Welcome to Business Analysis Live.
I'm your host, Susan Moore, community engagement manager
with the International Institute of Business Analysis.
I explore topics with industry guests about the work of
business analysis professionals and how their work helps
organizations achieve better outcomes.
And Yep, we take your questions too.
Thanks for listening. Let's get started.
If you have listened to this broadcast anytime really, you
know that we often talk a lot about human skills.
Maybe you call them soft skills, I call them essential skills and
how they are essential to the work that we do as business
analysis professionals. And so you might also think that
that means, well, if I do something more technical like
being a data engineer or being a tester or being a developer,
well, those human skills, they don't matter so much.
Well, you'd be wrong. And so today I've got an
interesting speaker who is somebody who's not just a
developer, but he's a Microsoft MVP, who says, actually, those
human skills give you a competitive advantage if you are
a more technical person. So I want to welcome to the
stage today Matei Toth. How are you, Matei?
I'm good, I'm good. Thank you very much for having
me. Well, it's lovely to see you
again. You and I had the great pleasure
to meet at BA and Beyond earlier this year in Luxembourg, and you
had a really interesting story and actually your talk there was
really interesting as well. So first, why don't you tell the
audience a little bit about yourself?
Hi everyone, I'm Matt Today. I work as a power platform
consultant and trainer, and I also spend a lot of time
building communities. I lead the Hungary Power
Platform user group. Yeah, it's a giveaway.
I based in Budapest, Hungary, and I'm one of the organisers of
the Shift Enter summit, which will happen next week in
Budapest. So yeah, it's it's it's it's
close and it's exciting. But yeah, my background is a bit
usual unusual. I'm not by trade and IT guy, so
I started off as a cruise ship photographer.
I worked in a photo agency and then of course I moved into
finance before finding my way into low code, no code and
Microsoft technologies. So and I feel like everything
connects together with human skills, with transferable
skills, everyday skills, essential skills, however you
have it. And I like it as a solving
problems, teaching, making things easier to understand with
through Smart Tools and cooperation.
So I think that's that's all about me.
That well, there's tons more about you, you're just you're
just fascinating and thanks for the reminder that you have got
your conference that's coming up next week.
I think it's your second annual that you've done.
Tell us a little bit about that conference and its focus.
The focus is Microsoft Technologies.
So it's a tech conference, but you will have some soft skills
going on, of course. And yeah, this is the second
year we do and but the first time with this name.
So we wanted to create our own brand and it's a community
conference from the community to the community, non profit.
So it's it's not a high, high, high price tag conference.
And I hope it will be fun. I mean, that's the goal to be
fun for everyone. Not yeah, not a normal
conference where everyone is just wearing a suit and walking
around, but wear whatever you want.
And it will be full day 26 sessions.
We will have a debate as well and networking mixer with drinks
and a lot of giveaways for other conferences as well.
So I think you can win, win conference tickets to like 4-4
or five conferences. So yeah, we'll be, we'll be
good. Oh my gosh.
I, I know it is going to be a good time.
And I remember when you and I spoke that I think I'm
remembering this correctly, that you actually had spoke, had
spoken at a Microsoft conference.
And I think it, one of your early talks, you, you blended
that human skill, tech skill. And then you thought it went
pretty well. And it was a little, it was
unusual because there, there weren't a lot of those talks.
And then the following year, I think you said you were
disappointed that that Microsoft had focused just more on the
technical skills. I think maybe part of the
inspiration for this conference that you've created is because
you believe it is important to blend those two things.
True text. Yeah, yeah, 100 percent, 100%
because it's whenever you are on online, you can see those
tutorials on YouTube, you can read the articles.
You don't need people at the same spot to listen to the to
the technical skill session. But I do believe those are
important to share new features to talk about, share the
learnings about the new tech. But also if we are in the same
room, why don't we try something else as well?
So yeah, that's what I'm trying to do to not disrupt, but to get
into tech tech conferences with my soft skills sessions.
