1 00:00:38,069 --> 00:00:41,459 ​ W. Curtis Preston: hi, and welcome to Backup Central's Restore it All podcast. 2 00:00:41,459 --> 00:00:44,099 I'm a host w Curtis Preston, aka Mr. 3 00:00:44,099 --> 00:00:49,629 Backup, and I have with me my software troubles consultant, Prasanna Malaiyandi. 4 00:00:49,629 --> 00:00:50,619 How's it going, Prasanna? 5 00:00:50,924 --> 00:00:51,614 Prasanna Malaiyandi: I'm good. 6 00:00:51,614 --> 00:00:52,634 I'm good Curtis. 7 00:00:52,634 --> 00:00:54,434 And like software troubles. 8 00:00:54,434 --> 00:00:55,274 You should expect it. 9 00:00:55,274 --> 00:00:57,434 You've been in the industry for how long now? 10 00:00:57,434 --> 00:00:57,824 Like it 11 00:00:57,959 --> 00:01:01,289 W. Curtis Preston: I know, but I, I, you know, that I generally don't 12 00:01:01,289 --> 00:01:06,494 like, I generally, so like, I like tech and then like, I like working 13 00:01:06,494 --> 00:01:10,874 on tech, but then I like using tech and the tech that I'm using. 14 00:01:10,964 --> 00:01:12,224 I just want it to work. 15 00:01:12,414 --> 00:01:15,144 I'm not TiVo anymore, but you know, when I had the TiVo, that's why I 16 00:01:15,144 --> 00:01:17,724 opted for TiVo and not Linux box. 17 00:01:17,909 --> 00:01:21,749 With hard drive in some software that will record my TV stream, right? 18 00:01:22,139 --> 00:01:25,259 Um, the stuff that I actually use on a day to day basis. 19 00:01:25,259 --> 00:01:27,509 I want to just, I want it to just work. 20 00:01:27,514 --> 00:01:34,589 And I've broken that trend by, uh, upgrading a tool that I love, right? 21 00:01:34,589 --> 00:01:38,549 I love descript, but I've decided to go on the bleeding edge with 22 00:01:38,779 --> 00:01:42,329 their new version, which is amazing. 23 00:01:42,999 --> 00:01:48,039 But it's in beta and I'm and I'm using a beta tool for the first time. 24 00:01:48,039 --> 00:01:49,269 And I'm like, I don't know. 25 00:01:49,269 --> 00:01:52,299 I push this button and it doesn't, it doesn't do the thing. 26 00:01:52,419 --> 00:01:52,839 Right. 27 00:01:52,839 --> 00:01:53,709 And then, yeah, 28 00:01:54,249 --> 00:01:56,319 Prasanna Malaiyandi: But, but, but at least you have to hand it 29 00:01:56,319 --> 00:02:00,669 to the descript support folks for actually like, taking your calls and 30 00:02:00,669 --> 00:02:02,589 your chats and your emails, Right. 31 00:02:02,589 --> 00:02:04,319 And be like, Hey, let me walk you through that. 32 00:02:04,899 --> 00:02:06,189 W. Curtis Preston: they're good with live chat. 33 00:02:06,189 --> 00:02:07,809 Although there's been a handful where. 34 00:02:09,189 --> 00:02:12,129 Where at some point they're like, you know, I think it's 35 00:02:12,129 --> 00:02:14,799 best to transfer this to email. 36 00:02:15,069 --> 00:02:17,349 That's when you know, you've put, you've asked like one too 37 00:02:17,349 --> 00:02:19,059 many questions in a support chat. 38 00:02:19,509 --> 00:02:22,209 They're like, I think maybe you should put all your questions in an email. 39 00:02:22,209 --> 00:02:24,279 I'm like, But that's not, that's not how my brain works. 40 00:02:24,279 --> 00:02:26,469 Like I, I get a question, I get it answered. 41 00:02:26,469 --> 00:02:29,169 I work for a little bit a while and then I get another question, you know? 42 00:02:29,409 --> 00:02:30,669 Um, yeah. 43 00:02:30,789 --> 00:02:31,689 Anyway, so 44 00:02:31,764 --> 00:02:33,924 Prasanna Malaiyandi: sometimes it unblocks you and then you like hit the next 45 00:02:33,924 --> 00:02:35,364 thing and you're like, Oh, what is this? 46 00:02:35,634 --> 00:02:39,024 Which is why if you're a good product manager, right, you go in front 47 00:02:39,024 --> 00:02:41,514 of customers and you're like, Hey, show me what you're doing and let me 48 00:02:41,514 --> 00:02:43,914 figure out like what your problems are, what your pain points are, 49 00:02:44,184 --> 00:02:45,594 what features I should be building? 