Energy 101: We Ask The Dumb Questions So You Don't Have To

0:00 Welcome to Energy 101. I'm very proud to do our first intro here. And we got co-host Julie and Sean Kelly. This man knows everything about efficiency and making your business better. And it goes

0:13 from everything and energy into just any business. Really, this is going to be very informative and helpful for anyone watching. So let's kick it off with a little intro about Sean I think,

0:27 basically, we need a bunch of Sean's in our life. And maybe let's stick with energy first. We picture a bunch of guys out in the field and stuff like that going to tens of thousands of feet in the

0:41 ground. There's safety precautions. There's data. It's crazy. It's all over the place. So are these guys out there doing all that work? Or is there people behind the scenes keeping it tight and

0:54 organized? I think that's where Sean comes into place. Yeah, I mean, it's a great question, right? Because that's only part of it. That might be the service part of the business, but the other

1:04 part is getting the rig out there or building the rig, right? So we have to start somewhere. But then also mobilizing those people, there's so many processes that are included, but to talk about

1:15 like efficiency is you have to understand the full process. So whether you're talking about somebody working in a shop, you're working in your current job, you have to understand that there's a

1:27 level of efficiency that we can implement through technology or through digital solutions or through process improvement. And that's where really the starting point is

1:38 for any job, for any project, for any operation is mapping out those steps, figuring out where you have gaps or where you have like block points and then identifying how can we make this more

1:52 efficient? How can we improve this process? And that's really the basics, yeah. How to save time and money. Yes, to simplify it, absolutely. But it's, you know, that's, that's a easy word

2:05 to say, but what does that actually mean? It takes a lot of work, like mapping out each process. Like if you take one process, there's probably 50 steps. And it's like, how do we remove a step?

2:15 Or how do we make it more efficient? And you have to understand what's happening in each phase or each step. And then from there, you can say, well, we need to get rid of the paper copies and

2:26 make this a digital solution. And in that way, it saves eight steps, so. Right, and that's a big use case right now in oil and gas or removing paper trails.

2:39 So can you take us through like one process that where you've like eliminated steps just so we can like visualize kind of where you're at and the steps to efficiency? Yeah, one easy case, which can

2:54 be a. whether you're oil and gas, manufacturing or anything is some of those digital forms. Like, for example, let's call it a QC form, right? It's usually something that somebody's filling out.

3:05 They're inspecting something and they're filling it out. Well, they fill it out. So that's, let's just say one or two steps. But the reality is somebody has to scan that in. Somebody has to

3:15 enter it into like a database or they have to follow like the purchase order or the sales order, and then they have to submit it to the client and maybe even drag it over to Dropbox or to SharePoint,

3:25 right? So you've now created 10 steps in this one process and you could have had a digital form that that individual could sign with their finger, excuse me, they can fill it out. And then

3:39 whenever they submit it, there's no need to scan this document. There's no need to print it. There's no need to rescan an old document, right? You have this document that lies with this process.

3:49 Maybe you're building a skid or whatever it is and you've done a QC there And then now you. unlocked that other person that was doing that admin work to focus on something else, to focus on the more

3:59 important pieces, like maybe selling another job. Yep, I feel like you're speaking my language. I, with this company, I try to automate everything I can. Yeah. It just makes things more

4:10 efficient. And yeah, yeah, I'm

4:14 always so curious 'cause my experience is really, I've worked at one medium-sized company and the rest is like startup world. So it's very easy to be efficient in startup world where you get to

4:25 create the processes. But I've always been super curious how hard change management is in these bigger companies and how long it takes to actually see your changes and the fruition that comes from

4:40 that. Do you have a favorite project that you've worked on that you saw the improvement and you're like, man, I'm so proud of that. Yes, and to back up a little bit, you mentioned change

4:51 management, which is something that usually is not. focused in enough that in communication, right? So we see we have an idea and we're like, okay, this is the potential solution. But we forget

5:04 about how all of these solutions impact people and they impact the processes. And if we can't capture and figure out that piece of it, then our change management is not going to be effective. And

5:15 then the adoption rate is going to plummet. And then what happens if the adoption rate is not good, they're going to go develop their own solutions because yours was not exactly what they had

5:25 thought. And so that is the key area that I like to focus in on because I probably have 10 ideas a day. And you know, taking that through the through like a full life cycle to delivery is important,

5:38 but you have to understand how it's impacting the business and people in that change management piece. And that's the really the critical piece. Because if you can identify those risks, then you

5:49 can avoid those risk and therefore you can have a successful implementation. You basically say like five steps ahead. Try to, try to, yes, yeah, yeah. Because if you don't, and risks come

6:01 along the way, then it's gonna derail your project, or it's going to, you know, potentially, it's gonna potentially ruin or end the project, right? If you don't account for all these risks and

6:12 how it's impacting the business. So to put this in perspective of oil and gas,

6:18 something that you change in a process What does that look like for kind of the end project? Is it saving however much money is it saving? Like, can you put that in actual numbers? Usually, yes.

6:35 So the goal whenever I start a project is to identify if I'm gonna be saving labor or if I'm just gonna be making the process more efficient, which typically does save labor. And so that's how I

6:48 usually determine how well or how well it's going to improve the process. right, by that efficiency factor, right? And you gotta try to, sometimes you have to guesstimate, right? Let's say,

7:01 for example, you're building a package and you're sending all of your equipment off to be painted, blasted and painted and you're bringing it back. Well, it takes two days to get to the blast and

7:10 paint, another two days or three or four days to do the blasting and painting, then they have to send it back. Well, what happens if there's a quality issue? Then they gotta send it back. So you

7:18 have this long process So if you bring your painting, your blasting and painting in-house, like let's say you have a big enough yard that you could do it in-house, you now have control over that

7:29 process and you're not wasting time. So yes, the capital to build that big project was2 million, but if you look at the cost to, for the logistics and for the third party supplier to do all that

7:42 work and then to bring it back. So there's just, every case is a little bit different, but you should be able to document and try to. you know, show those levels of efficiency to simplify it. I

7:56 mean, it's like, if you want to create a clothing brand, the first step or go to step would be go to China or somewhere with cheap labor, but then you're dealing with sending samples back and

8:08 forth way to, you know, creating just one product can take half a year. You manufacture in America, pay the extra price, but then it's more efficient Like what is, I mean, that's, cannot be

8:21 applied to every industry, probably not, but I mean, that's, I feel like that's essentially what you're saying. Yeah, and it's a balance, right? I mean, you might have a cheaper product, but

8:31 there might be issues with quality, you know, coming from China or wherever it might be, versus if you have more control having it in-house and you pay twice the cost, right? And then you have a

8:41 lower margin. So just, there's a balance, absolutely. I mean, it sounds like you're kind of like in logistics. Is that the way to put it? I mean,

8:50 I think it's involved in every process, right? Yeah, yeah, so it can be, I mean, every industry has the logistics, right? Whether you're moving equipment, you're moving product, whatever it

9:02 is. So everything starts with data, right? We can't have control in the organization if we don't have the data structured. And when I say structured, that can be whether you have all of your data

9:16 in one database or you have it all centrally located, but a lot of times what we're doing is we're creating our own tools or our own trackers in Excel and we have them stored on our laptop and then

9:27 we'll just send the report out. But then you have that globally and you have 10 or 15 different teams that are all doing that. They might try to use Power BI or they'll use some other centrally

9:38 located systems, but when you're talking about data for projects related or whether it's field data as well, it's the same scenario, you have this data set to be able to do something with it, you

9:50 have to be able to manage the business 'cause if you don't know what your data's telling you, then you can't control it and then risks pop up and then potential failures, whatever it might be. So

10:01 one of the things that I'm currently working on is trying to centralize all of our data from a project controls perspective. So for all of our capital projects like HSC data, our productivity data,

10:15 you name it And then bringing that all together and then having the ability now to be able to develop KPIs and dashboards, but now you have control over your data. So now you're able to drive

10:29 performance. So it's a balance, right? Because trying to get everyone's data in one location is probably near impossible. You have to look at some of the core processes of like maybe it's your PL,

10:43 right? or something like that where it's got a lot of information in it.