So I talk about transferable skills, I talk about mentoring,
about a new one, will be networking next year,
storytelling, and you have these these kind of things that makes
us human and makes us connect. And yeah, that's what I try to
bring in because, yeah, what do we have without the connection
with the fellow human beings? There must be a story, there
must be something that that you experienced in your career that
made you see that actually these human skills are really
important for tech work. Is is there like an inspiration
behind why you're on this path? There like there was one story
which was more about transferable skills than than
human skills. So we were building what I was
building my very first application seven years ago in
Power, Power Apps. And I just, I wasn't good in
design. So it, it worked, it had
something, but it just didn't look good.
So I was looking around in the company to find anyone would
help me because it was really, really new to the, to the
company we were working for. And yeah, I was just found
someone who was also in finance but wanted to become a graphic
designer, was really good with PowerPoint and other other
tools. And yeah, I asked if like, hey,
do you want to chip in? And she made the design look
much, much, much better. So that's when I first realized
that, OK, we have more than what we have in our job titles, in
our position, in our job descriptions.
We have much more than that. And of course, like I told my
background before, so I have many, many other carriers in my
in my life. So I usually say that I am a
like a serial carrier Switcher in that sense.
But yeah, so that's, I think that was the story when when I
first realized that, yeah, there's something more than than
just OK, that's, that's your job title.
And that's why I usually have trouble to put like here in the
headline. I was like, OK, what should I
put? OK, that's, that's what pays my
bills, right. But I do much more like user
group leader and public speaker volunteer and so on and so
forth. And like, who are you?
That's also like an interesting question, mainly like how to,
because we usually say that, yeah, I'm, I'm this, I'm that I
work. And sometimes you associate
yourself with, with your position.
So yeah, that's, that's interesting.
Anything. I can't.
I can't help but notice as somebody who also has an arts
background. And I think that was the other
thing that that when you and I talked that I really, I really
enjoyed, right, That you did have this arts background as a
photographer, as someone interested in graphic arts, that
you had that interest and you were in a way applying that
artistic sense to the work that you were doing in that story
that you just told. You weren't just happy with
delivering a thing. I could deliver you a box and
the box would work, but actually you were interested in going a
little bit beyond that. You not only wanted them to be
able to use the box, but maybe you wanted them to like, love
working with it. I don't know.
How do you see your artistic side into this work?
Yeah, so I think the background in photography gives me like an
eye for aesthetics, right. So it's like I can see when
something doesn't look good, but I sometimes I cannot really
change it or most of the times I cannot really change to do
something about it. That's why I wasn't.
I am a photographer because I cannot paint or cannot draw.
So because, yeah, they usually say photography is just like you
clicking the button. It's much more than that, I'm
telling you, but. It is much more than that.
Yeah, it's for me it's it's easier because it's you have the
technology part of it that helps you in a way, but you also need
to have the eye for it. You need to have the passion for
it. Otherwise like you can have the
best cameras and takes take the worst pictures.
So yeah, I think it's the artistic side of it.
I think it's from for me, the photography brings me more the
communication part of it or the human element.
Understand what the client wants or understand how they would
like to see themselves and and also like adaptability,
flexibility, because if you are a wedding photographer, for
example, things will change every wedding.
They have the schedule and then Nope, it will do something
differently or you will have clouds, you will have sunny day,
you will have a rainy day and then yeah, you just need to go
out and and make the best out of what you have.
So I think those are the things it's for me, it's not the
artistic bit. I was never like an artistic
photographer, more like a journalist style photographer.
But I also had some some photo shoots where it was really going
into the artistic bit. But yeah, I've never been like a
photo artist. I never call myself that but.
Like an art guy, Yeah. Yeah, I.
Yeah, I, I get that as somebody that, you know, went to school
to be a filmmaker. I, I and I, I'm an art historian
like I always like the, the production of it.
And, and there's, there is a technical side to that, but
there's also a little bit of an art because I do think you have
to know what looks good, what is, what is, you know, what's
possible with the technology. So I can see very clearly how
your work as a photographer easily and in the skills that
you developed as a photographer transcended over into this work.
So what was the reception like as you have been this Microsoft
MVPA functional consultant, basically how how have your
clients responded to your wanting to communicate, wanting
to talk with them more about like what it is they really
want? I think they are usually fine
with that because I'm not coming through like, OK, this is how we
do it and this is the technology.