50 00:02:46,164 --> 00:02:46,614 W. Curtis Preston: Yeah. 51 00:02:46,644 --> 00:02:49,914 And, and it is, it is kind of funny though that I now, I'm like 52 00:02:49,919 --> 00:02:54,594 on a first name basis with like four or so of their, of their, uh, 53 00:02:54,714 --> 00:02:56,834 Prasanna Malaiyandi: shout out to the descript support team 54 00:02:56,874 --> 00:02:57,144 W. Curtis Preston: Yeah. 55 00:02:57,144 --> 00:03:00,129 Shout out to for putting up with my, uh, my questions. 56 00:03:00,189 --> 00:03:04,089 Cause it's like, it's a combination of, the new version is significantly 57 00:03:04,094 --> 00:03:05,169 different than the old version. 58 00:03:05,919 --> 00:03:09,909 Um, and so it's a, it's a combination between Is this the way it's 59 00:03:09,909 --> 00:03:14,199 supposed to work now or is this the way it's supposed to work? 60 00:03:15,204 --> 00:03:15,714 Prasanna Malaiyandi: Well, and 61 00:03:15,714 --> 00:03:15,804 I 62 00:03:15,819 --> 00:03:16,509 W. Curtis Preston: think it's broken. 63 00:03:17,004 --> 00:03:18,894 Prasanna Malaiyandi: And I think for a lot of the features, right, 64 00:03:18,894 --> 00:03:20,214 they're building the right things. 65 00:03:20,214 --> 00:03:23,124 Like just talking to you like they've optimized some of your flows and some of 66 00:03:23,124 --> 00:03:26,694 the things that you've spent so much time working on in the past, right? 67 00:03:26,694 --> 00:03:29,754 So it's going to get there, It's just, it's gonna take a little bit of time. 68 00:03:30,219 --> 00:03:32,229 W. Curtis Preston: But it's been, it's been a difficult 69 00:03:32,529 --> 00:03:33,909 couple of weeks, you know? 70 00:03:34,179 --> 00:03:38,349 Um, anyway, let's bring on our longtime friend. 71 00:03:38,769 --> 00:03:45,069 Uh, I, I've known him for, I don't know, for forever, and he's for, he's 72 00:03:45,074 --> 00:03:47,449 been on the podcast multiple times. 73 00:03:47,979 --> 00:03:52,269 You may remember him from, from such hits as how does Hollywood do backup? 74 00:03:52,629 --> 00:03:55,059 And, uh, he is also. 75 00:03:55,289 --> 00:04:00,659 A, uh, a co-author on my book, uh, latest book, uh, Modern Data 76 00:04:00,664 --> 00:04:06,029 Protection, which by the way, you can get free by going to druva.com/ebook. 77 00:04:06,389 --> 00:04:10,499 And, um, he wrote the chapter that we're gonna talk about today 78 00:04:10,859 --> 00:04:12,839 in our Back to basic series. 79 00:04:13,169 --> 00:04:17,279 He is now the head of Technical Operations for Frame Store, a 80 00:04:17,279 --> 00:04:19,649 visual effects studio in Hollywood. 81 00:04:19,919 --> 00:04:22,969 Welcome to the podcast Jeff Rochlin. 82 00:04:24,454 --> 00:04:24,874 Jeff Rochlin: Hey. 83 00:04:24,909 --> 00:04:25,029 Prasanna Malaiyandi: Yeah. 84 00:04:26,699 --> 00:04:27,369 . . Woo-hoo. 85 00:04:27,954 --> 00:04:28,614 Jeff Rochlin: Hi guys. 86 00:04:28,614 --> 00:04:29,184 How are ya? 87 00:04:29,649 --> 00:04:30,609 W. Curtis Preston: How's it going, Jeff? 88 00:04:30,884 --> 00:04:31,534 Jeff Rochlin: It's going. 89 00:04:31,534 --> 00:04:32,364 It's going well. 90 00:04:32,544 --> 00:04:32,874 It's going. 91 00:04:33,039 --> 00:04:37,269 W. Curtis Preston: It, it's, uh, it, it is it nice to be back? 92 00:04:37,269 --> 00:04:41,409 Cuz I know for a while you weren't, you weren't, you, you've always 93 00:04:41,409 --> 00:04:44,889 enjoyed sort of combining the tech side of you and the, and the, you 94 00:04:44,889 --> 00:04:46,419 know, the entertainment side of you. 95 00:04:46,419 --> 00:04:50,799 And for a while you weren't in that space Right now it's good to be 96 00:04:50,799 --> 00:04:54,129 back with, you're a full person. 97 00:04:54,129 --> 00:04:57,729 You get to be in entertainment and be in tech at the same time. 98 00:04:58,179 --> 00:04:58,929 Jeff Rochlin: definitely. 99 00:04:58,989 --> 00:05:00,849 Um, I love the creative. 