Real Talk on AI from the Field | Brian O'Shea | EP: 05

Welcome to What the futr Podcast - where we dive into what’s next in AI, tech, sales, and the messy, brilliant human hustle behind it all.

This episode features Sandesh Patel in conversation with Brian O'Shea, a GTM Leader, who’s been at the crossroads of sales, strategy, and AI innovation.

In this episode of What the futr, Brian and Sandesh explore the human side of artificial intelligence - how trust, empathy, and storytelling are becoming the real differentiators in the age of automation.

From the shifting culture of Silicon Valley to leading teams through massive change, Brian shares practical lessons from the trenches - what works, what doesn’t, and why staying human might just be your best edge in tech.

The conversation dives deep into building trust in AI, redefining leadership in high-growth environments, and why technology should serve people - not the other way around.

It’s a candid, no-fluff exchange for founders, sales pros, and innovators who believe that the future of tech is still deeply human.

Subscribe for regular episodes.

👉 Explore the platform: https://futrconnect.io

👉 Business inquiries: sandesh@futrconnect.io

Transcript

00:00:00:00 - 00:00:21:06
Sandesh
Thank you for tuning in to another What the Future podcast. Now, in the first four episodes, we had four CEOs and founders from very promising early stage AI startups, and we learned a lot. One thing that we've learned is customer adoption is still slow, which is obviously going to impact tech sales. So got me thinking why is this?

00:00:21:08 - 00:00:43:03
Sandesh
I started talking to a bunch of people in my network and I was having some incredible conversations. So I was thinking, why not just transfer those conversations, but make it into a podcast and share it with others? So this podcast will be a little more casual, it won't be as structured, and it'll give us the opportunity just to have a normal conversation with two two people in the industry.

00:00:43:05 - 00:01:16:14
Sandesh
So the first one is no stranger to the Silicon Valley. Brian O'shay. He's an incredible sales leader and I trust his opinion a lot. We're going to talk about everything from AI, startups, tech sales, and of course, humanity as well. Thank you for tuning in. Hope you enjoy the show. We got to change the game.

00:01:16:15 - 00:01:19:06
Sandesh
Before we get started, man, how's hard things going?

00:01:19:08 - 00:01:20:08
Brian
Okay.

00:01:20:10 - 00:01:22:09
Sandesh
Are you interviewing your face off?

00:01:22:11 - 00:01:26:14
Brian
Dude? It's crazy. I get easily two calls a day.

00:01:26:16 - 00:01:30:22
Sandesh
Oh. That's great. Is that mean? So you got a lot of a lot of options.

00:01:31:00 - 00:01:36:06
Brian
Yeah. It also means like, there's you don't know what's real, what's not.

00:01:36:08 - 00:01:38:01
Sandesh
And that's what we're going to talk about.

00:01:38:02 - 00:01:59:12
Brian
But you know, it's it's given me like I was talking to our company yesterday and I'm like how do experience these guys, these guys, these guys, these guys. And they're like never even heard it talk. I'm like, yeah, this this is what these guys do. Yeah. They're direct competitors. And they still know like it's it's crazy. There's so many.

00:01:59:14 - 00:02:01:17
Sandesh
And are they all AI.

00:02:01:19 - 00:02:05:08
Brian
They're all AI.

00:02:05:10 - 00:02:13:01
Sandesh
Would you say basically what 90% of startups out of the Valley now have are strong AI.

00:02:13:03 - 00:02:14:08
Brian
Market.

00:02:14:09 - 00:02:15:15
Sandesh
More than 90.

00:02:15:17 - 00:02:17:23
Brian
Yeah.

00:02:18:01 - 00:02:21:14
Brian
It's just hard to get funding if you don't have an AI story.

00:02:21:16 - 00:02:52:02
Sandesh
Yeah. Yeah. Well, that's part of the discussion I want to have is like. Everyone is talking about AI. So like what? For the last three decades, you and I have seen this where the technology comes out like, let's just say, you know, deduplication data domain comes out, does dedupe, and then all these big guys, they kind of reverse engineer the dedupe into their, their solution.

00:02:52:02 - 00:03:18:02
Sandesh
Right. And I feel like what's happening now is you got all these OEMs that are creating AI agents or AI solutions for their product. It's it's not a platform of AI, but it's a feature of AI inside of their platform. And it almost feels like you have to have some kind of an AI story, which to me, does it really matter?

00:03:18:04 - 00:03:37:12
Sandesh
Like right now, if you're buying into some someone's AI story like a current manufacturer, a big company, a server vendor, storage vendor, networking vendor, or whatever, aren't you really buying into what the future capabilities of their AI solution is? Because what they can do now.

00:03:37:13 - 00:03:55:02
Brian
It's not even, you can compare it to what would be like future. And really, I think you're spot on. Like you have to make up that on who's most capable. And look at certain companies. I'm like, you know, like ServiceNow is executing pretty well. You know, she asked me two years ago, would you bet on ServiceNow?

00:03:55:02 - 00:03:58:23
Brian
I'm like, no way, sir. I was actually really, really.

00:03:58:23 - 00:04:17:02
Sandesh
Well, I think they're going to I think they're going to crush in the AI game. They also bought Move Works, which was at two point some billion. Great acquisition, great exit for move works. But also great acquisition by ServiceNow.

00:04:17:04 - 00:04:31:22
Brian
They've been on the buying spree actually they bought a couple other companies. They buy recently. They were I really liked the company. They were, kind of a I made it a CRM company.