I don't want to sell you the technology only, right?
So I'm not coming here like, OK, this is the best tool you can
use. And, and I'm always really
honest with my with my clients and with my customers.
And yeah, yeah, someone sold, sold us this.
And then from the first sentence, I understand that it
will not be the right tool for you.
And I will tell you that it's not the right tool for you.
So I think it's just I'm trying to find always the common ground
or the common understanding and make sure that I, I explain
things in a way that they will understand or they will
appreciate or they will see, you know, see it better at the at
the end of the day. And yeah, just really, really
understand it much, much better. So I think that's how I found
the human element of it in tech as well, That because at the end
of the day, it's human beings are using the technology and
they will be the end users. They will be the administrators,
they will be the consultants, they will be the you name it.
And if they don't like using it, then what's the point?
I mean, we can always ship in new new products.
We can always ship in new features.
But if if people actually using it are hating it then.
You you haven't solved their problem.
Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I, so I think, I think
that is a really important piece of this is that your approach is
less here's the tool, here's the capabilities.
If you don't like it, whatever, what you're actually trying to
do is, is speak to them in the language of their needs rather
than speak to them in the language of the technology that
you're using. Kind of if I'm understanding
your your. Approach.
And that that I I bet is a is appreciated by the people that
you're working with. Not most of the times, yeah.
Oh well. When is it not appreciated?
No, yeah, most of the times they like it and understand it.
Sometimes they they like if if the other party is really
technical or they just really want to get into the point and
they were like, hey, OK, cut the chase.
We don't, we don't care about use cases.
We just need to see what's to keep the tool is capable of.
And sometimes that's that's the point.
But I also, I had that story in my mind that when I, I do create
applications, I don't say I develop applications because
even if it's a, if I'm a developer, I'm a local
developer. So I only do low code and local
tools. So powerups and power automate.
And so I usually say like I build applications or make
applications and when I'm in the making.
So really deep down and someone is trying to have a call with me
and I'm everywhere, like all day.
I'm just talking to the computer trying to create an app and
someone is calling me. Then OK, I don't have my human
skills on and like, oh, OK, sorry, sorry.
I cannot talk. I cannot talk.
I just have like my solution mindset and just I cannot do it.
But maybe next day or an hour later when that one is off, then
I'm good and I can explain things with human language.
So I really do understand developers who have trouble
saying that or yeah, talk through their problems or
through to the challenges or selling their ideas or showing
what they built. Because it can happen if like
the whole day you are trying to talk to the computer and find
out like what's the best thing you can do there?
It's it's hard to just step back and because you're talking a
different language, right? So it's absolutely if that, then
if this, that loop and things like that.
And if you, if you do that, it's like hard to go back and like,
OK, we have a different syntax in the human communication and
we, we need to see the other person to see if it, if it
works, if they understand what I'm saying, not just press play
or press run and press compile and then we will see the result.
It's. It's not like that in.
The so, so this is interesting. So I would use, have you ever
heard the phrase code switching? Not actually like code code, but
code switching. So what what I hear you saying
is there's you are very aware of when you are in a solution
mindset and using a quote UN quote language for solution, but
that you have to code switch. So you have to switch your
mindset into being able to talk to humans.
Well, that's interesting, right? So, but that you recognize that
you that that is a thing that you have to do in order to be
able to kind of access these human skills.
It really is a different step. That's fascinating.
Yeah, it was a it was a journey, right to to understand that
because sometimes like that the other one doesn't understand me
what's what's going on. And then I realized that I, I
don't understand my thoughts either because it's just, I'm in
a completely different mindset and like, oh, OK, so I need to
step back or, or come out from the, from the display and like,
OK, I'm here in real life. And then I need different.
I need a different syntax for for human.
I love it and I love that you even talk about I need a
different syntax to talk to humans.
Yeah, I'm not a developer. Right.
So right, right. But that's, that's that idea of
code switching. Like I literally need to.
It's just like, you know, we're speaking in English, but you
obviously speak Hungarian, right?
