was really
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interesting here is by caring about both people, I was
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kind of able to understand what was going on and
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to you know, then give the feedback that hey, you know,
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in the future, maybe don't be so obnoxious about like
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giving someone a tissue. Don't assume that your cultural norms
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are the universal cultural norms. Very Western thing to do.
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And so anyway, a long story short is I've I've
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had a like a like a pretty wide variety of
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managerial and leadership experiences. Also the founder of a of
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a company. During COVID Black Lives Matters, we had immigration
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policy issues with people stranded in different countries. We actually
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were the name plaintiff in a lawsuit against the immigration
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in the US, which we won. So we've been through
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our fair share of all the challenges that that you
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can go through, from training first time managers, trying to
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get longtime managers to adapt to the world of AI,
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and everything in between.
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You know, I I would love to dig daper in
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through the handful team first, because this is this is
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not a part of and you said that this is
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not very well in the US, but the US is
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going to have like Olympic team from Hample from one US.
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And so I know some of the players, some of
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the players amazing small world wise in the US, it's
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a very very small world.
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Yes, yes, that's true. So because you said that you've
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learned so many things when you you had this part
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of your of your story, what what do you actually
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use right now? Because you have many years of experience
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in leading different as you mentioned, different teams, different organizations
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in tech, So what is something that you use from
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this part of your life.
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Still, I think there's a couple of things. One of
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them is I think the concept of talent density is
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a concert that was made famous by It was a
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famous Netflix paper on this. But I think top players
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want to play with top players. We were mentioning handball
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and like I've I've been fortunate enough to play with
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like you know, some like elite players in my days,
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and the elite players want to play with the lead
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players and any kind of average player on the team.
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It's more than just their impact. It drags down the
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entire morale the entire team. But they are situations where
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you can help fix that, right, Like, you can have
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high potential fairly minimal impact, but if you have medium
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to low potential, then there is a hard decision to
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be made about retaining or not that that person on
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the team. And the longer you delay that decision, the
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harder and the worse the impact is going to be
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on the team. That's probably one of my you know,
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biggest learnings is how an okay player actually has a
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very very much more negative effect than a bad player,
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because a bad player, it's obvious you leave them on
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the bench. The problem is the average player where they
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could it could work and it could not work right,
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So you kind of want to give them the ability
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to take a shot to like you know, like do something,
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and then it's always like a fifty to fifty percent chance.
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But like slowly over time people start worrying and they're
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they kind of lose trusted. It breaks down, like the
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whole concept of trust within the team, and like the
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whole mechanics don't work as well. Wors again, bad player.
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It's obvious to everyone, there's no discussion. We move on.
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So I think that's one that that I reuse consistently.
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And then just the fact that you know, like a
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good team sport, everybody shows up, you show up to practice,
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you show up on time, We start practice all together
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at the same time, and we do the same routines, right,
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just pass the ball for hours, right, so that it
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becomes like mechanical, Like there are things about the game
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that you repeat, like your plays, Like you know, you
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don't do plays because you know they're going to score
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a goal or they're going to help you do them,
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because you want the mechanics to be so deeply ingrained
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in your brain that they don't occupy any mental bandwidth
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and you can focus on the actual challenge, which is
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reading the situation, and that's where your brain power needs
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to be. Like some of those things I think are
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are one of the reasons why I like to hire
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top level athletes because they have that sense. They know
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how to practice hard, and they understand this concept of
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getting things to become mechanical and consistency.
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Right, because this is all about the reps. If you're
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under your reps, this is as as you mentioned, this
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is non mechanical. This is you need to focus all
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the time of doing something and it's it's people just
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quit it because this is too too much, it's too
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hard for the brain and don't want to be in
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that kind of a situation, and you just you just
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don't want it to be gone. And you know, people
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just not in position to do it all the time.
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They think that this is Uh, this is what's happening
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right now, because I see it and I have a
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lot of conversations about it lately, especially with some leaders.
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So I'm super curious on your of house on this
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one because you mentioned that them, the back players are obvioused,
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the A players are abused, but the worst worrstponding quote.
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Of course, the most problematic, let's say, is the middle,
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the messy middle, right, So the B players, because they
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have potential, we recruited them, you know, in some context,
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and sometimes they deliver, sometimes they're not. So we're like,
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in this limbo of decision making, we don't know what
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to do with them. Uh, And I have so many
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questions from leaders that are saying to me, Alex, what should.
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I do with them?
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How long should I give second chances or third chances
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and so on? So I'm you know, we always talk
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about contracting and what we creed both of the sides
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agreed to do. From from the transactional perspective, it doesn't
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work with every single culture, as you mentioned culture differences.
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But let's say this is quite fair that we have
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some agreements or what you should deliver and now what
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should you do for of how you should tre have
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to change and what kind of outcome you should you
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should deliver in your in your job, and what kind
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of growth Father, we have what we have for you
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create together. But sometimes people are okay ish, So you cannot,
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you know, say that they're bad. But they're just like
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nine to five, I'm doing my job sometimes not perfectly
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on time, but they're okay, and uh it is it
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is exhausting sometimes, and so what's you know, what are
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your faults.
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On this one? I think there are a couple of
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things that I want to call out. One of them
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is I try as much as possible to separate the
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impact from the potential, because I think a someone that
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has great potential and has a medium like okay ish impact,
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that's your problem as a leader, Like that's one hundred
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percent on you. However, then the people that are medium
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potential generally that means that probably was a hiring mistake.
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But once it's happened, it's happened, right. That's a story
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for maybe later on on how to avoid those. But
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the biggest thing I've found is being very clear on
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what is expected of them. I there's this concept that
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I've been using lately. I find with AI the bar
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is getting higher, where usually it's just essentially think about
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people through different layers of the pyramid. Right, So at
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the bottom you have kind of your your doers. Right,
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you give them a task, it's well defined, they'll do
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the task. Seventy percent of the time, they do it right.
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Right.
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This one is kind of the I call it the
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task monkey. It's a horrible name, but it's like you're
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just like you're you're just like, you just do the
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task right and you don't really think about it. Then
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above that you have people that you you know, you
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give them the problem and and they might come up
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with the solution. And then above that you have the
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people where you know they're system thinkers. They see the problem,
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they understand the systemic source of it, and they're going
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to find a solution not just to the problem symptom,
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but rather to the root cause of it. And then
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at the top of that you have the absolute rock stars,
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the people you aspire to have on your team, who
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just unprompted will come to you and say, by the way,
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I've diagnosed this in our system, and here's a systemic
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solution I want to propose for it. And so The
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question then is if you use these kind of scales
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and you start mapping your team against it, the question
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is like what percentage of your team is in the
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rockstar bucket the system thinker or kind of the task monkey.
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And the thing is if you have if you're too
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heavy today on the task monkey side, you're just going
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to spend your life micromanaging and like guiding things here
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and there. It's exhausting and your rock stars are going
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to leave immediately. So again like the trend that there's
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a status of like where you are to given point
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in time. But someone who today starts as a task monkey,
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but it is showing the potential to be a system thinker.
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That's someone you want to invest in. That The challenge
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I find today and this is it's a bit unfortunate
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right in our workforce is you have people who spent
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their career just doing the thing with AI and automation.
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There is a question like what is their place in
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a company. But if you're just literally just doing the
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thing and you're not thinking about the system, that means
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you're not able to take the thing you're doing, you know,
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create a system out of it and delegate it to
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someone else there potentially isn't a future for you in
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the in the workforce, And the sooner you come to
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that realization, and the sooner you help the person understand
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this and you start coaching them on how to be
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system thinkers, how to divide and conquer problems, how to
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think about like breaking down you know, complex problems into
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smaller task that then you can address one by one
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and sorry thinking about it more systemically that if you
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want to invest, if you can rather invest that time,
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that's what I would recommend. But otherwise, unfortunately, they're just
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going to be it's a it's a debt and attacks
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that is, yeah, that you have to pay on the team.
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And uh, you know, I'm very much a fan of
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of what actually Kam Scott is saying what you have
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mentioned pradical candor so use it that you cannot have
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only eight players in your team because there are people
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need it from maintenance as well.
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So maybe that's the monkeys because we need for them
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to be a little bit different because as you mentioned,
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the changes in in a structure of a team. This
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is something that I've talked about in the previous episodes
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of the Guests Staff Engineering, interest and we were talking
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about how expectations about certain levels and teams changed over
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the last three years or so. About these years and
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then particularly they moved even faster geometrically, I would say,
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so them were we were talking about how the all
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juniors right now are new meats because the expectations changed,
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and then the expectation level of a leader of the
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team quite quite for changed because of how the infrastructure
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is changing and what kind of things they can actually
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do with are all different, a different, different tech stack.
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So so this is connected with the other thing I
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want to ask ask you, because we talked about the
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middle and what about the situation when you have in
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a team one or more people who are brilliant jerks.
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They're amazing eight players, theylieve an amazing job. Sometimes they're
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very very expert, have an expertise so narrow that in
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one one piece of tech for example. So they work,
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they they have their kps s right, everything is great,
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But they are jerks to others, so they comment, what
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is organizational organization is doing, what kind of decisions, what
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kind of pavots are happening in organizations. They have a
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toxic influence on others, but they delivered the job, so
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the question is what to do with them what they think.
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In my experience, you try to try to get them
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to realize that their role in the team is beyond
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what they delivered directly, the same way that a star
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player in a team is meant to be an inspiration
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for the rest of the team. So, I mean, for
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those who've watched ted Lasso, I think a lot of
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the show is about this, right where ted Lasso is
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trying to coach one of the top like this like
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young striker. Like then that's a very typical thing in football, right,
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Like the striker is really kind of super cocky and
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and he's trying to coach him to understand that his
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behavior is what then others are going to mimic, and
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his role is not just to strike, it's also to
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drive to lead the team. And that's why I think
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a concept that most people don't realize, and that's what
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I love about the engineering has this dual track of
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you can be an ic or you can be a
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manager all the way to you know, the top levels,
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and some people are just excellent leaders without being managers.
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I think getting the person to realize that you're at
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this point if you do the job really well, but
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you're a jerk and you're you know, not necessarily helping
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to improve the system. You're just an excellent task monkey.
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You're not a rock star. And you might think you are,
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but you're not because you're not improving the system. You're
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actually destroying the system by demotivating the rest of the team,
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by not helping them, by not putting in place solutions
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that would remove your frustration. Right, because if you see
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something broken, the right system thinker is going to be like, oh,
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I can fix this, rather than just pointed to say, oh,
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this is broken, I'm not happy about it. And and
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so that's again the role of the manager is and
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and the leader is really to help this person understand
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that their role goes beyond beyond that. And I've had
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players like this and in my teams in the past,
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like I've had a like a former national Boast Bosnian
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player and he was excellent, like best player in the
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US for for a couple of years, but horrible attitude,
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and we never managed to really perform at the elite level.