00:04:32:00 - 00:04:32:21
Sandesh


00:04:33:06 - 00:04:36:11
Brian
Logics. I like, like.

00:04:36:13 - 00:04:37:16
Sandesh
Okay, what do they.

00:04:37:16 - 00:04:42:17
Brian
Do? Yeah, it's a it's a Salesforce competitor.

00:04:42:19 - 00:04:44:00
Sandesh
Oh, really?

00:04:44:02 - 00:04:45:07
Brian
Yeah.

00:04:45:09 - 00:04:48:22
Sandesh
So wait a minute. ServiceNow bought,

00:04:49:00 - 00:04:56:20
Brian
Salesforce competitor ServiceNow bought a sales cart. Today it's a Cpq. And what's.

00:04:56:21 - 00:04:58:10
Sandesh
A cpq.

00:04:58:12 - 00:05:13:23
Brian
Configure price quote. So, you know, you want to like, you have a multi skew, solution data domain, you know, you've got your, your controller and then your base of storage,

00:05:14:01 - 00:05:17:05
Sandesh
HbA NICs cables. Exactly.

00:05:17:07 - 00:05:39:09
Brian
Support. And then it's going to, so you can configure the whole thing various different part numbers to make a solution. You can code it and it's going to spit out a proposal to, these guys were I really like these guys super smart. So I'm stoked for them. And and I think it's a good move for ServiceNow.

00:05:39:15 - 00:05:43:05
Sandesh
Does that. What does that do to the sales person?

00:05:43:07 - 00:05:44:13
Brian


00:05:44:15 - 00:05:51:20
Sandesh
And and engineering because like typically engineering and architecture are the ones, you know, creating the bombs.

00:05:51:22 - 00:05:58:21
Brian
Yeah. So what used to be like, I don't know if you've ever configured a symmetric or if you've ever seen that symmetric.

00:05:58:23 - 00:06:03:19
Sandesh
Oh yeah. Yeah, I hated selling it. I hated selling it, but I yeah, it's.

00:06:03:19 - 00:06:26:06
Brian
Like seven pages long and you're like the shittiest part was when a customer would be like, what is this part? I don't know, dude, but you're not paying for it anymore. It's a $0 life. So instead of having to have, like, a couple engineers figure out, how do you quote a solution for it, you can do it.

00:06:26:06 - 00:06:40:03
Brian
It's kind of automated. Do that process. And, it is actually one of these things that I learned stuff really well too, because you can set specific parameters and then just be like, all right, go, go this.

00:06:40:05 - 00:06:41:00
Sandesh
Yeah.

00:06:41:02 - 00:06:45:09
Brian
I'm going to move some of the shit behind me I saw that I saw Max get into,

00:06:45:11 - 00:06:49:05
Sandesh
No worries. Right.

00:06:49:07 - 00:06:58:10
Brian
Well I not let's get back in that. So, Yeah. Well, that's Chris Frazier. Is he up here?

00:06:58:12 - 00:07:07:13
Sandesh
Yeah. Yep. He's up here. And, he's loving it. Total, total fanboy of pure always watch.

00:07:07:13 - 00:07:08:04
Brian
Right?

00:07:08:06 - 00:07:26:18
Sandesh
Oh, yeah. Yeah, yeah. Because like, dude, when he and I were selling pure in the early days, we were selling the crap out of it. And our customers loved it. And they still love it. You know, it's just like, okay, now to me. Yeah. Don't do I want to I don't want to minimize what pure has done in the market.

00:07:26:20 - 00:07:42:22
Sandesh
They've had an incredible impact. And how many people can come into the storage industry and become a multibillion dollar company? You know, it's just a it's it's a total w. But at the same time, they made storage simple. They made it cost effective.

00:07:43:03 - 00:07:44:21
Brian
The evergreen model is crazy.

00:07:44:22 - 00:07:56:02
Sandesh
Yeah. And like and what's funny is all the other storage vendors have been trying to follow that lead. Yeah. But no one's ever. No one's done it as good as as they have.

00:07:56:03 - 00:08:21:22
Brian
Well, it was really the the architecture was built before the models. And all these people are trying to chase the model post architecture. Yeah, right. Like, so Korres came up with with the idea of evergreen storage, but he also came up with the architecture initially. Yeah. And so it's like you can't have the architecture, you can't have the business model fall or you can't do the business model.

00:08:21:23 - 00:08:31:10
Brian
Then try and try and modify the architecture after the fact. You have to have the architecture that lends itself to the business model. Yeah, I'm sure it was just unique in that there.

00:08:31:12 - 00:09:02:09
Sandesh
Yeah. Oh, dude. And like, this is the thing to me though. And we'll get into this too when we start, really getting into it. What's going to happen with infrastructure or with it? Like where do we where do we make money? And it's interesting. I was watching Jensen yesterday on whatever thing that he was on, and his basic comment was, I mean, obviously right now Nvidia's crushing it, you know, with AI, but he was basically saying how energy is going to be the number one most important thing.

00:09:02:09 - 00:09:29:17
Sandesh
But the second part is, you're saying just the amount of infrastructure that is going to be needed is going to be absolutely massive. Which is interesting to me because, like, I've been selling infrastructure my entire career. And it's, you know, when people are saying, oh, it's going to get commoditized, what's going to get commoditized now with AI and infrastructure, what part of that equation will get commoditized?