It's the same thing. It's like, I know I need to, I
need to use this language in order to talk to Susan, and I
might need to use this language to talk to somebody that's at
the registration table for at the conference who doesn't speak
English. Interesting.
I mean, that's, that's kind of an interesting concept there.
I I am wondering, why do you think these human skills are
undervalued in tech spaces? You know, that was your
inspiration for this conference, was your disappointment that
Microsoft didn't focus on those? Why?
Why do you think we there's not an appreciation for those
skills? I think like most of the tech
companies are are trying to push maybe it's a stronger, but
they're trying to push the the features, the product itself,
right. And and also on these
conferences, that's the that's the focus just to say like, OK,
these are the new features. This is how you do things.
So it's in tech, what I see it's like they the people who work in
tag, they just come from like, OK, how to solve problems
through logic and not through any other soft skills.
Like it's the human skills are. I believe it's really hard to
measure or hard to measure, harder to teach because like,
just imagine like you, you go on YouTube or whatever website, you
go on medium, try to read through articles and, and you
can just. Learn things you, you can learn
how to code, you can learn how to make applications, you can
learn a lot of things in the hard skill.
And and I love teaching hard skill, right.
So it's and I think there is a space for that.
But, but if you are going on YouTube and try to learn soft
skills, you can watch the the videos and you are like, OK,
yeah. And then nothing.
You cannot apply it right now. And so that's why I feel like
it's like harder to not to master, but it's harder to teach
or harder to like, you need someone to practice it with or
you need to, you need to have someone to do it with.
And it's not not enough just to see what's going on on the video
itself, because you need to actually put it in practice.
And yeah. I think you're right and I think
you nailed it. I, I think it, I think they,
those human skills, they are hard to measure.
They are hard to teach. You're not going to a boot camp
to, to learn how to deal with conflict.
And then your certificate says, I can handle all conflict.
The only way I can be good at it.
I can certainly learn some techniques, some skills, but
I've got to go practice it. It, which is honestly, it's not
much different than how you taught yourself how to, you
know, how to use your Microsoft stack.
I mean, you had to like learn it and then practice.
But the way that you get good at human skills is it, it really
does require practice and not just practice on the same kinds
of things over and over. You need a variety of things in
order to learn those, so. Yeah, and in some sometimes in
Teams, the soft skills are only notice when they are missing.
And that's true. Like you, you have like you talk
about the project, you do a debrief and like, oh, the
communication wasn't great or we, we didn't.
And and if you think about like every project, every new
technology implementation requires a lot of communication.
For example, because you will do chat messages on on Teams, you
will sit on Zoom calls, you will do this, you will create
presentations, you will lock tickets in Jira or in Azure
DevOps. And yeah, it's, it's all
communication and all the time. I, I, I feel like it in many,
many of the projects. If that's like the toughest
thing to do to communicate with others, especially with virtual
settings or hybrid settings and sometimes in in office settings
as well because like, oh, they are not there at their desk and
yeah, so. So I wonder if because the value
of our technical people, developers, low code, no code
builders. I wonder if because
organizations put the value on their tech skills and they are
in that mindset of I have to solve this problem.
I wonder if somehow that's that is part of the reason that they
are not encouraged by organizations to to develop this
human skill set in communication, in facilitation.
What would you would is is that what you see?
We we just keep our developers in one, one lane.
It it could make 100% sense from from the organization
perspective that we keep our people doing what they are good
at. But on the other hand, I believe
that if they, for example, cannot communicate well, they
cannot sell their ideas. A lot of good things can be
stuck within because you can just expect that the they will
do whatever they do and then they will have a perfect
presentation on on their biggest idea, which could turn your
whole company around and you just it will be stuck within the
within the organization or within this boxes.
Because I think that's that's we are labeling them or we are
putting them in boxes that OK, that's your spot.
Don't move right. Don't.
Move, don't try to move as well because it's like if you are
trying to get like, OK, let's go back to your box and and I feel
that could be the problem here that a lot of things, a lot of
good things can stuck in there. I, I, you know, I, I understand
that, you know, maybe organizations don't realize that
they are missing opportunities to have even better outcomes.
