WEBVTT 00:00:00.330 --> 00:00:03.089 Hey, what's up, Toby? Hey, buddy. How you doing, 00:00:03.169 --> 00:00:07.969 man? We made it through a half a year. Happy 00:00:07.969 --> 00:00:14.910 year. Welcome to spring. I know. We did it. What's 00:00:14.910 --> 00:00:19.230 funny is I did one by myself, and that was hard. 00:00:20.350 --> 00:00:22.929 I got a whole new respect for people that do 00:00:22.929 --> 00:00:26.170 podcasts by themselves. Oh, brother. It was nutty. 00:00:26.469 --> 00:00:30.899 I so appreciate. Having fun and doing these silly 00:00:30.899 --> 00:00:34.060 things with you and silly and serious, but it's 00:00:34.060 --> 00:00:39.119 a lot easier to trade witticisms with somebody 00:00:39.119 --> 00:00:43.340 across the table, you know? Heck yeah. No. What 00:00:43.340 --> 00:00:45.840 have you been thinking about? You, I love to 00:00:45.840 --> 00:00:50.299 serve some things. Yeah, I have a topic for today. 00:00:50.359 --> 00:00:52.960 The topic for today that I would like to talk 00:00:52.960 --> 00:00:55.820 about, and I don't even know why this one came 00:00:55.820 --> 00:00:57.880 up, but I was thinking about those like military. 00:00:59.659 --> 00:01:02.780 human exoskeletons well sure like we do right 00:01:02.780 --> 00:01:04.879 yeah yeah i mean like like i mean were you lifting 00:01:04.879 --> 00:01:08.799 something heavy or what was going on maybe maybe 00:01:08.799 --> 00:01:11.939 it's because i'm i'm older and my hip hurts i'm 00:01:11.939 --> 00:01:17.819 like maybe i need maybe fair okay maybe i need 00:01:17.819 --> 00:01:21.420 to go and rent one of those uh and i don't Well, 00:01:21.439 --> 00:01:25.359 what I was trying to think about there was specifically 00:01:25.359 --> 00:01:28.400 around, like, structures that seem like they 00:01:28.400 --> 00:01:33.000 would actually be very helpful. Yeah. Or look 00:01:33.000 --> 00:01:37.359 like they assist. And it also feels like every 00:01:37.359 --> 00:01:39.879 time those little exoskeleton things happen, 00:01:40.019 --> 00:01:41.599 and maybe it was an infomercial. I don't know 00:01:41.599 --> 00:01:46.299 what I was thinking about this. But you're always 00:01:46.299 --> 00:01:48.439 kind of like, oh, man, that looks cool. But then, 00:01:48.519 --> 00:01:53.900 like, they never work. yeah no like like we want 00:01:53.900 --> 00:01:58.180 we want them to work like uh avatar right or 00:01:58.180 --> 00:02:02.019 like alien where they just flawlessly pivot it's 00:02:02.019 --> 00:02:03.519 almost like they understand what you're gonna 00:02:03.519 --> 00:02:07.319 do yeah yeah i i've never experienced anything 00:02:07.319 --> 00:02:14.080 that works remotely like that yeah well and then 00:02:14.080 --> 00:02:16.319 the other funny thing is like they're always 00:02:16.319 --> 00:02:19.120 marketed as like military grade and they'll help 00:02:19.120 --> 00:02:21.490 people and you're like These dudes are, like, 00:02:21.509 --> 00:02:25.110 the strongest, like, badasses out there. And 00:02:25.110 --> 00:02:26.870 you're, like, you're going to give them an exoskeleton 00:02:26.870 --> 00:02:31.409 to slow them down? Yeah. A little bit encumbered. 