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And once he was gone, funnily, like the you know,
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the level of the team was a bit lower but
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we performed a lot better because then we were all
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pushing each other and there was like something positive. And
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so you try and some people actually transform. I've had
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players the same thing that transformed and became incredible leaders
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within the team, and it's it's magical to see them.
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They can come and save the day and at the
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same time they're going to, like, you know, pick up
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the player that's struggling, and it means a lot to
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them when they show up. Their impact is just it's
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way beyond just what they can deliver themselves. So I
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think you try to get them to understand what leadership means,
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and if that doesn't work, you have to cut your losses.
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I think this is another one of the hard decisions
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to make, is letting go of someone who's excellent at
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what they do, but it's detrimental to the team. It
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seems it seems hard, but like that's why we do
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cultural fit interviews, and that's why culture fit and you know,
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impact on culture is actually an important metric to evaluate
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people on.
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Do you know that?
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For example in Poland and you cannot say that you
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can't you know, you're not offering a job to a
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candidate record because they are not a culture fit. It
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is actually league. So of course we are we are
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talking about recruitment and onboarding check right now than the criteria.
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But this is this is important from the perspective of
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of of the audience because a lot of people are
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listening goal around the globe and then the bigle.
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Stuff is also ing and I think often the problem
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is like the cultural fit is kind of this this
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like wishy washy kind of thing of like for a
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long time there was this test of like would I
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want to go have a beer with this person? I
377
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think that's the absolutely that's like the kind of cultural
378
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fit that should be illegal. It doesn't mean anything, right
379
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because then you're just hiring your buddies from college. But
380
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I do think there's something about the like how you
381
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fit in the team, like the kind of the EQ. Right,
382
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So we can measure EQ. We can measure how do
383
00:21:49.119 --> 00:21:52.039
you react to feedback? How do you react to being
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challenged on something by someone who isn't your peer and
385
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it is potentially considered junior. How do you learn?
386
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Right?
387
00:22:00.680 --> 00:22:06.039
Like those kind of questions I think are are questions
388
00:22:06.079 --> 00:22:08.880
that measure more the EQ. And when we say cultural fit,
389
00:22:09.279 --> 00:22:11.519
essentially what we're describing is like, what is the kind
390
00:22:11.559 --> 00:22:14.400
of EQ that we're looking for in addition to the
391
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type of IQ, and.
392
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We can actually measure the communication intelligence. So then another
393
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part of the of the story and this is what
394
00:22:21.839 --> 00:22:24.359
I what I actually teach in't and well this is
395
00:22:24.440 --> 00:22:27.519
my expertise area. And what I what I say to you,
396
00:22:27.599 --> 00:22:29.839
to the to the leader is like, hey, you cannot
397
00:22:29.880 --> 00:22:32.839
do the culture fits per se, but this is something
398
00:22:32.880 --> 00:22:37.000
that the person needs to marge the team. They cannot
399
00:22:37.039 --> 00:22:39.359
be copy and piece because this is this is actually
400
00:22:39.359 --> 00:22:41.640
you mentioned you are hiring your bodies or you are
401
00:22:41.720 --> 00:22:44.519
actually hiring you all the time because it's easy, we
402
00:22:44.599 --> 00:22:47.000
have a flow in the conversation and we are talking.
403
00:22:47.240 --> 00:22:49.680
We can talk for hours. Yeah, of course, because this
404
00:22:49.759 --> 00:22:52.079
is the same person as you from the structural perspective.
405
00:22:52.200 --> 00:22:56.599
And then yeah, surprise, surprise, you say, Oh, then novative,
406
00:22:56.680 --> 00:22:58.920
they're not engaged as I would love for them to be.
407
00:22:59.079 --> 00:23:03.880
It's troubles reprised because you manage the the recruitment in
408
00:23:04.359 --> 00:23:06.880
a certain in a certain way. Yeah. And coming back
409
00:23:06.920 --> 00:23:09.720
to to the to the brilliant, brilliant jerk, this is
410
00:23:10.079 --> 00:23:13.160
the situation. This is something that I Honestly, I have
411
00:23:13.319 --> 00:23:16.680
this conversation with different theaters repetitively, and this is happening
412
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all the time. And as you mentioned that there are
413
00:23:19.839 --> 00:23:21.880
different scenarios, I would say that this is. You know,
414
00:23:22.480 --> 00:23:25.559
every single scenario has a conversation per beginning. So you
415
00:23:25.680 --> 00:23:27.799
need to have this conversation with the sampoint because this
416
00:23:27.920 --> 00:23:30.680
is part of your team and they're destructed to your team.
417
00:23:31.119 --> 00:23:34.160
So they either understand and change. As you mentioned the
418
00:23:34.200 --> 00:23:37.599
examples that you have, actually that they change. The rock
419
00:23:37.680 --> 00:23:40.839
stares writing right now and they understood because never nobody
420
00:23:40.920 --> 00:23:43.559
never said to them before, and this is something that
421
00:23:43.880 --> 00:23:46.640
we assume that they should know, but we know how
422
00:23:46.680 --> 00:23:50.759
assuming is ending most of the time. And then the
423
00:23:50.839 --> 00:23:54.279
second situation is like they the here but they don't change.
424
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And the third situations that they quit. And I think
425
00:23:57.839 --> 00:24:01.039
that a lot of rrors are scared that they're a
426
00:24:01.240 --> 00:24:04.039
players quote unquote because they delivered the results, they're going
427
00:24:04.119 --> 00:24:07.880
to quit when we have this conversation or this is
428
00:24:08.160 --> 00:24:10.480
you mentioned that this is not intuitive, but I think
429
00:24:10.559 --> 00:24:13.480
it doesn't make any sense to fire them right because
430
00:24:13.480 --> 00:24:16.039
it's like, hey, they delivered the job, but long term,
431
00:24:16.119 --> 00:24:19.680
the cost is so much higher than the short term delivery.
432
00:24:19.799 --> 00:24:24.599
So now, yeah, and that's ah, I find that'say. Just
433
00:24:24.720 --> 00:24:28.519
in general, like, the one of the biggest challenges with
434
00:24:30.200 --> 00:24:33.079
hiring someone or you know, putting them on a PIP
435
00:24:33.440 --> 00:24:40.720
is this idea that even people who aren't delivering much
436
00:24:40.880 --> 00:24:44.920
are doing something right. So there's always the fear, Oh,
437
00:24:45.000 --> 00:24:48.440
but if I get rid of this person, somebody like
438
00:24:48.599 --> 00:24:51.480
the rest of the orc has to absorb the work
439
00:24:51.920 --> 00:24:55.400
and you cannot afford it, right right, exactly, We're already overwhelmed,
440
00:24:55.480 --> 00:24:56.839
so like, how are we going to deal with this?
441
00:24:57.839 --> 00:25:03.559
And again, the of your system thinkers and your rock
442
00:25:03.599 --> 00:25:07.079
stars is pretty frequently what they'll realize is a lot
443
00:25:07.119 --> 00:25:09.039
of the work we're doing doesn't need to be done,
444
00:25:10.720 --> 00:25:14.680
and they'll come in and apply a couple fixes here
445
00:25:14.720 --> 00:25:17.519
and there that just like then reduce the overall workload
446
00:25:17.599 --> 00:25:20.839
for everyone. But you were never you never really looked
447
00:25:21.480 --> 00:25:23.759
into how we were doing things because you kind of
448
00:25:23.880 --> 00:25:29.000
had the people that the task monkeys doing this, and
449
00:25:30.160 --> 00:25:35.079
and that's where you start creating. You know, you just
450
00:25:35.200 --> 00:25:38.559
have like a big and fat organization right that just
451
00:25:38.720 --> 00:25:42.039
doesn't move as quickly. There's just a lot of inertia
452
00:25:42.960 --> 00:25:44.720
because we're just like this is how we do things
453
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right instead of thinking about how do we fix the system?
454
00:25:48.400 --> 00:25:51.720
That's true switching gears a little bit, you said that
455
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I'm with you on this one. Eight players just to
456
00:25:55.759 --> 00:25:58.160
just want to work and play with out our eight
457
00:25:58.240 --> 00:26:01.119
players because this is fancy and we want to be
458
00:26:01.319 --> 00:26:03.400
an a team, because this is well, this is the
459
00:26:03.880 --> 00:26:07.920
best one that we can be. What we as leaders
460
00:26:08.079 --> 00:26:10.039
right now we are recording this episode at the very
461
00:26:10.039 --> 00:26:12.599
beginning of June twenty twenty six, right now, in this
462
00:26:12.759 --> 00:26:16.559
world that we experience in right now, what we need
463
00:26:16.680 --> 00:26:19.720
to do, who we need to be as leaders in
464
00:26:19.920 --> 00:26:25.759
tech to attract all of those A players to our teams.
465
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What do you think? I think the main thing is
466
00:26:28.039 --> 00:26:32.160
to well have something think about them, right. I think
467
00:26:32.240 --> 00:26:35.640
it's not about It's never about us, It's it's about them.
468
00:26:35.680 --> 00:26:40.039
So it's thinking. You know, if you've met A players
469
00:26:40.079 --> 00:26:41.559
and you ask them like, what are you looking for?
470
00:26:41.759 --> 00:26:42.880
What gets you excited?
471
00:26:43.119 --> 00:26:43.599
And then.
