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If you are an engineer who 
actually comes and asks me tell 

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me what to do, you already 
failed the test. 

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He came to me in a month and 
told me that's not an important 

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problem. 
The best idea should win 

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irrespective of hierarchy. 
To go to a staff engineer, you 

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need to lead an engineering team
of like 10 people. 

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That's like a meme. 
The reality is it doesn't 

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matter. 
We will celebrate engineering 

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depth, we will celebrate impact.
You're an IC engineer, you could

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get the most highest level by 
having an impact on the 

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business. 
As you level up a software 

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engineer, your scope, 
responsible abilities and 

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impact, they all increase and 
you become more of a product 

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engineer as you understand your 
customer domain, your business 

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deliverables, and you measure 
your results. 

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That's exactly what we discussed
today. 

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And joining me is Praveen 
Murghasan, VP of Engineering 

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over at Samsara. 
And we discussed what great 

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engineering looks like, 
especially when the stakes are 

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high. 
How do people act and how can 

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you incorporate that in your own
day-to-day as software engineer?

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So enjoy. 
I was talking to MO from 

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ServiceNow a few days ago, OK. 
And he mentioned there's a lot 

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of room for growth in 
specifically a new engineering 

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role or not really new, but more
more trendy. 

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I think in the forward deployed 
engineer, that is 1 role that I 

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think is quite interesting. 
It's very much consultancy. 

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It's very much understanding 
your customer, understanding 

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your product and then doing kind
of a version of an 

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implementation that is custom. 
That role next to product 

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engineer, especially with the 
introduction of AI have been 

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really on the forefront of my 
mind, I would say as very 

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interesting roles that are now 
more up and coming from your 

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perspective, I'm wondering what 
the difference is between when I

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say product engineer versus 
regular software engineer. 

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Your thoughts on that? 
Yeah, No, it's a great question.

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So I think from a product 
engineering perspective, I think

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the main thing is you are 
already responsible for a 

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product that you're shipping to 
customers or you're working on a

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product that's shipping to 
customers. 

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So you actually get like, you 
know, the direct connection to 

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the customer problem, right? 
So I would say like effective 

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product engineers who I've seen 
like effectively grow really 

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well, or people who actually 
understand the impact of their 

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work and they want to really 
understand the why of like, what

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am I doing? 
And like, you know, why should I

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do this particular like work? 
It's something they deeply 

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understand the context for. 
Like they partner with product 

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managers really effectively. 
They're not necessarily people 

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who are like waiting to be told 
what to do, right? 

51
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Like, so you think about the job
as like part building business 

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context and customer context and
being able to effectively 

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partner with product leadership 
to actually also like give shape

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to the problem. 
It's one of the things that as 

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an engineer you always hold a 
unique advantage is you 

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understand technology. 
You also like, you know, want to

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be somebody who keeps up with 
trends of technology today in 

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the world of like when you think
about AI and all, like there's a

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lot of tools available now, like
historically machine learning or

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like building complex data 
products used to be dedicated to

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specialists like you have data 
science functions or like really

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like engineers or like applied 
scientists who would do deep 

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work. 
Today it's become a lot more 

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accessible. 
So a great product engineer can 

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really understand what's 
possible to technology, 

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understand the business context 
and help develop like the right 

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solution, right? 
Like should you almost shrink 

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the solution in phase is I think
what great product engineers do.

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And it also ties back to a 
little bit of evolution of 

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software engineering in itself. 
I think over time, when you look

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at it, a lot of software 
engineering was about the build 

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phase, like where people would 
anchor on the build phase. 

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Whereas today it's evolved quite
a lot from a lens of like, you 

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know, you would see that the 
most effective software 

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engineers or even the people 
that grow themselves in their 

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career are usually the people 
who do the part of understanding

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the business context, really 
well-being able to actually take

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that context and reshape ideas 
and also like partner 

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effectively with product and 
other stakeholders. 

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Interesting. 
Yeah. 

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And also like just demonstrate 
this notion of extreme 

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ownership. 
I would say like where like an 

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example would be like, you know,
in, in our case, if we were to 

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run a project, right, like, and 
we talked about the concept of a

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technical DRI. 
Let's say if we assign a product

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engineer as a technical DRI, the
expectation becomes like from 

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day one, they're like working 
with their product managers to 

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go understand like business and 
customer context. 

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And then from there they are 
able to actually like drive the 

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entire project end to end, where
like the engineer usually is the

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best person suited to see the 
through line of a project. 

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Like an example, when you think 
about it is like any product 

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that you're trying to build has 
like a design phase, like 

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product iteration phase, actual 
building, but then you go back 

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to design and iteration, right? 
But ultimately at the end of the

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day, what do you ship? 
The end product is something 

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that an engineer built as like 
going through the entire 

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development life cycle, right? 
By making the engineer the 

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directly responsible person from
some product to ship, they have 

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the they see the true line and 
they're the best suited people 

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to actually flag and tell you if
you're like in like any 

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organization on where the 
product is in terms of like 

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health, is it going to ship on 
time, whatever you plan for, 

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what are the risks you're 
seeing? 

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So that's also one of the 
reasons why we anchor on like 

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this role of like, OK, a product
engineer needs to be a technical

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DRI to see a product ship end to
end. 

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But then what is the role of a 
product person in that? 

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Because my assumption was, OK, 
product in the end is 

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responsible for what ships. 
And I've seen some technical 

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product managers when it comes 
to kind of a technical platform 

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or product rather and that can 
be a platform that taters 

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towards engineers. 
But when you're saying, OK, I 

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have a product engineer that's 
directly responsible individual 

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at DRI, what is the role of a 
product person there? 

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Yeah, no, it's a great question.
I think the to, to distinguish, 

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right, like any product that you
want to build usually like, you 

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know, has a very clear product 
definition face, right, which 

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means it's, it's actually quite 
a lot of work before you define 

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what's even the right product to
build. 

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And it will be motivated also by
many different things from, you 

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know, is that a, is there a 
common customer problem that 

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you're trying to solve? 
It's like one thing, what's the 

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business opportunity is another,
right? 

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So there's a lot of pre work to 
the sausage making of building a

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product, right? 
So I think about product 

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management is a lot more of like
an 80% role is actually customer

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facing or outward facing, not 
your internal operations or 

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management of a project. 
Like project management is a 

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very different thing and it's 
not the job of a product 

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manager. 
Sometimes people confuse this 

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and the best companies usually 
lead to managing an individual 

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project to internal people like 
a technical DRI or an 

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engineering manager. 
In most cases in in Samsara, 

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where I work now, where it's 
fundamentally we've defined it 

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as project management's as an 
aspect of a technical DRI 

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responsibility. 
And in some cases, when the 

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project's fairly complex, we 
might tap into like a technical 

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project manager where it's like 
it's involves 20 teams, right. 

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00:07:36,640 --> 00:07:39,000
Sure. 
Like then it makes sense where 

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you actually have some structure
around it. 

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But if it's involves one team, 
an engineer who's like, you 

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00:07:44,480 --> 00:07:46,360
know, technical DRI should be 
able to do it. 

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00:07:46,600 --> 00:07:50,160
Yeah, So we think about product 
management's more like a very 

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customer facing role. 
It's actually defining why we 

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are building something, the 
business outcomes etcetera. 

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The second part I would say of 
product management is also 

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really understanding and giving 
shape to the customer 

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interfaces. 
So this could be be the person 

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who actually coordinates across 
the user experience and like, 

151
00:08:15,520 --> 00:08:18,960
you know, product design and 
also engineering, like the 

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00:08:18,960 --> 00:08:22,680
person's actually like actively 
understanding the customer 

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needs, what you're trying to 
solve for and translate that 

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into like the right user 
experience in collaboration with

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understanding what it takes to 
build this, which is where the 

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technical DRI becomes a key 
stakeholder where like the DRI 

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will have an influence to say, 
for example, hey, this is the 

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problem we're trying to solve. 
We could design this product in 

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00:08:44,520 --> 00:08:47,920
either way. 
A or BA might take you like 12 

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00:08:47,920 --> 00:08:52,240
weeks, B might actually take 3 
and B might be enough to 

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00:08:52,240 --> 00:08:55,040
actually ship a first version of
a product. 

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So this is where that 
collaboration super crucial 

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where having the technical DRI 
involved in that conversation 

164
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sort of helps you both like de 
risk accelerate learning in 

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general in terms of getting 
products out to market quickly, 

166
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so you can learn quickly and 
iterate quickly, which is what 

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like you know, is important to 
stay competitive in any industry

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00:09:15,640 --> 00:09:16,720
today. 
Right. 

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And I see it scale way more easy
that way as well. 

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The thing is though, within 
teams, team of software 

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00:09:23,320 --> 00:09:26,280
engineers that kind of let's say
project management or more 

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00:09:26,280 --> 00:09:29,640
orchestrating, more operational 
thing, I've always seen that 

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00:09:30,200 --> 00:09:33,000
executed by a product person. 
What you're saying is let's say 

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a product person that is only 
doing that for 20% and is way 

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more engaged with customers and 
strategy and how does that fit 

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00:09:38,640 --> 00:09:40,840
into the business? 
We'll be able and better 

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00:09:40,840 --> 00:09:44,440
equipped to then steer bigger 
programs and much more teams 

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00:09:44,440 --> 00:09:47,520
working on that product vision. 
And I haven't been in a team 

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00:09:47,520 --> 00:09:50,360
sadly because I would love to 
see this that has actually 

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00:09:50,360 --> 00:09:52,960
operated at that scale where 
there are directly responsible 

181
00:09:52,960 --> 00:09:55,640
individuals that take up kind of
the technical program management

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00:09:56,040 --> 00:09:58,640
within their team or as 
responsible person for their 

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00:09:58,640 --> 00:10:01,000
team and then solidly execute in
that way. 

184
00:10:01,000 --> 00:10:02,440
Yeah. 
Yeah, Now 100% right. 

185
00:10:02,440 --> 00:10:05,600
So think about this for like a 
second, right? 

186
00:10:05,600 --> 00:10:10,960
Like, an example would be if 
let's say the project management

187
00:10:10,960 --> 00:10:14,160
or like reporting of a project 
or is owned by, let's say a 

188
00:10:14,160 --> 00:10:18,200
product manager, right? 
They have to go through a phase 

189
00:10:18,200 --> 00:10:21,520
of first information gathering 
internally, Yeah, because they 

190
00:10:21,520 --> 00:10:25,120
don't know which engineering 
projects at risk because they're

191
00:10:25,120 --> 00:10:26,920
not writing code in general, 
right? 

192
00:10:27,280 --> 00:10:29,640
They also don't know about all 
the dependencies. 

193
00:10:29,640 --> 00:10:32,840
And it becomes it shifts their 
job to be spending too much of 

194
00:10:32,840 --> 00:10:35,000
their time now on like I'm 
talking to other people to 

195
00:10:35,000 --> 00:10:37,960
collect status to like, you 
know, report out. 

196
00:10:38,120 --> 00:10:40,360
That's what it feels. 
Like also from an engineer 

197
00:10:40,360 --> 00:10:42,600
within that team, correct So, 
but. 

198
00:10:43,400 --> 00:10:45,680
All of that's overhead, right? 
Like when you think about it, if

199
00:10:45,680 --> 00:10:48,520
you just make the engineer who's
building it responsible for it, 

200
00:10:48,600 --> 00:10:51,560
they see the true line. 
Like, why would he just not make

201
00:10:51,560 --> 00:10:54,440
the engineer responsible for it?
Obviously the one reason which 

202
00:10:54,440 --> 00:10:59,040
is commonly cited is hey, like, 
but it's taking away time for me

203
00:10:59,040 --> 00:11:02,360
to build right now. 
This is where judgment comes a 

204
00:11:02,360 --> 00:11:05,720
little bit into question where 
like at least the way we work at

205
00:11:05,720 --> 00:11:09,040
Samsara is like we have a 
standing policy to say project 

206
00:11:09,040 --> 00:11:13,200
tracking internally is like done
by engineering, meaning it's a 

207
00:11:13,200 --> 00:11:17,040
technical DRI and by default. 
But in case the project gets a 

208
00:11:17,040 --> 00:11:19,160
little bit more complex, it then
falls on the shoulders of 

209
00:11:19,160 --> 00:11:23,440
engineering management. 
OK, if it becomes super complex,

210
00:11:23,440 --> 00:11:26,160
it's like one of these projects 
which require like coordination 

211
00:11:26,160 --> 00:11:27,880
a lot. 
We will assign a technical 

212
00:11:27,880 --> 00:11:32,160
project manager, but we will not
make a product manager to it, 

213
00:11:32,160 --> 00:11:33,400
which I don't think is the 
right. 