10:49 how to drive or how to drive the business from what you're seeing from the data, then you have to bring the data together. So I bounced forward and back on your conversation, but yes, data is the

11:03 key to every step. Like if you don't have your data correct, then you can't make the right decision for the business. I noticed there's kind of a paradox when we're talking about all this,

11:15 including efficiency, that the solution to a lot of it seems to be like the fewer steps to better, but you kind of get into a situation, I guess the best way to compare it is like

11:30 the iPhone and like the current trend of like

11:35 the right to, was it repair? You know, like there's like this issue where like, don't you don't have to worry about anything. You don't have to take out your battery anymore. You don't have to

11:44 do this Everything is in one piece, and all you gotta do is, here you go, and everything's solved. but obviously there's issues to think breaks, whatever, you can't fix the thing at home. You

11:55 have to go to someone to do all that. And then that one step solution turns back into 20 steps. So is that sound kind of comparable to like what you do? No, yes. So that's where you identify a

12:11 points

12:13 of failure. So like if you're deploying a solution or a technology or maybe you're digitizing an Excel spreadsheet, you have to also identify, like if you put this rigid process around that data

12:25 set and they have to follow this in order to do this, but then there's a separate scenario that is different than every one of them, but that individual can't proceed forward with that technology

12:38 because of some issue. Maybe it's not referencing the right product or it's not referencing a right dropdown then like that's a point of failure. to answer your question, absolutely, because if

12:50 that's a point of failure, they're gonna stop that process, go back to their old ways, and then they're gonna produce the report or whatever it is that they're working on. So that's a lot of

13:01 whenever you're deploying technology, you have to identify those risks and

13:07 remove those roadblocks. There's usually a way around it, but if you don't identify it and you go live with something, the first day they use it, this is not usable, this is crap. Like, well,

13:16 we just spent a million dollars on a really awesome solution and everybody thinks it's crap. Yeah, so that brings me to a question. Whenever you're getting ready to work on a project, do you have

13:28 like your kind of pre-project research where you kind of go in the role of every single person, like actually work with a person and say, what do you do here? What do you do here? And you really

13:40 like map it out that granular? Yes, yes, absolutely. A lot of times that's also for visibility so that you understand what each role does because a lot of times they're working on multiple, maybe

13:52 multiple different projects or they're working in multiple different functions. And so understanding what each role does so that whenever it's being developed, it's being developed correctly to

14:03 their business. And sometimes there is, whenever you're doing that, you're gonna say, okay, do we want to proceed this way or do we want to optimize this process? 'Cause we noticed that there's

14:12 multiple steps that we could really consolidate. And so maybe it's like contract management. Instead of us typing up a long contract, sending it through email for eight different approvals, why

14:24 don't we digitize this step and create a workflow? And now somebody just clicks a button and clicks a button and now it stores into a database. So like that's a simple use case in order to really

14:33 improve 'cause every oil and gas business has a contract, right? So that's kind of, that's what I like to do to identify those risks and try to, you know, that out those processes before we go go,

14:48 before we start to develop the project. Right, yeah. I mean, I'm sure it's very robust to like multiple touches, multiple different people and departments and each of them have their own lists of

14:59 what they do, so. That helps me rethink my stupid iPhone analogy. Yeah. What I'm basically trying to say is that it's best to reduce risk and it's best to

15:13 mistake proof things, right? Yes. So I've worked remotely here for like five years and we had a studio like this, right? So it's like, how do I have some person who works here in sales, walk

15:26 into this room, hit a button, and walk out and know that everything's gonna be on, everything's gonna record, and you know, and we've have episodes where it delights her off or one of the cameras

15:36 is, I'm not pointing that a while. You know, like, and I mean, basically that's, pretty much summed that up better for me. So I appreciate that.

15:48 Yeah, and I think the more work that you do upfront, the better the project is gonna go. And then that way you're not going through these major iterations. Like, how will we develop it this way,

15:57 right? Is that what you wanted? And it's like, no, we completely missed the whole left field over here, which was this, this and this. And so I think the more work that you do upfront is

16:06 helpful to really streamline and make it a smooth project. And asking the right questions I think that's the biggest thing I've learned in working with like operations and trying to build things for

16:17 other people is they don't know what they want. They'll ask for something and like it won't be what they want 'cause you'll build it and they won't use it at all. Yes, exactly right. And so like

16:29 that's the most frustrating thing I think is you make it to exactly how they say they want it. And if you haven't done that pre-planning to truly understand their process and how it works.

16:44 Um, you're just wasting your time, but that also brings me to a point. I'm sure you don't have to deal with this, but, um, here, I've dealt with it a lot having to kind of change workflows,

16:57 depending on like how a person thinks and like how their brain works and like maybe their brain works in a way where they want the workflow to go like this, but in a normal like operational

17:08 efficiency way, it works like this And so you're kind of like, how do I work with this ADHD person who's like all over the place where they want to see this and this and this, but then this other

17:18 person wants to work like, how do you, how do you deal with

17:22 that? You don't. Well, yeah. You don't. You make them follow. Yes, you do. You're like, okay,

17:29 this is how we're going to do this process and they kind of have to conform. So, and that might be, you know, for roles that maybe they own a lot of all the processes so they're used to doing.

17:41 from cradle to grave, they do all the processes. And then this new system or this new tool is now going to change their workflow, which is, oh, you need a level of approval here and here. And

17:52 that's not how I do it. That's not how my business operates, but it's needed, right? It's needed for visibility. It's needed for control. And so you're breaking their processes to add more

18:03 processes, but it's helping the business as a whole. So there's a balance. Right. So you keep the business goals in mind and you tell that person to get in line Pretty much. Yes, yes.

18:14 Okay, that brings me to, I lost my question, what was I gonna say? Well, it brings me to AI. I mean, you wanna talk about people who are like, Hey, you gotta do this now. And they're like,

18:25 Shit. I mean, that's what AI is to a lot of people. I would say, especially older people. I've heard stories and we're talking before about, even the major is dealing with stuff like this. And

18:36 yes, it's helpful, but not everyone thinks it is.