472
00:26:45.319 --> 00:26:47.599
Based on that and based on what aligns with who
473
00:26:47.640 --> 00:26:51.599
you are, putting together a clear story for them. I
474
00:26:51.680 --> 00:26:54.160
think it's funny when I read most of the job
475
00:26:54.279 --> 00:26:58.640
descriptions and offers that are out there, they always say
476
00:26:58.799 --> 00:27:02.720
we're looking for They never write it from the perspective
477
00:27:02.839 --> 00:27:06.119
of if this is you, this job is for you, right, Like,
478
00:27:07.119 --> 00:27:09.559
we don't care that you're looking for this like HP
479
00:27:09.839 --> 00:27:13.920
or whatever company. Right. I'm reading this like taught to me. Oh,
480
00:27:14.039 --> 00:27:16.279
if you are a blah blah check, yes I'm that
481
00:27:16.400 --> 00:27:18.880
person and you like too, yes that's me, and you
482
00:27:19.000 --> 00:27:21.160
want to yes that's me, then this position is view
483
00:27:21.240 --> 00:27:25.599
Oh okay, that's appealing. So I think really thinking about
484
00:27:25.640 --> 00:27:30.160
it that way and then designing a hiring process that
485
00:27:31.400 --> 00:27:34.680
showcases that you're different, showcases that they are going to
486
00:27:34.759 --> 00:27:37.640
be interacting with with rock stars and they're going to
487
00:27:37.640 --> 00:27:42.160
be doing rockstar work is one of the biggest things, right,
488
00:27:42.240 --> 00:27:45.799
So that's that's one. I get it that this is
489
00:27:46.279 --> 00:27:49.759
at the point where people are already applying to, you know,
490
00:27:49.960 --> 00:27:53.200
to be hired or looking at your job posting, which
491
00:27:54.279 --> 00:27:57.920
isn't necessarily the case for most people. I do think
492
00:27:58.000 --> 00:28:03.400
there there's a lot of This is one of those
493
00:28:03.440 --> 00:28:05.519
things where there aren't many shortcuts, right. You have to
494
00:28:06.200 --> 00:28:08.000
you have to try and determine what does a rock
495
00:28:08.039 --> 00:28:10.599
star profile look like, how do I go hunt them,
496
00:28:11.079 --> 00:28:13.640
how do I go find them? Where are they? And
497
00:28:13.880 --> 00:28:17.039
the thing is like rock stars tend to hang out
498
00:28:17.119 --> 00:28:20.960
with the rock stars, and so there are different pools
499
00:28:21.039 --> 00:28:23.960
of people we realize good like find these people, I
500
00:28:24.079 --> 00:28:27.759
talk to them and like where it spreads and and
501
00:28:27.920 --> 00:28:32.680
it works well to get their attention. But unfortunately I
502
00:28:33.279 --> 00:28:37.640
have not seen any shortcuts, like you know, sourcing agencies
503
00:28:37.880 --> 00:28:40.559
all that kind of stuff. Like the top players are
504
00:28:40.599 --> 00:28:43.200
not looking for a job. The top players are crushing
505
00:28:43.279 --> 00:28:46.240
it at their job today. The only thing that's going
506
00:28:46.319 --> 00:28:51.880
to make them move is like an incredible opportunity to
507
00:28:51.960 --> 00:28:56.359
work on something exciting within an exciting team. So again,
508
00:28:56.440 --> 00:28:59.119
think about it from like the sports analogy isn't perfect,
509
00:28:59.160 --> 00:29:00.480
but there's a lot of good stuff. Right, if you're
510
00:29:00.480 --> 00:29:03.960
a top player at one of the top European teams,
511
00:29:04.440 --> 00:29:07.880
you're not looking to go, Like the only way someone
512
00:29:07.960 --> 00:29:10.559
can get you is if they have a project that's
513
00:29:10.759 --> 00:29:17.119
really exciting. Right. I'm a big fan of the the
514
00:29:17.279 --> 00:29:21.720
Kilsche handball team, right, and you don't get talent du
515
00:29:21.839 --> 00:29:24.960
Chebayev to come and coach that team for years without
516
00:29:25.119 --> 00:29:27.759
having like something to offer. And it was this whole
517
00:29:27.839 --> 00:29:31.000
idea of like this is like a very like historically
518
00:29:31.559 --> 00:29:36.319
meaningful team in Poland and there's like a big project
519
00:29:36.400 --> 00:29:38.079
to try and bring it to the front of the
520
00:29:38.720 --> 00:29:42.279
of the European scene. And that's something when you're you know,
521
00:29:42.400 --> 00:29:44.920
a coach of the caliber of talent, you're like, yes,
522
00:29:45.759 --> 00:29:48.839
I want to do this and I'll go to Poland
523
00:29:48.920 --> 00:29:51.640
When he could have been coaching any of the German
524
00:29:51.920 --> 00:29:56.160
like top teams or Spanish or Barcelona and now he's
525
00:29:56.200 --> 00:29:58.200
going to be coaching the French teams. That's very happy
526
00:29:58.240 --> 00:30:03.599
about that anyway. So I think having a clear idea
527
00:30:03.599 --> 00:30:06.119
of what is the project, what is exciting about it,
528
00:30:06.279 --> 00:30:08.880
and why are they the good fit for it, and
529
00:30:08.920 --> 00:30:11.640
then surrounding them with the right kind of uh, making
530
00:30:11.640 --> 00:30:13.559
sure you're surrounding them with the right kind of talent
531
00:30:14.160 --> 00:30:18.720
and that you're ready to make the the hard decisions
532
00:30:18.720 --> 00:30:21.640
that have to be made to you know, to keep them. Yeah,
533
00:30:22.160 --> 00:30:22.599
I think it.
534
00:30:24.160 --> 00:30:27.440
Requires a lot of courage from the leadership perspective, because
535
00:30:27.480 --> 00:30:31.319
it's like, what I see is a lot of people
536
00:30:31.359 --> 00:30:34.720
who are leading teams are not very well preferred to
537
00:30:34.880 --> 00:30:38.480
do it, you know, and they never were taught how
538
00:30:38.559 --> 00:30:42.559
to make decisions that are unpopular. We talked about it
539
00:30:42.599 --> 00:30:46.799
a little bit before we hit record, and I think
540
00:30:46.920 --> 00:30:53.839
that it costs a lot of frustrations, burnout, misunderstandings, wasted time.
541
00:30:54.680 --> 00:30:58.680
And I see a lot of tech teams. I work
542
00:30:58.759 --> 00:31:01.359
mostly with the engineering community. I am a data science
543
00:31:01.359 --> 00:31:04.599
so this is my area as well, and they see
544
00:31:04.799 --> 00:31:09.119
the pattern here as well that people are saying to me, Hey,
545
00:31:09.559 --> 00:31:12.039
you know, I'm leaving this team. I had this conversation
546
00:31:12.160 --> 00:31:15.720
like last week, very fresh and my head, my boss
547
00:31:15.960 --> 00:31:20.519
is like, is avoiding decision making whatsoever. We are talking
548
00:31:20.640 --> 00:31:22.720
to him that we need this and that and that
549
00:31:22.880 --> 00:31:26.480
and even very much open because they're just like, hey,
550
00:31:26.559 --> 00:31:29.640
I'm beyond being nice and being nice, and I'm just
551
00:31:29.759 --> 00:31:31.279
going to say it out loud because this is what
552
00:31:31.400 --> 00:31:33.519
I need to be a good leader for my team.
553
00:31:34.400 --> 00:31:39.279
And they are not making decisions. They are just trying
554
00:31:39.319 --> 00:31:42.559
to avoid it as much as possible. It is super uncomfortable,
555
00:31:42.839 --> 00:31:46.960
and this is costing me so much quote unquote, And
556
00:31:47.519 --> 00:31:51.559
those people are earning so much money and they're super
557
00:31:51.680 --> 00:31:56.000
high in organizational structure that you again you would assume
558
00:31:56.119 --> 00:31:59.160
that they're supposed to be those people who actually are
559
00:31:59.279 --> 00:32:03.960
courageous enough to make bold decisions, sometimes super uncomfortable decisions,
560
00:32:03.960 --> 00:32:07.480
because this is a part of the job and last
561
00:32:07.880 --> 00:32:11.680
this week actually today, very very early in my morning,
562
00:32:11.799 --> 00:32:14.839
I talked to him, one of him, one of one
563
00:32:14.880 --> 00:32:17.960
of them, and that he told me that he didn't
564
00:32:18.079 --> 00:32:22.799
even know that it was part of his job to
565
00:32:23.759 --> 00:32:26.359
do that. Then that and you know, not going into
566
00:32:26.599 --> 00:32:30.200
too many details. So my question about it to you
567
00:32:30.519 --> 00:32:35.480
is how we can if it, if it's even possible,
568
00:32:36.200 --> 00:32:42.000
how we as leaders, ourselves included, we can teach ourselves.
569
00:32:42.079 --> 00:32:47.920
We can learn the courage to be bold to you know,
570
00:32:48.519 --> 00:32:54.200
just to sometimes quit the logical thinking critical might be
571
00:32:54.279 --> 00:32:57.680
not critical thinking, but the all new using logical approach,
572
00:32:57.759 --> 00:33:02.960
analytical approach and analytical part of yourself, and and just
573
00:33:03.079 --> 00:33:05.440
you know, to be the best version of yourself as
574
00:33:05.480 --> 00:33:07.319
a leader for your team, because what you need, what
575
00:33:07.400 --> 00:33:10.279
you mentioned is they're building. We need to build for
576
00:33:10.400 --> 00:33:12.720
those people the environment where it's they are going to
577
00:33:12.799 --> 00:33:16.319
be the most important things, not us. So is it
578
00:33:16.400 --> 00:33:19.119
even possible for us to learn how to be more
579
00:33:19.240 --> 00:33:21.359
courageous or what do you think?
580
00:33:21.720 --> 00:33:23.440
Yeah, I think it's a it's a great question. And
581
00:33:23.839 --> 00:33:27.200
uh it's you know, like leadership is like multi layered, right,
582
00:33:27.319 --> 00:33:30.680
but this one, in my opinion, is is one of
583
00:33:30.680 --> 00:33:34.000
the highest levels of leadership. So it potentially goes all
584
00:33:34.039 --> 00:33:37.000
the way up to the CEO, and it's around what
585
00:33:37.799 --> 00:33:41.160
what do we value? What do we reward? Right because
586
00:33:41.319 --> 00:33:45.599
at a lot of companies, we you know, we the
587
00:33:45.680 --> 00:33:48.599
stick is always present, Right, you mess something up, We're
588
00:33:48.640 --> 00:33:50.880
going to come at you with a stick. But we
589
00:33:50.960 --> 00:33:56.920
don't reward failing at a moonshot, right, Like sailing at
590
00:33:56.920 --> 00:33:59.440
a moonshot means that you had a moonshot idea that
591
00:33:59.599 --> 00:34:01.400
you went all the way to trying and at some
592
00:34:01.519 --> 00:34:04.039
point it didn't work, but at least you tried. And
593
00:34:05.200 --> 00:34:07.240
this is like, this is where like this is cultural. Right,
594
00:34:07.279 --> 00:34:10.400
there's an element of how do we reward being bold?
595
00:34:10.519 --> 00:34:14.599
How do we reward being courageous? It's like the you know,
596
00:34:14.719 --> 00:34:18.960
the famous saying nobody gets fired for buying IBM, and
597
00:34:19.199 --> 00:34:21.480
the thing is, maybe we should start firing people for
598
00:34:21.559 --> 00:34:25.639
buying IBM uh and and and it's if you're not
599
00:34:26.079 --> 00:34:31.159
making any bold decisions, then you're slowing the company down.
600
00:34:31.199 --> 00:34:34.119
I think the we're at a time, especially in tech, right,
601
00:34:34.480 --> 00:34:38.920
we're at a time where AI is accelerating everything. Velocity
602
00:34:39.039 --> 00:34:40.599
is now the name of the game. The question is
603
00:34:40.679 --> 00:34:43.920
like how quickly can you move? And it's not just
604
00:34:44.920 --> 00:34:47.480
the speed at which we're seeing the AI native companies
605
00:34:47.559 --> 00:34:50.360
move is not this kind of like linear. We just
606
00:34:50.480 --> 00:34:53.320
work a little bit harder and we'll get there. These
607
00:34:53.360 --> 00:34:56.960
are massive step functions that are happening one off to
608
00:34:57.079 --> 00:35:00.079
the next, and the only way that happens is you
609
00:35:00.199 --> 00:35:04.400
make a gigantic bet or multiple gigantic bets, hoping that
610
00:35:04.519 --> 00:35:06.400
you know you're going to be able to sling yourself
611
00:35:06.480 --> 00:35:09.239
from here to there in a very short period of time.