214
00:11:33,680 --> 00:11:37,880
So, so all because you've just 
taken away valuable time to give

215
00:11:37,880 --> 00:11:42,480
and shape customer outcomes, 
which is what the role is about.

216
00:11:42,480 --> 00:11:45,840
Like it's about managing the 
product, not projects, right. 

217
00:11:45,840 --> 00:11:48,760
So, yeah, yeah. 
For me, when you were discussing

218
00:11:48,760 --> 00:11:51,600
kind of understanding the 
business problems in the context

219
00:11:51,600 --> 00:11:54,960
and mainly why we are doing 
things, especially early on in 

220
00:11:54,960 --> 00:11:57,760
my career, I wanted that, I 
needed that. 

221
00:11:57,760 --> 00:12:00,000
If I didn't have that and I 
still have that to a certain 

222
00:12:00,000 --> 00:12:02,960
degree, if I don't understand 
why we're doing this, it's 

223
00:12:02,960 --> 00:12:06,120
incredibly demotivating because 
I'm just flying blind and I, I 

224
00:12:06,120 --> 00:12:08,440
can execute to a certain degree.
That's just the discipline that 

225
00:12:08,440 --> 00:12:10,880
I have. 
But as I progress in my career, 

226
00:12:10,880 --> 00:12:13,080
I have less and less patience 
for being in the dark. 

227
00:12:13,440 --> 00:12:16,840
Like I truly need to understand 
if the ship that I'm on, if it's

228
00:12:16,840 --> 00:12:19,800
sailing in the right way, or if 
it's at least the vision that I 

229
00:12:19,800 --> 00:12:22,640
can see myself behind. 
Because otherwise I feel like 

230
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I'm, I'm wasting my time. 
Like I don't just get joy out of

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executing. 
I want to execute and as a 

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result have certain outcomes, 
certain outcomes that align with

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a level of personal fulfilment. 
But also then what I see in an 

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organization grow and have good 
business outcomes that I feel 

235
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like from a early on in my 
career perspective, maybe I was 

236
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kind of where I had these 
tendencies as product engineer 

237
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and other fact that we are a lot
or a lot of times in the dark 

238
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and there is a lot of 
engineering capacity and 

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building becomes easier than 
software engineers are kind of 

240
00:12:55,680 --> 00:12:59,040
naturally more trending or 
you're your unique selling point

241
00:12:59,040 --> 00:13:01,240
as engineer will be to 
understand the business and then

242
00:13:01,360 --> 00:13:04,840
be the the silver lining 
throughout kind of the the 

243
00:13:04,840 --> 00:13:06,880
technical project to execute. 
Yeah. 

244
00:13:06,960 --> 00:13:08,600
Yeah, 100%. 
I think I one of the things I 

245
00:13:08,600 --> 00:13:11,200
loved from our conversation 
earlier was the fact that you've

246
00:13:11,200 --> 00:13:13,440
done both product and 
engineering. 

247
00:13:13,440 --> 00:13:17,920
I think it's like one way where 
you can get a taste of both, 

248
00:13:17,920 --> 00:13:20,160
right. 
And I think now, as you said, 

249
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you become this engineer who 
probably cannot work without 

250
00:13:22,920 --> 00:13:25,280
that business contest anymore. 
It's very difficult. 

251
00:13:25,280 --> 00:13:27,440
Exactly. 
So I think the way to do it is 

252
00:13:27,440 --> 00:13:30,360
like there are we talked a 
little bit about how do people 

253
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get to those skills? 
And that's another way to do it,

254
00:13:34,760 --> 00:13:37,280
right? 
Like, but I would say, as I 

255
00:13:37,600 --> 00:13:40,640
mentioned earlier, like the best
way to do this is actually go 

256
00:13:40,640 --> 00:13:42,800
find the environment which 
allows for this, right? 

257
00:13:42,800 --> 00:13:45,760
So it's like what we're talking 
about is unique about cultures 

258
00:13:45,760 --> 00:13:48,160
of how companies work. 
And it's something I would 

259
00:13:48,160 --> 00:13:51,880
encourage engineers like to 
actually find out more about, 

260
00:13:51,880 --> 00:13:55,920
Hey, like this is like, is this 
an culture or a company which is

261
00:13:55,920 --> 00:13:59,680
going to allow me access to my 
customers or who I'm working 

262
00:13:59,680 --> 00:14:01,120
with? 
That's a question you probably 

263
00:14:01,120 --> 00:14:05,360
want to ask as an engineer and 
you want to find companies which

264
00:14:05,360 --> 00:14:07,440
sort of understand celebrate 
this. 

265
00:14:07,840 --> 00:14:09,960
And there are many of them by 
the way, like you know, and it's

266
00:14:09,960 --> 00:14:14,880
also like an evolving like, you 
know, trend in the industry. 

267
00:14:14,880 --> 00:14:18,680
I would say especially with the 
advent of AI tools, etcetera, 

268
00:14:18,680 --> 00:14:23,080
like where the building portion,
I wouldn't say it's becoming 

269
00:14:23,760 --> 00:14:28,720
completely like eliminated or 
anything radical, but we know 

270
00:14:28,720 --> 00:14:32,000
there's a lot of leverage people
are gaining out of AI tools. 

271
00:14:32,600 --> 00:14:37,800
A lot of the problem, the, the 
core art of engineering is 

272
00:14:37,800 --> 00:14:41,840
problem solving with the 
business problem in mind and to 

273
00:14:41,840 --> 00:14:43,680
create like a business impact, 
right? 

274
00:14:44,320 --> 00:14:46,920
That part is not going away 
anywhere, right? 

275
00:14:46,920 --> 00:14:50,320
Like problem solving as a 
concept is going to, it's here 

276
00:14:50,320 --> 00:14:53,040
to stay, right? 
We will always have new problems

277
00:14:53,040 --> 00:14:57,000
to go solve and the tools to go 
solve those problems are helping

278
00:14:57,000 --> 00:14:59,320
us and become more simpler, 
which is where what the leverage

279
00:14:59,320 --> 00:15:03,560
you're getting. 
And yeah, I think it's like the 

280
00:15:03,600 --> 00:15:06,920
engineers of the future are just
the people who actually know how

281
00:15:06,920 --> 00:15:10,400
to leverage these tools the best
to go solve the right problem. 

282
00:15:10,800 --> 00:15:14,680
So being able to build context 
and on the business is going to 

283
00:15:14,680 --> 00:15:18,200
help accelerate companies. 
The more people companies have 

284
00:15:18,200 --> 00:15:24,800
where they have demonstration of
like curiosity to understand the

285
00:15:24,800 --> 00:15:29,480
business and like the customer 
outcomes, those companies will 

286
00:15:29,480 --> 00:15:32,560
thrive. 
And like, that's like I think 

287
00:15:32,560 --> 00:15:34,840
what's happening in the industry
in itself and that you'd see 

288
00:15:34,840 --> 00:15:40,040
more and more engineers who like
companies will try to attract 

289
00:15:40,040 --> 00:15:42,000
and recruit. 
Like I try to do that all the 

290
00:15:42,000 --> 00:15:44,680
time. 
It's like find people who 

291
00:15:44,680 --> 00:15:49,200
demonstrate a lot of curiosity 
and has a track record of like, 

292
00:15:49,200 --> 00:15:52,120
you know, focused execution 
towards that curiosity. 

293
00:15:52,160 --> 00:15:55,520
That's equally important. 
And that's a winning 

294
00:15:55,520 --> 00:15:57,280
combination. 
Like, in a way, it's a very 

295
00:15:57,560 --> 00:16:00,200
powerful combination because 
when the more people you have 

296
00:16:00,200 --> 00:16:04,320
with those skills, you don't 
really need to prescribe to 

297
00:16:04,320 --> 00:16:05,520
them. 
Also, like, what to do? 

298
00:16:06,080 --> 00:16:07,480
They would often tell you what 
to do. 

299
00:16:07,560 --> 00:16:09,360
Yeah. 
Because they've, they've they 

300
00:16:09,360 --> 00:16:11,120
will not wait. 
And they will try and figure 

301
00:16:11,120 --> 00:16:12,480
things out and then they will 
start. 

302
00:16:12,560 --> 00:16:14,920
Yeah. 
Is curiosity something that you 

303
00:16:14,920 --> 00:16:18,280
can cultivate? 
Because for me, I've always had 

304
00:16:18,280 --> 00:16:21,040
it for certain topics. 
I'm just very curious when it 

305
00:16:21,040 --> 00:16:24,440
comes to let's say deep tech and
maybe even fundamentally how a 

306
00:16:24,440 --> 00:16:27,520
lot of things work. 
I haven't been curious until 

307
00:16:27,520 --> 00:16:30,840
I've had to apply it, which 
makes sense for me because I'd 

308
00:16:30,840 --> 00:16:32,360
like, I don't like wasting my 
time. 

309
00:16:32,360 --> 00:16:35,000
To a certain degree. 
I I still enjoy a lot of things 

310
00:16:35,000 --> 00:16:37,280
that are time wasters. 
But when it comes to deep tech, 

311
00:16:38,040 --> 00:16:40,840
I don't see the need of learning
a lot of things with regards to 

312
00:16:40,840 --> 00:16:43,920
that because there is just an 
abundance of things to know 

313
00:16:44,440 --> 00:16:46,960
until I actually, I'm at a 
certain point where I have to 

314
00:16:46,960 --> 00:16:48,640
apply it. 
And then it's scary because then

315
00:16:48,640 --> 00:16:51,160
you have to dive deep and you 
have to make it your own quite 

316
00:16:51,160 --> 00:16:53,640
quickly. 
But that's always been a driver 

317
00:16:53,640 --> 00:16:55,840
for me. 
Being curious at the right time 

318
00:16:55,840 --> 00:17:00,520
or even in advance cultivates or
kind of stimulates Dr. And then 

319
00:17:00,520 --> 00:17:03,920
where I see people lacking 
curiosity, I sometimes also see 

320
00:17:04,160 --> 00:17:06,880
a lack in drive. 
And you can compensate that with

321
00:17:06,880 --> 00:17:10,079
discipline. 
But I also, as a team lead a 

322
00:17:10,119 --> 00:17:12,280
little bit closer to, let's say,
engineering manager. 

323
00:17:12,880 --> 00:17:15,920
If someone's not curious, I have
no clue how to do it because I 

324
00:17:15,920 --> 00:17:17,720
have it innately. 
And if someone else doesn't have

325
00:17:17,720 --> 00:17:20,440
it, I can't just say have it, 
yeah. 

326
00:17:20,680 --> 00:17:24,960
Yeah, No, I think it's, it's a 
very interesting question, 

327
00:17:24,960 --> 00:17:27,400
right? 
Like I think when you think 

328
00:17:27,400 --> 00:17:32,080
about curiosity, I think can be 
cultivated, but it's also a 

329
00:17:32,080 --> 00:17:33,960
little bit of like individual 
choice. 

330
00:17:33,960 --> 00:17:35,560
And I think that's totally fine,
right. 

331
00:17:35,560 --> 00:17:40,520
So we've talked about in a way 
like, so when I think about 

332
00:17:40,520 --> 00:17:43,000
businesses, different 
businesses, right, Like people, 

333
00:17:43,240 --> 00:17:46,000
the businesses are in different 
stages and businesses have 

334
00:17:46,000 --> 00:17:50,560
different cultures, right? 
Like a culture could be like 

335
00:17:50,560 --> 00:17:54,280
it's, I don't really believe 
that like, OK, what is whatever 

336
00:17:54,280 --> 00:17:59,120
I'm saying is the only way to 
run an engineering organization 

337
00:17:59,120 --> 00:18:01,560
or like, you know, develop 
products, etcetera, right? 