18:40 is like the initial steps to implementing AI and to whether it sees the majors, any energy company or just business in general. Like I can safely say that it's not like an optional thing. It's

18:55 almost necessary. Like what are your thoughts on that? So for me is to identify where it brings value. So obviously there's gonna be a gap. And usually in our industry, we fill that gap with

19:10 people. We're always adding people, right? Oh, we wanna manage finances better, or we wanna manage field operations better. How do we do that? We need to add a project accountant, or we need

19:20 to add a field service manager, whatever, you know, we always like to fill it. But I like to take a different approach, right? I'm like, what is the actual goal here? Is the goal to understand

19:30 our data and to be able to make decisions of what our data is really trying to tell us. And then that's a simple use case for an AI solution because it can now say, this is what your data is telling

19:44 you. This is what you delivered last year, or even in the past month, based upon these benchmarks. And here's where, here's some anomalies, or here's some areas of concern. And, you know, so

19:55 it's a highlighting, it's giving you, it's like an analyst that's always working for you. But you have to turn it on, right? It's, you have to ask it questions. You have to know what questions

20:06 to ask. And of course, it can produce a report, it can highlight things in red and do things like that. But a simple use case is connecting your databases together. So let's take, for example,

20:19 for a PMO, a project management office. Usually most businesses have those. You have a lot of systems in place, right? But all of these systems have a single purpose. So they're built in a silo.

20:32 And you're not able to leverage the data across different disciplines and the data's not speaking together. So you have disconnected data in silos and then therefore you're making a decision based

20:45 upon one technology. And sometimes that's not the full picture. Well, it's not sometimes. It's always not the full picture, right? So let's say, for example, you have lessons learned. You

20:53 have a lessons learned database. And you wanna go and look at, I wanna see lessons learned for that technology. But then you have to go back and look at, well, what changes were actually

21:02 implemented on that project? So management of change. So, you know, what was the impact on those lessons learned potentially that they documented? And like, how does that tie into how they

21:13 executed the project? So now you funnel all this data together and then you let AI start to highlight these areas for you. So I wanna see this technology delivered to Exxon. And then from there,

21:26 it can show you all of your information and it helps you to build a better risk process as well for that project so you can avoid those risks 'cause we don't wanna repeat history, right? more

21:38 efficient or to improve our margins. So that's a simple, you know, simple use case for AI is it can connect your databases together without building a big enterprise type solution, which a lot of

21:52 times is what we sometimes need, but AI is kind of now coming in at a little bit more palatable approach, right? It's not foolproof, you know? I mean, I think from the industry perspective,

22:08 even a lot of businesses are still putting the QA type open AI into their internal system, but people aren't really using it in their business because they're like, what question am I gonna ask it?

22:19 I mean, I can just do it on my phone, right? And so it's really not bringing a ton of value there, but if you start to look at isolated use cases for the business, that's where it starts to bring

22:29 value But we have to still teach people that if you ask this question, it's gonna give you this output. And now that's gonna drive a data-driven decision versus a hopeful decision, you know? Yeah,

22:46 yeah. One of the coolest tools I've discovered recently is called RANAI, who you heard of it. No. It's really cool. You connect your databases to it and you can basically ask it a question and

23:01 it'll write your SQL query for you. Okay, yeah. And then

23:06 it answers it, but what's cool because I feel like AI, you can trust it with a lot of things, but with data, especially for me, it's like marketing data. I do not trust the numbers that it spits

23:18 out. I need to see, and I'm sure a lot of engineers in this space are the same way where they need to see the proof. So it spits out the SQL query and it tells you what it did and it shows you

23:30 where in your database. So you can go and like verify. It's really cool for anyone needing a quick solution to. connects multiple different databases. It's not quite like always accurate, but at

23:42 least you can see that. Yeah, it's the worst ad ever. It's not quite accurate, but it's great solution.

23:49 They're still building, they're still building. Yeah, I mean, you made me think of something like implementing the AI and stuff like that. I mean, there's a difference between having it

24:00 standalone and integrated in your actual workflow, like making the people ask questions through it, and it's like they're not even gonna use it Like, what is the, I mean, I think the answer is

24:10 like, is to use it, you know, stand alone and optionally and not completely just making everyone in your business use a certain method if it's not really 100 like, Oh, this is gonna help. So

24:23 like, what's your thoughts on like implementing completely or stand alone on AI? It depends on the user, right? I feel like the early adopters, maybe this, you know, this room right now, of

24:34 course, you know, we're going to use it, right? It brings value. Whether it's just idea creation, which is huge, right? I mean, you're in order to say you come up with an idea to maybe it's a

24:46 posting, right? And you just need some better words, some filler words, whatever. I mean, it's a super simple solution, but it helps us be very efficient, right? To get tasks done very

24:57 quickly. But I would always go with the integrated system. So let's take, for example, like a QuickBooks. A lot of businesses are using QuickBooks. Smaller businesses might be using QuickBooks.

25:09 If you did a standalone version, you would probably have to upload an Excel file or a CSV file, and then you would say, Read this data, and then you would ask it questions, right, based upon

25:19 that data. But if you had an integrated solution, you don't have to upload any files. It's automatically connected to the backend, to the database, and from there, you can ask questions, What's

25:30 my inbound shipments today? orWhat's the productivity of X project, whatever it might be, you know, and so that's a simple like an integrated type. So because it's integrated into your, like you

25:44 mentioned, like your workflows as well. So it's now it's like, maybe it can also send you a report, you know, a weekly report. So that way you have insight into what's happening in the business,

25:55 because again, you're probably focused on a thousand other tasks. And last thing you want to do is read an Excel spreadsheet You can implement solutions like that that can read your data, your

26:06 sensitive data, and give you outputs so you can make those decisions. Yeah. It's really satisfying when you get the right tools for what's really needed. I mean, and it's maybe so mundane, like

26:17 we, we got a, we use Brex and now ramp, um, is that private? And um, we have like this policy where it's like, Oh, it's something, something's over seventy five dollars, you have to take a

26:30 picture of the receipt and upload it.

26:33 That's so stupid. I mean, I won't be buying a lot of crap, but whatever. And then the first time it happens, I scan something at Home Depot, it costs like80. And then it just ramp is like, oh,

26:45 hey, you just spent over 75 bucks. We uploaded it and you're good. I'm like, oh, great. So it like, that's nice. Like that's a perfect example of something so simple that just makes your life

26:56 so easier. And that all goes into the company. It's organized data and like all that was done by a computer, so And that typically would have been like eight steps to upload a receipt, submit

27:07 expense report. Those are the results. So that's like your accountant, your accounting. Imagine if that's done with every other little section of your job and your workforce. Like you got 20 of

27:17 these tools running at one time and then how much money and time are you saving? Yeah, however each tool costs a lot of money. Yeah, that's my problem is like, we use a lot of SaaS tools and I'm

27:28 like, okay, I think we could use less. but we're the type of people who like to try new tools a little bit too much, which, that's a question for you.

27:39 How long after a project is delivered, do you monitor and iterate and change if necessary, because I feel like there does become

27:52 this change fatigue. Yeah, yeah. And how do you deal with that? So I look at it as, let's say you implement a solution, whether it's lessons learned, it's any type of solution that you

28:08 implement.

28:10 It can be a new process, it can be a new technology. You have to understand how it's impacting the business and is it driving change? Is it driving those workflows? Is it driving communication?

28:20 Is it driving performance? And sometimes it doesn't always, when we first deploy, it doesn't always answer all of those questions, right? Because we have to learn how to use the new tool first.