00:09:29:18 - 00:09:57:06
Brian
Yeah, I, I think there's a few different things. They can get commoditized. But I also do think the there's efficiencies coming out coming to bear in the market today that are reducing the, the like, not the dependency, but the, scale of GPUs and significantly reducing the power consumption. And so I think, yes, the power is still going to be the bottleneck for the next three, four, five years, potentially.

00:09:57:07 - 00:10:23:05
Brian
And maybe quite a bit longer than that. But I think and the in the US that you've got to close that gap with somewhere between solar and natural gas probably because it's going to take so long to bring nuclear, online. But I genuinely think like there's, we talked about this before. In the short term, I think some of this stuff is a bit overblown in the long term.

00:10:23:05 - 00:10:25:19
Brian
I think it's under understate.

00:10:25:21 - 00:10:28:21
Sandesh
I agree with that. I agree with that.

00:10:29:00 - 00:10:49:16
Brian
It's like just like the internet. You know, if you looked at the internet in 1999, 2000, you're like, okay, I did the the hype. It's just crazy around us and the infrastructure being rolled out to support it. Like dark fiber everywhere, like around you were here at that point time, right? Like, oh yeah, all the roads are being dug up.

00:10:49:16 - 00:11:02:04
Brian
So dark side. It's like way more bandwidth than you need to go at that point in time. And then totally, you know, years later, it's like, oh yeah, well, actually the internet was under state. That's it's die.

00:11:02:05 - 00:11:39:10
Sandesh
That is the unintended consequences of technology. We we create something. But then there is something that holds us back from getting the absolute value out of the tech. And I think, you know, the energy piece is going to be interesting to man, I don't know, I think it's going to be longer than five years. It and and I don't I'm not an energy expert, but from what I'm hearing is like America is going to have to do a tremendous amount of innovation and figure out partnerships in order how to, you know, get that much energy.

00:11:39:12 - 00:12:07:23
Brian
Yeah, I, I always bet on innovation. And I think I think there's a path where you see these small modular reactors and you're going to see them and like hundreds of them around the country. And it's it'll follow the path of inference. Right. Like where you have pops today, you might have a answer, I don't know, I like I'm every time I'm like, oh, that's a catastrophic bottleneck.

00:12:07:23 - 00:12:16:01
Brian
And Jack, I feel like a couple of years later it's like, oh, we start talking about what happened. Oh, there's just so that's a carrot.

00:12:16:02 - 00:12:16:10
Sandesh
Yeah.

00:12:16:13 - 00:12:47:02
Brian
You know, like, yeah, sometimes like the Big bang stuff. I don't know if you remember, but remember at the, remember the Segway came out, people were like, dude, this is like the biggest thing that's inspire, like nothing. And like, the only, only impact, was on mockups. Yeah. And then like, and maybe, like, your occasional tourist attraction and then other stuff comes around as, like, over time, you're like, oh, my God, that had just such a profound impact.

00:12:47:04 - 00:12:55:23
Brian
Like, you know, the iPhone comes out. I mean, I was pretty content with my BlackBerry, but then the iPhone came out just like massive disruptive.

00:12:56:01 - 00:12:56:19
Sandesh
Totally.

00:12:56:21 - 00:13:13:16
Brian
You know, I just wanted to be able to play Frogger on the plane. So I switched to the actual. Right. But like, there's there's so much more impact. Like do you think you'd stop while watching the news for the weather person because of the iPhone? But like that app, right? Like, you know.

00:13:13:16 - 00:13:14:04
Sandesh
Right.

00:13:14:06 - 00:13:19:09
Brian
Wait just five more minutes. I mean, I've got to, like, I got to see what the weather is like tomorrow. Like this.

00:13:19:10 - 00:13:21:11
Sandesh
Unintended consequences, dude.

00:13:21:15 - 00:13:45:14
Brian
But that's holding that's this platform place. And I think, you know, like you can say mobile is a platform, which for sure it is. But like the iPhone in itself is a micro platform. I just think that these platform plays that are always under state, right? There's, there's these hype cycles and the hype cycle like, you and I came out of school right around the same time.

00:13:45:14 - 00:14:14:15
Brian
It's like we, What was it? The Y2K bug. Yeah. I saw so much infrastructure in my first job because all these people were like, oh, yeah. Yeah. When the, January 31st, 1999 or December 31st, 19, I'm like, the world is going to come to an end from a tech perspective because all the clocks on are, are kind of set to the 1900s.

00:14:14:17 - 00:14:40:03
Brian
It's like, dude, that was absolutely nothing. It was just such a blip because it was the segue. But then the internet, like everyone near the internet, the really smart people, knew the internet was going to be an absolute game changer. It just kind of seeped into our lives. And if you look back, it's like, just look back in, have you seen that video that it's like what school was like in 1990?

00:14:40:03 - 00:15:03:17
Brian
No. And it's like, no cell phones now. Like it's it's this guy with a camcorder walking around. First of all, kids were a lot happier and it's know, but, you know, everyone's talking to each other. Note heads down there and like, it's just so society has changed 180 degrees in that time frame. You know, obviously we've we've had a front seat to that.

00:15:03:19 - 00:15:27:00
Brian
But it's just like we I think you heard it 7000 times in the short term. These things are overhyped and under realized. In the long term. They are absolutely understated. Right. And I think I, I think the internet like and obviously they build upon each other. I think they're, they're all just massively understated right now.