338
00:18:01,560 --> 00:18:04,920
There have been many companies 
over time successfully evolving,

339
00:18:05,960 --> 00:18:08,360
which has operated in like a 
very waterfallish manner of 

340
00:18:08,360 --> 00:18:11,640
working, for example, right? 
And there's been companies that 

341
00:18:11,640 --> 00:18:16,240
actually like, have I've seen 
people worked in an environment 

342
00:18:16,240 --> 00:18:19,240
which is like boxed to say this 
is your role. 

343
00:18:19,240 --> 00:18:23,400
Do that really well, right? 
In those cases, like what I 

344
00:18:23,400 --> 00:18:26,400
would define it as is like it's 
called focus, right? 

345
00:18:26,400 --> 00:18:31,080
Like, you know, you have a very 
clear responsibility and having 

346
00:18:31,080 --> 00:18:34,920
focus towards doing that, it's a
powerful thing. 

347
00:18:34,920 --> 00:18:38,280
So somebody you might look at 
their resume and they would say,

348
00:18:39,320 --> 00:18:44,160
hey, like I actually had the 
built up a really strong skill 

349
00:18:44,160 --> 00:18:48,640
set as an engineer and I 
actually like was given this 

350
00:18:48,640 --> 00:18:53,200
specific problem and then I did 
really well, right? 

351
00:18:53,200 --> 00:18:56,440
Like, and that person can be 
immensely successful, right? 

352
00:18:57,800 --> 00:18:59,720
The question if you ask me 
though, would I hire that 

353
00:18:59,720 --> 00:19:03,040
person? 
I would probably say it's still 

354
00:19:03,040 --> 00:19:05,920
no. 
I would look for like curiosity 

355
00:19:05,920 --> 00:19:08,400
and that's more my personal 
choice in the cultures that I 

356
00:19:08,400 --> 00:19:12,400
want to build in. 
Like, you know, taking into 

357
00:19:12,400 --> 00:19:16,640
account like the phasing of 
where the business I work at is 

358
00:19:16,640 --> 00:19:18,440
like some sort of a high growth 
business. 

359
00:19:18,560 --> 00:19:22,480
Like, you know, we while it's a 
reasonably larger size business 

360
00:19:22,480 --> 00:19:25,800
with like billions in revenue, 
but we consider ourselves to be 

361
00:19:26,080 --> 00:19:29,600
the missions like 10 plus years.
Like what we need is actually 

362
00:19:29,600 --> 00:19:35,840
people who can deliver with 
focus but bring along curiosity 

363
00:19:36,240 --> 00:19:38,400
because they have this 
multiplier effect in the 

364
00:19:38,400 --> 00:19:40,360
organization. 
It's not just about for them 

365
00:19:40,360 --> 00:19:44,240
getting what has been asked of 
them to be done, but they can 

366
00:19:44,240 --> 00:19:47,920
also help shape or give way to 
what are the next 5 things we 

367
00:19:47,920 --> 00:19:55,440
can do by short circuiting some 
of the processes slash like just

368
00:19:55,440 --> 00:19:57,280
general product development 
approaches. 

369
00:19:57,320 --> 00:20:01,400
Maybe did talk about technical 
Dr. is or like product 

370
00:20:01,400 --> 00:20:04,960
engineering, which is where 
like, you know, being able to be

371
00:20:04,960 --> 00:20:07,760
a good engineer with really good
skills, you actually can focus 

372
00:20:07,760 --> 00:20:10,280
and actually develop and have a 
track record of shipping 

373
00:20:10,280 --> 00:20:12,920
products. 
But coupled with curiosity, you 

374
00:20:12,920 --> 00:20:16,480
would know what is the right 
sequence to build. 

375
00:20:16,480 --> 00:20:20,560
And also like you could actually
have an influence on how you can

376
00:20:20,560 --> 00:20:23,000
help accelerate the growth of 
the business, right? 

377
00:20:23,000 --> 00:20:23,920
So. 
So I think that's the. 

378
00:20:24,760 --> 00:20:27,680
A little bit of a difference, I 
think, and I think it comes down

379
00:20:27,680 --> 00:20:32,160
to individual choices. 
I do think though, the evolution

380
00:20:32,160 --> 00:20:40,000
of like, you know, AI in recent 
times is going to push more of 

381
00:20:40,000 --> 00:20:44,800
the industry forward into the 
direction of people that thrive 

382
00:20:44,800 --> 00:20:47,920
are the ones who actually can 
demonstrate both curiosity and 

383
00:20:47,920 --> 00:20:50,720
focus. 
Like, and we also see like 

384
00:20:50,960 --> 00:20:54,280
another way to think about it is
like even when you study 

385
00:20:54,280 --> 00:20:58,400
engineering carriers, there's 
always like outcomes could vary,

386
00:20:58,400 --> 00:21:00,160
right? 
Like some people actually have 

387
00:21:00,160 --> 00:21:03,560
disproportionate outcomes. 
They would actually grow 

388
00:21:03,560 --> 00:21:07,240
themselves to be like really 
senior engineers quickly, 

389
00:21:07,240 --> 00:21:09,600
etcetera. 
And you usually could bat and 

390
00:21:09,600 --> 00:21:13,680
match that to people who have 
both curiosity and focus, 

391
00:21:14,320 --> 00:21:17,400
whereas some people would still 
be very successful, work at like

392
00:21:17,400 --> 00:21:20,880
really incredible businesses and
be a part of that journey, but 

393
00:21:20,880 --> 00:21:24,160
might not grow to those higher 
order influential roles. 

394
00:21:24,600 --> 00:21:26,640
And that usually comes down to 
their, they might be very 

395
00:21:26,640 --> 00:21:28,880
focused engineers and really 
good at their job getting stuff 

396
00:21:28,880 --> 00:21:31,880
done, but they didn't really 
like enable the impact of that 

397
00:21:31,880 --> 00:21:33,480
business, which requires 
curiosity. 

398
00:21:33,800 --> 00:21:34,200
Gotcha. 
Yeah. 

399
00:21:34,960 --> 00:21:39,000
Curiosity is always been a big 
driver for me, and I also see 

400
00:21:39,000 --> 00:21:42,400
that the people that tend to not
necessarily be curious, they 

401
00:21:42,400 --> 00:21:44,640
might be the most headstrong. 
Like when someone disagrees with

402
00:21:44,640 --> 00:21:47,240
me, I think it's interesting 
because if I have a certain 

403
00:21:47,240 --> 00:21:49,760
perspective, if I have a certain
vision and then someone that I 

404
00:21:49,760 --> 00:21:53,120
think is is very smart, someone 
that I admire disagrees with 

405
00:21:53,120 --> 00:21:55,080
that, that means there is a 
learning opportunity. 

406
00:21:55,280 --> 00:21:57,880
I'm not going to try and 
convince someone from what I 

407
00:21:57,880 --> 00:21:59,760
believe, but I want to 
understand their perspective 

408
00:22:00,000 --> 00:22:03,280
because then I can better judge 
what is in the middle or is it 

409
00:22:03,280 --> 00:22:05,040
mine or is it his. 
And in the end, the outcome 

410
00:22:05,040 --> 00:22:06,800
doesn't matter. 
I learned something and the 

411
00:22:06,800 --> 00:22:09,640
people that are curious, I've 
seen kind of not necessarily 

412
00:22:09,640 --> 00:22:12,320
throw away their own opinion, 
but take this as an opportunity 

413
00:22:12,320 --> 00:22:13,640
and learn from that. 
Yeah, no. 

414
00:22:13,640 --> 00:22:16,360
It's 100% right. 
Actually, what you said 

415
00:22:16,360 --> 00:22:18,880
resonates with me. 
Like, you know, in terms of 

416
00:22:20,800 --> 00:22:23,880
people that are curious, like 
want to learn. 

417
00:22:23,880 --> 00:22:27,000
I think learning is the driver. 
I think that's foundational, 

418
00:22:27,080 --> 00:22:29,360
right? 
To give you a practical example 

419
00:22:29,360 --> 00:22:35,480
that I actually saw was like, we
had like a product that like, 

420
00:22:35,480 --> 00:22:40,560
you know, which is about like 
detecting some signals with data

421
00:22:40,560 --> 00:22:43,280
available. 
Like, and we had the solution 

422
00:22:43,280 --> 00:22:49,200
that was built like long ago, 
but we almost got to a point 

423
00:22:49,200 --> 00:22:51,640
where the customer was not happy
and like, you know, we'd like 

424
00:22:52,080 --> 00:22:55,000
thought, OK, like we're hitting 
a wall or a dead end, right? 

425
00:22:55,480 --> 00:22:58,840
Whereas when we hired, we 
actually ended up hiring a new 

426
00:22:58,840 --> 00:23:02,200
engineer who actually like 
started and started to look at 

427
00:23:02,200 --> 00:23:05,200
this problem with fresh eyes. 
So he went back to sort of 

428
00:23:05,760 --> 00:23:10,400
square 1 and question a lot of 
the fundamentals of like how we 

429
00:23:10,400 --> 00:23:12,800
thought about solving this 
particular problem. 

430
00:23:13,360 --> 00:23:17,320
And he was able to also like 
reconnect and talk to people who

431
00:23:17,320 --> 00:23:21,280
had built the original solution 
and like understand both their 

432
00:23:21,280 --> 00:23:23,920
point of view. 
And then we kind of came up with

433
00:23:23,920 --> 00:23:28,520
this iteration, which was almost
like, you could call it going 

434
00:23:28,520 --> 00:23:30,560
back to first principles like 
erase everything that's been 

435
00:23:30,560 --> 00:23:33,560
done, like you've spent a year, 
but sure, really like going back

436
00:23:33,560 --> 00:23:37,040
to square one and then 
rethinking how we should build 

437
00:23:37,040 --> 00:23:40,280
this solution. 
And we were able to come up with

438
00:23:41,400 --> 00:23:45,800
a new methodology to like, you 
know, approach the problem, 

439
00:23:45,800 --> 00:23:49,640
which actually we are now like 
rolling it out to customers and 

440
00:23:49,640 --> 00:23:51,760
we are already getting very 
positive feedback on. 

441
00:23:53,560 --> 00:23:56,600
So it, it comes down, I think 
when I reflect on that 

442
00:23:56,600 --> 00:24:01,120
particular like story, which 
happened in the organization, I 

443
00:24:01,120 --> 00:24:06,960
see two things. 1 is like yes, 
having people who actually bring

444
00:24:06,960 --> 00:24:10,520
the mindset of like being 
curious about problems and like 

445
00:24:10,600 --> 00:24:14,560
being able to go to the depth 
also like it, it really helps 

446
00:24:14,560 --> 00:24:16,280
you. 
The other one that I also felt 

447
00:24:17,560 --> 00:24:22,920
that helped is like, you know, 
and as you said, like curiosity.

448
00:24:22,920 --> 00:24:30,600
Curious people usually come at 
it from, they usually also like 

449
00:24:30,600 --> 00:24:33,520
a coupled with like a mindset of
collaborating. 

450
00:24:34,320 --> 00:24:37,840
It's incredibly powerful because
then you get like you, you're 

451
00:24:37,840 --> 00:24:39,880
sharing ideas between like 
really smart people. 

452
00:24:39,880 --> 00:24:43,440
And then you also bring the 
notion of like the best idea 

453
00:24:43,440 --> 00:24:46,840
should win. 
Like we at Samsara, we actually 

454
00:24:46,840 --> 00:24:48,640
talk a lot about like 
meritocracy. 

455
00:24:48,680 --> 00:24:51,880
Like one of the things that I 
enjoyed telling people and talk 

456
00:24:51,880 --> 00:24:54,480
about is like the best idea 
should win. 

457
00:24:54,480 --> 00:24:57,840
Like wherever it comes from. 
We would have a like, you know, 

458
00:25:00,000 --> 00:25:03,800
we generally like to celebrate 
the idea of the best idea should

459
00:25:03,800 --> 00:25:07,280
win irrespective of hierarchy 
specifically, right? 