00:02:31.409 --> 00:02:35.389 Like, maybe just go old school and use your body. 00:02:35.610 --> 00:02:40.770 But anyway, so the thought here is just really 00:02:40.770 --> 00:02:45.889 around, from a process standpoint, I think a 00:02:45.889 --> 00:02:48.789 lot of businesses build up these exoskeletons 00:02:48.789 --> 00:02:56.000 around tooling. Oh, dude. Right? Yeah. And so 00:02:56.000 --> 00:03:02.699 our daily work is this exoskeleton clunky thing 00:03:02.699 --> 00:03:08.360 where we've got to put a piece of our day. It's 00:03:08.360 --> 00:03:12.500 almost always the trifecta of some ERP or some 00:03:12.500 --> 00:03:15.919 sort of system like that. A ticketing system. 00:03:16.199 --> 00:03:23.750 Yeah. A PowerPoint deck. excel and uh pick 12 00:03:23.750 --> 00:03:27.830 other tools right yeah well and some of the clunkiness 00:03:27.830 --> 00:03:30.610 today is it's different than when you and i first 00:03:30.610 --> 00:03:33.090 entered the workforce in the 90s right because 00:03:33.090 --> 00:03:36.490 we have a factor authentication everything is 00:03:36.490 --> 00:03:39.389 in the cloud we're working remotely whether it's 00:03:39.389 --> 00:03:41.990 from home or somewhere else so there's all these 00:03:41.990 --> 00:03:47.060 additional layers and then the the Malcontents, 00:03:47.219 --> 00:03:51.300 you know, those maliciously oriented, fierce 00:03:51.300 --> 00:03:55.719 -agended monsters are out there figuring out, 00:03:55.780 --> 00:03:58.219 how do I crawl into all of their stuff that I'm 00:03:58.219 --> 00:04:01.280 not supposed to be in? Oh, yeah. And so even 00:04:01.280 --> 00:04:04.139 if the software has been tuned after decades, 00:04:04.340 --> 00:04:06.560 there's all these extra layers of exoskeleton 00:04:06.560 --> 00:04:08.560 that have nothing to do with the motion we're 00:04:08.560 --> 00:04:12.180 trying to accomplish. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Dude, I 00:04:12.180 --> 00:04:15.419 love this. It totally is. It's almost like if 00:04:15.419 --> 00:04:21.879 a reptile never shed its skin. It was just dragging 00:04:21.879 --> 00:04:27.540 along years of dead skin. Why do you have that? 00:04:27.620 --> 00:04:31.779 We're not sure. Henry over there, he just won't 00:04:31.779 --> 00:04:33.740 shed his skin. He just wants to hold on to things. 00:04:34.300 --> 00:04:36.560 Henry is so selfish, hanging on to all that dead 00:04:36.560 --> 00:04:40.899 skin. Henry, Henry. That's an example of why 00:04:40.899 --> 00:04:43.920 do we do this report? Yeah. TPS reports, baby. 00:04:44.800 --> 00:04:50.000 What do you do here? You know, you raise a really 00:04:50.000 --> 00:04:51.860 interesting point, too. And I want to go back 00:04:51.860 --> 00:04:54.579 to what you said about, you know, we talk about 00:04:54.579 --> 00:04:57.920 military grade, which generally means that we're 00:04:57.920 --> 00:05:02.879 talking about physical tasks that are being performed 00:05:02.879 --> 00:05:08.079 by generally younger people. at or near their 00:05:08.079 --> 00:05:11.180 peak physical condition. So they've already been 00:05:11.180 --> 00:05:15.399 tuned and optimally aligned. Let's mean a benefit 00:05:15.399 --> 00:05:17.360 of the doubt. We always know exceptions. We all 00:05:17.360 --> 00:05:22.079 saw stripes. Bill Murray's not dealt the course 00:05:22.079 --> 00:05:25.360 of one kind of specimen, but he's funny. But 00:05:25.360 --> 00:05:28.279 here we have people that are tuned for the work 00:05:28.279 --> 00:05:30.980 at hand, but then what we're trying to do is 00:05:30.980 --> 00:05:33.579 promote a better way of getting more out of them. 00:05:35.009 --> 00:05:37.089 Talk to me about how you see that in the workplace. 