00:15:27:02 - 00:15:49:16
Sandesh
You also just hit on something that, you know, it's very top of mind for me, and it's one of our three, you know, we, future connected, focused AI, tech sales and humanity. So I just feel like. People are becoming less and less human. And many people don't argue it. They don't argue it. Even for me, I'm guilty.

00:15:49:16 - 00:16:13:12
Sandesh
I am so addicted to my phone. I have to turn off apps. I have to force myself not to get on there. But the impact of it is huge. And it's not something that like, we can hide. When social media came out, you know, accelerated by smartphone, did we know the impact that was going to have on our children?

00:16:13:14 - 00:16:40:11
Sandesh
You know, maybe, you know, we were thinking this is going to bring people more together, you know, socially community. And then there was this unintended consequence of it. Now with AI, I think this needs some serious, serious consideration as a society, as a community, you know, as a human on this earth, we know it's coming. We understand we understand some of the impacts it's going to have.

00:16:40:11 - 00:17:01:12
Sandesh
There's a lot that we don't know. But in that ambiguity, I'm really worried. I am more worried about the human side of it. You just touched on it. One of the things that I've been talking about with my friends has been how the family dynamics have changed. Remember how our parents would be like, oh, you know what it was like when we were growing up?

00:17:01:12 - 00:17:18:01
Sandesh
You know, I had to wait this long in the bus, and I had to do that, and I had to do that, and we'd be like, oh God, what a drag. You know, I keep hearing the same story, and now we're telling our kids similar stories. I didn't grow up with an iPhone. You guys don't understand what this is like.

00:17:18:01 - 00:17:44:10
Sandesh
You know, the the yeah, you guys, all these streaming apps, everything is now, now, now DoorDash, dad, just DoorDash it. Can you just DoorDash some chick fil A? So in that whole technology boom that we're experiencing and we're going to experience with AI, I feel like humans are going to become more and more depressed. Mental health is going to be even a bigger deal.

00:17:44:12 - 00:18:04:13
Sandesh
We're not going to be in touch with humanity. I see it in our kids now, kids in their 20s. I see it in the industry now. Kids that grew up with the phone went through Covid and it's not their fault, right? I just want to be clear, it's not their fault, but there's anxiety there. There is this inherent anxiety that is just lingering there.

00:18:04:13 - 00:18:17:05
Sandesh
And I feel so bad for them. But they are a product of the environment that they grew up in and we have created it. So you're welcome. Jeff Gen-Z.

00:18:17:07 - 00:18:41:03
Brian
Yeah, itself. I, I have a lot of family and friends, that have had their own kind of psychological issues. I remember talking to a therapist that said, it was specifically around OCD, but it's probably applicable to a lot of these things. And I was like, do they have a lot OCD on the Serengeti when the the cheetah is chasing?

00:18:41:05 - 00:19:00:20
Brian
Like it's just not set, right? I mean, when you have these existential things, where am I getting my next meal? How am I going to survive like, all these things, you know, like that, that is. But when you have an abundance of everything, then it's like, you know, it's all available to you, including all the things I have solutely.

00:19:01:00 - 00:19:26:21
Brian
And and it's, you know, when you see the other thing is you see everyone else around you, everyone is visible to you. Like their best image on the internet is visible to you. It's like, okay, how do I stand out more? So you get more radical behavior. You get people doing weirder things to try to stand out. There's a, I heard someone talk about the narcissism of small distinctions.

00:19:26:23 - 00:19:49:03
Brian
I'm a vegan. Well, I'm a vegan. A, but I eat paleo and, like, you know, like, you have these things, like, okay, you're you're standing out more than me. Cool. Yeah. You know, it's like. So I think it's just harder for peop for teenagers want to be unique, stand out. Well, it's hard to do that when you see all these people, all these different personalities.

00:19:49:05 - 00:20:07:14
Sandesh
Right. And it's all online. So the other part of that is how do you fix it? And in my opinion, I'm not suggesting me go back into the office like people that are doing that work from home. I think you're fighting. I mean, it will, you know, go back into work. I think you're fighting a trend that doesn't need to be fought.

00:20:07:14 - 00:20:30:05
Sandesh
I think what you need to do is create a culture that is more aligned with the world today. The reality is more mothers are working now than ever. Right? And they got flourishing careers. So now you got many, many families that have two parents at home that are working. That wasn't the case when we were growing up there.

00:20:30:06 - 00:20:55:23
Sandesh
You know, it was, there was, but it wasn't as much. And now with the younger generation, they have a lifestyle they want to live. I think you have to give them some of that flexibility. However, what I do think needs to happen is we still need to get together. We still need to have fun together. Like the fun has been just taken out of work.

00:20:56:01 - 00:21:26:09
Sandesh
So I ask this question all the time, like, can you have a good tech culture without a successful sales team? And when I say a sales team, I don't mean just a sales rep. I mean the architects, the engineers, the inside sales, the maintenance renewals people, every business development reps, everybody that is aligned with sales. Are they, for the most part feeling that they are success?

00:21:26:09 - 00:21:49:10
Sandesh
Well, I'll tell you at NetApp, NetApp was almost impossible not to have a great culture from 98 to 2002 when I was there, because just NetApp was just crushing, you know, and I've been thinking about that, how how much of it is attributed to the fact that NetApp, as an organization, company and technology was thriving. Right? I got there and the stock split twice within three months or six months.