460
00:25:07,280 --> 00:25:09,680
Like, and I've usually always 
seen like the best ideas come 

461
00:25:09,680 --> 00:25:13,600
from like everywhere. 
Like we've have stories from 

462
00:25:13,600 --> 00:25:16,800
like interns coming and having 
an impact by like kind of asking

463
00:25:16,800 --> 00:25:20,680
like the question which nobody 
thought about and so on, right. 

464
00:25:20,680 --> 00:25:25,480
So, but I think coupling 
curiosity with a culture where 

465
00:25:25,480 --> 00:25:28,400
you actually can eliminate 
hierarchical thinking is 

466
00:25:28,400 --> 00:25:32,600
incredibly powerful. 
And pulling people together in 

467
00:25:32,600 --> 00:25:36,680
that environment usually results
in like the best outcomes for 

468
00:25:36,680 --> 00:25:37,720
the business. 
Right. 

469
00:25:38,040 --> 00:25:40,520
And like, yeah, when you're 
running a larger businesses, you

470
00:25:40,520 --> 00:25:43,120
you have to think about these as
like more like, OK, how do you 

471
00:25:43,400 --> 00:25:46,600
make make it in into the 
company's culture? 

472
00:25:46,600 --> 00:25:51,360
And I think, yeah, we, we try to
do a good job there, like try to

473
00:25:51,360 --> 00:25:53,240
kind of celebrate some of these 
stories. 

474
00:25:53,600 --> 00:25:56,320
And like when we see these 
instances go bring it back to 

475
00:25:56,320 --> 00:25:59,640
like an all hands setting and 
actually tell people this is 

476
00:25:59,640 --> 00:26:01,480
what good looks like. 
It cultivates that into the 

477
00:26:01,480 --> 00:26:02,840
culture that's. 
Very nice. 

478
00:26:03,360 --> 00:26:06,840
Like I've never been responsible
for cultivating such a culture. 

479
00:26:06,920 --> 00:26:09,520
Fresh pair of eyes is incredibly
powerful. 

480
00:26:10,080 --> 00:26:12,720
But the hiring strategies that 
I've seen, they very much still 

481
00:26:12,720 --> 00:26:15,560
test on hard skills. 
I was at a conference and it was

482
00:26:15,560 --> 00:26:18,400
about technical leadership and 
then we had an on conference and

483
00:26:18,400 --> 00:26:20,080
I was like, I really want to 
talk about AI and hiring. 

484
00:26:20,160 --> 00:26:23,760
Like what, what have you changed
in your hiring process? 

485
00:26:23,760 --> 00:26:26,160
What is still solid and what is 
different? 

486
00:26:26,680 --> 00:26:29,800
And some people are like, well, 
we're still experimenting or we 

487
00:26:29,800 --> 00:26:34,240
do have a hands on part of the 
hiring process and then it's in 

488
00:26:34,240 --> 00:26:35,720
a call. 
And then I'll say, well, I'll 

489
00:26:35,720 --> 00:26:38,320
just jump back in two hours. 
And that person stays in that 

490
00:26:38,320 --> 00:26:40,640
call and executes and they can 
use whatever AI tooling. 

491
00:26:41,120 --> 00:26:43,760
Other teams I've seen or 
companies that say, OK, we 

492
00:26:43,760 --> 00:26:46,840
expect you to use AI and we just
do pair programming. 

493
00:26:46,840 --> 00:26:48,920
So do whatever you do normally 
and then I'll see that. 

494
00:26:49,400 --> 00:26:52,360
But that is all very much with 
regards to hard skills. 

495
00:26:52,800 --> 00:26:55,960
I'm wondering when you say, OK, 
I look for hard skills, but I 

496
00:26:55,960 --> 00:26:58,240
also want you to be curious. 
And if you only have fundamental

497
00:26:58,240 --> 00:27:02,000
hard skills by virtue of not you
not having curiosity, I'm less 

498
00:27:02,000 --> 00:27:04,360
certain on are you going to be 
collaborative? 

499
00:27:04,360 --> 00:27:06,760
Are you going to be asking 
questions on the business 

500
00:27:06,760 --> 00:27:08,520
outcomes? 
Are you going to care at all? 

501
00:27:08,960 --> 00:27:12,920
How do you then in your hiring, 
because you are in the end part 

502
00:27:12,920 --> 00:27:15,160
of the people that is 
responsible for this culture and

503
00:27:15,160 --> 00:27:17,360
you want people to be curious to
drive business outcomes. 

504
00:27:17,680 --> 00:27:19,880
How do you make sure you 
actually find the people that go

505
00:27:19,880 --> 00:27:22,080
through and then are part of 
that company? 

506
00:27:22,480 --> 00:27:24,240
Yeah, no, it's a, it's a great 
question. 

507
00:27:24,240 --> 00:27:32,000
So the, I think one thing we 
look for effectively when it 

508
00:27:32,000 --> 00:27:36,360
comes down to hiring is like 
some techniques to actually 

509
00:27:36,360 --> 00:27:39,360
check for these skills that I 
talked about, like curiosity and

510
00:27:39,360 --> 00:27:41,640
focus, particularly if you 
unpack it, like how do you go 

511
00:27:41,640 --> 00:27:43,000
for, how do you go about it, 
right? 

512
00:27:43,320 --> 00:27:48,240
So the first thing is we look 
for trajectory of people over 

513
00:27:48,240 --> 00:27:50,760
their time, like whatever 
they've done, like, you know, 

514
00:27:50,760 --> 00:27:55,680
one of the things that you can 
always look for is like, you 

515
00:27:55,680 --> 00:28:00,600
know, people that have had like 
some degree of a trajectory like

516
00:28:00,760 --> 00:28:05,080
would have usually done like or 
delivered outcomes for a 

517
00:28:05,080 --> 00:28:08,480
business, which actually made 
them like, you know, successful 

518
00:28:08,480 --> 00:28:10,400
and they got promoted in other 
places, etcetera. 

519
00:28:10,480 --> 00:28:12,800
Right. 
And we dive into it a little bit

520
00:28:12,800 --> 00:28:15,080
more into the details. 
The, the most common question I 

521
00:28:15,080 --> 00:28:18,240
end up usually asking people is 
like to talk about like one of 

522
00:28:18,240 --> 00:28:19,920
their favorite projects and like
why? 

523
00:28:19,960 --> 00:28:23,560
And it's a little bit of an 
abstract easy question, which 

524
00:28:23,560 --> 00:28:26,560
you might get. 
But what I'm looking to hear is 

525
00:28:26,560 --> 00:28:29,520
about the first thing is I want 
to understand, like, do you 

526
00:28:29,520 --> 00:28:31,560
really understand why you bought
this product? 

527
00:28:31,560 --> 00:28:33,800
What's the outcome? 
Like if this goes back to 

528
00:28:33,800 --> 00:28:37,800
understanding the business 
outcome and is sometimes people 

529
00:28:38,080 --> 00:28:41,040
tell me I was told to work on 
it, that's actually a flag for 

530
00:28:41,040 --> 00:28:42,560
me. 
Like, you know, it's like you 

531
00:28:42,640 --> 00:28:45,480
just like went by somebody 
else's vision, but like you 

532
00:28:45,480 --> 00:28:47,000
didn't really paint a vision 
yourself. 

533
00:28:47,000 --> 00:28:50,280
So that's something I try to dig
into, right. 

534
00:28:50,600 --> 00:28:53,880
The other thing I look look for 
is usually when people talk 

535
00:28:53,880 --> 00:29:00,200
about their like, you know, 
journey is actually like talk 

536
00:29:00,200 --> 00:29:03,720
about or ask them for specific 
decisions they influenced and 

537
00:29:03,720 --> 00:29:09,400
made and the why, like, and if 
you've really done the work 

538
00:29:09,400 --> 00:29:12,520
which you picked as a project, 
you can talk to those details 

539
00:29:12,560 --> 00:29:15,960
really well. 
And then actually I look for 

540
00:29:15,960 --> 00:29:18,520
some degree of excitement from 
the person talking about it. 

541
00:29:18,520 --> 00:29:21,680
Usually the person who's really 
done it is very excited and 

542
00:29:21,680 --> 00:29:24,120
proud about some of the things 
that they navigated along the 

543
00:29:24,120 --> 00:29:25,920
way. 
Really proud and really proud 

544
00:29:25,920 --> 00:29:27,800
about it. 
And you can actually easily feel

545
00:29:27,800 --> 00:29:29,880
it. 
You can like, you know, get it 

546
00:29:29,880 --> 00:29:32,800
out of the conversation quickly 
because they know the details. 

547
00:29:33,240 --> 00:29:35,640
They feel good about some of 
some things that they've done. 

548
00:29:36,080 --> 00:29:39,120
They usually also get a little 
reflective on, oh, I learnt this

549
00:29:39,120 --> 00:29:42,400
later, like, you know, and so 
those are all really strong 

550
00:29:42,400 --> 00:29:46,240
signals. 
And then you look for two 

551
00:29:46,240 --> 00:29:47,960
things. 
One, did they get the business 

552
00:29:48,120 --> 00:29:52,640
context, the customer context 
asks you executed on this 

553
00:29:52,640 --> 00:29:54,520
project. 
What did you do with that? 

554
00:29:54,880 --> 00:29:57,880
Did you do anything with it is 
something I usually fish for 

555
00:29:57,880 --> 00:30:00,760
like, you know, OK, you got 
those contexts you executed 

556
00:30:00,760 --> 00:30:03,520
like, yeah, we this was the 
technically hard part of it. 

557
00:30:03,520 --> 00:30:08,240
All of that's great, but did you
do something to either like, you

558
00:30:08,240 --> 00:30:11,240
know, accelerate timelines, like
make it a better customer 

559
00:30:11,240 --> 00:30:13,720
experience? 
Like think through the longer 

560
00:30:13,720 --> 00:30:16,200
term impact of the product you 
built, Maybe like you made a 

561
00:30:16,200 --> 00:30:18,360
technical decision with a 
forethought off. 

562
00:30:18,800 --> 00:30:21,120
I know we've done this, but the 
next three things we're going to

563
00:30:21,120 --> 00:30:23,880
do is this right? 
So, so those are incredibly 

564
00:30:23,880 --> 00:30:27,560
strong signals. 
The other thing which by default

565
00:30:27,560 --> 00:30:32,320
I look for is like people's 
demonstration of focus. 

566
00:30:32,320 --> 00:30:34,720
Like I mentioned, curiosity and 
focus being the other thing. 

567
00:30:34,720 --> 00:30:39,360
Focus is very, you can only very
clearly see where people have 

568
00:30:39,360 --> 00:30:43,720
actually spent their time and 
shipped meaningful things over 

569
00:30:43,720 --> 00:30:46,520
time. 
This is just almost like a test 

570
00:30:46,520 --> 00:30:49,440
of time thing, right? 
Like, you know, you sometimes 

571
00:30:49,440 --> 00:30:52,440
have engineers who hop around 
all the time, like, you know, a 

572
00:30:52,440 --> 00:30:54,600
year like into different jobs 
and so on. 

573
00:30:55,600 --> 00:30:59,080
What I personally feel from my 
experience is like if you really

574
00:30:59,080 --> 00:31:03,120
want to deeply build something 
great, you need to put your time

575
00:31:03,400 --> 00:31:05,920
and you need to actually like 
iterate on it and really be 

576
00:31:05,920 --> 00:31:10,440
focused on it, right? 
So and that you get signals by 

577
00:31:11,360 --> 00:31:15,160
really understanding, have they 
worked on problems which they 

578
00:31:15,160 --> 00:31:18,600
saw it from zero to 1 or like, 
you know, took it at from some 

579
00:31:18,600 --> 00:31:21,720
point to another major point, 
like almost like a step function

580
00:31:21,720 --> 00:31:26,200
change in outcomes for the 
business and were they able to 

581
00:31:26,200 --> 00:31:29,440
stay with it through the ups and
downs, which I think is a very 

582
00:31:29,440 --> 00:31:32,720
powerful thing to look for, 
especially in today's world. 

583
00:31:32,720 --> 00:31:34,440
It's extremely easy to get 
distracted. 

584
00:31:34,920 --> 00:31:36,920
All know that, right? 
Like everybody is like so many 

585
00:31:36,920 --> 00:31:39,160
sound bites around you, so many 
tools thrown out at you. 