28:31 And then once it goes operational, then you still have to go back and do an iteration, right? I'm going through a few of those right now where it's improving the workflows because we need

28:41 additional visibility into some of these processes. And it's important, it's an extreme value add. We typically do those like once a year, right? I stepped into a new role and immediately, the

28:54 first thing I did, I was like, I want this change done to this tool because this tool is not efficient and it's not giving us the data that we need, right? And it was an immediate change. Now,

29:05 that sparked a whole nother slew of conversations of like, how can we really leverage this technology, right? But it just, because people are just checking a box, they're taking this tool,

29:16 they're uploading the data to it, and then they're submitting it. But there's no change that's ever happening from it. So that's where I was like, you know what? We're gonna do a quick little

29:26 sprint and we're gonna go and change it. you things and implement it so that it brings more value. So I think that's a, you know, that's the understanding is like, if you deploy a technology, is

29:36 it really giving value to that process? And then you assess there and decide whether we move forward, take a step back. You know, it just depends. Okay. Yeah. I have an off topic question.

29:47 It's not really off topic, but you've mentioned it. Uh, how do you measure productivity? Through KPIs. So just the KPIs you create and then you're like, okay, if this is increasing in whatever

29:59 decreasing, then I know my productivity percentage. Yeah. Okay. So, I mean, if you want to keep it to like fabrication, like oil and gas, you're, you're going to look at specifics, like

30:12 let's say it's welding or it's structural steel, you're going to look at tonnage or inch dia for, for those. And you can determine based upon the number of welders they have on the project and the

30:23 number of inches that they weld per day, if they're on track. And so that's an easy way to measure their productivity. 'Cause a lot of times you look at a schedule and the schedule is like, oh,

30:33 you're 5 behind, that's probably okay, but you're really not understanding what that 5 really is. It's like, well, they took three welders off your project and they put them on project B. And we

30:44 don't know that 'cause we're not there on site, but we're looking at reports. And so, but if you look at the productivity metrics and it can be applied to other situations, but if you look at

30:52 those productivity metrics, then you can understand really what's happening Got it, got it. Yeah. Yeah, that was a much better, simple analogy of basically what we're talking about, I feel like.

31:03 Yeah. Let's go back to just tools and making things efficient, whatever. Like, what is like something that, something you

31:11 maybe try to implement or tool you wanna use that you learned kinda just isn't the way to go or in a similar vein, what is like a hype overkill tool everyone's trying to use? It's like, no, that's

31:23 not really the way to go.

31:26 Okay, let's go on to detail about that. Yeah, a little bit. I mean, it's brief, right? But like, for example, CRM, you feel like it's supposed to like solve all small business problems

31:37 through reality is like, it might not be the right tool for that team. You know, like, if you're a really sales oriented team, then it might be that it might be the right fit. But if you're more

31:47 of an in-person, shake a hand, get to know somebody through a relationship, and that's how you drive business, then a CRM tool is really overkill for a database of contacts. So that's a simple

31:59 solution to be. And

32:02 it just depends on the business, right? For the type of solution that they need, not every business is the same, and each business uses different technologies. There was a second part to that.

32:12 What tool would you - What a C-R-M-A-B-R. What would you do for it? The same client relationship management. Oh, okay. What would you use instead of using a CRM? You could, I mean, you could

32:22 use a simple Microsoft tool, like Microsoft lists. And it's a simple tool, and it gives you the insight that you need. But again, if you have other technologies that you're trying to connect it

32:34 with, it just depends, every situation is a little bit different. We recently went through that where we stopped using our CRM for our sales, and it's all in Notion now, which we built our own.

32:47 It's like our own CRM, so we still have CRM, but it's just built in a tool we use for other things as well So it's actually nice, 'cause it's putting all of our data in one place, so we can query

32:59 Notion AI. And that's been my biggest thing recently, is like, how do we get all our data in one place where we can use LeverJi? You can LeverJi, absolutely, yeah. Let's talk about, basically

33:13 something I do in life is, and I know I'm not alone with this, is kind of gamifying life. You can do it with business and stuff like that, right? I mean, even as simple as being like, you know,

33:23 you work out, you go to the gym, think about it as like leveling up or whatever, right? Like it's dumb, but I know some of y'all watching do the same thing, but I mean, I won today. Yeah.

33:35 You, Julie, you can get in on this too. Like what have we seen in businesses that work that like you get like employees like a way to gamify their work or like reward them, you know, not with

33:47 like money, but like just in a fun like cultural way. Like what are some things that actually work that you've seen? Well, I guess recently, I mean, we did use money, but. Oh, that's a good

33:59 example. Yeah, recently we did a like social media contest where we're really encouraging our employees to post on social, mostly LinkedIn. So we ran a month long contest. And whoever got the

34:15 highest, I think we did highest engagement rates, so poor John. John actually won. He got the most impressions. Oh, that's fun He was beat by the person who had the less. amount of connections,

34:26 because she got more impressions as it correlates to her connections. Yeah, if John has

34:35 a

34:38 lot of connections. And John. Honestly, I don't think I agree with that, but. Oh, was it original content too? Yeah, it was all original content, and we had some rules like you have to post.

34:43 You have to post like four. If John has 11, 000 followers and gets 100, 000 impressions, and then - Yeah, to wear a card ticket, there's 11, 000 connections. And you're getting more

34:54 connections with the more valuable content you put out. The person who beat him was nine years old when he started the LinkedIn profile. She's our intern.

35:06 But Sean, I mean, like maybe with that example, like any kind of way or just a hypothetical thing on the spot to like go to any kind of business and be like, you know, if we do something like

35:16 this, this can bring up numbers. and it gets more people on our product collide. Like it actually works. Like what - I think a different way to ask this is how do you story tell or communicate to

35:27 the employees or users that you're trying to get to use the new system or technology? That's a good, that's a good - What she said, what she said. 'Cause I was gonna go like through the healthcare

35:40 piece of it where you encourage them to, you know, your employees to work out and to be healthy and go do their doctor's appointments, right? And they get points through their healthcare. I

35:49 thought that's the direction that you're going. We actually do that as well. We will pay for a gym membership for our employees. If they go, was it four times a week? No, not even. Like it was

36:02 a very low amount. I think like two a week. Maybe it's like eight times, maybe it's eight times a month. And if you don't go, if you don't check in eight times a month, you have to pay for it.

36:10 Talking about technology is making sure that you're involving the people that you're in, into the system, whatever it is, whatever process it is, 'cause if you develop it in a silo and you try to

36:24 roll it out, they're just, they're gonna throw their hands up. I'm like, what is this? Why am I now having to do this? And there's a lot, like if you do a stakeholder analysis, you're probably

36:34 going to map out who's gonna be on board, who's gonna be resistant, and who do I really need to work with, right? And if you do a stakeholder analysis, and I know I'm probably like throwing out

36:43 all these different tools that you have to use, but like everybody has a backpack and you have to use these tools in order to really deploy solutions successfully. And if you do your stakeholder

36:54 analysis, you'll identify those people that you really need to engage with. And it might just be a sit down and to like hear out their side of the, whether you're changing their process or not,

37:03 but to hear their side of how this might affect them and what their feedback might be. Because for the more senior generation, They might have been doing that same process for the past 30 years and

37:17 then young guns come in here and shake it up, right? And they don't like that. But you're doing something good for the business. All they see it is that you're making my job more difficult. And

37:28 so starting early on in like meeting with those individuals, understanding how this might affect them, it can help to break down those walls so that you can really start to engage with them and then

37:42 they can provide feedback because they might have wise feedback, right? And then that can go, that can be a value add. Yeah, making sure they feel heard in a part of the process, they'll get

37:52 bought in. Like, if they can say, like, Oh, yeah, like, I, that was my idea that we put that little feature right there. And like that just gets them bought in. Yeah. And that ties back to

38:03 the communication piece. Like, I was thinking through communication the other day, and I realized is like, you might be engaged with part of the team, and in your you're telling them about this

38:15 new feature or maybe it's a new SaaS that, hey, we're going to start working on this, but then this other group over here that you, maybe it's your, maybe it's your manager, right? You're not

38:24 really involving them, but then you go and tell them, hey, we just deployed this new technology and you're like, what? You know, it's like, why didn't you tell me? It's like, I would have

38:31 loved some input there. And so it hit me the other day. I was like, I've been communicating with this silo group for so long. It's like, I forgot about half of these other people over here that

38:43 really needed to hear what project we're working on so that my stakeholders understood the value that we're trying to, by trying to deploy a technology, what value that's actually going to bring the

38:54 organization. And so it's an important time, like, whenever you're, whether it's process improvement or new technology, you have to take a second and stop and say, am I communicating correctly?