It's one thing for us to say the developer will develop what you
asked for and that thing that you asked for could solve your
problem, but it could be a terrible experience.
It could be actually not, it could create a whole other set
of problems. But if we were to encourage our
our technical folks to step up, even if they're not asked, but
to step up and try to build these skills or use these
skills, organizations might get better outcomes.
I yeah. So now I just want to remind our
audience today we are live and we are going to take your
questions. What do you want to know about
human skills in a tech world? Don't forget to put some
questions in there. We'll take those questions
shortly. All right, well, let's see what
is some advice? I mean, I know the talk that you
did for BA and beyond. What would be some other advice
that you might give to developers who are thinking, you
know, maybe, maybe I should, maybe I would like to get more
involved with helping to define solutions, not just provide
them, but I'd like to be more involved in how we get there.
What's advice you give them? I think like the very first one,
I usually say that raise your hand, OK, I'm here or articulate
your needs or articulate what you would like to do, ask
questions or request things. And, and also I've been to 90
days mentoring challenge by a Microsoft fellow, Microsoft MVP,
Mark Smith. And the very first thing we
needed to do is to work on our communication skills.
So that the very, very first thing, that was the first thing
like that is super important. And I think it's stuck with me.
And the very first challenge was that we needed to go to a
Toastmasters session and they they said like, OK, if you like
it, you can stick with it for six months to see if you can can
improve. And I think it was, I did three
years and it was a really, really great thing that that
happened. It gives you a really good space
to practice. And it's not only public
speaking or communication, but also how to give feedback and
how to do any leadership skills, delegation and a lot of other
good things that that's in Toastmasters and it's available
in a lot of countries and a lot of cities.
So I think that I would stick with that just to start, like,
hey, OK, I'm here. Be visible some with the
question with a request or if, if no one knows what you want,
then how how do how would they enable you in that sense?
So I think that would be the the very first thing that if you
want to be more on the on that side that you want to get out of
your box, then you need to get out first and then say that.
And it's it. It might not work with with all
the organizations. I I get that because some
organizations will say like, OK, that's your box, go back.
But some more organization will say that or even rewarded that,
hey, OK, you are out of your box because you want to do something
else, you want to do differently, you want to obscure
yourself. And we, we appreciate that.
And then you can lead to a promotion.
It can give you a bigger bonus, a carrier change completely,
Yeah. Or just a bigger satisfaction at
your daily, daily life at work. So.
I think, I think that last point that you made is really
important. If you are somebody who wants to
move up with your technical skills and manage teams, manage
projects, be, you know, part of a leadership team, actually, it
is going to become incredibly important for you to have
developed these human skills around giving feedback,
leadership, being able to communicate with a wide variety
of audiences. The farther you move up your
career path, actually the more important those skills become
and the less important your technical skills become.
So that's that's a really good piece of advice.
And maybe something that we don't think about it is, is
we're growing our career is there's a balance to the skill
sets that we have at different, at different points in our
career. Also, I, I know that for some,
some folks that do development or are data engineers, I've got
one of those in my house right now.
They say, well, I'm an introvert.
I can't, I can't possibly talk to people.
I just want to be behind the screen all day.
I, I you've got to have advice for them, right?
And, and I think it's fine, right?
I have, I have the same. So I, I work in Home Office, I,
most of my meetings are virtual and I completely get it right.
So I, I completely get it if they don't, don't want to go out
in the real world. And, and I, I go to conferences
as a speaker or I organize my own conference.
And in, in many cases, what I, when I do a volunteering session
in a camp, I go to a place where there will be 102 hundred, 300
people and like, they are buzzing and moving around and
energetic and like, yeah, well, what's going on?
And I need, I need time to, to feel right in those situations.
So I think like the main advice for them, it's like, it's OK,
it's nothing wrong with it. It's you are, you are fine.
It's, it's the way you live your life.
Sometimes it's good to challenge yourself to go out and try to
talk, like at a conference, for example, to, to go walk up to
someone and ask a question or just introduce yourself or join
a group conversation. Or just first of all, go to meet
up that is free in your city or that may be the biggest step you
ever took or ever taken. It's just like to show up that
that would be already something. Because like that could be for
someone the most challenging thing just to be present or just
to show up to an event. Because it can be those kind of
thoughts in your head that, OK, a lot of people, I don't like
people and you know, you know the drill, I guess.