100 00:05:01,329 --> 00:05:01,974 Part of it. 101 00:05:01,974 --> 00:05:05,754 And I love dealing with the crazy people that make creative things. 102 00:05:05,754 --> 00:05:09,564 And so it's, that's, that's why I've spent, you know, the better part 103 00:05:09,564 --> 00:05:13,914 of the last 30 years working at, um, uh, some kind of movie studios, 104 00:05:14,424 --> 00:05:20,304 preferably in production and not, you know, it cause anybody, this will get 105 00:05:20,304 --> 00:05:22,644 me in trouble, anybody can do email. 106 00:05:22,704 --> 00:05:26,754 But, you know, dealing, dealing with the, dealing with the executive 107 00:05:26,754 --> 00:05:30,384 producer who's trying to get his movie out on time is a different kind of, 108 00:05:31,374 --> 00:05:34,824 Prasanna Malaiyandi: Yeah, I can only imagine the pressure with that 109 00:05:35,994 --> 00:05:40,494 Jeff Rochlin: Um, yeah, the, the only place I've worked in the past that 110 00:05:40,494 --> 00:05:44,664 where the pressure was worse in a different kind of way was Wall Street. 111 00:05:45,564 --> 00:05:48,144 Working on a trading floor in Wall Street is a different piece also, 112 00:05:48,834 --> 00:05:49,044 but 113 00:05:49,284 --> 00:05:51,264 W. Curtis Preston: cuz that's where like you're, you know, you're making a 114 00:05:51,264 --> 00:05:53,745 trade or you're trying to make a trade or you're trying to make thousands of 115 00:05:53,750 --> 00:05:56,844 trades and suddenly the system goes down. 116 00:05:57,459 --> 00:05:57,789 Jeff Rochlin: Right? 117 00:05:58,149 --> 00:06:00,039 And it's, and it's all time critical, right? 118 00:06:00,039 --> 00:06:03,279 Because the price is not sitting static waiting for you to close the trade. 119 00:06:03,549 --> 00:06:06,879 If you don't buy it right now, then five minutes from now it's gonna be, you know, 120 00:06:06,879 --> 00:06:10,539 a hundred million dollars more in cost and there goes your profit margin, right? 121 00:06:10,689 --> 00:06:11,349 So, 122 00:06:11,394 --> 00:06:11,694 W. Curtis Preston: Yeah. 123 00:06:11,694 --> 00:06:16,104 Which is why, at least in in my IT experience, and I spent a, I spent a good 124 00:06:16,104 --> 00:06:19,854 time in and outta Wall Street and working with other consultants that I knew that 125 00:06:19,854 --> 00:06:24,804 were working on Wall Street, and I, I got the sense, it was the one place that I've 126 00:06:24,804 --> 00:06:27,864 seen where it's like money is no object. 127 00:06:27,864 --> 00:06:30,324 So they do, they do what is right. 128 00:06:30,834 --> 00:06:35,124 To, um, to have fully, highly available systems. 129 00:06:35,514 --> 00:06:39,084 Um, and I, I'd say Hollywood might be right behind that, right? 130 00:06:39,089 --> 00:06:43,824 Because you've got all these super expensive actors, um, and super expensive, 131 00:06:43,824 --> 00:06:45,294 you know, both above and below the line. 132 00:06:45,299 --> 00:06:47,334 People see, I learned from you, I learned that 133 00:06:47,379 --> 00:06:47,859 Jeff Rochlin: You did. 134 00:06:47,919 --> 00:06:48,069 you. 135 00:06:48,069 --> 00:06:48,399 did. 136 00:06:48,414 --> 00:06:52,174 W. Curtis Preston: Uh, and, and they're all sitting there and, and 137 00:06:52,174 --> 00:06:55,314 you know, and if, and if they can't do it because the computers are down, 138 00:06:55,994 --> 00:06:56,444 Prasanna Malaiyandi: what? 139 00:06:56,474 --> 00:06:58,394 What's above and below the lo line? 140 00:06:58,394 --> 00:06:58,784 By the way, 141 00:06:59,184 --> 00:06:59,364 W. Curtis Preston: oh. 142 00:07:01,224 --> 00:07:05,414 Jeff Rochlin: anybody in the creative titles, actors, directors, producers, 143 00:07:05,419 --> 00:07:07,794 writers are called Above the line. 144 00:07:08,319 --> 00:07:12,759 Um, anybody in the skilled trades and the crew, right? 145 00:07:12,839 --> 00:07:18,519 The, the camera, the, uh, the gaffer, who's the electrician, uh, you know, 146 00:07:18,519 --> 00:07:19,959 those kind of got the stage hands. 