39:05 Because we get stuck in the process We've got to start finished, start finished, start finished, we have to finish, you know, we have to finish these jobs and we kind of forget things along the

39:13 way. I just watched your LinkedIn video about that. Yeah. It was good. I actually, so when do you communicate to all the people? And how do you keep that communication streamlined and not like

39:25 meeting with different people all the time on the status of the project? Like what does that look like? For me, email communication is the first starting point. That way, let's just say you have

39:38 a group of like 40 people and they're really the only, the major contributors are probably gonna be five or 10 different people You usually have like a core contributors that are gonna help focus and

39:47 build these solutions. But for these other people, maybe they're located around the world or maybe they are on the same office that are just not involved in the project is communicating to them

39:57 because their mind starts to go in interesting places, right? They start to put those walls up and they're like, okay, well, something cool is happening. They are developing a solution, but how

40:08 is it gonna affect me? by demonstrating even through an email, you can demonstrate the value of what we're trying to accomplish, and even if it's six months out, you're showing them, you're kind

40:20 of waving that shiny object through an email, and you're starting to communicate. You just have to identify which ones that you need to sit down with into really communicate because everybody's at a

40:31 different level of seniority, and people may be a little bit more protective of their processes and things like that, and then a sit down would be definitely the value add, but email is fully

40:43 acceptable, and then you can start, once you get closer, you start having, you know, teams meetings or you have in-person meetings,

40:55 and you start to show the features, demonstrate what we're trying to build here and how it's bringing you value to the business, and then that way you're kind of like selling internal, and that's

41:03 how you start to kind of communicate better Yeah, I like talking about tools, essentially. tool that we'll use and forever use. And we use messaging apps like Slack and Discord. And while we kind

41:18 of wrap up, and the end segment will kind of be tool oriented, I believe, what are like tools in your tool belt that are kind of like the go-to to baby steps for companies? Like everyone, like we

41:31 use Slack, and it's like very helpful. Like everyone uses it to communicate things on a main page and no one like takes advantage of it or like post memes and stuff. Like it's pretty clean and

41:44 helpful, right? And then there's a small like siloed messages between like a marketing team and a finance team, whatever.

41:51 And like it's so funny seeing like my girlfriend works at HEB and like they have a Slack and it's all super organized. You have a Slack? Yeah, and like people at restaurants have Slack. I'm like

41:58 this is like - I love that. This is the right direction, right? Like what, like are you going into businesses and seeing them like still like texting groups and like use like emails at 50 people?

42:10 easy solutions that people can just start with. They're, Microsoft Teams is super dynamic and it's super easy. I mean, that's what I primarily use, but there is people that are like, what, I

42:24 don't use Teams, like I just text whoever I need to get the answers from. What's up? Like, but how can I get ahold of you? You know, and so Teams is very powerful, right? It is a communication

42:35 tool like Slack is, but it also has Teams environment where you can have documents that you can share amongst them. You can collaborate with individual teams. You can have private teams if you want

42:46 to share, you know, specific data. You can also create a planner, which is tasks. So like say you're doing project management, it's a simple tool that you can now have an action tracker in there.

42:57 You assign that to the resources. It even has a Gantt view, Gantt chart view as well. So you can kind of tie in a simple schedule. Again, it's a very dynamic tool. you can have all of your Power

43:09 BI's uploaded in there. You can create custom apps in there. I mean, there's a million different tools. So that's the tool that I like to use from a communication perspective. It's super, super

43:20 simple. And usually everybody has a Microsoft 365. So why not leverage something that's free? Not free, but it is free because everybody has Microsoft Word. So then you have Teams. Yeah. I mean,

43:32 we use Notion for like a more project Like Google, a Google company. Yeah, there's like the more organized messaging app, like Slack or Teams. There's the project management where you can like

43:45 create a project, assign people, check it off. Like you're not doing that. Like that's crazy.

43:51 And then, I mean, like what other tools are like pretty essential starting points, you think? Or it's kind of something like Teams. It's about documentation. Documentation, there's a lot of, I

44:02 mean, there's a lot of different solutions.

44:05 There's a content server, there's a number of different ones that are, that are different solutions. And you have to find the right one that is works for your business, right? Even at SLB, we

44:14 have two teams on the same, same organization that are using two different documentation systems. So it just depends on the business, right? One does a little bit, one has better workflows than

44:26 the other. Is it all, I feel like for bigger companies, like everything's kind of in the Microsoft suite. Is that as well? Yeah, trying to get approvals to use other things is challenging. But

44:42 it's powerful. Yeah. When you start using all the tools that they have to offer. Yeah, absolutely. Okay. I'm ready for the on-screen segment. Yeah. Yeah. So this should bring up some more

44:51 talking points. But this one, this one's a little random. But I think after our talk, it kind of adds up. It makes sense. It'll be on this screen, by the way. Okay. Okay. So I'm going to

45:00 just go to the first image and kind of explain it Alright, so we're here, we got a bunch of products. What do you think is the similarity between the three of these products? Hmm, media. We got

45:13 a modern flip phone, a vinyl, and a Polaroid camera. Oh, '90s. So these are all products that have essentially were advanced at one point, died, and then came back, right? The flip phone was

45:29 interesting 'cause we redid the flip phone and integrated it with the modern smartphone Vinyls are literally the same thing, they died and came back. And then Polaroid's kind of somewhere in the

45:38 middle where we have modern ones that people still use like actual film, you know, Hollywood still uses film cameras, some time, stuff like that. So I'm gonna go through a bunch of products that

45:47 are, you know, potential candidates, whether they're ones that have died and not come back, or they're something we use now and we can maybe predict the future of their life, their lifespan. So

45:60 I think I got about 15 of them repurposing technology. Yeah, all right, first one. the box CRT TV. We're gonna see these come back in living rooms, yes or no? No. No. There's not enough room

46:07 to

46:12 hang that on the wall. Can't do that. I'm gonna need a bigger entertainment center.

46:20 All right, easy start. Next, is a blackberry, but more importantly, the iteration back to buttons or no only touch, only screens. I don't know if you've seen Apple's recent updates, the

46:35 notification center has gotten a lot more busy. So, one of the posts recently that says, Steve Jobs would hate the new team 'cause they're making it more complicated than me 'cause Apple used to be

46:47 super, super simple. And now if you swipe down, you got your notifications, there's like 30 of them. Oh my gosh, it's insane, yeah. Yeah, I mean, we got the Picasso thing in the office.