586
00:31:40,040 --> 00:31:43,040
Like focus is a really powerful 
thing. 

587
00:31:43,560 --> 00:31:46,480
And I think a lot of the people 
who succeed would agree, say 

588
00:31:46,480 --> 00:31:48,880
like, you know, the curiosity 
and focus I think are the most 

589
00:31:48,880 --> 00:31:50,560
powerful things. 
And I try to like really like 

590
00:31:50,560 --> 00:31:55,760
look at that through deep diving
people's work in an. 

591
00:31:55,760 --> 00:31:58,840
Interview the first part that 
you mentioned of what is a 

592
00:31:58,840 --> 00:32:02,080
project that you're proud of or 
what are some of your fondness 

593
00:32:02,080 --> 00:32:04,480
memories with regards to 
learnings or even failures that 

594
00:32:04,480 --> 00:32:06,920
you can share. 
I typically ask that from an 

595
00:32:06,920 --> 00:32:09,720
interviewer perspective, like 
from an interviewee perspective 

596
00:32:09,720 --> 00:32:12,280
to my interviewer because I want
to see that same spark. 

597
00:32:12,280 --> 00:32:15,480
If I'm going to work with these 
people, I actually want to just 

598
00:32:15,480 --> 00:32:17,360
like you see if that spark is 
there. 

599
00:32:17,360 --> 00:32:20,000
If they have done something at 
this company that I'm applying 

600
00:32:20,000 --> 00:32:23,480
for that they are proud of or 
that it's a failure and they've 

601
00:32:23,480 --> 00:32:25,560
learned from it. 
I want to see introspection. 

602
00:32:25,560 --> 00:32:28,000
I want to see productivity. 
I want to see reflection and 

603
00:32:28,000 --> 00:32:31,400
learnings because then I know 
for me and from my perspective, 

604
00:32:31,400 --> 00:32:33,360
it's an environment where I can 
do the same. 

605
00:32:33,360 --> 00:32:35,520
There is room for that. 
People are already talking about

606
00:32:35,520 --> 00:32:36,800
that. 
It's not the first time someone 

607
00:32:36,800 --> 00:32:39,880
has asked a question like that. 
I don't want it to be something 

608
00:32:39,880 --> 00:32:41,840
new that I introduced. 
I want it to be part of the 

609
00:32:41,840 --> 00:32:45,200
culture that I'm applying for, 
which I think is very powerful. 

610
00:32:45,400 --> 00:32:47,400
And sometimes from an 
interviewee perspective, you 

611
00:32:47,400 --> 00:32:49,200
might think, OK, what am I going
to ask? 

612
00:32:49,680 --> 00:32:52,280
Honestly, just having a personal
conversation and going on that 

613
00:32:52,280 --> 00:32:53,360
level I think is completely. 
Fun. 

614
00:32:53,360 --> 00:32:55,840
I think it what you said makes a
lot of sense, right? 

615
00:32:55,840 --> 00:32:58,480
Think about this for a second. 
You asked me earlier in the 

616
00:32:58,480 --> 00:33:02,320
conversation like hey, like how 
do I as a person find an 

617
00:33:02,320 --> 00:33:05,880
environment where I can become a
great product engineer, 

618
00:33:05,880 --> 00:33:09,560
technical DRI, etcetera. 
This is a good shortcut way for 

619
00:33:09,560 --> 00:33:13,440
you to get to an understanding 
if that environment actually 

620
00:33:13,440 --> 00:33:16,400
allows for it, right? 
Because you're just asking the 

621
00:33:16,400 --> 00:33:19,840
same question of like, what is 
it like to work here, right? 

622
00:33:19,840 --> 00:33:22,320
Like you'd get clear signal 
around why somebody's saying 

623
00:33:22,320 --> 00:33:26,480
that's because either they 
worked in and like for you to 

624
00:33:26,480 --> 00:33:28,800
learn these skills, you need an 
environment to be very clear, 

625
00:33:28,800 --> 00:33:30,840
right? 
Like not every company operates 

626
00:33:31,320 --> 00:33:33,840
like this, like I worked at 
different places and people 

627
00:33:33,840 --> 00:33:35,560
choose to do operate 
differently. 

628
00:33:36,200 --> 00:33:39,880
So you want to understand if 
that environment is going to be 

629
00:33:39,880 --> 00:33:42,520
like product centric, like the 
environment's going to actually 

630
00:33:42,520 --> 00:33:46,720
enable you to be able to. 
Is the environment actually 

631
00:33:46,720 --> 00:33:50,000
going to tell you like, you 
know, hey, show curiosity, like 

632
00:33:50,000 --> 00:33:52,080
understand the business problem?
Are they going to tell you like,

633
00:33:52,080 --> 00:33:53,640
you know, go to your job? 
Yeah, right. 

634
00:33:53,640 --> 00:33:56,080
Like we told you to write code 
for these four tickets. 

635
00:33:56,360 --> 00:33:58,760
You might you want to ship, you 
might not know why. 

636
00:33:58,760 --> 00:34:00,480
Just execute, correct. 
Yeah. 

637
00:34:00,560 --> 00:34:03,880
And so that's something that you
want to get a signal. 

638
00:34:03,880 --> 00:34:07,000
So it's a perfect question for 
you to ask and look for the 

639
00:34:07,000 --> 00:34:10,440
actual signals from, like, you 
know, a good way to understand 

640
00:34:10,440 --> 00:34:11,880
the culture rather than ask 
somebody. 

641
00:34:11,880 --> 00:34:14,040
OK, tell me about your culture. 
Like, OK, tell me about your 

642
00:34:14,040 --> 00:34:15,040
favorite project. 
Yeah. 

643
00:34:15,360 --> 00:34:17,840
Yeah, absolutely. 
I was speaking with MO and then 

644
00:34:17,840 --> 00:34:20,199
we were diving deep into the 
forward deployed engineer role. 

645
00:34:20,600 --> 00:34:23,440
And from that I had the feeling 
of, OK, you have a lot of 

646
00:34:23,800 --> 00:34:25,600
responsibilities on your plate. 
You need to be technically 

647
00:34:25,600 --> 00:34:28,520
apartment to know your product. 
You have to dive into customer 

648
00:34:28,520 --> 00:34:31,480
contexts and figure things out 
and how to make that match, also

649
00:34:31,480 --> 00:34:32,800
understanding the business 
problem. 

650
00:34:33,400 --> 00:34:36,480
So then I thought maybe it's not
a good role for people that are 

651
00:34:36,480 --> 00:34:38,920
early in career and I'm 
wondering if product and 

652
00:34:38,920 --> 00:34:41,920
understanding the business and 
innately early in career people 

653
00:34:41,920 --> 00:34:44,159
might be more curious. 
They're not as jaded as people 

654
00:34:44,159 --> 00:34:47,199
that have been in the industry 
for 20 years and have burned 

655
00:34:47,199 --> 00:34:50,440
themselves just a little bit too
often to be that way. 

656
00:34:50,880 --> 00:34:53,600
So they have that drives like a 
blank canvas, a real fresh pair 

657
00:34:53,600 --> 00:34:55,679
of eyes. 
I feel like product engineers 

658
00:34:55,679 --> 00:34:58,560
and that role, they are well 
suited for people that are more 

659
00:34:58,560 --> 00:35:00,200
early in career. 
They can come in with a fresh 

660
00:35:00,200 --> 00:35:03,520
perspective and really bring 
things down to square one with 

661
00:35:03,520 --> 00:35:07,120
regards to reasoning and asking 
questions and learning from that

662
00:35:07,120 --> 00:35:09,720
perspective. 
Yeah, it's an interesting 

663
00:35:09,880 --> 00:35:13,040
thought, right. 
I think the so forward deploy 

664
00:35:13,040 --> 00:35:15,760
engineers is something that we 
don't have at Samsara at the 

665
00:35:15,760 --> 00:35:19,160
moment, right. 
But I think I guess the 

666
00:35:19,160 --> 00:35:21,680
fundamental way I would call the
difference is like, you know, 

667
00:35:21,680 --> 00:35:25,360
you're building custom solutions
where you need a forward 

668
00:35:25,360 --> 00:35:28,480
deployed engineer who's working 
more with a specific customer. 

669
00:35:28,480 --> 00:35:31,720
All our product engineers work 
on products that's like catering

670
00:35:31,720 --> 00:35:34,200
to like a larger customer base, 
right? 

671
00:35:34,200 --> 00:35:37,040
So whether it's like, but if the
customer interaction is still 

672
00:35:37,040 --> 00:35:40,160
true, so, so that's kind of the 
crux of it. 

673
00:35:40,760 --> 00:35:47,160
Now, when you think about like, 
you know, is that role suited 

674
00:35:47,160 --> 00:35:50,560
for like an early engineer or 
not, I generally don't believe 

675
00:35:50,560 --> 00:35:53,960
that like, oh, like these roles 
are only for people with 

676
00:35:53,960 --> 00:35:59,000
experience or like like somebody
who is like more earlier cannot 

677
00:35:59,000 --> 00:36:02,440
do it, etcetera. 
Like I don't I really don't bind

678
00:36:02,440 --> 00:36:06,680
to that school of thought. 
I think the key is to if you are

679
00:36:06,680 --> 00:36:09,240
trying to cultivate that culture
and like you want to have it in 

680
00:36:09,240 --> 00:36:12,200
your teams, meeting people where
they are with their skill set 

681
00:36:12,200 --> 00:36:18,240
and then exposing them to some 
of these qualities like which 

682
00:36:18,240 --> 00:36:20,200
you want from product engineers 
and iterations. 

683
00:36:20,200 --> 00:36:24,360
Like an example would be like, 
you know, you might actually 

684
00:36:24,560 --> 00:36:28,240
have like a small feature which 
you could easily give it to a 

685
00:36:29,080 --> 00:36:31,960
like a junior engineer who just 
maybe graduated out of school. 

686
00:36:32,680 --> 00:36:35,680
And but then you use that as a 
means to teach them. 

687
00:36:35,680 --> 00:36:38,520
Hey, like what's important here 
is for you to actually 

688
00:36:38,520 --> 00:36:42,360
understand some of the customer 
impact, etcetera. 

689
00:36:42,360 --> 00:36:45,880
A trick to do that, which I 
often encourages and which is 

690
00:36:45,880 --> 00:36:47,320
highly encouraged. 
It's I'm sorry, it's like 

691
00:36:48,280 --> 00:36:50,840
getting engineers in front of 
customers, like have the product

692
00:36:50,840 --> 00:36:53,080
manager take the engineer to 
like even be a family on the 

693
00:36:53,080 --> 00:36:54,960
wall. 
Like listen to a couple of calls

694
00:36:55,400 --> 00:36:57,200
like you benefit from these 
things, right? 

695
00:36:57,200 --> 00:37:00,960
So the IT goes back to you then 
understand the why and it helps 

696
00:37:00,960 --> 00:37:03,280
you cultivate that mindset of 
like, OK, now I actually 

697
00:37:03,280 --> 00:37:06,640
understand the why so I could 
make better decisions. 

698
00:37:06,640 --> 00:37:09,560
And the second thing would be 
like teaching them to measure 

699
00:37:09,560 --> 00:37:11,120
outcomes. 
Like, OK, you shipped something.

700
00:37:11,760 --> 00:37:15,800
Can you actually proactively 
think about actually like 

701
00:37:16,080 --> 00:37:18,680
understanding if what you 
shipped as a feature, they 

702
00:37:18,680 --> 00:37:21,800
didn't get adoption? 
Like why are people adopting it?

703
00:37:21,800 --> 00:37:24,200
And you could easily build out 
like dashboards, right? 

704
00:37:24,560 --> 00:37:27,440
Again, like this, I could 
consider a role of a product 

705
00:37:27,440 --> 00:37:30,960
engineer where you not only 
understood the why and you saw 

706
00:37:30,960 --> 00:37:33,880
the true line to the product, 
but you also measured what 

707
00:37:33,880 --> 00:37:37,120
happened like, and you form an 
opinion on maybe you want to 

708
00:37:37,120 --> 00:37:39,600
work with your product manager 
and to find the next iteration 

709
00:37:39,600 --> 00:37:41,600
of this product because it 
didn't really get the outcome 

710
00:37:41,600 --> 00:37:43,480
you wanted. 
But if you didn't measure it, 

711
00:37:43,800 --> 00:37:45,400
how can you move on to the next 
thing, right? 