147 00:07:19,959 --> 00:07:20,829 Those are below the line. 148 00:07:21,729 --> 00:07:25,959 Um, and the best way to describe it is, I guess if you watch the credits of a 149 00:07:26,049 --> 00:07:31,539 movie, um, at the end, you know, they always run the, the cast gets their, 150 00:07:31,539 --> 00:07:34,899 their individual cards and the people who wrote the movie get their cards, 151 00:07:34,899 --> 00:07:36,639 and then it goes into that long scroll. 152 00:07:37,074 --> 00:07:40,884 Of everybody else that's kind of above and below the line, you know, visually. 153 00:07:41,304 --> 00:07:41,784 Um, 154 00:07:42,744 --> 00:07:42,984 Prasanna Malaiyandi: Interesting. 155 00:07:42,989 --> 00:07:43,194 Yeah. 156 00:07:44,064 --> 00:07:47,514 Jeff Rochlin: so Hollywood is kind of always walking that middle line between, 157 00:07:47,514 --> 00:07:51,354 I wanna, I want perfection and I really don't want to have to pay for it. 158 00:07:51,909 --> 00:07:52,569 You know what I mean? 159 00:07:52,689 --> 00:07:54,879 Which is sort of what the rest of the world is doing as well. 160 00:07:55,149 --> 00:08:00,159 Um, how can I strike the balance so that I know I'll get a hundred percent of what 161 00:08:00,159 --> 00:08:04,749 I need and yet at the same time, not have to spend the money to, to make it happen? 162 00:08:05,199 --> 00:08:09,969 Uh, backups are a, backups and storage in a production are a 163 00:08:09,969 --> 00:08:11,259 perfect example of this, right? 164 00:08:11,259 --> 00:08:15,069 Because artists iterate their work over and over and over again. 165 00:08:15,069 --> 00:08:18,639 They create a lot of files at the end of the day that they don't need because. 166 00:08:19,269 --> 00:08:22,629 They've done, you know, they've done 20 versions of the scene and the 167 00:08:22,689 --> 00:08:24,339 21st is the one they're gonna use. 168 00:08:24,849 --> 00:08:27,699 Um, and then you go back to them and say, We're out of space. 169 00:08:27,699 --> 00:08:28,449 Go clean up. 170 00:08:28,869 --> 00:08:31,959 And they look at you like, Well, I don't have time to clean up. 171 00:08:31,959 --> 00:08:33,219 I'm busy making art. 172 00:08:33,219 --> 00:08:36,429 If you want somebody to clean up, then I can't make art. 173 00:08:36,489 --> 00:08:36,669 Right. 174 00:08:37,119 --> 00:08:39,459 . And you're looking at 'em and going, Well, I can go spend a hundred 175 00:08:39,459 --> 00:08:43,089 thousand dollars and buy more storage for you to put more stuff on. 176 00:08:43,809 --> 00:08:46,749 But eventually somebody's gotta clean this up cuz you don't need that storage. 177 00:08:47,604 --> 00:08:52,584 Um, and that's been a kind of a standard theme throughout my career in Hollywood. 178 00:08:53,034 --> 00:08:56,604 Um, they, they are upset when it's broken. 179 00:08:56,664 --> 00:09:00,804 They, it costs them a lot of extra money to make up for it when it's broken, right? 180 00:09:00,804 --> 00:09:04,374 Because over time on skilled trade and union people is not cheap. 181 00:09:04,974 --> 00:09:08,704 Um, and so we do everything we can to make sure that it doesn't break.. 182 00:09:09,344 --> 00:09:12,549 Prasanna Malaiyandi: And I'm guessing, like especially with Hollywood, right, 183 00:09:12,579 --> 00:09:17,919 when you're producing or creating right, uh, content, right, Those are 184 00:09:17,924 --> 00:09:20,829 like significantly large files, right? 185 00:09:21,279 --> 00:09:24,699 Uh, like you said, if you're doing like 21 versions of it, right? 186 00:09:24,939 --> 00:09:27,519 The only other industries I could really think of that are similar is 187 00:09:27,519 --> 00:09:34,089 probably things in like the, uh, genome space or the mining space, right? 188 00:09:34,089 --> 00:09:37,239 Where you just have a whole bunch of data all coming in at once, but. 189 00:09:37,824 --> 00:09:41,604 Jeff Rochlin: And we're in, uh, from a, like a rendering, the, the final 190 00:09:41,604 --> 00:09:44,244 stage of production compute process. 