46:57 That's literally the whole thing that Steve - And their photo, their photo album and

47:04 the phone calls now, they're so complicated Yup. Think about it, Blackberry.

47:07 Come back. But Blackberry was way hard. I mean, yeah, but I owned that brick breaker on it back in the day. I've never had one, but it was like confusing, no? Yeah, little tiny buttons too.

47:19 Hey, you know what? I got an idea. Yeah.

47:23 Maybe something without a cell signal, but you could bring back the technology, but it could be a toy for kids. Like because like my daughter's five and she likes the little snake game that's like,

47:33 Oh yeah. She's had a little bitty watch that's this big and she'll play the snake game on there. It's nearly impossible. Yeah, snake and brick breaker. That's all you need. I was literally

47:41 talking about the snake game yesterday. So bring it back, but let it be for kids. Yeah. I mean, that's kind of what the dumb phones are doing. We need more dumb phones. The dumb phones aren't

47:50 just like, you know, no data, but they are kind of doing like flip phones and like Nokia style phones and the buttons, so. Yeah. Okay, this one might already be on the way Next one. Emojis.

48:03 So we kind of have a timeline of like a modecon to emojis. Like where are we going to be using crying laughing faces with our grandkids? I'm still like a boomer and I use the first one. And then

48:16 I'm like, oh my gosh, I can't move. I just typed that out. Yeah, like on an email or something, absolutely. I mean, what's the future of our emojis? Are we going to go hyper realistic? Are

48:25 they going to be like the AI generated ones that Apple's trying to work on? I'm kind of digging the pixelated one. I think we're back to pixelated one Back to emoticons, you know, probably.

48:36 That's an objective answer. The fax machine. Oh my God. I'll be honest, I'm not really sure what a fax machine is. Are you sending a piece of like a

48:48 paper would print on it and just sending it physically, right? It's like a telephone that you call. You're sending a bunch of ones and zeros through a phone line and then it transcribes it and it

48:58 prints it out. Honestly, that sounds like really cool technology like they still got to use this right like Technically. You can email and print now. Why would you do that? Yeah, you just

49:08 download a PDF and print it. That's a solution. Yeah, why do you need a call of phone to send? I don't know, I feel like a couple of years back, I was still having, like I had to fax something

49:17 like to the insurance company, I don't know. Oh my God. And I didn't even know where to start. I think somebody had helped me. I think it's not coming back. We have way too cool modern

49:28 technology that we can email in. Okay, I guess I never used it I think we had one in the house, but yeah. Next, AirPods. No, this one's interesting 'cause it's kind of like, how do we use

49:41 headphones? It's like, we had the wired headphones and then we went, but now people still wear like the big muffs, it's kind of a mix, right? Like, are we gonna like do some implants? Are like

49:50 those weird bone ones? You ever seen those? And I like those. Yeah, I mean. I like wired headphones, but I don't think I can use them on my phone anymore.

50:01 I know, that's the thing. They're taking off all the awks and the holes and stuff, it's like with the brain. Yeah, and isn't there something with Bluetooth being by your brain? Oh, you're

50:08 getting a lot of conspiracy theories here. I'm interested. I don't know, Tim and Mac wouldn't wear them, that's all I know. Oh, get into the Miss Certain Information section of the video. My

50:20 was wife, she was like, when are you ever gonna get a pair of wireless headphones? I had some back in the day, but every time I worked out, they fell out. I was like, I'm done with them, right?

50:28 So I went back to the wired ones, but I don't usually use them where I'm working now, but if I'm at my desk, well, I got a new phone. Well, now the connector doesn't work. So I need to set. I

50:39 always plug mine into my computer now. Yes, I do the same thing. That's what I, 'cause I like wired because mine were always dead. Yep. Or my child stole them, and I don't know where they are.

50:52 But it was reliable. That's the reason why we still have them. Wired, yeah. Exactly. And the main solution is that the wired's not gonna wait

51:02 kids can't wear these 'cause they'll lose one, they'll lose two, they'll lose the case. And I have real life experience at that.

51:09 Next, streaming services. Now this one's so funny because everyone was like, Netflix, Hulu. Are you asking if they're going away or coming back? Well, let me do my little schedule. So it's

51:22 like, there was a few and everyone's like, okay, great. And then there was 15 or like, okay, we're gonna revert back to cable where it's just everyone has their own channel That's where we are

51:30 in the timeline. There are 50 streaming services. So is that gonna expand? Are we gonna go back to everyone like buying themselves? Well, they've already kind of started to bundle. Yeah, the

51:41 Hulu, Disney and - Max, right? Someone, yeah, like they did that. So where are we going? All right, here's my strategy. Yeah. Sell it for twice the cost. So like say the cost of two

51:54 platforms and combine all platforms into one solution. And now whenever you go and you go to stream something, you can go search your live channels, but it's new to TV, or you can immediately,

52:07 with maybe a click of the button to the left, you go to Fubo, and you're not leaving the application. You're staying inside the application. But of course, you gotta charge more, right? 'Cause

52:15 you're trying to consolidate. That's my idea. I wonder if the platforms would allow that. Like cable with extra stuffs. Oh, there would have to be huge mergers. Yeah. That would be a. That

52:25 would be nice, though Yeah, we're gonna live to see some wacky shit happen. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, absolutely. It's gonna be fun. Look at the popcorn. I am tired of spending so much money,

52:34 though. Oh, yeah. I'm tired of logging into my

52:41 parents' accounts so many times,

52:44 yes, right? They can have heard your max account. Podcasts, we're podcast going. They're dead. I

52:49 don't know,

52:53 like two years ago, totally different than today. I feel like. I feel like it peaked did. I think it's I think it's a, okay, okay, if we're thinking in the future. When we talk about AI, you

53:04 know, there's some recent post on even a LinkedIn of like AI images that people are getting all these hits off of, but it's not even a real person. So that's my theory is that in the future, these

53:16 type of round tables are gonna be huge for - Generated. Yes. Like fake, not real people generating conversations. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, these like

53:26 in person is still value-add, like - Right, because they won't be able to generate - How will we have to prove that we're real? Do something weird, I talked like a robot a couple times in this

53:40 episode, not gonna lie. Yeah. No, I feel like a robot would have been more precise, not just, well, you do stuff.

53:49 Yeah Yeah. there's kind of like the idea that like podcasts have always been a thing, you know, like the talk shows on radios. It's all kind of the same medium, right? So it's kind of, it's

53:58 always been going on. I think, yeah, I think there was hype, like you said, a couple years ago.