00:21:49:10 - 00:22:11:05
Sandesh
I was crazy, blew my mind. Right. And how much of it was because of the fantastic leadership? Mendoza is a total stud and he totally created that culture. And but what was his what was his mantra? It was a human culture. It was a people first culture. That was the kind of leader that he wanted to be. Now there's no leadership like that.

00:22:11:07 - 00:22:11:14
Sandesh
You're not.

00:22:11:14 - 00:22:13:14
Brian
Going to. It's harder to find for sure.

00:22:13:16 - 00:22:32:10
Sandesh
It's very hard to find. What I am seeing is people, especially in the middle management layer, coming in, and they're getting the job because they're going to be the ball busters. They're going to be the ones. Oh, we need this person to whip this sales team into shape. You think that shit works? It doesn't.

00:22:32:14 - 00:23:19:18
Brian
Work. I think you can have a metric based approach and still lead with hearts and minds and, Yeah, the the the problem is and and some of the great, some of the legends of tax sales actually did, you know, John McMahon. Bill scale. Those are people that I had some exposure to. They were absolutely, fanatical about metric based selling, that they, they were process based, but they were also you run through Wall Street and, a lot of people take the, the metrics and the process, but they don't try and capture the hearts and minds like these other leaders did.

00:23:19:20 - 00:23:40:06
Brian
And it's like, I don't think you can have one without the other. And by the way, going back to the office thing, I dispute that. I think you, you know, you and I take this for granted because we've been doing this for over a quarter century, which let that sink in for a second. But, they, you know, we've had great office cultures.

00:23:40:06 - 00:24:01:13
Brian
We've benefited from this. We've learned from the gray haired people. Now, we are the gray haired people, you know, maybe more than you, clearly. But the, the I think, you know, we've got this generation of kids coming out of college and, like, you and I played in the street more than we played on a structured day.

00:24:01:15 - 00:24:23:17
Brian
These kids all had structured throughout their life. They went from, you know, baseball practice to to dance to whatever it's all structured. And then we're going to be like, okay, here's your laptop work from up. That's not going to work, especially for these kids, right? These kids didn't know how to how to play by themselves their entire life.

00:24:23:17 - 00:24:29:12
Brian
And now we're just going to mail my laptop and say, figure it out. This is not going to work, I think.

00:24:29:12 - 00:24:30:23
Sandesh
Yeah.

00:24:31:01 - 00:24:54:18
Brian
Now, I do think that that's good point. I think the 669 thing is bananas. I think, you know, what's that? It's we're going to work, six, six days a week, nine hours a day, kind of right. I butcher, butcher. That's that's something more radical math. But it's like I'm in the office six days a week.

00:24:54:20 - 00:24:59:00
Brian
We're working. It's probably more than that. Hours. I don't.

00:24:59:00 - 00:25:15:04
Sandesh
Do it. Well, I just feel like it from a sales perspective. Right? There's all different kinds of roles in tech, but from a sales perspective, you want to be out in the field, you want to be out. And that's what I'm trying to promote. By the way, in fact, if you're.

00:25:15:06 - 00:25:25:15
Brian
No one knows the term field sales anymore, when you say like, oh, are they inside sales? Are field salespeople. Like, what do you mean field steps? I know, like we all do everything over zoom.

00:25:25:17 - 00:25:26:18
Sandesh
Like, no.

00:25:26:20 - 00:25:38:06
Brian
Not everyone, but a lot of people do most of their work over zoom. And so the concept of field sales, it's like, what is field sales to.

00:25:38:10 - 00:26:00:00
Sandesh
To to me the point is and I've been changing the way I sell now, the last, you know, after Covid hit, I didn't spend a lot of time relationship building. I, to be honest, it was just really hard to do. Yeah. But the last year and a half, two years, I've really doubled down on it.

00:26:00:00 - 00:26:31:03
Sandesh
And I think it was the best thing that I could have done, honestly. Once you actually get in front of clients and partners in, you're actually in the same room. It's different. The energy is different, the results are different. You're building trust, you're building relationship. You know, it's it's something that I don't it doesn't make sense in a, like, in a practical accounting sense, but the idea from a human perspective, that is what works.

00:26:31:03 - 00:26:46:17
Sandesh
And still a lot of the buyers are like our age now, gray haired folks, and they still appreciate those relationships. Yeah. As you know, they're they're younger team members. Not as much, but they do.

00:26:46:19 - 00:27:14:14
Brian
Yeah, I don't think but I, I, they appreciate the relationships and they probably hang out with you just if you're a good guy that you're with. What you also brings up on the table, right. Like you're a tack evangelist. You're normally on the cutting edge of technologies. You're pretty opinionated about that space. And I do think that's the evolution of we're never going back away from is you can't just be relationships.

00:27:14:14 - 00:27:15:22
Sandesh
Okay, exactly.

00:27:15:22 - 00:27:38:23
Brian
Just. Yes. You know, like you have to bring something to the table. So in your world, you have to bring new technology to a table. You have to be a thought leader. And you have to be a planet. And if you can't have some technical chops, you're not relevant. It was just like, And you're like, it was always that guy was kind of the punch line, like how?

00:27:39:00 - 00:27:42:16
Brian
And, And Billy here will will buy us dinner.

00:27:42:18 - 00:27:44:00
Sandesh
Right? Right.