191 00:09:44,484 --> 00:09:46,554 It's the same kind of technology being used, right? 192 00:09:46,554 --> 00:09:51,534 We run supercomputing clusters on the back end to render large projects, uh, 193 00:09:51,564 --> 00:09:56,634 just like oil and gas, use supercomputing clusters to analyze data to figure 194 00:09:56,634 --> 00:09:57,864 out where to drill next, right? 195 00:09:58,434 --> 00:10:04,569 Um, and as the, the beautiful picture that you get on your TV at home gets 196 00:10:04,569 --> 00:10:10,539 better and better when it moves from two K to 4k to eight K to 16 K plugged 197 00:10:10,544 --> 00:10:14,739 directly into the headset that's connected into your cerebral cortex so that you're 198 00:10:14,739 --> 00:10:19,869 living in the picture , that the files get exponentially larger every time. 199 00:10:19,869 --> 00:10:20,229 Right. 200 00:10:20,439 --> 00:10:24,939 Um, and I think I did the math for you a long time ago where, think about a. 201 00:10:25,794 --> 00:10:31,944 From the perspective of there are 23 frames, still pictures in every 202 00:10:31,944 --> 00:10:35,064 second of the film, and the film averages two and a half hours. 203 00:10:35,574 --> 00:10:35,784 Right. 204 00:10:36,084 --> 00:10:38,274 That's a lot of, that's a lot of images, 205 00:10:38,904 --> 00:10:39,264 W. Curtis Preston: Right. 206 00:10:39,854 --> 00:10:42,654 And, and, you know, and, and I'm glad, I'm glad we sort of started with this 207 00:10:42,654 --> 00:10:47,304 part of the discussion because what we wanted to talk about, you know, this is 208 00:10:47,304 --> 00:10:51,124 our back to basic series and I'll take this opportunity to do our disclaimer, 209 00:10:51,274 --> 00:10:54,814 Um, uh, Prasanna and I and Jeff, we all work for different companies. 210 00:10:55,024 --> 00:10:59,524 I work for Druva, Prasanna works for Zoom, and Jeff works for Frame Store. 211 00:10:59,524 --> 00:11:00,844 We're not speaking for our companies. 212 00:11:00,849 --> 00:11:05,254 We're speaking, uh, our individual, um, uh, opinions. 213 00:11:05,464 --> 00:11:10,384 And uh, also if you would like to rate us, we'd love you to do that. 214 00:11:10,624 --> 00:11:10,804 We're. 215 00:11:12,214 --> 00:11:17,944 Running our Santa Claus special . If you, if you want to see this beard get 216 00:11:17,944 --> 00:11:22,774 longer and longer to turn into a Santa Claus beard by Christmas, then uh, 217 00:11:22,804 --> 00:11:27,124 you know, you gotta get us a few more comments in, uh, specifically in iTunes. 218 00:11:27,124 --> 00:11:31,054 So go to the iTunes, just scroll to the bottom, you know, click on and give us 219 00:11:31,054 --> 00:11:32,554 a, give us a rating, give us a comment. 220 00:11:33,184 --> 00:11:36,844 And, um, if you'd like to be a part of this conversation, please reach 221 00:11:36,844 --> 00:11:41,134 out to me at WC preston on Twitter or w Curtis Preston on gmail. 222 00:11:41,719 --> 00:11:47,299 And, um, so we, we've been doing this back to the basics, uh, series, Jeff. 223 00:11:47,359 --> 00:11:52,369 And, uh, so basically I'm, I'm pulling out, you know, my favorite book, Modern 224 00:11:52,429 --> 00:11:56,059 Modern Data Protection, which you may recall having, having a part in. 225 00:11:56,509 --> 00:12:00,899 And, um, we already did chapter one, it was Why We back up. 226 00:12:00,899 --> 00:12:01,889 Right, Right. 227 00:12:01,889 --> 00:12:04,949 Risks, what are all the things that, that could do damage to data. 228 00:12:06,209 --> 00:12:10,994 and what I really want, you know, we talk a lot about, in the backup space, we 229 00:12:10,994 --> 00:12:18,464 talk a lot about, um, the fact that too many times, those of us in technology, 230 00:12:19,434 --> 00:12:24,494 we focus only on the technology, and then we find ourself asking questions, kind of 231 00:12:24,494 --> 00:12:25,634 like you were talking about the stores. 