00:05:37.790 --> 00:05:41.490 Cause I'm hearing that in this process. No, what's 00:05:41.490 --> 00:05:44.589 interesting is like, I think, you know, developers 00:05:44.589 --> 00:05:46.829 happen to be, you know, they're, they're one 00:05:46.829 --> 00:05:51.730 of the highly highest paid like careers. Yeah. 00:05:51.970 --> 00:05:54.490 And I think it's because they are forced to build 00:05:54.490 --> 00:06:00.269 stuff that's repeatable. And I, you know, sometimes 00:06:00.269 --> 00:06:04.029 like they, they also. What's interesting about 00:06:04.029 --> 00:06:06.850 developers is oftentimes they have the ability 00:06:06.850 --> 00:06:10.410 to just basically ignore things like they're 00:06:10.410 --> 00:06:13.629 one of the few like one of the few careers where 00:06:13.629 --> 00:06:16.370 they can put on blinders. Yeah. And it's kind 00:06:16.370 --> 00:06:19.870 of OK if they're respected by their peers. Yeah. 00:06:20.910 --> 00:06:23.610 But you go into you go into other like you go 00:06:23.610 --> 00:06:27.029 into a marketing like or creative stuff like 00:06:27.029 --> 00:06:29.750 it like a lot of that work is just reactionary 00:06:29.750 --> 00:06:37.610 or can be at least. Right. And then the management 00:06:37.610 --> 00:06:41.790 layer, like the exoskeleton reporting management 00:06:41.790 --> 00:06:45.709 layer that people put on, that has just always 00:06:45.709 --> 00:06:50.750 been fascinating to me. Because the report's 00:06:50.750 --> 00:06:52.870 never good enough, and so it's always changing. 00:06:54.269 --> 00:07:01.529 And oftentimes the process doesn't fully support 00:07:01.529 --> 00:07:04.389 the report, so the report... you know, has to 00:07:04.389 --> 00:07:06.889 be altered or changed or whatever in order to 00:07:06.889 --> 00:07:12.029 meet a need. And then the process stops, but 00:07:12.029 --> 00:07:15.610 the report continues, just keeps going. It's 00:07:15.610 --> 00:07:19.430 like the Energizer bunny. The thought that crosses 00:07:19.430 --> 00:07:22.689 my mind as you start to talk about management 00:07:22.689 --> 00:07:27.269 reports and the inadequacies there and the exoskeleton 00:07:27.269 --> 00:07:31.579 of reporting up to leadership. It makes me think 00:07:31.579 --> 00:07:35.160 that the optimally tuned organism that is the 00:07:35.160 --> 00:07:39.120 organization has maybe outgrown and it's not 00:07:39.120 --> 00:07:41.759 figured out how to shed its skin. I don't know 00:07:41.759 --> 00:07:46.680 that organizations at thousands of people are 00:07:46.680 --> 00:07:52.180 really an optimal organism. I think it's something 00:07:52.180 --> 00:07:55.079 that's done for economies of scale. It's done 00:07:55.079 --> 00:07:57.199 for a myriad of reasons, but I think that we're 00:07:57.199 --> 00:08:01.360 still very tribal. Our optimal working teams 00:08:01.360 --> 00:08:04.180 are probably that tribal range. You know, I think 00:08:04.180 --> 00:08:06.180 that I think the approximate number and that 00:08:06.180 --> 00:08:09.379 the number of relationships, healthy relationships 00:08:09.379 --> 00:08:13.579 where we can see one another's worth and identify 00:08:13.579 --> 00:08:16.220 boundaries and how we work together, that number 00:08:16.220 --> 00:08:19.579 really maxes out at something like 60. Yeah. 00:08:19.620 --> 00:08:23.180 And so we talk about departments, you know, maybe 00:08:23.180 --> 00:08:25.620 at that size. And then we have managers inside 00:08:25.620 --> 00:08:29.629 of departments. But I don't think. I don't think 00:08:29.629 --> 00:08:32.570 that organizations were ever intended to report 00:08:32.570 --> 00:08:36.029 up for thousands of people across multiple time 00:08:36.029 --> 00:08:39.090 zones, multiple continents. And therefore it's 00:08:39.090 --> 00:08:42.629 inherently broken, perhaps. It's just bad exoskeleton. 