00:27:44:04 - 00:27:54:09
Brian
And like, the only thing Billy would do would be, like, if I dinner and he would say something like, okay, so, what is the timeline for this? You know, like.

00:27:54:11 - 00:27:56:16
Sandesh
Yeah. Yeah.

00:27:56:18 - 00:28:00:13
Brian
You know, like, does this have budget? Yeah. Great. Billy.

00:28:00:15 - 00:28:18:07
Sandesh
And it's always at the end. There's always this awkward phase where the customer is, is just waiting. He's waiting for that question of like, yeah, when are you ready to buy? Do you think it's going to be this quarter? And, you know, and the salesperson is trying to still be nice and, you know, doing all that stuff.

00:28:18:09 - 00:28:45:07
Sandesh
To your point, I think that's all old school before. Let's be honest. You know, the 20 years ago, like you see a salesperson, they're likable. They're they're hungry. They got the attitude, you don't know shit about the tech, but they're showing all these other qualities. Yeah. And we would hire them because of that, of the human like of the personality that they had.

00:28:45:07 - 00:29:08:13
Sandesh
Yeah. Now it's where is the value. How are you going to help me? Right. You can help me solve my problem. Do you even understand my problem? You know, I, I think one of the things that, like people like you and I have done. Well, you are like, such an incredibly technical guy. You know, it's it's incredible. I just people outside of the valley in sales are just aren't that technical.

00:29:08:15 - 00:29:23:02
Sandesh
But you're getting immediate credibility with clients when you're able to actually understand what their problem is and, and actually create an environment to solve the problem.

00:29:23:04 - 00:29:45:14
Brian
Yeah, I think there's so there's so many great technical people and how many how many great tactical resources not not even just like technical resources that you work with, they could go in depth on a technology, but could not that tie it to the business value? The customer? So I think that's the magic it was when you can be like, okay, this is my business problem.

00:29:45:16 - 00:30:18:00
Brian
What do you have to solve for it? I think, yeah, at the end goes back to I know this, I think that coupling has never been tighter, where you can just actually genuinely see, okay, if you could do this, that drives business value. If you can do this right, requires such resources. I that's a super though understanding it and understanding the differentiation between like, you know, one agent versus another is really difficult and really hard to do from a tactical perspective.

00:30:18:02 - 00:30:22:18
Brian
B I think it is getting easier to tie all all value.

00:30:22:20 - 00:30:52:07
Sandesh
Yeah. Yeah. Well it needs to because we're not going to see an, an acceleration in innovation, an adoption with clients if we're, if we're not able to do that, you know, like if you cannot show how this technology is going to help you save money, make money, make things more efficient. You're it's very, very difficult to sell, especially in this, you know, financial climate right now where customers are doing everything to hold as much money as possible.

00:30:52:07 - 00:31:05:02
Sandesh
I have customers that are losing budget, you know, year after year, that's, you know, and that's not typical for data center infrastructure, cloud technology. Right. You're supposed to it's supposed to go go the other way.

00:31:05:04 - 00:31:30:06
Brian
That that underscores the kind of what we're in right now. It's and I mean that, I mean, in, in every sense of the work, like, I'm in an AI bubble because most of the world I touch is AI and but just really don't seem that constrained. Right. Like if you can show business value and you're offering an AI technology that drives value, it reduces cost.

00:31:30:06 - 00:31:36:02
Brian
One of those two things, those things are seen removing through very quickly.

00:31:36:04 - 00:32:02:03
Sandesh
Okay. So let me ask you this question. You live in Silicon Valley, the innovation capital of the world. All big tech is there. I've always seen the you know, before back in the day it was PayPal, eBay and those, you know, LinkedIn, you know, doing big things. Now you see the Teslas and Apple and you know those are were the big, big, big deals are happening.

00:32:02:03 - 00:32:40:13
Sandesh
And you guys have ton of those customers that are willing to take risks and are accepting of failure because they know the failures. How are they going to ultimately be successful? How do you think what you just said about when you're able to show that business value, how many non-tech big companies are actually interested? Let's just say the fortune 500 and below that, how many of them are actually buying into some some kind of AI solution or strategy and spending.

00:32:40:13 - 00:32:49:07
Brian
Money on it? I would say within the fortune 500 that the tech companies for sure are betting very heavily.

00:32:49:09 - 00:32:52:11
Sandesh
Tech companies. How about how about like, health care?

00:32:52:11 - 00:33:25:07
Brian
And you know, because health care is number two on the list. Health care. Ooh, health care, I think is it you're showing dimensional returns on the investment and health care. Yeah. There's there are always going to be some concerns. But there's, you know the the a doctor a doctor patient experience has changed dramatically. I don't know when the last time you went to the doctor was, but in all probability, there was, listening device between you and the doctor.

00:33:25:07 - 00:33:55:00
Brian
Either it was an iPhone or it was an ambient device in the room. And they are. And they'll typically inform you of this. It's transcribing the entire conversation, and then it's uploading it into the EMR. After that, the, the the visit and then it's making kind of, band of potential care options available to the doctor. And that is giving the doctor, on average, about 40% of their time.

00:33:55:04 - 00:33:56:00
Sandesh
Of course.

00:33:56:00 - 00:34:19:11
Brian
Now, whether they take that, whether they take that time and spend more time with patients or whether they take that time to spend more time on the golf course or with the family or whatever. It's it's a significant improvement in big time, right? Like, because just like in sales, we'd rather be with customers than, you know, selling out reports or uploading data into the, the CRM.