612
00:35:09.280 --> 00:35:10.800
That's the only way you can get that kind of
613
00:35:10.960 --> 00:35:14.719
exponential result. And if you don't encourage this, if you
614
00:35:14.840 --> 00:35:22.159
don't create time space rewards systems to promote this, then
615
00:35:22.320 --> 00:35:24.519
it's not going to happen. And then you are going
616
00:35:24.599 --> 00:35:26.519
to end up with a lot of people that are
617
00:35:26.920 --> 00:35:30.960
well paid, very comfortable, and they're just chugging along. Right,
618
00:35:31.000 --> 00:35:33.840
They're just doing the thing, and that's what they're asked for, right,
619
00:35:34.239 --> 00:35:36.320
What we're asking them to do is to not mess up.
620
00:35:36.719 --> 00:35:39.119
They're not messing up. The easiest way to never mess
621
00:35:39.199 --> 00:35:42.159
up is to not do anything right. So maybe we
622
00:35:42.320 --> 00:35:47.639
need to start changing the way we think about management.
623
00:35:48.119 --> 00:35:50.760
That's like, to me, is a massive one that's changing
624
00:35:50.840 --> 00:35:54.400
with AI and also thinking about what is the reward structure,
625
00:35:54.760 --> 00:35:58.639
how do we value and how do we promote these
626
00:35:58.760 --> 00:36:04.280
bold choices. I don't think most I've seen most companies
627
00:36:04.320 --> 00:36:07.800
don't do it yet. That's just what I just wanted
628
00:36:07.840 --> 00:36:08.280
to say that.
629
00:36:10.440 --> 00:36:14.159
Actually, my book is coming so fingers crossed for everything,
630
00:36:14.280 --> 00:36:16.679
and I I wrote a part of it because this
631
00:36:16.800 --> 00:36:19.079
is the book is from Code to People and this
632
00:36:19.239 --> 00:36:21.800
is about everything that we are talking about here, about
633
00:36:21.840 --> 00:36:25.400
that being the leader that actually people want to work
634
00:36:25.519 --> 00:36:29.880
with and the whole communication intelligence for the structures, frameworks,
635
00:36:29.880 --> 00:36:32.599
et cetera. And there's one piece that actually stuck with
636
00:36:32.719 --> 00:36:35.039
me like months ago, and I thought about it. I
637
00:36:35.199 --> 00:36:40.679
thought about it that people are failing in leadership in tech,
638
00:36:41.039 --> 00:36:44.679
not because they are bad potential for leadership or they
639
00:36:44.719 --> 00:36:46.960
are bad people and they just want to screw everything up,
640
00:36:47.519 --> 00:36:52.559
but they never made a shift from the rewarding perspective
641
00:36:52.599 --> 00:36:55.960
because as I see it, they were rewarded for the
642
00:36:56.119 --> 00:36:59.960
delivered work, the tech delivered work tasks as we mentioned before,
643
00:37:00.840 --> 00:37:05.480
and they moved to team lead position, manager position and
644
00:37:05.599 --> 00:37:09.159
then for further in your organization, and they never they
645
00:37:09.239 --> 00:37:12.440
never had this switch that right now they're rewarded not
646
00:37:12.639 --> 00:37:16.280
for their their job delivered the tasks actually crossed out
647
00:37:16.400 --> 00:37:19.880
from from the checklist, but from they are. They should
648
00:37:19.920 --> 00:37:22.880
be rewarded for what their team is delivering. And this
649
00:37:23.079 --> 00:37:27.719
is the difference. So this he as well. No, I'm
650
00:37:27.880 --> 00:37:28.559
super curious.
651
00:37:29.519 --> 00:37:32.920
Yeah, no, absolutely, And I think the most most organizations
652
00:37:32.960 --> 00:37:38.679
have terrible first time manager onboarding. That's okay, it's it's
653
00:37:38.719 --> 00:37:41.840
a very common one. And uh, there's so many things
654
00:37:41.880 --> 00:37:44.440
that change when when you become a first time manager.
655
00:37:44.719 --> 00:37:49.840
There's the idea of you know, your performance is not
656
00:37:50.000 --> 00:37:52.119
measured on what you do, is measured based on what
657
00:37:52.239 --> 00:37:54.960
the team is able to accomplish. There's this that the
658
00:37:55.079 --> 00:37:59.360
notion of like the first team principle, which I find
659
00:37:59.400 --> 00:38:04.079
always very interesting to say, like a manager's primary loyalty
660
00:38:04.360 --> 00:38:07.239
is to his peers, not to his direct reports. That
661
00:38:07.440 --> 00:38:11.599
is something that I see go wrong with almost every
662
00:38:11.679 --> 00:38:14.639
I mean actually with every single first time manager, where
663
00:38:14.920 --> 00:38:18.320
they're constantly fighting for their direct reports rather than fighting
664
00:38:18.440 --> 00:38:23.119
for their peers. And yeah, and that's because we're not
665
00:38:23.239 --> 00:38:26.840
training them to understand why. You know, like your role
666
00:38:27.239 --> 00:38:30.960
is the cross alignment and then using that cross alignment
667
00:38:31.039 --> 00:38:34.400
to bring focus to your team rather than your goal
668
00:38:34.639 --> 00:38:37.199
is to be the voice of only of your team
669
00:38:37.719 --> 00:38:42.599
in this in this organization. So I think that the
670
00:38:42.760 --> 00:38:48.079
lack of training there is is huge and I think
671
00:38:48.119 --> 00:38:51.119
we often make the mistake of taking And this is
672
00:38:51.159 --> 00:38:54.519
why again I love the dual track where I see
673
00:38:54.639 --> 00:38:59.039
versus manager. I do think a lot of the best
674
00:38:59.239 --> 00:39:05.679
players engineering aren't meant to be managers, and there's a
675
00:39:05.800 --> 00:39:11.280
lot of value in having managers who aren't necessarily the best,
676
00:39:11.559 --> 00:39:14.400
the most technical people. The respect they're going to earn
677
00:39:14.480 --> 00:39:17.679
from the team is not necessarily that there right better code,
678
00:39:17.760 --> 00:39:19.760
or they scored better than them at lead code or
679
00:39:19.840 --> 00:39:23.519
whatever it's it's rather that they help bring focus on
680
00:39:23.599 --> 00:39:27.079
the right things. They help make the job easier, and
681
00:39:27.639 --> 00:39:32.559
they are good at the cross functional alignment that is
682
00:39:32.679 --> 00:39:35.079
required again to make the life simpler for all of
683
00:39:35.159 --> 00:39:36.360
your direct reports.
684
00:39:37.079 --> 00:39:39.559
This this is your job, right And I have a
685
00:39:39.599 --> 00:39:43.199
lot of different conversations about being authority and in teams
686
00:39:43.280 --> 00:39:45.920
in tech, and we are talking a lot above do
687
00:39:46.079 --> 00:39:48.880
I need to be the best engineering a team, the
688
00:39:48.920 --> 00:39:52.239
best data scient is the best cybersect person to actually
689
00:39:52.360 --> 00:39:56.159
be the best manager for them? And right now it
690
00:39:56.280 --> 00:39:59.239
is the market is shifting and so we see hr
691
00:39:59.360 --> 00:40:02.920
people more getting people salespeople meeting tech teams in the
692
00:40:03.039 --> 00:40:06.039
other way around, because you don't you know, it's extremely
693
00:40:07.400 --> 00:40:10.519
hard for you to not micromanage people because you actually
694
00:40:10.679 --> 00:40:14.199
know how to deliver a certain task, how to code,
695
00:40:14.280 --> 00:40:17.639
hard to do analysis, do a power va, and every
696
00:40:17.760 --> 00:40:22.239
every single thing. And I have these conversations all the time,
697
00:40:22.320 --> 00:40:24.760
and there are two camps. I would say. One camp
698
00:40:24.880 --> 00:40:28.400
is that, hey, this is impossible to lead a team
699
00:40:28.519 --> 00:40:30.840
if you are not an expert, because how on earth
700
00:40:30.880 --> 00:40:34.239
you should control them or know what they do and
701
00:40:34.360 --> 00:40:37.719
build authority as an expert. And then the other camp is, hey,
702
00:40:38.159 --> 00:40:40.559
this is better that you don't know how to code,
703
00:40:40.719 --> 00:40:43.800
or how to how to do the marketing campaign or
704
00:40:43.840 --> 00:40:46.320
how to do the sales, because this is this is
705
00:40:46.400 --> 00:40:48.800
not your job. Your job is to create an environment
706
00:40:48.920 --> 00:40:52.079
for them so they can deliver their job. You need
707
00:40:52.159 --> 00:40:54.440
to know what they you know the process is that
708
00:40:54.519 --> 00:40:58.199
they're actually working with them, so you can be a hand.
709
00:40:58.719 --> 00:41:02.840
But it is not necessary for you to be an
710
00:41:02.920 --> 00:41:06.639
expert in your team's area. So which count you are
711
00:41:06.719 --> 00:41:09.599
end because I'm hearing that who can be in the
712
00:41:09.639 --> 00:41:11.480
second one? But then I just wanted to check.
713
00:41:12.320 --> 00:41:17.000
I think it's it really depends on how you set
714
00:41:17.079 --> 00:41:22.159
up your structure, right. I think having a like having
715
00:41:22.199 --> 00:41:26.559
a non tech person leading a tech team only works
716
00:41:26.719 --> 00:41:31.239
if they are principal distinguished like top ice players who
717
00:41:31.320 --> 00:41:35.159
can do that, who can look at the the technical part. Again,
718
00:41:35.400 --> 00:41:37.559
just to go back to the analogies of sports, right
719
00:41:38.000 --> 00:41:41.239
when you think of like a big soccer because not
720
00:41:41.320 --> 00:41:44.320
everyone is that familiar with henball, right, But in soccer
721
00:41:44.480 --> 00:41:49.760
you have the main coach, right. The coach isn't the
722
00:41:49.880 --> 00:41:52.400
coach of the goalies and the coach of the strikers, right.
723
00:41:53.039 --> 00:41:57.559
The coach's perspective is what is the right team set up?
724
00:41:57.599 --> 00:42:00.159
What is the right strategy based on the players have,
725
00:42:00.440 --> 00:42:02.880
based on who we're playing against, like how are we
726
00:42:03.000 --> 00:42:05.320
going to set up to maximize our chances of winning?