232 00:12:25,814 --> 00:12:27,134 Well, what should my retention be? 233 00:12:27,494 --> 00:12:27,764 Right? 234 00:12:27,824 --> 00:12:29,534 How long should I keep my backups? 235 00:12:29,684 --> 00:12:32,354 How long, how, how often should I do backups? 236 00:12:32,354 --> 00:12:32,564 Right? 237 00:12:32,569 --> 00:12:35,714 What, So, and you know, and how quickly should I backup and how 238 00:12:35,714 --> 00:12:37,334 quickly should I be able to restore? 239 00:12:37,424 --> 00:12:41,294 And what I'm constantly telling people is, you should not be 240 00:12:41,294 --> 00:12:43,034 the one answering this question. 241 00:12:43,909 --> 00:12:49,099 You should always go back to the business because the business is 242 00:12:49,099 --> 00:12:50,839 why you are doing what you're doing. 243 00:12:51,319 --> 00:12:56,599 And so, Chapter two is about, um, gathering and determining 244 00:12:56,599 --> 00:12:57,399 your service levels. 245 00:12:57,449 --> 00:13:00,389 we have to realize what our organization does, whether it's 246 00:13:00,389 --> 00:13:03,119 a government organization or a business organization, and I think 247 00:13:03,119 --> 00:13:04,919 you always understood that role. 248 00:13:06,029 --> 00:13:07,049 Jeff Rochlin: Um, yeah. 249 00:13:07,259 --> 00:13:13,229 Well, so one of the things that we do as workers at any particular company we 250 00:13:13,229 --> 00:13:15,469 go to is we focus on the job we have to. 251 00:13:16,079 --> 00:13:20,219 Learning everything we need to learn about the job and, and understanding 252 00:13:20,219 --> 00:13:21,719 that so we could be good at it, right? 253 00:13:22,199 --> 00:13:25,259 But very few people started a company and then sit down and say, I wanna 254 00:13:25,259 --> 00:13:27,089 understand the product we produce. 255 00:13:27,179 --> 00:13:27,479 Right? 256 00:13:27,719 --> 00:13:29,729 I wanna understand what the marketing is all about. 257 00:13:29,729 --> 00:13:33,659 I wanna understand everything this business does because I don't just see 258 00:13:33,664 --> 00:13:35,099 myself as a worker for the company. 259 00:13:35,099 --> 00:13:37,769 I see myself as part owner of this business, right? 260 00:13:38,099 --> 00:13:42,989 I'm, I'm a critical cog in the wheel that makes the place produce something. 261 00:13:43,169 --> 00:13:46,049 And so that's always been my approach to my jobs. 262 00:13:46,049 --> 00:13:48,519 It's not good enough to just know I'm a sysadmin. 263 00:13:48,539 --> 00:13:51,209 I have to be able to write scripts to run this Unix box. 264 00:13:51,479 --> 00:13:55,799 Um, I wanna understand that we rent cars to people all 265 00:13:55,799 --> 00:13:57,419 over the, all over the world. 266 00:13:57,689 --> 00:14:00,329 And there's a process involved in how that works or. 267 00:14:00,914 --> 00:14:05,534 When I worked in, in broadcasting, right, I took the time to understand what 268 00:14:05,534 --> 00:14:07,244 the actual broadcast chain is, right? 269 00:14:07,514 --> 00:14:10,994 We create an image, it goes into a bunch of systems before 270 00:14:10,999 --> 00:14:12,044 it goes out over the air. 271 00:14:12,044 --> 00:14:16,034 It passes through a dozen different things that layer different sub carriers on it. 272 00:14:16,034 --> 00:14:17,954 Like your Nielsen ratings box, right? 273 00:14:18,194 --> 00:14:21,614 There's a, there's a subcarrier running on the signal that tweaks 274 00:14:21,614 --> 00:14:24,524 your Nielsen box that says, Hey, he's watching Channel nine, right? 275 00:14:25,379 --> 00:14:28,709 Um, and I wanted to understand all of that right up to the, the 276 00:14:29,129 --> 00:14:31,529 transmitter, because I'm crazy that way. 277 00:14:31,859 --> 00:14:36,329 Um, and what you Yeah, exactly right. 278 00:14:36,359 --> 00:14:41,099 Um, and what, what you find as you become that interested in the business 279 00:14:41,099 --> 00:14:46,439 also is that the people who are running the business part of the business, they 280 00:14:46,439 --> 00:14:47,799 don't know anything about technology. 