00:34:19:12 - 00:34:46:08
Brian
But their version of the CRM or expense reports is, is, the EMR that the, the epics or whatever they don't want to do that yet. And so it's, you know, it's you can give that back to that. It's, it's a game changer and like, it's a tangible value. And if you think about who runs these healthcare organizations, there's typically the most influential person.

00:34:46:08 - 00:35:11:12
Brian
If they're not the the head of the hospital is an existing or former clinician. So they totally get it. And and oh, by the way, instead of going through all these manuals, they're now using something like open evidence that is basically a search engine for all their relevant. And so you've got this search engine specifically for clinicians.

00:35:11:14 - 00:35:18:02
Brian
It's going to give you the, the appropriate patient care. Search results. And so I think so.

00:35:18:02 - 00:35:19:00
Sandesh
Cool. Yeah.

00:35:19:00 - 00:35:40:22
Brian
I think, you know, like you take the good with that. Just like the hint of that. Yeah. Can give me a package within four hours if I, me, you know, like, a water park. Yeah. Which I have no idea why. You know, I because I might use a water pack, but, the, like the, the and there's the downside of cyberbullying.

00:35:41:00 - 00:35:49:16
Brian
The same is true for for I like, I think healthcare, which is in such bad shape globally.

00:35:49:18 - 00:35:50:06
Sandesh


00:35:50:21 - 00:36:13:09
Brian
There's just a dearth of, of, practitioners versus patients. And I think it's just going to be going to be transformational. And I think the next big, impact similar to that is going to be an education. I really do think education is so ripe for disruption.

00:36:13:11 - 00:36:14:13
Sandesh
Big time.

00:36:14:15 - 00:36:42:15
Brian
And and probably less, probably less impactful from a risk perspective, but as well, there probably is more headwinds from a, political perspective. Right? Right. Yeah, yeah, I think I think the teachers unions will be reticent to adopt it. I broadly think about that as risk, which is just a necessity at this point that absolutely.

00:36:42:17 - 00:37:07:10
Sandesh
Absolutely quicker, the better. While you hit on a lot of stuff. I haven't seen so far with, at my doctor's office where they're Trent, you know, they have a transcriber, but I just bought this. Have you? I'm sure you already know Silicon Valley, boy, but, have the, the plod.

00:37:07:12 - 00:37:19:04
Brian
I've heard that I, I've, I've used any of those sayings I would love to know. So, like, there's so many different things to consider. That number one, it's like,

00:37:19:06 - 00:37:22:09
Sandesh
So much to consider there, bro. Big time.

00:37:22:11 - 00:37:27:16
Brian
In California. Well, legally, I probably can't use that.

00:37:27:18 - 00:37:28:20
Sandesh
Oh.

00:37:28:22 - 00:37:32:09
Brian
Right. Like I'm recording a conversation that's actually.

00:37:32:10 - 00:37:34:00
Sandesh
Yes.

00:37:34:02 - 00:37:37:10
Brian
So all these things have their own kind of like.

00:37:37:12 - 00:37:39:20
Sandesh
It's an invasion of privacy for sure.

00:37:39:22 - 00:38:01:04
Brian
Well it's it's funny because as long as you're notifying people that it's like you're and they have the right to consent or declined, it's fine. But like, as you're wearing a pen or whatever, the two things, like there's the technical barrier was like, okay, what's so great? So like it's it kind of captured the entire conversation that's captured.

00:38:01:05 - 00:38:15:12
Brian
Yep. Yep. Conversation as well. Which may or may not be relevant. I love those things. My concern is like, how many people's phone numbers do you know that you've met in the last ten years?

00:38:15:14 - 00:38:16:21
Sandesh
None.

00:38:16:23 - 00:38:24:19
Brian
Right. And so, but 20 years ago, you knew dozens of people sometimes. And you probably still remember most of.

00:38:24:21 - 00:38:25:22
Sandesh
Right.

00:38:26:00 - 00:38:54:23
Brian
But if you don't have to know critical information about people because you've got something that's gonna going to do it for you, like, yeah, it's, it's, you know, it's a muscle that we exercise or don't. And so I'm concerned that we're going to see atrophy there because we see atrophy where the phone does great work for us. We see atrophy where like did my kids, their math skills suck like basic math skills.

00:38:55:05 - 00:39:06:03
Brian
I'm still very good at like quick math stuff because I didn't have the benefit of having calculator in my pocket my entire life. They've had a calculator in their pocket since the day they were carrying out.

00:39:06:04 - 00:39:10:04
Sandesh
So yeah, the 985. Yeah, yeah.

00:39:10:06 - 00:39:17:07
Brian
In Texas in and I walked around with that in my pocket, I got beat up, you know, like yeah.

00:39:17:07 - 00:39:46:18
Sandesh
Yeah, yeah. You know, this is I know this isn't, the use case for plod, but what I was thinking is I seem to find myself at times at parties or just, you know, out somewhere in the next day. I'm thinking, I know I had a great conversation with, okay, I know I got what was that podcast he was talking about, or what was the name of that company that he was talking about?

00:39:46:18 - 00:40:09:14
Sandesh
I can't I can't remember it. I remember he was telling me he's I got to check it out. And, you know, well, the problem there is that I've been overserved, but there was more. That's like a use case for me where it would be, you know, which is a horrible thing to say. It's. I know that's not the use case, but, that would certainly help me.