727
00:42:05.719 --> 00:42:08.119
And then when it comes to making sure the goalies
728
00:42:08.199 --> 00:42:11.519
are the best at doing goalie stuff and that the
729
00:42:11.559 --> 00:42:15.320
strikers are the best at striking, we then have you know,
730
00:42:15.480 --> 00:42:18.559
specific coaches for that, and then we have a fitness coach,
731
00:42:19.079 --> 00:42:22.400
and then each of these are the experts at helping
732
00:42:22.559 --> 00:42:25.719
individual players understand by the way in your form, like
733
00:42:25.840 --> 00:42:27.840
this is something you need to change when you're running
734
00:42:27.960 --> 00:42:29.760
you're not doing this like we're going to have to
735
00:42:29.840 --> 00:42:33.119
train on your like you know, whatever like zone two
736
00:42:33.440 --> 00:42:35.320
or whatever kind of challenge you want to work on.
737
00:42:36.280 --> 00:42:40.400
And the main coach doesn't have to be the expert
738
00:42:40.480 --> 00:42:43.119
at all of this because he's put in place a
739
00:42:43.280 --> 00:42:47.800
system that allows to delegate to specific experts the expert
740
00:42:47.880 --> 00:42:52.480
level discussion. So the same way that most CEOs are
741
00:42:52.559 --> 00:42:55.800
not technical people, right, and they're the ultimate leader of
742
00:42:55.920 --> 00:42:59.079
the engineering organization. But what they do is they place
743
00:42:59.639 --> 00:43:03.280
a ETO who's excellent at technical stuff, and then actually
744
00:43:03.599 --> 00:43:07.840
pretty quickly you have the CTO who's generally not a
745
00:43:08.000 --> 00:43:11.079
people manager, and then you have the VP of engineering,
746
00:43:11.199 --> 00:43:14.440
who is the people manager and potentially isn't the most
747
00:43:14.519 --> 00:43:17.960
technical person in the organization. But what they're excellent at
748
00:43:18.360 --> 00:43:23.719
is understanding how do we place the team in order
749
00:43:23.800 --> 00:43:25.800
to win, Like what are the right systems to put
750
00:43:25.840 --> 00:43:27.960
in place? Where do we need DevOps? Where do we
751
00:43:28.039 --> 00:43:30.679
remove DevOps? Like how do we deal with like soft
752
00:43:30.760 --> 00:43:34.159
two compliance slowing us down because like manual reviews for
753
00:43:34.320 --> 00:43:36.920
like all of our controls, like these are things that
754
00:43:37.079 --> 00:43:41.639
like this person will handle without necessarily being the most technical.
755
00:43:42.159 --> 00:43:44.960
But then when the engineering team has a very technical,
756
00:43:45.599 --> 00:43:48.320
like very very deep question. That's when you need the
757
00:43:48.440 --> 00:43:52.199
CTO to be able to be there. And this works
758
00:43:52.320 --> 00:43:55.320
only if the CTO and a VP of engineering are
759
00:43:55.559 --> 00:43:59.280
in lockstep, right. The worst thing that can happen is
760
00:43:59.360 --> 00:44:03.199
if these two don't work well together, then the engineering
761
00:44:03.239 --> 00:44:06.400
team stops respecting the VP of engineering because they're considering, Ah,
762
00:44:06.519 --> 00:44:08.199
he doesn't know what he's taught or she doesn't know
763
00:44:08.199 --> 00:44:10.159
what she's talking about. I'm just going to go to
764
00:44:10.199 --> 00:44:13.679
the CTO because they do. And that's a failure of
765
00:44:13.800 --> 00:44:18.440
like CEO leadership, of not making sure the structure is
766
00:44:18.559 --> 00:44:21.400
designed to make sure everything works well. So I would
767
00:44:21.400 --> 00:44:24.000
say in probably camp, you don't have to be technical,
768
00:44:24.960 --> 00:44:29.679
but I do believe there is a level of understanding,
769
00:44:29.719 --> 00:44:31.840
Like you need to be able to understand the process.
770
00:44:32.840 --> 00:44:34.880
That's like one of my big things with AI. I
771
00:44:34.960 --> 00:44:37.119
think it's too easy to fake output. We used to
772
00:44:37.199 --> 00:44:40.239
manage based on output. Today we have to manage on process.
773
00:44:40.280 --> 00:44:42.639
So you have to be able to ask your data scientists. Cool,
774
00:44:42.960 --> 00:44:45.840
so you built this model, walk me through the steps,
775
00:44:45.920 --> 00:44:47.960
like what decisions did you make? Like how did you
776
00:44:48.119 --> 00:44:51.159
come to building this model? Why are you using you know,
777
00:44:52.039 --> 00:44:55.840
boosted decision trees or whatever it is. Like you need
778
00:44:55.960 --> 00:44:58.599
to be able to entertain that conversation and to understand
779
00:44:58.639 --> 00:45:00.639
it well enough to be able to ask the right
780
00:45:00.760 --> 00:45:04.199
kind of questions in order to even help them see
781
00:45:04.320 --> 00:45:07.559
some of the blind spots they might have. So I'm
782
00:45:07.639 --> 00:45:09.480
kind of in the middle where I think you need
783
00:45:09.679 --> 00:45:13.320
to have a good enough understanding of what's going on
784
00:45:13.559 --> 00:45:18.000
that you can ask questions and understand like the answers
785
00:45:18.000 --> 00:45:22.679
and understand where when BS is coming out. But you
786
00:45:22.719 --> 00:45:25.719
don't need to be a data scientist or you know,
787
00:45:25.840 --> 00:45:29.920
a production engineer, you know, writing code for forever and
788
00:45:30.039 --> 00:45:34.840
like innovating on whatever uh on small protocols.
789
00:45:35.920 --> 00:45:39.800
Yeah, no, I agree. I saw so many success stories
790
00:45:39.960 --> 00:45:45.920
where people actually were great needs in areas that they
791
00:45:46.079 --> 00:45:49.039
didn't have any expertise whatsoever before. As you mentioned that
792
00:45:49.119 --> 00:45:51.400
you need to understand what is happening and understand the
793
00:45:51.480 --> 00:45:55.079
process and understand what's with that, what the what the
794
00:45:55.199 --> 00:45:58.639
goal of the of the team is. But I see
795
00:46:00.119 --> 00:46:04.960
honestly more advantages done disadvantages because I see so much
796
00:46:05.079 --> 00:46:11.039
of a market management and not delegating and being burned
797
00:46:11.079 --> 00:46:14.280
out because it is not that you don't have the team,
798
00:46:14.519 --> 00:46:18.039
you just don't have the skills and your mindsets and
799
00:46:18.199 --> 00:46:22.079
I see and you just you just cannot gain just
800
00:46:22.199 --> 00:46:25.599
give it, give it away, and it creates and it
801
00:46:25.719 --> 00:46:28.000
brings more harm and good to team, you know, And
802
00:46:28.159 --> 00:46:31.280
this is something that I would I would love to
803
00:46:31.360 --> 00:46:33.599
do more experiments like that and see the you know,
804
00:46:34.360 --> 00:46:36.840
a b testing to to see two teams that are
805
00:46:36.960 --> 00:46:40.639
working in similar space in the same organization with a
806
00:46:40.840 --> 00:46:43.960
tech lead that is actually a tech person and that
807
00:46:44.199 --> 00:46:46.599
non tech person but actually speaks the language. Because this
808
00:46:46.719 --> 00:46:51.440
is essential and what is the difference between performance engagement
809
00:46:51.599 --> 00:46:55.800
level and you know all the KPIs we can actually
810
00:46:56.000 --> 00:47:00.960
measure how the team is going on and on the
811
00:47:01.000 --> 00:47:03.639
psychological level, but also on the performance level because this
812
00:47:03.719 --> 00:47:07.559
is an organization and meteorytur also yes, this is this
813
00:47:07.760 --> 00:47:11.199
is this is interesting. The one last thing because before
814
00:47:11.239 --> 00:47:13.840
we go into the linking crown, because last week I
815
00:47:14.119 --> 00:47:18.960
was at the word computers actually so WordPress community and
816
00:47:19.119 --> 00:47:22.960
it was a big event some twenty I think that
817
00:47:23.159 --> 00:47:26.039
over two thousand people twenty five hundred or so were
818
00:47:26.079 --> 00:47:28.760
there's a huge event. And at the end of the
819
00:47:28.800 --> 00:47:31.639
event was it was a panel that was that on
820
00:47:31.719 --> 00:47:34.519
the panel was the one person from the same level
821
00:47:34.639 --> 00:47:37.679
and lead architect and I had a product. Actually, so
822
00:47:37.760 --> 00:47:39.760
this is a panel and there were discussions that there
823
00:47:39.760 --> 00:47:43.039
were discussions what is happening in WordPress and all of
824
00:47:43.119 --> 00:47:46.679
the things that are happening. And in one moment there
825
00:47:46.800 --> 00:47:50.360
was a question from the lead architect I believe or
826
00:47:50.440 --> 00:47:53.039
that I had a product to the to the audience
827
00:47:53.079 --> 00:47:57.719
that was their listening, and they started to talk about
828
00:47:57.880 --> 00:48:00.800
word Press seven point all and the contribution. And then
829
00:48:00.840 --> 00:48:04.719
there's a question, just please raise your hand if you
830
00:48:05.239 --> 00:48:10.000
still coote manually. And I just look around because I
831
00:48:10.079 --> 00:48:13.760
was sitting in a front row. Over I would say
832
00:48:14.239 --> 00:48:18.760
over a half of the room, rose your hand. So yes,
833
00:48:18.960 --> 00:48:24.000
I still cold with my hands manually, and I was.
834
00:48:24.280 --> 00:48:26.800
I was. I started to think, okay, interesting, this is
835
00:48:26.840 --> 00:48:29.119
an open source so maybe this is different in a
836
00:48:29.199 --> 00:48:33.880
different space. But I started to think, what is going
837
00:48:33.960 --> 00:48:38.239
to happen to those people and what should we do
838
00:48:38.440 --> 00:48:43.960
as leaders right now? Again in middle twenty twenty six,
839
00:48:44.480 --> 00:48:48.000
you you know, you had AI slash machine learning and
840
00:48:48.119 --> 00:48:51.360
your profile before it was fancy started two thousand and
841
00:48:51.679 --> 00:48:56.039
nine or something. So I said the story and I'm
842
00:48:56.079 --> 00:48:59.280
asking you, what do you see that this is happening
843
00:48:59.440 --> 00:49:03.199
right now in teens intact because of what is so
844
00:49:03.480 --> 00:49:06.559
what is happening with AI for the last three years,
845
00:49:06.679 --> 00:49:09.159
let's let's say, and what is going to happen next
846
00:49:09.280 --> 00:49:14.760
two And what is going to happen to those people
847
00:49:14.840 --> 00:49:16.880
who just roll their hands and to say, hey, I
848
00:49:16.960 --> 00:49:20.239
do it manually all the time, not using any any
849
00:49:20.320 --> 00:49:25.079
any any any automation whatsoever. So yeah, I'm opening this
850
00:49:25.960 --> 00:49:26.440
loving one.