Yes, I'm an introvert. I understand this.
And it's, it's, it's completely fine.
So if I go to a conference, like, I think like my very first
conference was with like 3000 people.
And, and I, I, I think it's back in, back in that year, I was
working in the office. So I had people around me.
But after that, like my second biggest phone was in in Vegas
two years ago and and from Home Office going to 4005 thousand
people conference. That's.
In Las Vegas, no less. That's a lot of.
Energy, a lot of lights, a lot of loud music, a lot of drunk
people like, ah, no, that's like, that's, that's what I
signed up for. And but yeah, I got I, I, I
don't say I got the hang of it. I got super, super tired of it,
of this. It drained my energy a lot.
Just try to find people, try to talk to them and try to have
some like genuine connection. But yeah, I come back from
conferences and like, or, or volunteering and like, Oh, yes,
it's, it's, it's quiet now and it's, it's no people running
around me. And it's, it's sometimes it's
amazing to just just go back to your little bubble or little.
And, and really, that's what being an introvert is.
It is where you you find your energy.
And for introverts, typically a noisy spaces with lots of
people, it's just it's a whole lot.
But in those spaces, you can find a human connection with a
couple of folks. Like I'm, I'm that person that,
you know, I'm in the lunch line, I'm waiting for coffee, right?
And I'm just making small talk with people around me, not
necessarily to make a like to create a relationship, but it's
not, it's a great opportunity to just talk to someone just a
little bit because in those moments, you never know when you
will meet someone who has a similar interest as you or is
going to the same talk as you. And you don't have to be friends
forever, but it's an opportunity to practice.
By the way. So if you are someone that says
I don't, I don't really talk to people.
OK, great. Talk to somebody in the lunch
line, that's all. Just say, hey, that salad looks
delicious. What are you going to have
today? Like it sounds crazy, but those
are opportunities to practice if you aren't comfortable speaking.
Yeah, 100%. I mean, it's always, always fun
to go out to do these these kind of events and just challenge
yourself and, and just try to just, yeah, do your out of your
comfort zone a bit. It's it's.
Yes, I I worked with someone on one of my teams who was very
intimidated. She was very skilled at at her
job but found it very intimidating to be in a room
full of other people that she felt knew more than her that did
better work than her. And I said, no, like that's,
it's not what's happening, but I, I want to appreciate that you
are feeling that way. And then let's work on a tool
that you can use to help you be part of the conversation.
Because she was feeling like, I do have things to say, but I'm
just too afraid to speak. And So what we would do is
before each of her meetings, we would sit down and she always
came very prepared and we would put together a couple questions
that she could ask that she could have ready and she could
raise her hand and she could, you know, ask a question.
And that gave her confidence. And it also allowed her to be
part of the conversation because of course, if you ask the
question, you get an answer. And sometimes you have to ask
more questions. So there are also little tricks
that you can use, but I'll use your words.
It is. It is raising your hand and
being visible. Those are actually the very
first steps. If you are wanting to get
outside of that tech bubble, you need to make yourself visible.
So yes. There's nothing wrong with the
tech bubble. So it's it's right.
You need to Yeah, yeah, yeah. So it's yeah, but yeah, all
right. Just yeah.
Raising the hand is is good. I just see.
Right. Those sound like simple steps.
We are. I'm going to move over here to
some questions. So let's see.
I've got 4 questions flagged, but if you see something else,
you let me know. All right, so the first question
that we have here, this is from Mary.
Hey Mary, does the tech world value business analyst human
skills? If not, how do you handle this
situation? I think they do.
I think they do in many, many ways.
Not always, but I think it's not black and white in most of the
cases, right. So it's you can't say that.
Yeah, yeah, it will, it will happen anytime or all the time
that they do value the human skills.
But I think they, I mean most like some of the new reports and
some of the new research shows that it's getting more and more
and more important because of the quick, quick pace and the
quick changes in, in, in our environment.