281 00:14:48,189 --> 00:14:49,929 It could be a technology company. 282 00:14:50,229 --> 00:14:53,019 The guy who's running the business isn't thinking about 283 00:14:53,649 --> 00:14:55,569 how the engine actually operates. 284 00:14:55,569 --> 00:14:57,369 He just wants the engine moving fast. 285 00:14:57,729 --> 00:14:59,649 W. Curtis Preston: It's kind of like, kind of like it in the earlier 286 00:14:59,649 --> 00:15:02,649 part, you know, when I was saying I, I just want my technology to work. 287 00:15:02,649 --> 00:15:03,809 That's the way they are with tech. 288 00:15:03,924 --> 00:15:04,584 Jeff Rochlin: exactly. 289 00:15:04,614 --> 00:15:05,184 Exactly. 290 00:15:05,184 --> 00:15:07,494 And they, and they don't really care about the details. 291 00:15:07,494 --> 00:15:08,424 It's not important to them. 292 00:15:08,424 --> 00:15:11,904 What they care about is they're gonna get what they expect on the outside 293 00:15:11,934 --> 00:15:17,484 of the business right now because it people being who we are, think 294 00:15:17,484 --> 00:15:20,844 that the technology is the do all end, all of what makes the business 295 00:15:20,844 --> 00:15:24,264 work, especially in big corporations. 296 00:15:24,474 --> 00:15:28,244 IT departments tend to do it for the sake of doing it. 297 00:15:28,689 --> 00:15:29,079 Right. 298 00:15:29,259 --> 00:15:33,789 They make systems for everybody else to use that are complicated, 299 00:15:34,179 --> 00:15:37,359 uh, because they work really well inside the machine, right? 300 00:15:37,359 --> 00:15:42,069 They take advantage of faster databases, faster storage, so 301 00:15:42,074 --> 00:15:45,639 that things on the back end, which are complicated work really well. 302 00:15:45,639 --> 00:15:49,749 But then when you and I have to go, you know, fill out our payroll record, you get 303 00:15:49,749 --> 00:15:54,939 this screen that looks like it's something from 1954 off of an IBM mainframe, right? 304 00:15:55,449 --> 00:15:56,769 In a world where. 305 00:15:57,069 --> 00:15:57,789 W. Curtis Preston: possibly is 306 00:15:58,284 --> 00:16:01,854 Jeff Rochlin: Uh, true, but, but you're in a world where everything is, 307 00:16:01,859 --> 00:16:03,744 um, you know, graphical interfaces. 308 00:16:03,744 --> 00:16:08,334 There's no reason why it has to be that way, and that's why I've always 309 00:16:08,334 --> 00:16:11,844 taken it, that you have to understand what the business is doing, and you 310 00:16:11,849 --> 00:16:14,694 have to understand what the people in the business are expecting the 311 00:16:14,699 --> 00:16:18,864 business to do in order to be able to deliver to them effective systems. 312 00:16:19,599 --> 00:16:22,389 W. Curtis Preston: I, I've always had that similar opinion and, and it could 313 00:16:22,389 --> 00:16:27,939 be because my very first technology job when I was at MBNA, the bank that 314 00:16:28,179 --> 00:16:33,129 everybody of a certain level had to spend four hours a month as a customer 315 00:16:33,134 --> 00:16:36,339 support rep talking to cardholders, 316 00:16:36,804 --> 00:16:37,524 Jeff Rochlin: that's cool. 317 00:16:37,584 --> 00:16:38,754 That's really great. 318 00:16:38,904 --> 00:16:41,784 W. Curtis Preston: and, and it really gave you a sense of like, 319 00:16:41,844 --> 00:16:43,464 this is what we were about. 320 00:16:43,944 --> 00:16:44,394 Right? 321 00:16:44,544 --> 00:16:48,354 We are about the cardholder out there spending money that we are lending 322 00:16:48,354 --> 00:16:52,614 them because that's how a credit card company is judged, is the outstanding 323 00:16:52,619 --> 00:16:57,414 balance of everybody added all up, which in that world was 35 billion. 324 00:16:58,074 --> 00:16:58,434 Right? 