00:08:43.389 --> 00:08:46.730 Yeah. Well, and I think what's hard is like, 00:08:46.830 --> 00:08:49.710 because the larger you get, the more control 00:08:49.710 --> 00:08:53.110 you have to have. Right. Or perceived control. 00:08:54.129 --> 00:08:57.009 Yeah. And so you have to report on that somehow. 00:08:57.230 --> 00:08:59.570 And the other thought that I had, you know, recently 00:08:59.570 --> 00:09:04.750 was like, does reporting structure or business 00:09:04.750 --> 00:09:11.090 reports limit innovation? And, you know, cause 00:09:11.090 --> 00:09:13.350 I, I've, I, I was, I was talking to a friend 00:09:13.350 --> 00:09:17.350 cause I did a, I was, I did some Salesforce work. 00:09:18.230 --> 00:09:21.169 Yeah. Three or four years ago. Okay. And one 00:09:21.169 --> 00:09:22.970 of the things that we wanted to change is we 00:09:22.970 --> 00:09:24.990 want to actually make the system better, but 00:09:24.990 --> 00:09:28.610 because of one of our measurements, I couldn't 00:09:28.610 --> 00:09:32.929 actually make a change because it was going to 00:09:32.929 --> 00:09:38.250 make the manual response time go from less than 00:09:38.250 --> 00:09:40.809 two days to two seconds because we were automating 00:09:40.809 --> 00:09:43.009 it. And we were automating it for a very specific 00:09:43.009 --> 00:09:46.330 purpose, which was any time in these ticketing 00:09:46.330 --> 00:09:49.629 systems when you send an email, it captures that 00:09:49.629 --> 00:09:51.830 email and it basically links all those emails 00:09:51.830 --> 00:09:55.210 together. What was happening was with the Salesforce 00:09:55.210 --> 00:09:59.600 implementation, they would send it to the client 00:09:59.600 --> 00:10:01.720 but it would be before hours and then we'd get 00:10:01.720 --> 00:10:03.200 a reply and then all of a sudden they'd have 00:10:03.200 --> 00:10:07.240 12 tickets oh and so we had to fight very hard 00:10:07.240 --> 00:10:11.419 to do the auto response piece because it would 00:10:11.419 --> 00:10:15.419 have hit you know your two day your two day or 00:10:15.419 --> 00:10:18.840 12 hour whatever response time down to two seconds 00:10:18.840 --> 00:10:20.820 and then it just basically killed their metric 00:10:20.820 --> 00:10:23.840 and you're like no no i'm solving a real problem 00:10:23.840 --> 00:10:26.600 over here but but there was this exoskeleton 00:10:27.360 --> 00:10:30.559 of something that had to be met that really was 00:10:30.559 --> 00:10:33.120 met because of when when we started it we just 00:10:33.120 --> 00:10:36.620 didn't know yeah and the the innovation was in 00:10:36.620 --> 00:10:39.919 make adding an automation to help reduce reduce 00:10:39.919 --> 00:10:41.940 duplicate tickets because there was a ton of 00:10:41.940 --> 00:10:44.919 them and it was it was like this internal battle 00:10:44.919 --> 00:10:46.899 of like well that's going to change the report 00:10:46.899 --> 00:10:52.639 you're like ding ding ding on the nose you're 00:10:52.639 --> 