54:05 I think it's very hard to stay consistent in podcasting and people are figuring that out. So that's kind of why it's dying down. It's not as easy as people think it is. But I think what's cool

54:17 about podcasting and AI is now that you can easily transcribe. All of this information is now searchable and you can learn things quicker and you don't have to listen to the whole thing you can

54:31 search for it. So I think that part of podcasting is really cool. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, that's the right answer. I mean, there are so many cases where people don't follow a podcast, but they

54:41 follow a clip channel of the podcast. Yeah. Or they just, they, their algorithm learned that they just show him a bunch of Joe Rogan or Tim Ferriss clips. Yeah. And like, and that scratches

54:52 their itch. They have seen minutes to hours of footage of Tim Ferriss, but they've never seen a single episode and that's kind of like where we are. It's kind of weird. Yeah. Next,

55:04 food delivery

55:08 apps. So I've used the food delivery app once in my life outside of what we do here at work. And I ordered it wrong. And what I did was I spent18 on a bowl of rice, guacamole, black beans, which

55:19 was all day. And I said, well, that's the last time I used this. Okay, does this include grocery shopping apps? Yeah. 'Cause I'm all about efficiency and I use Instacart every single week. I

55:31 understand that like, there's an, my understanding is that people use these apps. It costs more, the food's worse and it's cold, but they just keep using it. Like, when are these people gonna

55:41 stop? It's very expensive. When are you gonna realize it's worth going out or picking up yourself for a hot meal, like, I don't know. If they, I would rather the pricing be the same and they

55:54 charge like the delivery fee versus hiking up like a 10 or 20 on like, let's just say you buy a burger for18.

56:02 The reality is it was only like a14 or15 burger

56:05 if you ordered it there and then just have your delivery fee so that you know like, okay, I bought it at the price that the restaurant would have sold it. But you're right, it's not that we're

56:16 lazy. We just want convenience It's like, I want that burger. I'm not going to go drive five minutes to get it, but I'll wait 30 minutes for it, which doesn't make any sense. But it does make

56:26 sense while you're doing other things. And I'm speaking as a mom of three who is very busy. I will not go to Costco on my weekend 'cause I have two days off, that's it. I'm not going to go to HEB.

56:39 and Costco and spend a whole day grocery shopping when I could be doing anything else. So yeah, makes sense for. You could be washing podcast clips at the curbside order, you know? I don't want

56:53 to do curbs. I don't want to drive there. I mean, also - You need a library for Costco and HB? I go to HB 'cause I enjoy HB. I do not enjoy Costco. Costco is like a mad house and so many people

57:04 just standing around, it makes me so mad. I know that placing my order online for HB would be more efficient, but I just enjoy it. I enjoy it too. So I love to cook, right? That's my thing And

57:17 so going into the grocery store is like a chef's - Dream. Right, you get to go over here and this is what I want to make for this meal and this meal and you get to pick everything out, so I love it.

57:27 It's like your playground. It is. Agreed. All right, next.

57:34 Court Zoom. This is more like a - Should have got the cat, right? The funny thing that happened in life where we realized we had video calls forever and then we like use it kind of like whatever.

57:47 And COVID happened, forced us to use that. And we're like, oh, this is a sick tool. It's like, no shit. It's like in every sci-fi movie ever that we're gonna grow up and be in like a future

57:55 with video calls, but didn't really take advantage of it until we're forced to. And now there are court zoom meetings now. Like it isn't like they took it away. Like it didn't die. Yeah, they're

58:07 like, oh shit, this is so much better. Let's do this. More efficient. It's like, this is a, this is kind of, I don't know. Like it's just so funny that like, this is obviously the way to go.

58:17 And I don't think video calls are going anywhere. I mean, come on. Pretty. Yeah. Yeah. Like FaceTime's. Yeah, I think. Sorry. Kids FaceTime. Save the important trials for the in-person.

58:29 And then like, all the rest of the 90 of them online. I think that's what's happening. Yeah. That's what's happening, yeah. You're saying something about kids. Yeah, my kids don't call, they

58:39 FaceTime. Exactly. And it is crazy. And it is crazy Kids, like that's what they say, kids don't know what this is. Yeah, they're like this and then they don't even like, I don't think they

58:50 even know they can make a phone call instead of like a FaceTime audio. Yeah, we're like in the car listening to music and it's like blasting and it's like, hey dad, it's like bro, like he can't

59:00 hear you or like you're in a grocery store, you're out in public and you're just like calling her friends. Mine just leaves his on his iPad, he leaves his friend on his iPad. I don't know that

59:10 he's on the phone 'cause they're just like playing together and sometimes talking but they're all like, what is happening? And then I'll come in and get onto him and his friends here, who their mom

59:21 probably hears. What if kids like to see our faces? Like they wanna see the expression on our face because sometimes my daughter be like, Daddy, why are you upset? I'm like, I'm not upset. Oh,

59:33 and you had a COVID baby. I'm perfectly, yeah, I'm perfectly fine. Like, I'm happy. She's like, Well, you don't look at it. Oh, okay. So maybe that's like when kids, they want to FaceTime

59:44 because they want to see the facial expressions. Yeah. They want to see if you're happy, sad. Aww. Yeah, except when you leave the iPad and zoom around and doze off and. Yeah, it's like. It's

59:55 a little bit of both. It'll give them the benefit. Yeah. Yeah. It's sweet. All right, next.

1:00:01 MapQuest. Ooh. I've heard a story recently of like someone who's like, Their parents still do this. Like, yeah. That's crazyI mean, the navigation apps are kind of perfect, right? Like, why

1:00:12 - When someone starts giving you directions and you're just like nodding, and you're like, I'm not listening at all. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I think we all grew up with a piece of

1:00:24 paper, like, on the mirror, like - I didn't - And somehow we had less accidents back then than we do now. Well, because you're not on your phone. Exactly. Or we would get lost and it was okay,

1:00:38 right? And we would figure out, we would turn around. You don't have to be like, oh, I have to make a mistake right now. No, we're just staring at our phone, like, oh, I'm supposed to, wait,

1:00:45 I'm texting somebody still. Yeah, although I did have, this was probably when I first moved to Houston, my phone completely broke. I had to go find a Verizon store. I didn't know where one was

1:00:59 at at all. And I just had to go and explore and drive around until I got the Verizon store. I don't remember why I think my internet was out or something was

1:01:12 where I couldn't even look it up online. So it was literally just an adventure. Your life is a black mirror episode. It really was.

1:01:21 It was at the fun part though, kind of getting lost. I mean like, I still do that now. Like my wife's like, aren't you gonna put it in the fastest route? I'm like, no. I see if my brain can do

1:01:31 this. Yeah, it's around the corner she's like, you're gonna get lost. Yes, exactly, it's beautiful. We don't have to take advantage of the tools we have. We can just yolo it sometimes. That's

1:01:42 right. Yolo, yeah. Yolo. All right, next. Generative AI. Oh. So everyone. I know this was gonna be inflatable chairs.

1:01:55 Absolutely, awesome, awesome managers.

1:01:58 So, I need one in my office. Generative AI has gotten better and better, but it's still like so obvious to most people. But are we actually screwed where it's gonna be so good that all old people

1:02:10 are screwed, getting scammed? Yes. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. So, I like to listen to what the kids say when it comes to things like this, and like Remy is so particular on AI-generated images, and

1:02:26 she's like, That's AI-generated. Like you can tell, and she hates it. Good. And so, I don't know.