851
00:49:27.599 --> 00:49:29.920
I think there are two, at least two things have
852
00:49:30.000 --> 00:49:31.719
come to mind. One of them is there are a
853
00:49:31.760 --> 00:49:37.039
lot of people who abandoned AI at CHATBT or like
854
00:49:37.159 --> 00:49:41.079
GPT three point five, like the outputs are not good enough.
855
00:49:41.199 --> 00:49:46.039
I'm just moving on. Something fundamentally changed with Opus four
856
00:49:46.079 --> 00:49:47.960
point five in November last year.
857
00:49:48.519 --> 00:49:49.199
It was just.
858
00:49:50.719 --> 00:49:54.239
Something like fundamentally changed. Like I was still you know,
859
00:49:54.519 --> 00:49:57.480
I was fortunate enough to get early access to get
860
00:49:57.559 --> 00:50:01.800
help copilot. It feels like it feels like ten years
861
00:50:01.840 --> 00:50:04.480
ago now at this point when it would just autocomplete
862
00:50:04.559 --> 00:50:06.840
and I was like, oh my god, I'm like writing
863
00:50:07.119 --> 00:50:09.960
so much faster. There's like so many how does it
864
00:50:10.159 --> 00:50:12.760
know this is what I'm trying to do. But I
865
00:50:12.840 --> 00:50:14.719
was still like writing a lot of it manually and
866
00:50:14.800 --> 00:50:17.519
then I would use JGPT here and there. It was
867
00:50:17.679 --> 00:50:19.679
very buggy, and so I ended up like using it
868
00:50:19.840 --> 00:50:22.639
really to write specific functions or to write tools, but
869
00:50:23.079 --> 00:50:27.880
I never really got it to function as a outsourced engineer.
870
00:50:28.239 --> 00:50:30.360
And then Opus four point five was really the moment
871
00:50:30.360 --> 00:50:34.159
where I realized, Okay, now we have something where if
872
00:50:34.199 --> 00:50:36.199
you have the right guardrails, if you have the right
873
00:50:36.280 --> 00:50:40.559
system in place, it can actually do proper work. And
874
00:50:40.719 --> 00:50:44.320
so I think there's a bunch of people that you know,
875
00:50:44.519 --> 00:50:47.639
abandoned at that point, and I think for those people,
876
00:50:49.000 --> 00:50:52.000
we need to get them to actually try it, try
877
00:50:52.039 --> 00:50:57.079
the new models and realize, Okay, this is actually genuinely great.
878
00:50:58.320 --> 00:51:02.039
It's not perfect, but it's great. And that's going to change.
879
00:51:02.440 --> 00:51:05.159
You know, maybe like twenty percent or ten percent of
880
00:51:05.239 --> 00:51:07.719
the people that we're still raising their hand are no
881
00:51:07.840 --> 00:51:10.199
longer going to raise their hand. I think that the
882
00:51:10.320 --> 00:51:14.800
biggest challenge is and again, like this task monkey thing,
883
00:51:15.039 --> 00:51:17.000
hopefully we can put in the show notes like it's
884
00:51:17.519 --> 00:51:21.159
I took this from a Twitter post that I thought
885
00:51:21.280 --> 00:51:24.119
was really interesting in like thinking about system thinkers and
886
00:51:24.199 --> 00:51:27.079
all of that. The people that are crushing it on
887
00:51:28.519 --> 00:51:31.280
using AI are not vibe coding, right, It's like AI
888
00:51:31.519 --> 00:51:34.280
engineering you're thinking about like how do I architect a
889
00:51:34.400 --> 00:51:37.840
system that allows the AI to produce code with the
890
00:51:37.920 --> 00:51:40.960
right guardrails, with the right context at any given point
891
00:51:40.960 --> 00:51:44.159
in time, that has loops to verify what it's doing.
892
00:51:46.000 --> 00:51:49.519
That is system designed, right. It's really thinking about when
893
00:51:49.559 --> 00:51:53.480
I'm building a system, if I have to build a feature,
894
00:51:54.320 --> 00:51:56.679
if I break down those tasks and I allocate some
895
00:51:56.800 --> 00:51:58.960
kind of like what would be the outsourcing costs for it?
896
00:51:59.159 --> 00:52:02.119
So's say, think about the architecture of the system. That
897
00:52:02.280 --> 00:52:04.000
is something if you were to outsource it, you'd pay
898
00:52:04.000 --> 00:52:07.199
a lot of money. Now, if you have all of
899
00:52:07.320 --> 00:52:10.800
the architecture, you have the interfaces, and now you just
900
00:52:10.880 --> 00:52:14.119
need to write the code, probably wouldn't pay very much
901
00:52:14.199 --> 00:52:16.960
for that part, right, And that's the part you can
902
00:52:17.519 --> 00:52:19.960
give to the AI. And so what I find is
903
00:52:20.000 --> 00:52:25.000
that the people who haven't figured it out and just
904
00:52:25.360 --> 00:52:27.960
can't figure out how to think in systems and to
905
00:52:28.079 --> 00:52:31.039
realize it's not about producing the code, it's about thinking
906
00:52:31.079 --> 00:52:35.599
about the architecture and think about like bringing to consciousness
907
00:52:36.119 --> 00:52:39.559
everything that you were doing without even thinking about it, right,
908
00:52:39.920 --> 00:52:43.039
and understanding that that's something then you now have to
909
00:52:43.840 --> 00:52:46.159
give to someone else same thing. That want of challenges
910
00:52:46.199 --> 00:52:48.719
when you're first time leader is that you've been used
911
00:52:48.719 --> 00:52:51.079
to doing things and you're great at doing them, but
912
00:52:51.159 --> 00:52:53.960
you never realize why you were doing them, and now
913
00:52:54.000 --> 00:52:56.280
you have to teach someone to do them. Like that
914
00:52:56.559 --> 00:53:00.760
first step of teaching is so interesting. Thing when I start,
915
00:53:00.960 --> 00:53:04.280
you know, coaching handball for like young kids, the servilizing,
916
00:53:04.280 --> 00:53:06.480
Oh my god, Like even just like throwing the ball
917
00:53:07.000 --> 00:53:10.159
isn't something that's natural, Like they don't get it, Like
918
00:53:10.519 --> 00:53:12.679
what is the movement of the risk? Like when do
919
00:53:12.719 --> 00:53:14.960
you like use their risk to whip the ball? And
920
00:53:15.119 --> 00:53:17.800
like what's the kind of like shoulder movement like arm up,
921
00:53:17.960 --> 00:53:20.159
armed down? Like if people like kind of push the
922
00:53:20.199 --> 00:53:23.320
ball like this, Like things that just like are natural
923
00:53:23.400 --> 00:53:26.000
to you, Like you start thinking about them and you realize, okay,
924
00:53:26.039 --> 00:53:27.719
like there is a process to this, and being able
925
00:53:27.800 --> 00:53:30.079
to document the process allows you then to offload it
926
00:53:30.119 --> 00:53:33.159
to an AI. So the long story short is, unfortunately
927
00:53:33.239 --> 00:53:35.920
for the majority of those people, I don't know that
928
00:53:36.000 --> 00:53:40.159
there's much of a working future for them because if
929
00:53:40.239 --> 00:53:44.960
you're not able, like the bar of where automation can
930
00:53:45.039 --> 00:53:48.519
go in this pyramid all the way system thinkers, the
931
00:53:48.599 --> 00:53:52.079
bar is now higher. If all you do is executing tasks.
932
00:53:52.880 --> 00:53:55.880
That's where I is today, and it's doing it at
933
00:53:55.960 --> 00:54:02.320
a accuracy that is higher than like most people. And
934
00:54:02.440 --> 00:54:04.280
so if you're not able to think in systems and
935
00:54:04.400 --> 00:54:07.639
to have the AI do the work for you, I
936
00:54:08.000 --> 00:54:10.679
think it's yeah, it's going to be a rough couple
937
00:54:10.719 --> 00:54:11.079
of years.
938
00:54:13.199 --> 00:54:15.960
And you know, the skills is just one thing that
939
00:54:16.119 --> 00:54:17.639
the mindset shift is in mass.
940
00:54:18.320 --> 00:54:20.239
The mindset is the main thing. Right, If you're not
941
00:54:20.400 --> 00:54:24.519
able to think in systems and decompose everything you do
942
00:54:24.679 --> 00:54:29.119
into smaller subtasks, that's going to be rough.
943
00:54:31.239 --> 00:54:37.119
Yeah, optimistic, Hey, but this is what it is, right.
944
00:54:37.039 --> 00:54:39.079
And I guess what it is and I think there
945
00:54:39.440 --> 00:54:42.239
that's where there's one thing, which is like individually, we
946
00:54:42.400 --> 00:54:44.559
all need to make sure that we you know, we
947
00:54:44.719 --> 00:54:47.559
just the bar has gone up, so now we have
948
00:54:47.679 --> 00:54:49.880
to think about like how do I make myself? How
949
00:54:49.920 --> 00:54:53.000
do I put myself above the line. And that's really
950
00:54:53.119 --> 00:54:58.679
the practicing system thinking, practicing, just practicing thinking, right. I
951
00:54:58.719 --> 00:55:00.800
think this is like it's it's hard to say this
952
00:55:00.960 --> 00:55:03.960
in an era where we're all consuming like everything in
953
00:55:04.119 --> 00:55:09.320
like five second, like TikTok videos and stuff, but critical
954
00:55:09.440 --> 00:55:11.679
thinking is more important than ever because we're going to
955
00:55:11.719 --> 00:55:15.440
spend more time critically thinking about the architecture we're putting together,
956
00:55:15.519 --> 00:55:19.280
Critically thinking about how did the AI implement this, Critically
957
00:55:19.360 --> 00:55:23.199
thinking about are my harnesses good enough to make sure
958
00:55:23.280 --> 00:55:25.480
that this thing is not going to go off the rails.