00:10:56.629 you're right it sure will Well, our clients won't 00:10:56.629 --> 00:11:00.250 like that. Okay. Then, then so we, we literally, 00:11:00.389 --> 00:11:03.029 the, the, the, the one thing that we had to do 00:11:03.029 --> 00:11:06.110 is we had to make it a toggleable so you could 00:11:06.110 --> 00:11:08.769 turn it on or off per client. Right. Which was 00:11:08.769 --> 00:11:14.769 hilarious. Yeah. Let's add in light. You know, 00:11:14.809 --> 00:11:18.049 what's, what's funny, Chris, is that, um, I think 00:11:18.049 --> 00:11:21.230 in your example of, of there's a clear reason 00:11:21.230 --> 00:11:24.870 why timeliness matters. And then there's certain 00:11:24.870 --> 00:11:27.350 information that can and cannot be communicated 00:11:27.350 --> 00:11:31.990 as timely as people want. And you and I have 00:11:31.990 --> 00:11:35.269 lamented over the years about some of the gyrations 00:11:35.269 --> 00:11:39.210 we've gone through in our careers. And I remember 00:11:39.210 --> 00:11:41.809 doing a lot of one -off analysis. We've talked 00:11:41.809 --> 00:11:43.909 about this. And then they go, great, now make 00:11:43.909 --> 00:11:48.009 that persistent. Because it's something that 00:11:48.009 --> 00:11:51.289 was never created. Conversely, we're asked to 00:11:51.289 --> 00:11:54.950 build persistent things. But the need isn't well 00:11:54.950 --> 00:11:58.889 understood. And so, you know, I might have Ripley, 00:11:58.889 --> 00:12:03.389 awesome alien exoskeleton. But if my job is peeling 00:12:03.389 --> 00:12:07.509 grapes, I'm still screwed. It could be the absolute 00:12:07.509 --> 00:12:10.809 best tool in the world. But if we don't understand 00:12:10.809 --> 00:12:16.289 the purpose, then it's a misfit. Yeah, I have 00:12:16.289 --> 00:12:18.250 a friend. I have a friend that said this and 00:12:18.250 --> 00:12:20.250 I'm going to steal it from him. But he said there's 00:12:20.250 --> 00:12:22.799 nothing more. more permanent than a temporary 00:12:22.799 --> 00:12:29.080 fix like yeah there's just i mean and and so 00:12:29.080 --> 00:12:31.320 many of those things happen and i don't know 00:12:31.320 --> 00:12:33.120 i don't necessarily even know that there's a 00:12:33.120 --> 00:12:35.480 there's a problem like that you can it's something 00:12:35.480 --> 00:12:40.200 that you can fix i just think i do think that 00:12:40.200 --> 00:12:43.399 man i i guess i guess fundamentally it comes 00:12:43.399 --> 00:12:45.539 down to this management's management's number 00:12:45.539 --> 00:12:50.220 one task is to unblock its people And there is 00:12:50.220 --> 00:12:52.399 this exoskeleton. I don't think people get that. 00:12:54.539 --> 00:12:56.980 Yeah, well, I think management's number one role 00:12:56.980 --> 00:12:59.580 is to unblock people. Thank you. I appreciate 00:12:59.580 --> 00:13:01.399 you saying it again from the deep seats because 00:13:01.399 --> 00:13:04.139 I think that is a huge, huge statement for us. 00:13:06.100 --> 00:13:08.779 Yeah, well, I think if you can unblock people, 00:13:08.940 --> 00:13:11.080 you have the people that are the boots on the 00:13:11.080 --> 00:13:13.139 ground doing the work. Yeah. You're going to 00:13:13.139 --> 00:13:18.269 get phenomenal ideas. Yeah. And you're going 00:13:18.269 --> 00:13:21.769 to you're going to, you know, but I don't it's 00:13:21.769 --> 00:13:24.190 a hard that that in and of itself is a hard problem 