It's rapid. It's super, super fast.
Every week, sometimes every day, there is a new thing coming up,
a new shiny new thing coming up. And it's better and faster and
cost less, in many cases more. But that doesn't, but that's the
thing. And then, OK, how can you cope
with that if you don't have a group mindset, curiosity,
whatnot. And I think it's, they do, they
do value human skills. And if they don't and how I
usually handle I, I tell them that that this is really
important. It, it might be the go, no, go
for your project. If we don't use human skills and
we just solely rely on tech, then yeah, we will have a
product that people will not like or we will have a product
that will not work, not only, not like, or we will have a
delay for two years or yeah. So I think that's like how I
would usually handle it, that I would just be really honest,
straight and transparent with them that OK, this is what I see
and you like it or not, and let's have a conversation about
it. What's what's the point of not
having human skills in in in this project, for example?
And I think sometimes there's a perception that when I'm, when
I'm asking these questions, which might, which, you know,
sometimes our stakeholders haven't thought about, which
might introduce a whole new element to the thing that we're
doing. I, I sometimes think that
organizations think that that question is just going to slow
me down, right? But the reason that we want you
to take a moment to think about it is because we don't want you
to have a bad outcome because we don't want you to have an
unintended consequence. And especially with AI these
days, AI is a great example of if we move too quickly, we will
not just break things, but we we could potentially really damage
our businesses, our products, because there are important
things that we've, we've got to talk about and understand before
we can deliver. Yeah, 100%.
All right, so let's see, we've got something else here.
I'm preparing my students to enter the tech world one day.
How do I make them see the value of these skills?
They seem to be very disinterested in developing
those. I've heard this from other
educators, by the way. I have heard that there's more
of focus on the cool technology and less on developing these
other skills. Yeah.
And that and I think they will be especially I just had that
discussion yesterday with someone.
And like with experts, if if you are on a level, on an expert
level that it's OK if you and sometimes if you don't have
proper human skills, that's fine because you have your technology
and it's completely OK. But now if you are a fresh grad
or just starting off your career, if you are a junior in
an organization that I think the tech will not, tech knowledge
might not differentiate you from other candidates.
Because right now, how long does it take to find anything out?
And maybe you'll not get 100% correct answers right because it
can have a snake that can give you false information.
So it's, it's not, I don't think that will be the differentiator.
But if you are a better communicator, if you are more
flexible, if you can, yeah, if you have more that connection
capabilities with others, then I think you will be better off
than if you have, I don't know, 3545 people for the same role.
Then they might select someone who is like, OK, they have the
same tech skills, but they they communicate more clearly or
explain things in many different ways.
Or they have better leadership potential, or they have better
delegation because they did volunteering during the
university or they was part of the student association or of
whatnot. And I think maybe they will
learn it in the hard way and that they say like, OK, like no
one wants me as an intern because I, I only know Python
And it could happen and it's already happening.
I see, see a lot of those that even like to get an internship
is really hard or just to get a junior role as a developer or
data analyst or data engineer, or I think I can name a lot of
Thrones right now where where it's hard to get just an
internship or a junior role. So how, how do you make them see
it? It's just once again, I'm an
honest guy. So just try to be honest with
them that maybe it will be easier for them in the future if
they they try to to see the value in it or I think.
That's, that's and you know, we're, I'm well, I was going to
say, you know, we're talking to a younger generation who has,
has been, you know, they've had their, their devices with them
since they were born, almost right.
And so they've lived their whole life being connected to this
thing. And so you somehow have to
convince them that the technology that you have.
I I mean that that is an excellent point.
These days. You can find an answer and build
an app. I mean, that's kind of where we
started our conversation before we went Live Today.
You were talking about, well, I just, I got to go back to the
drawing board. I'm going to have to kind of
rebuild this thing and it will AI will, you know, expedite your
being able to build that you can get an answer quickly.
What will differentiate you is do you have the right skills to
talk to people to explain what's happening, to be able to verify
that this stuff coming out of AI is correct?
That is a completely different skill set than I know Python.
I'm good at Python. Well, AI can be good at Python
to a certain degree. So that's a tough one.