712
00:37:45,400 --> 00:37:49,920
So, so those are small things 
that like I think any engineer 

713
00:37:50,080 --> 00:37:53,560
can do. 
And I think the way to think 

714
00:37:53,560 --> 00:37:56,960
about it is like as people level
up in their careers, they're 

715
00:37:56,960 --> 00:38:01,600
just taking more larger efforts 
or like driving more complex 

716
00:38:01,600 --> 00:38:05,280
things. 
But the mindset to work with 

717
00:38:05,640 --> 00:38:10,440
ambiguity or the mindset to lean
in on customer feedback and get 

718
00:38:10,440 --> 00:38:12,800
this context needs to be 
developed and can be developed 

719
00:38:12,960 --> 00:38:18,120
from early on, right. 
And so that's how we think about

720
00:38:18,120 --> 00:38:19,680
it. 
So not necessarily specific to 

721
00:38:19,680 --> 00:38:21,480
like, oh, you need to be senior.
I would actually highly 

722
00:38:21,480 --> 00:38:25,120
encourage more younger engineers
to look for environments that 

723
00:38:25,120 --> 00:38:29,960
support these and yeah, and 
like, try to cultivate these 

724
00:38:29,960 --> 00:38:33,240
skills early on. 
Yeah, I think what I'm. 

725
00:38:33,240 --> 00:38:35,560
About to say is is relevant for 
both people that are early in 

726
00:38:35,560 --> 00:38:39,080
career, but also people that are
more senior that will come at A 

727
00:38:39,400 --> 00:38:42,800
at a certain point you'll face a
challenge with regards to it's 

728
00:38:42,800 --> 00:38:44,040
something I've never done 
before. 

729
00:38:44,080 --> 00:38:47,000
It is bigger than the scale of 
impact that I've had before. 

730
00:38:47,480 --> 00:38:50,480
And I feel like in your 
position, you have many more 

731
00:38:50,480 --> 00:38:53,240
conversations with people that 
are facing this, where you from 

732
00:38:53,240 --> 00:38:55,720
your standpoint believe they can
do it, but they from their 

733
00:38:55,720 --> 00:38:58,240
standpoint, they've never done 
it, which means sometimes 

734
00:38:58,240 --> 00:39:01,520
there's a lack of confidence or 
even a high feeling of imposter 

735
00:39:01,520 --> 00:39:03,320
syndrome. 
I feel like there's a lot of 

736
00:39:03,320 --> 00:39:05,680
imposter syndrome in this 
industry and it's due to the 

737
00:39:05,680 --> 00:39:08,600
fact that typically we are doing
a lot of things that we might 

738
00:39:08,600 --> 00:39:10,440
have never done before. 
If you're doing the same thing 

739
00:39:10,440 --> 00:39:13,720
over and over again, are you 
really growing or are you kind 

740
00:39:13,720 --> 00:39:16,400
of coasting? 
Sometimes it's OK and everyone's

741
00:39:16,400 --> 00:39:19,000
kind of family situation or 
personal situation is different.

742
00:39:19,000 --> 00:39:21,720
But for the people that want to 
grow, they will find themselves 

743
00:39:21,720 --> 00:39:25,480
in unknown waters. 
And more often you do that, the 

744
00:39:25,480 --> 00:39:28,600
more confident you become. 
But there will still be an 

745
00:39:28,600 --> 00:39:31,800
inkling of can I do this or is 
this beyond my scope? 

746
00:39:32,400 --> 00:39:35,920
The further you grow in your 
career, the more senior you are,

747
00:39:36,040 --> 00:39:38,920
the bigger responsibilities you 
might get, and especially when 

748
00:39:38,920 --> 00:39:42,200
the stakes are higher. 
Can some stress some people out?

749
00:39:42,560 --> 00:39:44,840
How do you have that 
conversation with people where 

750
00:39:44,840 --> 00:39:46,640
you truly believe they can do 
something, but they don't 

751
00:39:46,640 --> 00:39:49,800
believe in themselves? 
Yeah, I know it's a it's a great

752
00:39:49,800 --> 00:39:51,680
question. 
So we when we actually like 

753
00:39:51,800 --> 00:39:58,400
rolled out this notion of 
technical DRI at Samsara, we 

754
00:39:58,400 --> 00:40:00,000
actually talked about this, 
right. 

755
00:40:00,000 --> 00:40:02,160
So we. 
We didn't think about it as a 

756
00:40:02,160 --> 00:40:06,720
binary or like only it's 
reserved for senior engineers 

757
00:40:06,720 --> 00:40:09,640
and above or like special types 
of engineers, right. 

758
00:40:09,640 --> 00:40:14,840
So we actually said we want to 
develop our entire organization 

759
00:40:14,840 --> 00:40:18,240
to build these skills. 
Like as a engineering leadership

760
00:40:18,240 --> 00:40:21,160
team, we we have a 
responsibility to develop our 

761
00:40:21,160 --> 00:40:23,400
people with these skills if 
because we believe this is 

762
00:40:23,400 --> 00:40:26,400
important for the culture of the
company, right? 

763
00:40:27,000 --> 00:40:30,840
So the way we went about this 
was two things. 

764
00:40:30,840 --> 00:40:34,280
One is meeting people where they
are like giving the scope of the

765
00:40:34,280 --> 00:40:37,320
problem that actually kind of 
stretches them like always like 

766
00:40:37,680 --> 00:40:40,880
stretch people a little bit, but
then meet people where they are.

767
00:40:40,880 --> 00:40:44,440
Like we don't want people who 
might have never done like a, 

768
00:40:45,320 --> 00:40:49,840
let's take an example, right? 
Like we had this project that we

769
00:40:49,840 --> 00:40:55,240
had to ship in four months. 
It was for a big launch moment 

770
00:40:55,240 --> 00:40:59,680
that we usually have like, you 
know, customer facing events and

771
00:41:00,080 --> 00:41:04,080
it had to chip in four months 
and then I had to personally 

772
00:41:04,080 --> 00:41:07,560
step in and say, OK, we're going
to have like this staff engineer

773
00:41:07,560 --> 00:41:11,960
lead this project because it's a
mechanism to de risk like, you 

774
00:41:11,960 --> 00:41:15,200
know, an outcome. 
So while we had really good 

775
00:41:15,200 --> 00:41:17,600
senior engineers on the team, 
it's like not like we didn't 

776
00:41:17,600 --> 00:41:20,280
have good talent. 
That was not a place to 

777
00:41:20,280 --> 00:41:23,080
experiment because you had like,
the stakes are too high. 

778
00:41:23,080 --> 00:41:24,240
It's just risk. 
Management. 

779
00:41:24,240 --> 00:41:25,000
Exactly. 
It's a risk. 

780
00:41:25,000 --> 00:41:28,040
Management thing, whereas in 
other cases where we didn't have

781
00:41:28,040 --> 00:41:32,440
that kind of like, you know, oh,
we, we're not under a clock, we 

782
00:41:32,440 --> 00:41:34,600
would take risks. 
Actually, we said like, OK, 

783
00:41:34,640 --> 00:41:37,760
let's actually have this 
engineer in a couple of cases 

784
00:41:37,760 --> 00:41:41,560
where they've motivated. 
Let's give them the role in 

785
00:41:41,560 --> 00:41:44,200
cases where people didn't want 
to push themselves or like want 

786
00:41:44,200 --> 00:41:46,360
to pick up a larger challenge, 
we would give them a little bit 

787
00:41:46,360 --> 00:41:50,480
lower scope problem and say 
like, why don't you operate in 

788
00:41:50,480 --> 00:41:52,080
this? 
But it's still like fulfills the

789
00:41:52,080 --> 00:41:55,040
role at your level, but then 
you're slowly developing these 

790
00:41:55,040 --> 00:41:57,200
skills. 
You're not in the in isolation. 

791
00:41:57,600 --> 00:42:01,680
We also went one step further 
and said we actually want our 

792
00:42:01,680 --> 00:42:03,480
junior engineers to develop 
these skills. 

793
00:42:03,680 --> 00:42:07,400
So the way we're going to do 
this is an Ng manager will be 

794
00:42:07,400 --> 00:42:11,720
their backstop, but we're going 
to teach them along the way. 

795
00:42:11,720 --> 00:42:14,040
Like you know you're building a 
feature, you're going to be a 

796
00:42:14,040 --> 00:42:16,480
technical DRI, you need to work 
with your product manager, get 

797
00:42:16,480 --> 00:42:19,400
on calls with customers. 
You will actually define the 

798
00:42:19,400 --> 00:42:24,320
solution, you will report on it,
flag to our status issues, 

799
00:42:24,320 --> 00:42:27,800
etcetera, and drive it through 
the line in terms of 

800
00:42:28,680 --> 00:42:30,760
understanding the impact of 
work, etcetera. 

801
00:42:30,760 --> 00:42:34,760
But then every step of the way 
will backstop you with an inch 

802
00:42:34,760 --> 00:42:38,000
manager supporting you, checking
in on you and making sure you 

803
00:42:38,000 --> 00:42:40,480
don't you're not stressed in 
like, you know, distressed 

804
00:42:40,480 --> 00:42:42,480
through the process. 
It's not like saying like either

805
00:42:43,000 --> 00:42:44,600
figured it out to do it or get 
out. 

806
00:42:44,600 --> 00:42:45,800
Like that's what's not the 
intent. 

807
00:42:45,800 --> 00:42:49,200
It's really like this is from an
intent of it's going to help you

808
00:42:49,200 --> 00:42:51,200
in your long term carrier. 
And I think the one of the 

809
00:42:51,200 --> 00:42:55,160
things I try to tell people I 
work with always is like, you 

810
00:42:55,160 --> 00:42:57,480
know, a lot of these skills are 
not about like, you know, just 

811
00:42:57,480 --> 00:43:01,920
point in time going to help you 
in this job where you're doing 

812
00:43:01,920 --> 00:43:03,720
today for this particular 
company. 

813
00:43:04,240 --> 00:43:06,840
These are good skills to have. 
And it's going to, you're just 

814
00:43:06,840 --> 00:43:08,800
going to be happy that you 
develop these. 

815
00:43:08,800 --> 00:43:11,240
And we're in an environment 
which wants to support you 

816
00:43:11,240 --> 00:43:12,160
through that. 
Yeah. 

817
00:43:12,560 --> 00:43:15,080
I think that's amazing. 
One of the things I'm really 

818
00:43:15,080 --> 00:43:18,280
fond of is my experience in 
operations before I did any type

819
00:43:18,280 --> 00:43:21,280
of software engineering. 
And then figuring things out 

820
00:43:21,280 --> 00:43:24,160
that are running in productions 
and issues that can arise. 

821
00:43:24,160 --> 00:43:26,920
And the experiences of fucking 
something up. 

822
00:43:26,920 --> 00:43:30,000
And then really just blowing up 
something on production and 

823
00:43:30,000 --> 00:43:32,960
immediately getting a phone call
and being like, I really don't 

824
00:43:32,960 --> 00:43:35,680
want to answer this, but like, 
clearly they know it's me, so I 

825
00:43:35,680 --> 00:43:37,160
have to. 
And owning up to that. 

826
00:43:37,880 --> 00:43:40,840
All those experiences in the 
moment, maybe not as fun, but 

827
00:43:40,840 --> 00:43:44,200
reflecting back, I'm really 
thankful for opportunities like 

828
00:43:44,200 --> 00:43:48,280
that where maybe I had a little 
bit too much responsibility or I

829
00:43:48,280 --> 00:43:50,440
don't even know and I wasn't 
even aware that this was a 

830
00:43:50,440 --> 00:43:53,760
conscious de risk opportunity 
for me to learn and grow. 

831
00:43:54,280 --> 00:43:56,360
But I'm really thankful for 
those opportunities very early 

832
00:43:56,360 --> 00:43:58,240
on because they really 
accelerate growth. 