00:13:24.190 --> 00:13:25.730 because they've got they've got things that they've 00:13:25.730 --> 00:13:28.350 got to answer to. But if you can unblock people 00:13:28.350 --> 00:13:30.570 and go to the go to the shop floor and figure 00:13:30.570 --> 00:13:32.289 out, hey, what are these people doing or what 00:13:32.289 --> 00:13:34.809 are their ideas on making it better? You might 00:13:34.809 --> 00:13:38.370 actually get some really good stuff. Well, and 00:13:38.370 --> 00:13:42.750 dear Lord, you might also get people invested 00:13:42.750 --> 00:13:46.309 in your mission. You might get people engaged. 00:13:47.100 --> 00:13:49.820 in the work because they're seeing their insight 00:13:49.820 --> 00:13:58.480 manifest into new directions. Yeah. Exoskeletons. 00:14:01.120 --> 00:14:05.759 Exoskeletons, man. Yeah. And it's... Shellfish 00:14:05.759 --> 00:14:08.779 and broken make -believe. Well, you know, actually 00:14:08.779 --> 00:14:12.230 shellfish are a great example. Right. Animals 00:14:12.230 --> 00:14:15.149 in the wild that create and live inside of their 00:14:15.149 --> 00:14:18.129 skeleton instead of having all their skin suit 00:14:18.129 --> 00:14:21.610 wrapped around it. But it's super purposeful. 00:14:21.649 --> 00:14:23.870 I mean, and that's been a long and slow evolution. 00:14:23.889 --> 00:14:29.690 We're just horribly impatient. Well, if you also 00:14:29.690 --> 00:14:33.690 look at the exoskeleton animals like mollusks 00:14:33.690 --> 00:14:41.419 and like they they're not rapidly moving. Right. 00:14:41.720 --> 00:14:44.019 Like, and they're, they're, they're, they're 00:14:44.019 --> 00:14:48.720 localized. Like, you know, no one, no one says, 00:14:48.799 --> 00:14:53.320 you know what, when I think of strategy, I think 00:14:53.320 --> 00:15:07.000 of shellfish. I think, I think from a seasonal 00:15:07.000 --> 00:15:09.379 standpoint, like, I think companies have to. 00:15:09.600 --> 00:15:13.860 have to play that strategy. And, but that doesn't 00:15:13.860 --> 00:15:19.279 necessarily mean that like, yeah, it has to be 00:15:19.279 --> 00:15:22.960 intentional. And I guess, I guess that's the 00:15:22.960 --> 00:15:24.980 whole, that's the process that conversation here, 00:15:25.059 --> 00:15:27.799 which, which really comes down to like, you have 00:15:27.799 --> 00:15:29.980 to be intentional. Like, and we've talked about 00:15:29.980 --> 00:15:31.919 this, I don't know, probably 10 episodes. Like 00:15:31.919 --> 00:15:36.200 that isn't always bad, but it is if you don't 00:15:36.200 --> 00:15:47.350 know what you're doing with it. oh yeah oh so 00:15:47.350 --> 00:15:56.870 brutal no correct it it's not it's not a it's 00:15:56.870 --> 00:16:01.029 not a mortgage on a house right it's it's it's 00:16:01.029 --> 00:16:04.730 it's uh it's something that i did and i couldn't 00:16:04.730 --> 00:16:07.129 i i wanted to shortcut the system in order to 00:16:07.129 --> 00:16:12.559 do a thing If someone's going to have to pay 00:16:12.559 --> 00:16:13.919 the piper or someone's going to have to be the 00:16:13.919 --> 00:16:19.259 fall guy, that's how it works. Well, we did it 00:16:19.259 --> 00:16:25.039 again. We talked about exoskeletons. It's good 00:16:25.039 --> 00:16:33.679 stuff, man. Let's keep it rocking. I know. There 00:16:33.679 --> 00:16:41.639 you go. All right, man. All right. All right. 00:16:41.659 --> 00:16:44.240 Thanks, man. We'll see you next week. Bye.