Let's see. Well, let's here, let's take
maybe another question. I think I also dropped in a
couple of So Babaji Day says you can't be in tech or ABA and not
talk, that's for sure. Let's see.
How about here's a question from Russell.
Hey Russell is AI democratizes tech to more people.
Is the future value of the BA outside of the tech bubble and
in human skills? I mean is that kind of the
future? Like regardless of your title,
is it are like human skills? Just the thing anyway.
I mean, I'm not, I don't say that it's like the end of tech
skills. It's I think it would be really,
really not wise to say that from me at least.
And I don't like these future tellers in that sense that OK,
we will. We are going to just tell you
straight that this is going to happen.
I don't know. And many other people don't know
I'm not a researcher of the future of tech in that sense.
So it's just like I am interested in it.
But I think for me at least, I can only talk about me and what
I see in my future, right? So I built that's not the right
word. Proper developers will hate me
for that. I've I quoted an application
multiple applications for for my conference and also that helps
me which otherwise I wouldn't be able to do it at all.
It's, it's completely new as well.
Like I've done some coding before.
So I've created automation with VPA with macros and I did a lot
those kind of coding. I did and I did it when I was in
high school. I built my websites,
applications and a lot of other things.
But I just never wanted to become a full full time
developer or it's always always a self thought self thought
thing. And my example I was like, OK, I
want to build an application that can create badges with
personalized badges with QR code with the name, title and so on.
Of course there are some tools, but I don't want to give those
tools my the access to my database for example.
So I built a local tool that can go to my database and get all
that information and I can completely personalize how I
want it. How are the the printing company
needs this yeah, let's add it. Can you add this feature Yes and
a moment later it works. But yesterday I did some upgrade
that now it doesn't work when I need to send send things out to
the to the printing company. So, but I think just right
before the code started working again, because I, I played
around with the with the security, but now it's now it's
good and should be able to ship it today.
So, but that's, that's, I think how it could democratize for
people. And I also see it from like even
from my family, I would say because my, my 2, I have two
brothers and they are not so tech savvy.
And one of one of them, he was like, oh, OK, I've created the
something calculator for myself in Google AI studio with
prompting. And he has his own calculator
for his work. And he can just put in a lot of
information And this spits out the end result, which was 100%
wouldn't be able to do it by himself.
And, and these kind of things that can enable you to, to
create things. And it's also the the tough
question as well, because now those ideas that were in the in
the drawer can come out. And even if you can build an app
for it, it might not be a need for it, right?
So it can just be our, our world now.
It could be full of unwanted applications or just because you
could do it, it doesn't mean you should.
And yeah, that's, that's what I see.
Like what this AI generated pictures that sometimes just
doesn't make sense or just for fun.
They consume a lot of energy and it yeah, I'm not saying I
haven't done any of those that I just play around, but it, it
yeah. So these kind of things like
where you find the balance in in these things, that's from, yeah,
from any perspective. I think what I hear you saying
is really we've got an opportunity to be human first,
because really maybe the the future is.
And I think the future is now by the way, that anybody really can
use AI to help them do anything. You don't even have to be tech
savvy. I mean, clearly it helps
particularly if you are somebody hired into organizations to, to,
to creating. But I do think that human 1st
and then builder, to use your term builder next might actually
be maybe the future of our work because that's that is the
building part is becoming a little more quick these days.
I don't know, maybe that's maybe that's what it is.
Well, let's see. So that's the end of our
questions. Thank you again, this has been a
great conversation. I'm glad you could come in, you
could share some of this knowledge.
I can see there's lots of lots of folks are are agreeing with
you on we need some more human skills in this tech world.
So thank you, Matei. Thank you for having me have a
good. One, all right, we'll see you
soon. All right, And that is it for
today's session. I hope you got a little more
insight into why those human skills in the tech world are
really important. In two weeks, we're going to be
back and we are going to be talking to someone who has a
podcast and his podcast is all about talking with business
analysis professionals on many different kinds of subjects.
So we'll be talking about conversations that shape the
business analysis community. I hope that you'll join us in
two weeks from today. Take care.
Bye, bye. If you're hearing this, you made
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