833
00:43:58,480 --> 00:44:00,000
Yeah, I know. 
You're 100% right. 

834
00:44:00,000 --> 00:44:03,280
It actually brings a fond memory
myself when, like, I was like, 

835
00:44:03,320 --> 00:44:06,840
just a year out of school and 
like, I was now owning the 

836
00:44:06,840 --> 00:44:12,560
system at Salesforce.com. 
And my mentor who was supposed 

837
00:44:12,560 --> 00:44:15,320
to buddy with me on everything I
do, he's checking all my work. 

838
00:44:15,320 --> 00:44:19,000
He was actually on leave and the
system was owned by just the two

839
00:44:19,000 --> 00:44:19,680
of us. 
Yeah. 

840
00:44:19,920 --> 00:44:22,880
And on that particular week, it 
went off, right. 

841
00:44:24,440 --> 00:44:28,520
And I actually had like, you 
know, somebody from the customer

842
00:44:28,520 --> 00:44:31,920
success team, like at my desk 
asking, like, you know, I need 

843
00:44:31,920 --> 00:44:36,320
to report back to these really 
large big bangs on what is going

844
00:44:36,320 --> 00:44:38,320
on and, like, do you have an 
update? 

845
00:44:38,320 --> 00:44:40,560
And like, I was like, Oh my God.
Like, you know, it was like 

846
00:44:40,560 --> 00:44:41,640
panic. 
Yeah. 

847
00:44:41,640 --> 00:44:43,640
Like. 
And but I also have fond 

848
00:44:43,640 --> 00:44:46,600
memories of that time where my 
manager at the time actually 

849
00:44:46,600 --> 00:44:50,000
came to my desk and basically 
they got the customer success 

850
00:44:50,000 --> 00:44:54,120
Rep out of my way, said let him 
do his job, you can come to me 

851
00:44:54,120 --> 00:44:56,120
for status updates. 
And then he pulled me aside and 

852
00:44:56,120 --> 00:44:57,840
said, like, don't worry, just 
focus. 

853
00:44:58,000 --> 00:45:01,920
I'm here to backstop you and 
make sure like, you know, we get

854
00:45:01,920 --> 00:45:04,520
through this. 
And that actually helped me a 

855
00:45:04,520 --> 00:45:05,760
lot. 
I was able to focus. 

856
00:45:05,760 --> 00:45:08,520
And then like, we found the 
issue in like the next maybe an 

857
00:45:08,520 --> 00:45:11,000
hour or two. 
And then, yeah. 

858
00:45:11,000 --> 00:45:13,880
And I drove that entire 
postmortem process, etcetera. 

859
00:45:13,880 --> 00:45:15,560
Like when was the first time I 
were doing it? 

860
00:45:15,560 --> 00:45:20,280
The first year out of school, 
like taught me a lot and, and 

861
00:45:20,280 --> 00:45:23,480
you're totally right. 
I think the it's these 

862
00:45:23,480 --> 00:45:26,720
experience that shape you and 
the moment it feels hard, like 

863
00:45:26,720 --> 00:45:28,800
it's like people say like what 
doesn't kill you make you 

864
00:45:28,800 --> 00:45:30,200
stronger. 
It's true, right? 

865
00:45:30,200 --> 00:45:32,680
Like, you know, actually, like 
you take these experiences and 

866
00:45:32,680 --> 00:45:35,720
the next time you see it is 
like, you know, you can handle 

867
00:45:35,720 --> 00:45:39,240
it with a much calmer head. 
And you also learn. 

868
00:45:39,240 --> 00:45:41,920
And you now aspire to push 
yourself to like, OK, what else 

869
00:45:41,920 --> 00:45:43,720
can I do? 
Because you're now testing your 

870
00:45:43,720 --> 00:45:46,160
own sort of skills here. 
Absolutely. 

871
00:45:46,400 --> 00:45:49,000
One of the thoughts when you 
were explaining where we put our

872
00:45:49,000 --> 00:45:51,920
staff engineers are for projects
that really we cannot take. 

873
00:45:51,920 --> 00:45:53,640
We cannot afford to be risky 
here. 

874
00:45:53,920 --> 00:45:56,800
And then other projects where 
you can afford a little bit more

875
00:45:56,800 --> 00:46:00,200
risk, you put on engineers that 
first of all want this and have 

876
00:46:00,200 --> 00:46:03,160
to drive, but also where you're 
like, OK, I, I do think they can

877
00:46:03,160 --> 00:46:04,120
do it. 
They just have to prove 

878
00:46:04,120 --> 00:46:07,240
themselves and then you have 
opportunities where there's room

879
00:46:07,240 --> 00:46:10,480
for people early in career that 
are enabled by other engineering

880
00:46:10,480 --> 00:46:14,040
managers potentially to grow. 
I feel like if you have an 

881
00:46:14,040 --> 00:46:18,400
organization where the engineers
are very driven, you need to 

882
00:46:18,400 --> 00:46:21,240
have enough opportunity where 
they are in these positions for 

883
00:46:21,240 --> 00:46:24,120
them to learn and grow. 
If there's not opportunities and

884
00:46:24,120 --> 00:46:26,880
they get bypassed, maybe then 
there's not opportunity for 

885
00:46:26,880 --> 00:46:28,880
growth from their perspective. 
So you need to have this 

886
00:46:28,880 --> 00:46:31,160
balancing act of having the 
right people and the right 

887
00:46:31,440 --> 00:46:33,640
assignments for the job. 
Otherwise, it's a lack of 

888
00:46:33,640 --> 00:46:36,000
fulfillment. 
I'm laughing because I just 

889
00:46:36,000 --> 00:46:37,080
heard this last week. 
Well. 

890
00:46:37,160 --> 00:46:39,280
That's a recent team. 
Yeah, Yeah. 

891
00:46:39,480 --> 00:46:44,120
No, I think they, OK, I'll tell 
you the way I think about this 

892
00:46:44,120 --> 00:46:47,640
specifically, right. 
I think the reason this was this

893
00:46:47,640 --> 00:46:53,880
came up in context to us with AI
leverage and with how the 

894
00:46:53,880 --> 00:46:57,400
industry is shaping a common 
thing that most people will be 

895
00:46:57,440 --> 00:47:00,120
confronted with right now is 
like teams are going to be 

896
00:47:00,120 --> 00:47:04,960
smaller, there'll be more teams,
but smaller teams is you can get

897
00:47:04,960 --> 00:47:07,200
stuff with some degree of AI 
leverage. 

898
00:47:08,040 --> 00:47:10,400
Obviously it's not like 100% 
there, but like, you know, you 

899
00:47:10,400 --> 00:47:16,240
do get leverage, but the and a 
lot of people who get leverage 

900
00:47:16,240 --> 00:47:19,360
more are people who are a little
bit more senior, obviously, 

901
00:47:19,480 --> 00:47:21,600
right. 
So, so teams are shifting in 

902
00:47:21,600 --> 00:47:23,400
shape to be a little bit more 
senior. 

903
00:47:23,400 --> 00:47:26,640
And this is happening in across 
the industry, I would say, 

904
00:47:26,880 --> 00:47:28,040
right. 
So somebody had actually asked 

905
00:47:28,040 --> 00:47:30,480
me like, hey, but like if we 
have a little bit of a 

906
00:47:30,480 --> 00:47:34,160
composition shift, like what do 
we do for creating opportunities

907
00:47:34,160 --> 00:47:36,200
for people? 
Like very valid question, right.

908
00:47:36,960 --> 00:47:40,000
My answer to that was pretty 
much consistent and always 

909
00:47:40,000 --> 00:47:45,560
straightforward, like where we 
are not making the shift only 

910
00:47:45,560 --> 00:47:51,920
separately just on by dimension 
of saying that hey, like teams 

911
00:47:51,920 --> 00:47:53,720
are going to be a little bit 
more senior, etcetera. 

912
00:47:54,360 --> 00:47:58,000
We actually coupled that with 
also like re looking at our what

913
00:47:58,000 --> 00:48:02,400
does it mean for our engineering
hiring and also like engineering

914
00:48:02,400 --> 00:48:03,920
career ladder, for example, 
right? 

915
00:48:03,920 --> 00:48:07,120
Like most people, when you think
about why do people feel this 

916
00:48:07,120 --> 00:48:12,080
way, a lot of driven people want
to grow to the next level and 

917
00:48:12,080 --> 00:48:15,440
they actually there's an 
industry sort of meme, I would 

918
00:48:15,440 --> 00:48:19,240
say is where for you to go to a 
staff engineer, you need to lead

919
00:48:19,240 --> 00:48:20,760
an engineering team of like 10 
people. 

920
00:48:20,960 --> 00:48:23,680
That's like a meme, honestly. 
Like that's like how a lot of 

921
00:48:23,680 --> 00:48:25,400
big tech companies operate, 
right? 

922
00:48:25,720 --> 00:48:28,640
The reality is like, it doesn't 
matter, right? 

923
00:48:28,840 --> 00:48:33,160
You want to grow to US staff 
engineer, senior staff or 

924
00:48:33,160 --> 00:48:34,880
whatever. 
Like all these titles vary by 

925
00:48:34,880 --> 00:48:37,640
companies. 
So, but fundamentally when you 

926
00:48:37,640 --> 00:48:40,560
think about the skill set growth
that you're trying to deal with,

927
00:48:40,560 --> 00:48:45,040
it's like can I take on larger 
complex problems that require a 

928
00:48:45,040 --> 00:48:50,680
degree of ambiguity for me to go
unpack and the impact on the 

929
00:48:50,680 --> 00:48:53,360
business is going to be a step 
function change for the business

930
00:48:53,360 --> 00:48:55,240
in the context of public. 
That's what the definition 

931
00:48:55,240 --> 00:48:58,840
really of anybody who's a 
senior, much senior engineer is,

932
00:48:58,840 --> 00:49:02,440
right. 
Today with the world shifting, I

933
00:49:02,440 --> 00:49:06,520
think one we talked about a lot 
of more senior engineers 

934
00:49:06,920 --> 00:49:10,400
leveraging AIS junior engineers 
to work with, right? 

935
00:49:10,400 --> 00:49:14,160
So they're able to get more work
done by gaining leverage. 

936
00:49:15,120 --> 00:49:19,320
The ultimate measure of success 
for them is like, you know, did 

937
00:49:19,320 --> 00:49:21,360
I have the impact on the 
business? 

938
00:49:21,360 --> 00:49:24,080
And now we've normalized it to 
say, like, you know, you don't 

939
00:49:24,080 --> 00:49:26,000
need to actually like meet a 
bunch of people. 

940
00:49:26,000 --> 00:49:30,200
That was just an industry norm 
in the past and I actually drove

941
00:49:30,200 --> 00:49:32,840
this process at Samsara to say 
like, you know, we will 

942
00:49:32,840 --> 00:49:38,760
celebrate engineering depth, we 
will celebrate impact for what 

943
00:49:38,760 --> 00:49:40,960
you have on the business. 
If you are an individual 

944
00:49:40,960 --> 00:49:44,200
contributor, you're an IC 
engineer, you could get to like 

945
00:49:44,200 --> 00:49:48,880
the most highest level by having
an impact on the business and 

946
00:49:49,280 --> 00:49:52,440
also like, you know, just be an 
individual contributor without 

947
00:49:52,440 --> 00:49:54,800
the need to be like, oh, I need 
to be managing A-Team or like, 

948
00:49:54,800 --> 00:49:57,400
you know, I need to be the more 
senior person in the team. 

949
00:49:57,400 --> 00:50:00,200
So, so that's one thing we've 
tried to squash and move along, 

950
00:50:00,360 --> 00:50:03,840
right. 
The second part, which you asked

951
00:50:03,840 --> 00:50:06,360
about is like the opportunities,
creating opportunities. 

952
00:50:06,960 --> 00:50:09,920
We've actually flipped the 
script here to say a product 

953
00:50:09,920 --> 00:50:13,320
engineer needs to go learn about
the customer and the business. 