959
00:55:26.320 --> 00:55:31.000
That deep thinking and like spending time on a problem
960
00:55:31.320 --> 00:55:34.039
ahead of the execution, I think is a skill that
961
00:55:34.119 --> 00:55:36.920
we've started losing a little bit and is going to
962
00:55:37.000 --> 00:55:42.880
be incredibly important in coming years. Second part to this is,
963
00:55:43.599 --> 00:55:46.920
I think from a policy perspective, not necessarily the topic
964
00:55:46.960 --> 00:55:50.559
of this conversation, but there's a lot of work we
965
00:55:50.679 --> 00:55:54.239
need to do collectively to bring this to the forefront
966
00:55:54.280 --> 00:55:56.960
of our political leaders to understand. Look, it's great that
967
00:55:57.159 --> 00:55:59.599
Entropic and Open AI keep on saying that they're going
968
00:55:59.679 --> 00:56:03.880
to create mass unemployment with their AI. Shouldn't that be
969
00:56:04.000 --> 00:56:07.280
a warning sign that we should think about what happens next,
970
00:56:07.440 --> 00:56:12.400
Like if they actually reach this thing, what happens, like
971
00:56:12.599 --> 00:56:15.920
how are we making sure that we are setting ourselves
972
00:56:15.960 --> 00:56:19.599
for success rather than another set of revolutions where people
973
00:56:19.639 --> 00:56:21.719
are just going to storm the data centers and burn
974
00:56:21.760 --> 00:56:26.440
everything to the ground. Right, it's a pretangent, but it
975
00:56:26.599 --> 00:56:30.239
is something that we should be spending more time thinking
976
00:56:30.280 --> 00:56:33.920
about and at a local scale. I've been spending a
977
00:56:33.960 --> 00:56:38.360
lot of time thinking about redefining the roles and responsibilities
978
00:56:38.400 --> 00:56:42.280
of every job position in the organization in an era
979
00:56:42.519 --> 00:56:45.480
where more of the work is done by AI than
980
00:56:45.639 --> 00:56:48.000
what are we expecting of you? What is your role?
981
00:56:48.400 --> 00:56:49.679
What are your responsibilities?
982
00:56:49.760 --> 00:56:49.800
Like?
983
00:56:49.840 --> 00:56:53.000
What are you accountable for? That changes what I expect
984
00:56:53.079 --> 00:56:55.760
of every employee, But it also changes who I'm hiring,
985
00:56:55.840 --> 00:57:01.800
because now I'm potentially hiring fewer super super deep experts
986
00:57:01.840 --> 00:57:04.840
at something and more generalists, more people that are excellent
987
00:57:04.920 --> 00:57:09.519
at learning quickly. They understand the concepts, they understand the
988
00:57:09.679 --> 00:57:13.880
laws of thermoidynamics, and like basic like advanced math and physics,
989
00:57:13.920 --> 00:57:18.039
and they can jump from one thing to another. These
990
00:57:18.159 --> 00:57:21.639
people tend to crush it in the AI era a
991
00:57:21.760 --> 00:57:24.719
lot more than the super deep experts who are very
992
00:57:24.760 --> 00:57:28.880
good at doing one thing but struggle to translate what
993
00:57:29.000 --> 00:57:32.559
they're doing. On the note of a European in the US,
994
00:57:32.679 --> 00:57:35.079
that's one of the things that I found fascinating where
995
00:57:35.639 --> 00:57:39.320
the European or at least the French engineering institutions are
996
00:57:39.360 --> 00:57:43.559
a lot about like horizontal learning. We're very we're Jacksonville Trades,
997
00:57:43.639 --> 00:57:46.519
master of none, like become very good at like just
998
00:57:46.840 --> 00:57:50.280
learning complex stuff. And for the longest time I thought
999
00:57:50.320 --> 00:57:53.199
that was stupid. I came to the US and I
1000
00:57:53.320 --> 00:57:56.199
went to Stanford for a little bit, and I met
1001
00:57:56.320 --> 00:58:00.239
people who are excellent at what they were doing. They were,
1002
00:58:00.320 --> 00:58:03.039
you know, getting masters in mechanical engineering, and they were
1003
00:58:03.119 --> 00:58:05.800
struggling with some of the algebra that I was doing
1004
00:58:05.920 --> 00:58:10.119
the year after I graduated from high school. And that's
1005
00:58:10.159 --> 00:58:14.159
because we were learning just that, like it nothing applied,
1006
00:58:14.239 --> 00:58:16.519
like it had no idea why you were doing this.
1007
00:58:17.559 --> 00:58:21.800
And what I'm seeing is that this like ability to like,
1008
00:58:22.519 --> 00:58:25.039
you know, learn a bunch of things and shift and
1009
00:58:25.199 --> 00:58:29.760
not be fitted in a mold is has created some
1010
00:58:30.000 --> 00:58:34.599
incredible talent that I think is going to be the
1011
00:58:35.559 --> 00:58:38.719
the top talent of this coming era. I think we
1012
00:58:38.800 --> 00:58:40.320
are entering the era of the generalists.
1013
00:58:40.880 --> 00:58:43.320
Yeah, and this is I think this is a subject
1014
00:58:43.360 --> 00:58:47.960
for another episode, you know, because how to create teams
1015
00:58:48.079 --> 00:58:50.119
right now, what is going to happen and what is
1016
00:58:50.199 --> 00:58:52.400
already happening on the market, and when we can actually
1017
00:58:52.480 --> 00:58:56.360
observe it, and how we as leaders and as I
1018
00:58:56.480 --> 00:58:58.840
sees as well, what we should do to stay in
1019
00:58:58.960 --> 00:59:02.360
the market and not being kicked out of it because
1020
00:59:02.559 --> 00:59:05.559
we are not adaptive enough or we just say out
1021
00:59:05.599 --> 00:59:07.840
it worked for so many years, So what actually can
1022
00:59:07.920 --> 00:59:12.280
happen with the whole approach? And I think we both
1023
00:59:12.360 --> 00:59:14.920
see those people all the time using the example of
1024
00:59:14.960 --> 00:59:16.880
the right hand right, So this is something that I
1025
00:59:17.559 --> 00:59:20.039
think that yeah, you should do, I know, part two
1026
00:59:20.079 --> 00:59:22.719
of the conversation, because you know, we just scribe the surface.
1027
00:59:22.800 --> 00:59:24.239
So this is it.
1028
00:59:24.599 --> 00:59:27.760
But right now, because of the timing, I'm aware of
1029
00:59:28.199 --> 00:59:31.719
attention span of our audience, I will go to the
1030
00:59:31.880 --> 00:59:36.440
liking ground. Frances every ready, Yes, Okay, where's go. So
1031
00:59:36.840 --> 00:59:40.400
what is the worst leadership advice that you ever?
1032
00:59:41.840 --> 00:59:45.280
Titles don't matter. Oh, this is a big debate we
1033
00:59:45.360 --> 00:59:48.679
had with my co founder. He genuinely doesn't care about
1034
00:59:48.719 --> 00:59:50.519
titles and he does it so he's like, I don't
1035
00:59:50.519 --> 00:59:53.159
get why people want titles whatever, it doesn't matter. Just
1036
00:59:53.199 --> 00:59:55.039
as long as they get the job done, we're fine.
1037
00:59:55.760 --> 00:59:59.360
And the funny thing is like Conway laws, Conway's law
1038
00:59:59.440 --> 01:00:02.239
comes to bite. So it's this idea that your product
1039
01:00:02.320 --> 01:00:05.639
matches your org. It doesn't matter how small your this
1040
01:00:05.840 --> 01:00:10.760
principle is always going to apply it might seem meaningless
1041
01:00:10.800 --> 01:00:13.880
to spend time thinking about like what are the titles
1042
01:00:13.960 --> 01:00:15.760
and what is the ORG structure and all of this,
1043
01:00:15.960 --> 01:00:20.480
but the reality is like those decisions as leaders will
1044
01:00:20.599 --> 01:00:24.480
dramatically impact what your team is able to ship. It's
1045
01:00:24.559 --> 01:00:27.000
very funny because right now I'm in an organization where
1046
01:00:27.079 --> 01:00:31.400
I'm part of a CTO office. I'm working on innovation,
1047
01:00:31.679 --> 01:00:35.320
redefining the software development life cycle and building products, and
1048
01:00:35.480 --> 01:00:38.880
we're moving very, very very fast, and we're at the
1049
01:00:38.880 --> 01:00:42.039
point where now some of the things that we've built
1050
01:00:43.159 --> 01:00:45.079
are being sold and now we need to bring them
1051
01:00:45.119 --> 01:00:47.079
back to the engineering team. And the engineering team's like,
1052
01:00:47.079 --> 01:00:48.960
oh my god, like this is not how we work.
1053
01:00:49.559 --> 01:00:53.519
And so because we've created organizationally this thing where we
1054
01:00:53.679 --> 01:00:59.519
have a relatively slow moving team and a like rewarded
1055
01:00:59.639 --> 01:01:02.880
on as moving and learning team, we now have two
1056
01:01:03.000 --> 01:01:05.519
different products that are going to be hard to bring
1057
01:01:05.639 --> 01:01:08.000
back together again. And not saying it was the wrong
1058
01:01:08.119 --> 01:01:11.039
thing to do, I just saying that it always happens.
1059
01:01:11.239 --> 01:01:14.800
And so spending time on the ORG layout and the
1060
01:01:14.960 --> 01:01:17.960
ORG layout and the titles, like titles mean things to people.
1061
01:01:19.159 --> 01:01:22.039
They're actually more important than you might think. As a startup,
1062
01:01:22.119 --> 01:01:23.960
you kind of want to give see titles and vps
1063
01:01:24.000 --> 01:01:26.519
to everyone. It's going to come back to buye you.
1064
01:01:28.639 --> 01:01:31.360
It's might not be important for you, but it is
1065
01:01:31.440 --> 01:01:35.000
not about you anymore when you are so yeah, what
1066
01:01:35.199 --> 01:01:37.440
is the one thing that you wish you knew at
1067
01:01:37.480 --> 01:01:39.559
the very beginning of your leadership journey?
1068
01:01:40.159 --> 01:01:42.119
We touched upon this, but I would say it's the
1069
01:01:42.239 --> 01:01:46.400
cost of okay players I've worked with. I still work
1070
01:01:46.480 --> 01:01:50.880
with some truly truly exceptional people. Like the the energy,
1071
01:01:51.119 --> 01:01:54.320
the momentum, like it just it feels magical. It feels
1072
01:01:54.320 --> 01:01:57.119
like nothing can stop us when we're working together, and
1073
01:01:57.800 --> 01:01:59.519
you know, you wake up you want to work with them,
1074
01:01:59.599 --> 01:02:01.559
Like I'm I'm excited to go to work and to
1075
01:02:01.639 --> 01:02:03.199
work with these people. So I know they're going to
1076
01:02:03.320 --> 01:02:05.840
challenge me. I know we're going to have a good time,
1077
01:02:06.079 --> 01:02:08.519
like you know, pushing each other and then we're you know,
1078
01:02:08.639 --> 01:02:12.719
getting the best out of one another. But as soon
1079
01:02:12.800 --> 01:02:16.039
as you introduce like an okay person in the mix,
1080
01:02:17.320 --> 01:02:20.039
everything slows down, Like you know, it's you know, the
1081
01:02:20.800 --> 01:02:23.599
train only moves at the pace of the slowest wagon, right,
1082
01:02:23.760 --> 01:02:26.480
like all of a sudden, like everything just feels slower.
1083
01:02:26.599 --> 01:02:29.239
It's more painful, you have to explain more. You're not
1084
01:02:29.440 --> 01:02:33.599
challenging each other, and so there isn't that resonance like
1085
01:02:33.679 --> 01:02:37.000
there can be in a team of you know, top players.