00:40:09:16 - 00:40:37:02
Brian
Yeah, I, I do think that there's there's a value proposition there. I think, yeah, there's some technical things. So like the, the previous, tools have not been great, but also there's, you have that where in California, like how do you, how do you all get people that according to proposition or don't and just. Yeah. Yeah. But I do you think those are going to be more and more ubiquitous.

00:40:37:02 - 00:40:45:02
Brian
And I also think we're going to see, a downstream effect is that our muscles atrophy.

00:40:45:03 - 00:41:07:20
Sandesh
Yeah. I, I got, my brother actually, we were on vacation together this summer in Mexico, and he had these Ray-Bans on. I didn't think much of it, like, whatever. We went out, went on a boat with the kids. It was a good time. And, I had gotten pushed off the boat, and everyone thought that was just hilarious.

00:41:07:20 - 00:41:34:07
Sandesh
You know, I personally didn't because I had my phone in my pocket. That was. I'm still pissed about that. But he but his, his glasses were recording, and I was recording the whole trip of us going down there, getting on the boat, going out, blah, blah, blah, blah. And a part of me, I was, yo, dude, you should have told me that you're recording.

00:41:34:09 - 00:41:36:00
Sandesh
You know, I had no idea.

00:41:36:02 - 00:41:41:23
Brian
Yeah, yeah, the other part of it was like, dude, how they fit all that tech in there.

00:41:42:01 - 00:41:44:23
Sandesh
Yeah, exactly, exactly.

00:41:45:01 - 00:42:10:04
Brian
Well, I, I do think, I mean, that's just the web. There's just been so much money pumped in by meta Google and, yeah, that, like, those will become ubiquitous. And we're just going to have to deal with that. The downstream effects from like, but who doesn't assume they're being recorded at all that I mean, right. Yeah, I, I think Mark Sanchez figured that out by now.

00:42:10:06 - 00:42:33:04
Sandesh
Do you do you find people in the Valley? Do they, are they more open to having each of these meetings recorded? Yeah. So then they can get it transcribed. I mean, okay, so I see people are adopting that quite a bit more where I tell you, in the Midwest, at least, there are some people that do not want to be recorded.

00:42:33:04 - 00:42:39:13
Sandesh
And there are companies that are saying, no, you cannot record your conversations.

00:42:39:15 - 00:43:08:23
Brian
Yes. That that that happens occasionally. It's it's the exception rather than the rule that people ask for it to be turned off. I would tell you, you know, the financial services are typically more, to ask you to, to turn it off. Yeah. But yeah, it is I remember when I first rolled out gong at one of my companies and one of the reps in Chicago and, you know, was like my customer was out at the shop.

00:43:08:23 - 00:43:33:05
Brian
I'm like, well, let's ask and more often than not, they did. But there was more in the Midwest, in the northeast that were that had an aversion to it than in, in the West, in, in the southeast. And so until, yeah, there's just, or they're just more accepting of it now, the, the value is incredible, right?

00:43:33:05 - 00:43:54:03
Brian
Like for me, because I listen to gong calls all the time and I'm listening. Okay. Like, am I picking up something that the reps aren't, am I? Most of the time it's for the benefit of the rep, right? Like I want to help them. Okay, you did this. You should have been doing this. I'm looking at okay, our all the rap scene from the same book.

00:43:54:05 - 00:44:03:09
Brian
And okay, we're not getting great reactions out of this pitch. Let's iterate a little bit and then let's all march in the same direction.

00:44:03:09 - 00:44:33:07
Sandesh
But why not? Just why not just hire really good salespeople that you don't have to babysit? I mean, if you look at what's happening, like from a sales perspective, you like, you talk about the gray hair, fuck, man, this past two years is when it really hit me. Yeah, I'm working with these people that are in their young 20s, mid 20s, late 20s and no fans, but they do not know what the they don't understand the business, they don't understand how to sell to these people.

00:44:33:07 - 00:45:01:00
Sandesh
And it's again, it's not their fault because they grew up in a different time and now they're trying to sell to people that are generation older. And so there is this gap. So I understand why. But the same time, to me it's just hire good people and pay a little bit more versus what I am seeing is let's pay less and let's get five reps into Chicago instead of two.

00:45:01:02 - 00:45:01:11
Brian
Yeah.

00:45:01:11 - 00:45:03:05
Sandesh
What's your thoughts on that?

00:45:03:07 - 00:45:46:18
Brian
Great question. So number one, if you're selling to AI companies, you're not hiring a 40, 56 year old great rap. You're because the relationship they're going to have or with 4056 year old customers. Right. The reality is the vast majority of these AI companies, like their consumers, are early 20s, not late 20s. Right. And so you want to find some of the more relatable than it's probably going to be a, I do think the, but you don't have to sacrifice on, not hiring great reps with the pace of innovation and the, the, the pace of competition.

00:45:46:18 - 00:46:11:17
Brian
Like we've talked about this in the past, you and I privately like the barrier to start a new company so well that you name a space and I'll, I'll probably tell you tank about it, like, you know, like we each have our favorite player in the be voice agent space, but, you know, I can think of it was playing Sierra.

00:46:11:19 - 00:46:25:06
Brian
Docker gone crashed. Send that be there. I said crash that and then there's like intercom was a legacy. Like, that's a off the top of my head. There's a lease right where I could think of.