1:02:34 more kids will be like, no, I want like original artwork that is cooler original picture because it's real 'cause everything that they're growing up with is gonna be fake. Yeah. Well, what about

1:02:46 YouTube's new change in their policy? So they're not gonna be paying out for AI-generated media now. So everything has to be original. So maybe that's actually gonna be a cultural change that we,

1:03:00 like if kids are watching YouTube that it's still gonna be original content. Yeah, I mean, there's insane stuff on YouTube that's like better than like movies sometimes. But it will have to come

1:03:13 down to like policy and the government to like make sure this doesn't go out of hand. As of right now, it's like skirting the line. Oh, absolutely. So it's scary, but again, that's another

1:03:23 thing we're gonna live to see. But we've gone down this black hole rabbit hole so many times. So let's not get too dystopian

1:03:32 Peepers! Peepers are kind of cool. They are. They are kind of cool. I think you don't have to call them back, but you know that someone called you. That's where a smart watch is kind of come in

1:03:43 place. So, and I've told you this about the garments. So I have a Garmin watch, which is a big brand, but it's a cheaper one. So it's not like, so like when you have an Apple watch, you get a

1:03:53 text and you can like type on it, I guess, or like text a speech, take calls, whatever. I can't do that on here. It just Bluetooth connects to my phone So when I get like, you know, dozens of

1:04:04 emails, random notifications and shit, it buzzes my watch and I can look at it and go, oh, that's not important. And then move on in my life. It's kind of like what a beeper did, you know, in

1:04:14 a way where it's like, oh, what is this? Okay, I'll get to it later, or oh, I gotta take this. And so I feel like these not so intense smart watches are like the middle ground beepers right now.

1:04:24 And I think people should take advantage of it, like not make the Apple watches like literally your phone on your wrist, it should be your beeper. It should be like an extension of your phone, not

1:04:36 your phone twice. So beeper, the vibes of beepers, I think are currently happening, and if not, maybe kind of coming back. Yeah, I mean, if you look at it from, you mentioned, you know,

1:04:49 ignoring certain like emails or whatever, ignoring phone calls. A lot of times if people had your phone number for a beeper, then it was something important, right? Hey, I need you to call me

1:04:58 back, right? So it was actually trying to like weed out some of these other conversations and you only focus on the important things. Yeah, that's true. Same thing with like a medium watch,

1:05:10 right? Yep, okay, we're going to the end here. QR codes, sorry, it's a little misleading.

1:05:16 QR codes. My shout-out collides. QR codes, scan it. QR codes are a lot like what I brought up earlier where like the Zoom calls where COVID made everyone realize how fucking cool they are. It's

1:05:27 like, oh, you don't have to talk to your waiter anymore talked in a little box with squiggles on it.

1:05:33 Obviously, if you know anything about QR codes, you know that we won't run out of them. I think there's like trillions of variations on them. I mean, what do we, we're gonna see these boxes

1:05:44 until we die, huh? Yeah, I agree, 'cause I mean, there's still thousands and thousands of companies that have yet to implement any type of like QR code system for like inventory management or

1:05:56 anything like that, right? And it's, or maybe it's asset management in the field, right? A service tech can go in and now scan it and pick up all the specs and the service log for that asset. So

1:06:06 I mean, that's, I think it's something that's gonna stick for forever. This is one of those technologies that like seems so low-key, but it's like one of the most revolutionary things ever made by

1:06:16 humans. And you can like point like a potato camera from like a hundred yards away and it'll know exactly what it is. Like the design is perfect, it's used as perfect. Yeah. It's like perfect

1:06:25 technology. The only problem that I have with some of it sometimes is at restaurants where they'll give you and then they're like, oh, scan the QR code for the menu. Yeah. What, you just put it,

1:06:36 I'm not gonna specify which restaurant that is, but I'm like, you just gave me this huge drink menu, and then now I have to pull my phone out to scan it to see the dinner menu. I agree, like I

1:06:47 wanna put my phone up for dinner, I don't wanna have it out, and then accidentally get distracted or anything like that. Oh wait, somebody's messaging me, let me know. Yeah, it's so easy, like

1:06:56 I just wanna turn my phone over and eat. Yes, that's what, that's exactly it Yeah, we're slowly phasing out that COVID phenomenon that happened 'cause people are like, wait, everyone's on their

1:07:06 phone and yeah, it's on. It has its bad use case in that way, I guess. Is this your last one? Nope, a few more. LLMs, you know, do we use Google no more and we just do LLMs, where are we

1:07:20 going with that? I haven't used Google or Chrome in like the past, I would say probably six months and I love it Yep. I get directly to the source. directly to the point, if I'm asking a question,

1:07:34 I don't want to scroll. I want to know my answer immediately, right? And that's like how we're treating chat GPT now. It's like, I want my answer now, and if I don't get it, I send one more

1:07:43 response to focus the conversation, and then I get my response. And then I'm an expert. Yeah, plus if in 30 seconds. If you want to talk, if you want to talk about like the environmental use of

1:07:53 it, Google now generates something anyway. It does. And you want to talk about sources, you're just not using it, right? Like I use, I mean, you can ask any LLM for the source, but I actually

1:08:04 go to Copilot specifically when I want to get empirical evidence because it will give you a source without asking. But if you use GPT, your cloud, whatever, and you get information, you want like,

1:08:15 you know, you're not trying to like, oh, what's a, you know, write this thing better for me? Like that's like an opinion, whatever. It's like, hey, what year did this guy die? And you want

1:08:24 to check the source, just ask for the source. And then that's, you know, you're not using Google, It's the same thing. Google, but better. I mean, that's kind of my thought on it. So does it

1:08:34 replace Google search engines? Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, there even like in marketing world already, there's already so many people researching

1:08:44 on, I don't know what you would call it, but basically AI search engines, like how to get optimized to be cited by AI. Yep. Rather than Google, it's no longer SEO, it's whatever they're calling,

1:08:60 I don't know what they're calling it. Yeah, you're asking chat GPT about cars, and then you're getting Honda ads and stuff like that, like that's the whole thing where you're gonna live to see,

1:09:09 it's kind of happening now, but like, but it already happens in Google. Yeah, advertising will come. You Google something or search something on Amazon, and then you're hearing it on your Alexa

1:09:17 five minutes later, it's like we're already in that dystopian future anyway. I don't like it. Yeah, so we went out to see my family and somebody was mentioning about, they were at my grandma's

1:09:26 house, they were mentioning like sunscreen or something like that. They pull up their phone the very next day, every single ad was about sunscreen. And so she went out and she went unplug the Lexa,

1:09:37 she turned Siri off like completely. And she's like, how is this happening, right? It was like, they're literally targeting me after me. We're all about to get ads about sunscreen. Yeah, 90s

1:09:48 sunscreen, I mean, what? It's August. It is August. So hot. Take the robot's advice. It's protecting you

1:09:57 Last, but not least, large white pads, drawing, writing, I don't know. This is you, by the way. Everybody has their toolbox. Sometimes people have tablets, sometimes people have whiteboards

1:10:12 for me to communicate an idea or whatever idea is going on in my mind, I write it out. So it's not going away. So if you look at my backpack right now, I have two notepads, full of notes Now,

1:10:24 are those notes categorized

1:10:28 and usable? but in the moment I wrote them down and that's how I documented my notes, but that's just - No, I love it. I think I love a good whiteboard in the background. I'm assuming you also

1:10:41 have some of these large pieces of paper folded up 10 times and in your backpack as well. No, not in this backpack. Okay.

1:10:50 In the background, there's probably a stack of them that you can't see, but sometimes I don't wanna throw them away 'cause I'm like, well, maybe I should reference this data Yeah. Well, I guess

1:10:59 I could just go online and go look at my video.

1:11:04 That's funny. All right, well, that's the end of it. Sean, thanks for coming on. Julie, thanks for letting me do the intro. You did so great. Oh, big boy now. It was a rocky start, but we

1:11:14 got there. Yeah, thanks Sean, this is fun. Yeah, thanks for the invite.