1086
01:02:37.960 --> 01:02:41.840
The thing related to that to make it maybe more
1087
01:02:41.920 --> 01:02:45.360
tangible for people listening, so I use an interview scale
1088
01:02:45.519 --> 01:02:48.360
where every it's like one to four. One is like
1089
01:02:48.519 --> 01:02:52.239
I'm strongly against hiring four, I'm strongly for hiring. Very
1090
01:02:52.280 --> 01:02:56.159
important in my mind to have a even number. Indie
1091
01:02:56.159 --> 01:02:58.079
scales never an odd number, because if you go one
1092
01:02:58.119 --> 01:03:00.800
to five, everybody's going to be a three. When you
1093
01:03:00.920 --> 01:03:03.840
have to determine between two or three, that's a decision
1094
01:03:03.920 --> 01:03:06.679
like do you hire or not hire. And I used
1095
01:03:06.719 --> 01:03:09.519
to think that the you know, we want to hire
1096
01:03:09.559 --> 01:03:12.039
people that didn't get a two in any of their
1097
01:03:12.159 --> 01:03:15.039
interviews with the team, because that was the kind of
1098
01:03:15.079 --> 01:03:18.840
this disqualifying factor. What I've found is that the thing
1099
01:03:18.920 --> 01:03:21.400
that matters is actually like how many fours is this
1100
01:03:21.519 --> 01:03:25.639
person getting? And I found that the absolute top players
1101
01:03:25.800 --> 01:03:29.840
generally have like thirty percent of four ratings, but they'll
1102
01:03:29.880 --> 01:03:33.079
also get a one and potentially or like generally a
1103
01:03:33.199 --> 01:03:37.320
two or a few twos and maybe a one, And
1104
01:03:37.440 --> 01:03:40.400
that's actually not disqualifying. It's often like people that feel
1105
01:03:40.440 --> 01:03:46.559
threatened more than anything else. But if you hire people
1106
01:03:46.639 --> 01:03:48.639
are just like a bunch of threes, there's no twos,
1107
01:03:48.719 --> 01:03:52.440
no fours, you end up again. It's like this idea
1108
01:03:52.519 --> 01:03:54.079
that you know, if you don't you're just not going
1109
01:03:54.159 --> 01:03:56.679
to move. Nothing's going to change, and you're just going
1110
01:03:56.719 --> 01:04:01.880
to be static. And in the age of AI, I mean,
1111
01:04:02.360 --> 01:04:04.800
you know, being at a standstill is basically a death
1112
01:04:04.840 --> 01:04:06.119
sentence as a company.
1113
01:04:06.599 --> 01:04:10.400
Amen to that. And what is something Because we've talked
1114
01:04:10.840 --> 01:04:15.079
about learning transformation and that's you know, staying in the
1115
01:04:15.119 --> 01:04:17.480
same place and not being kicked out of the market.
1116
01:04:18.039 --> 01:04:20.440
So what is something that you do for your growth?
1117
01:04:20.800 --> 01:04:23.480
How you learn? Maybe see you or read something lately,
1118
01:04:23.719 --> 01:04:26.719
or listen to something or watch something that inspired you
1119
01:04:26.719 --> 01:04:28.760
to thought to something that we can all use a.
1120
01:04:28.800 --> 01:04:33.599
Lot of things. The number one is I have a
1121
01:04:33.719 --> 01:04:37.840
network of people that I highly highly respect, these kind
1122
01:04:37.880 --> 01:04:40.119
of top players. Some of them are you know, in
1123
01:04:40.239 --> 01:04:42.800
the company or in my team. Some of them are
1124
01:04:42.840 --> 01:04:45.760
even direct reports. Some of them are outside of the team,
1125
01:04:46.440 --> 01:04:49.280
and I go to them for inspiration, like what are
1126
01:04:49.320 --> 01:04:51.760
you working on? What's something cool you've seen this week?
1127
01:04:51.880 --> 01:04:57.400
And the funny thing is I find that LinkedIn Twitter.
1128
01:04:58.360 --> 01:05:00.000
I hate to say it, but I found more value
1129
01:05:00.039 --> 01:05:04.559
you lately in Twitter. Then yeah, then on LinkedIn. It's
1130
01:05:04.719 --> 01:05:07.480
just a cesspool of I call it tech porn. People
1131
01:05:07.559 --> 01:05:11.199
are just pretending that they're doing things. They're like showing you, Oh,
1132
01:05:11.239 --> 01:05:13.599
look at my five Mac minis that are rigged together
1133
01:05:13.760 --> 01:05:17.320
with like open claw running you know, at nauseum, and
1134
01:05:17.360 --> 01:05:19.360
you're like cool, but like, what are you doing with it?
1135
01:05:19.480 --> 01:05:21.280
Like what's like, what do you have to show for it?
1136
01:05:21.400 --> 01:05:24.159
Generally it's nothing. When you talk to people that you
1137
01:05:24.320 --> 01:05:30.159
know and you respect, they'll tell you very insightful and
1138
01:05:30.639 --> 01:05:32.960
very detailed things like, oh, like I ran into this
1139
01:05:33.159 --> 01:05:36.880
particular issue with like the Claude harness and this is
1140
01:05:36.920 --> 01:05:40.960
how I fixed it and and yeah, so that that's
1141
01:05:41.079 --> 01:05:41.719
one big thing.
1142
01:05:42.239 --> 01:05:42.679
And then.
1143
01:05:44.320 --> 01:05:49.800
Building. I think I I'm pret diligent about carving out
1144
01:05:49.920 --> 01:05:52.440
time every week. I know every week can seem like
1145
01:05:52.440 --> 01:05:54.880
a lot of other people. I'm part of CTO office,
1146
01:05:54.960 --> 01:05:57.199
so it's it's fairly easy for me. But even as
1147
01:05:57.239 --> 01:06:01.320
a co founder, I would always have one afternoon per
1148
01:06:01.400 --> 01:06:03.719
week where I'm just building and it doesn't matter if
1149
01:06:03.760 --> 01:06:08.000
it relates to the company. If it doesn't. But feeding
1150
01:06:08.119 --> 01:06:11.119
that curiosity and having to build is a great forcing
1151
01:06:11.239 --> 01:06:13.679
mechanism to go see what are other people doing, how
1152
01:06:13.880 --> 01:06:16.199
other people solve this problem? What are some of the
1153
01:06:16.239 --> 01:06:18.920
things that are out there. I recently discovered this tool.
1154
01:06:19.360 --> 01:06:23.800
It's not sponsored, but vast dot ai. They're basically a
1155
01:06:23.880 --> 01:06:26.880
true row for GPU. So if you need an H
1156
01:06:27.000 --> 01:06:30.199
one hundred, very expensive, very hard to buy these days,
1157
01:06:30.679 --> 01:06:33.800
you can rent one. So people have these GPUs sitting
1158
01:06:33.840 --> 01:06:36.719
at home. They're connected to a network and you basically
1159
01:06:36.920 --> 01:06:39.599
send your code and it's going to run on their GPUs.
1160
01:06:39.639 --> 01:06:42.480
If you want to do fine tuning or distilling, or
1161
01:06:42.559 --> 01:06:45.280
like some kind of heavy process that doesn't fit in
1162
01:06:45.440 --> 01:06:49.159
like the Google Collab GPUs, you can actually do this
1163
01:06:49.320 --> 01:06:53.159
for like ten bucks. You can distill like a pretty
1164
01:06:53.360 --> 01:06:58.400
like big Mini Max or Quen model. And that's something
1165
01:06:58.440 --> 01:07:01.000
that I discovered by just like lollocating time to doing this.
1166
01:07:01.599 --> 01:07:04.280
Yeah, I think that this is an extremely valid point
1167
01:07:04.800 --> 01:07:10.079
because you just not learn from reading or watching before
1168
01:07:10.199 --> 01:07:13.840
you start actually doing something like that. You're just amazing
1169
01:07:14.440 --> 01:07:17.519
you brain with a lot of information about the question.
1170
01:07:17.679 --> 01:07:21.239
So what so this is this is a great advice. Francis,
1171
01:07:21.440 --> 01:07:24.280
Thank you for the conversation. I loved it, and I
1172
01:07:24.360 --> 01:07:26.719
think that was uncomfortable from time to time. So this
1173
01:07:26.880 --> 01:07:30.280
is this is extremely well designed process that happen over
1174
01:07:30.480 --> 01:07:32.960
over us, I would say, So, I hope that your
1175
01:07:33.000 --> 01:07:35.039
audience will get a lot of value out of it,
1176
01:07:35.280 --> 01:07:38.920
a lot of real talk, not non fluff, but just
1177
01:07:39.119 --> 01:07:42.559
you know, real examples and the truth. That's sometimes we
1178
01:07:42.639 --> 01:07:44.519
are just not courageous enough to say it loud. So
1179
01:07:45.320 --> 01:07:48.519
thank you. And the question is if somebody wants to
1180
01:07:49.280 --> 01:07:51.159
connect with you, check out on you to see what
1181
01:07:51.280 --> 01:07:53.519
you're doing, where they can find you, will tell us
1182
01:07:53.519 --> 01:07:54.079
all the places.
1183
01:07:54.239 --> 01:07:56.079
Yeah, I would say LinkedIn is the best place. Even
1184
01:07:56.119 --> 01:07:58.079
though I hate the platform, it's where I'm the most
1185
01:07:58.159 --> 01:08:02.440
active trying to make it better by posting some actual
1186
01:08:02.920 --> 01:08:05.719
content that I would want to see on there. So
1187
01:08:06.000 --> 01:08:08.559
I'm generally freely responsive there, so that's the best place
1188
01:08:08.639 --> 01:08:09.360
to find me.
1189
01:08:09.920 --> 01:08:12.920
Great. Yeah, we're going to put the link in the
1190
01:08:13.000 --> 01:08:15.599
show notes so everybody can just click and then check
1191
01:08:15.639 --> 01:08:18.239
you out. So yeah, thank you. It was a blessed
1192
01:08:18.239 --> 01:08:19.840
to have you on the show. Yeah, thank you for
1193
01:08:19.880 --> 01:08:22.680
having me, of course, and thank you all for listening
1194
01:08:22.720 --> 01:08:25.439
because we are doing it for you. Of course we
1195
01:08:25.520 --> 01:08:28.439
are enjoying conversations, but this is for you, so we
1196
01:08:28.520 --> 01:08:31.119
don't know what's what resonated the most, what you hated,
1197
01:08:31.239 --> 01:08:33.600
maybe you'll disagree with something. You know, we just love
1198
01:08:33.680 --> 01:08:35.960
to have you in our DMS. Some LinkedIn and we'll
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also that and comments. So just go and leave some
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and shut the link with somebody who might actually use it,
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because you know, there are so many things that are
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happening right now so we can all be better together
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as a community. So thank you, Anthlesy you soon in
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another episode of the Lemma PEG Leadership Podcast by Everybody
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Lehman Tech Leadership Podcast