954
00:50:14,240 --> 00:50:18,520
So my view on this is especially
for engineers who needs to grow 

955
00:50:18,520 --> 00:50:22,120
beyond a certain level. 
If you are an engineer who 

956
00:50:22,120 --> 00:50:25,120
actually comes and asks me tell 
me what to do, you already 

957
00:50:25,120 --> 00:50:28,160
failed the test. 
Like my expectation is we'll 

958
00:50:28,160 --> 00:50:31,280
build you an environment where 
like you actually have access to

959
00:50:31,280 --> 00:50:35,760
customers, you understand the 
business strategy, you actually 

960
00:50:36,640 --> 00:50:39,680
like, you know, have access to 
all the data from what's 

961
00:50:39,680 --> 00:50:42,080
happening internally in terms of
product usage, etcetera. 

962
00:50:42,560 --> 00:50:47,520
We want people to actually come 
to us and tell us what to do, 

963
00:50:47,880 --> 00:50:52,040
not necessarily like me 
prescribing or like, you know, 

964
00:50:52,040 --> 00:50:54,720
this is what you need to do. 
And that's the type of engineers

965
00:50:54,720 --> 00:50:58,040
that are going to thrive. 
Like, you know, it's at some 

966
00:50:58,040 --> 00:51:00,640
sort of today, but also I think 
in the industry over time, 

967
00:51:00,800 --> 00:51:04,520
right. 
So the so that's what I would 

968
00:51:04,520 --> 00:51:06,640
tell people. 
And I think the two things that 

969
00:51:06,640 --> 00:51:09,840
needs to transform is like 
companies in the industry need 

970
00:51:09,840 --> 00:51:13,120
to move along from this idea of 
like, you know, you only go to 

971
00:51:13,120 --> 00:51:16,160
bigger engineers by like leading
larger projects that that means 

972
00:51:16,160 --> 00:51:19,440
like larger lots of people that 
I think needs to shift along and

973
00:51:19,440 --> 00:51:21,000
I think it is shifting along and
Italy. 

974
00:51:21,000 --> 00:51:24,760
And the second part is the 
environment you want to create 

975
00:51:24,760 --> 00:51:28,680
is for people to understand, 
create opportunities, etcetera, 

976
00:51:28,680 --> 00:51:33,280
not just be limited by like 
opportunities being created a 

977
00:51:33,280 --> 00:51:36,640
little bit top down, ish, right.
So, so that I think is extremely

978
00:51:36,640 --> 00:51:40,280
important. 
I can give you an example to 

979
00:51:40,280 --> 00:51:43,240
make it practical. 
I had hired this engineer who 

980
00:51:43,240 --> 00:51:47,240
recently joined us and I had 
originally told him go work on 

981
00:51:47,240 --> 00:51:51,840
this problem, right? 
Yeah, he came to me in a month 

982
00:51:51,840 --> 00:51:53,800
after looking at that problem 
and told me that's not an 

983
00:51:53,800 --> 00:51:56,680
important problem. 
I was like, OK, yeah, some. 

984
00:51:56,680 --> 00:51:58,280
Confidence. 
Doing that is good, yes. 

985
00:51:59,320 --> 00:52:03,480
And because I think what he was 
doing was he was observing where

986
00:52:03,480 --> 00:52:06,920
all the engineering resourcing 
was going, what is the more 

987
00:52:06,920 --> 00:52:08,680
important problem and what is 
the complexity. 

988
00:52:08,680 --> 00:52:11,360
And he was just like learning 
about all the different product 

989
00:52:11,360 --> 00:52:13,520
investments happening. 
He was a much senior engineer, 

990
00:52:13,520 --> 00:52:16,800
so he'd, he did, I feel like 
giving coming in. 

991
00:52:16,800 --> 00:52:20,440
He was a very senior engineer. 
So he had the he felt he had the

992
00:52:20,440 --> 00:52:23,600
agency and like to do it right. 
And yeah, but I loved it that he

993
00:52:23,600 --> 00:52:25,480
came and told me like, no, I 
actually want to work on this 

994
00:52:25,480 --> 00:52:27,400
other problem. 
And I told him why. 

995
00:52:27,400 --> 00:52:30,080
And then he actually said like, 
you know, hey, like I think the 

996
00:52:30,080 --> 00:52:32,600
current team is like a little 
bit struggling there. 

997
00:52:33,160 --> 00:52:35,560
I think I have some of these 
skills which and I have also 

998
00:52:35,560 --> 00:52:37,640
like a better idea of doing it. 
So so I said, OK, you have my 

999
00:52:37,640 --> 00:52:39,040
blessing. 
Go do it right. 

1000
00:52:39,320 --> 00:52:43,120
So he jumped on it and I, my 
original intent was to hey, like

1001
00:52:43,560 --> 00:52:45,680
he was going to work on the 
project and be done right. 

1002
00:52:45,680 --> 00:52:49,440
So later he comes and tells me I
actually under like to develop 

1003
00:52:49,520 --> 00:52:52,080
the solution end to end. 
We also have some platform 

1004
00:52:52,080 --> 00:52:55,080
dependencies which is owned by 
another team and I need them to 

1005
00:52:55,080 --> 00:52:57,200
do something. 
I'm going to actually jump in 

1006
00:52:57,200 --> 00:53:00,520
and work with them and build 
this platform capability which 

1007
00:53:00,520 --> 00:53:03,680
is going to help ship this 
product, but also guess what, 

1008
00:53:03,680 --> 00:53:06,080
ship five other things which we 
want to do in the next year. 

1009
00:53:06,240 --> 00:53:10,200
Yeah, right. 
So he did that on his own, like 

1010
00:53:10,200 --> 00:53:11,440
I didn't tell him. 
Right. 

1011
00:53:11,760 --> 00:53:14,280
So you did enable him, that's 
correct. 

1012
00:53:14,280 --> 00:53:18,720
Yeah. 
So the general point here is 

1013
00:53:18,720 --> 00:53:21,120
like, you know, you can operate 
this way. 

1014
00:53:21,280 --> 00:53:24,840
Like it's just really you have 
to find the environment that 

1015
00:53:24,840 --> 00:53:26,960
enables you. 
And these are obviously like the

1016
00:53:26,960 --> 00:53:29,480
example that I called about is 
like somebody who's a very 

1017
00:53:29,480 --> 00:53:33,840
senior engineer. 
But my thing that I try to tell 

1018
00:53:33,840 --> 00:53:36,320
people on my team is like, I 
would do that for anybody, 

1019
00:53:36,720 --> 00:53:37,920
right? 
Like, and that's the environment

1020
00:53:37,920 --> 00:53:40,240
I want. 
Like, you know, you, you should 

1021
00:53:40,240 --> 00:53:42,920
come and feel empowered to have 
conversations. 

1022
00:53:42,920 --> 00:53:45,600
I think the only thing is like, 
usually as you go higher in 

1023
00:53:45,600 --> 00:53:47,800
levels in companies, you just 
get access to more context. 

1024
00:53:47,800 --> 00:53:50,360
And like, that's something that 
it's on us to share with more 

1025
00:53:50,360 --> 00:53:52,800
people, right? 
So, yeah. 

1026
00:53:52,800 --> 00:53:56,000
So that's the main way I think 
about it. 

1027
00:53:56,800 --> 00:53:57,240
Yeah. 
I love. 

1028
00:53:57,240 --> 00:54:01,640
That a lot, I think in 
environments where ideas win and

1029
00:54:01,640 --> 00:54:03,920
it doesn't matter where you come
from or what your role or title 

1030
00:54:03,920 --> 00:54:06,040
is or how much experience you 
have, even if you have the 

1031
00:54:06,040 --> 00:54:09,040
feeling of this might be a good 
idea and there's room for you to

1032
00:54:09,040 --> 00:54:12,440
have that conversation and to 
execute then on opportunities as

1033
00:54:12,440 --> 00:54:14,680
well. 
That's just from a fulfilment 

1034
00:54:14,680 --> 00:54:15,880
level. 
I think that's going to be a 

1035
00:54:15,880 --> 00:54:18,000
blast. 
Operating in specifically. 

1036
00:54:18,120 --> 00:54:21,200
Yeah, before we round off, we've
talked to product management, 

1037
00:54:21,200 --> 00:54:24,160
but also or product engineering,
but also organizational culture.

1038
00:54:24,160 --> 00:54:26,800
Is there anything you still want
to share before we round off? 

1039
00:54:28,400 --> 00:54:31,600
No, I think the, the only thing 
I would say is like, you know, 

1040
00:54:31,600 --> 00:54:35,760
when I look back at my career, 
whatever helped me, if I were to

1041
00:54:35,760 --> 00:54:41,440
summarize it, it, it comes down 
to like fundamentally like 3 

1042
00:54:41,440 --> 00:54:44,040
things. 
I would say 1 is a little bit of

1043
00:54:44,040 --> 00:54:46,960
an obsession to understand the 
impact of the work that I'm 

1044
00:54:46,960 --> 00:54:48,480
doing. 
Like, you know, and it's 

1045
00:54:48,480 --> 00:54:50,400
actually extremely fulfilling 
when you do that. 

1046
00:54:50,480 --> 00:54:55,400
I would say like, you know, so 
that's something that's I think 

1047
00:54:55,400 --> 00:54:58,360
I would encourage people to 
really lean in and understand 

1048
00:54:58,360 --> 00:55:01,000
why am I doing, what am I doing?
Like answer your why, like you 

1049
00:55:01,000 --> 00:55:05,040
know, and so you find the work 
that you actually like, you 

1050
00:55:05,040 --> 00:55:09,240
know, enjoy doing the most and 
then while you do it, 

1051
00:55:09,680 --> 00:55:11,440
demonstrate curiosity and focus,
right? 

1052
00:55:11,440 --> 00:55:13,600
So I think that helps you do 
that really well. 

1053
00:55:14,240 --> 00:55:17,600
But I think ultimately I found 
joy in like finding work because

1054
00:55:17,600 --> 00:55:22,200
based on the impact that we do, 
like, I think at Samsara, it's 

1055
00:55:22,200 --> 00:55:26,320
like very real world as it gets 
on the products I work on, like 

1056
00:55:26,320 --> 00:55:28,320
it has an impact on people's 
lives. 

1057
00:55:28,320 --> 00:55:31,040
Like we do things which affect 
safety in the real world. 

1058
00:55:31,040 --> 00:55:35,200
We do work on like, you know, 
running the world more 

1059
00:55:35,200 --> 00:55:37,360
efficiently and like being more 
sustainable. 

1060
00:55:37,360 --> 00:55:42,240
It it speaks to me in terms of 
meaning and like the how we do 

1061
00:55:42,240 --> 00:55:43,600
it. 
This where I have most fun 

1062
00:55:43,600 --> 00:55:48,360
because trying to foster an 
environment of like, you know, 

1063
00:55:48,360 --> 00:55:52,360
having a lot of talented, 
curious people and enabling them

1064
00:55:52,400 --> 00:55:56,200
and like working on these 
solutions, which are very 

1065
00:55:56,200 --> 00:56:00,680
meaningful for the world in a 
way where you are applying a lot

1066
00:56:00,680 --> 00:56:06,000
of cutting edge technologies 
that's enabling it today. 

1067
00:56:06,000 --> 00:56:09,040
It's like incredibly fun. 
So I think I'd, I'd encourage 

1068
00:56:09,040 --> 00:56:12,680
people to like, you know, find 
what's fun for them and the 

1069
00:56:12,680 --> 00:56:15,920
usual way to go about this, 
like, you know, answer your why.

1070
00:56:15,920 --> 00:56:19,720
And also for optimizing your 
career, just think about like 

1071
00:56:20,360 --> 00:56:23,960
the impact that you could be 
driving because every company 

1072
00:56:23,960 --> 00:56:26,800
out there will want people who 
can like kind of multiply the 

1073
00:56:26,800 --> 00:56:28,360
impact they are having in the 
real world. 

1074
00:56:28,720 --> 00:56:30,560
Yeah, thank you so much for 
coming on and sharing. 

1075
00:56:30,560 --> 00:56:31,920
Of course. 
Yeah, awesome. 

1076
00:56:32,360 --> 00:56:34,400
We'll round it off here. 
If you're still listening, let 

1077
00:56:34,400 --> 00:56:36,040
us know in the comments section 
what you thought of this 

1078
00:56:36,040 --> 00:56:38,080
episode, and otherwise we'll see
you in the next one.