325 00:16:58,584 --> 00:17:00,174 Which is just staggering to think about it. 326 00:17:00,214 --> 00:17:03,894 Jeff Rochlin: the, the old adage, the customer is always right, is absolutely 327 00:17:03,894 --> 00:17:07,164 true all of the time, even when they're wrong and there are pains in your butt. 328 00:17:07,614 --> 00:17:12,234 Um, because if you're not going in with that attitude, Then people are gonna 329 00:17:12,234 --> 00:17:14,334 say, Well, especially nowadays, right? 330 00:17:14,334 --> 00:17:17,124 When there's a big in different choices, they're gonna say, Well, screw this. 331 00:17:17,124 --> 00:17:18,084 I'll just go somewhere else. 332 00:17:18,114 --> 00:17:18,444 I don't need, 333 00:17:20,139 --> 00:17:22,479 W. Curtis Preston: We talk about building a framework and building review 334 00:17:22,479 --> 00:17:24,309 and advisory boards in that chapter. 335 00:17:24,309 --> 00:17:26,079 What, what is, what is that? 336 00:17:26,954 --> 00:17:29,714 Jeff Rochlin: First of all, um, think about. 337 00:17:30,549 --> 00:17:32,759 A pilot flying an airplane, right? 338 00:17:32,764 --> 00:17:35,669 He's got a checklist that he goes through to make sure that he's 339 00:17:35,669 --> 00:17:38,249 checked all the important critical things about the system, right? 340 00:17:38,399 --> 00:17:42,059 And the reason why he has it written on a checklist is because those are 341 00:17:42,064 --> 00:17:43,199 things you don't wanna forget, 342 00:17:44,189 --> 00:17:47,819 So that's why you build a framework with anything that's important, right? 343 00:17:47,819 --> 00:17:50,639 You wanna make sure you capture all of the things you need to understand 344 00:17:50,969 --> 00:17:53,849 and have them on a list that you can check off so that you don't find out 345 00:17:53,849 --> 00:17:56,769 after you've built the building that, oh, you forgot to dig the foundation. 346 00:17:57,674 --> 00:18:02,309 Um, and, and it just assures that, you know, it's, you build things, right? 347 00:18:02,309 --> 00:18:06,659 So it's, it's, it's that same concept of you measure twice and you cut once, right? 348 00:18:06,664 --> 00:18:10,319 You don't wanna have to go back and have to redo it all again afterwards. 349 00:18:10,769 --> 00:18:11,339 Um, 350 00:18:12,404 --> 00:18:14,894 Prasanna Malaiyandi: question I have for you, Jeff, is I'm guessing the 351 00:18:14,894 --> 00:18:19,094 checklist is kind of what the, like you said, the pilot uses, right? 352 00:18:19,094 --> 00:18:23,024 In a term that, in this case, it would be like the backup admin would use 353 00:18:23,024 --> 00:18:25,484 and they would have their checklist in terms of, Okay, these are the things 354 00:18:25,484 --> 00:18:26,864 I need to make sure that I cover. 355 00:18:27,794 --> 00:18:31,574 But I, and I know we'll talk about this in a minute, but like that's 356 00:18:31,574 --> 00:18:35,264 not necessarily though exactly what you're going to be like word for word. 357 00:18:35,264 --> 00:18:39,734 You're not gonna be asking like the business, okay, what is your rto, Right? 358 00:18:39,734 --> 00:18:42,704 Because I'm guessing that like what you understand, right? 359 00:18:42,709 --> 00:18:45,734 You need some translation between like what's on that checklist 360 00:18:45,739 --> 00:18:46,934 into what you're asking the 361 00:18:47,319 --> 00:18:49,449 Jeff Rochlin: When you're out collecting requirements for what your system 362 00:18:49,449 --> 00:18:52,689 needs to be able to do, you may have to translate the question, right? 363 00:18:52,689 --> 00:18:56,199 You may not go up to the, the CEO of the company and say, What, 364 00:18:56,289 --> 00:18:57,699 what rto are you looking for? 365 00:18:57,969 --> 00:19:01,959 But you may go up to and say, So the building burns down tomorrow. 366 00:19:02,349 --> 00:19:06,999 At what point does it become no longer effective for you to reopen the business. 367 00:19:07,049 --> 00:19:10,889 At what point is it bankruptcy and we're gone versus we can 368 00:19:10,889 --> 00:19:12,209 survive this and move forward. 369 00:19:12,419 --> 00:19:12,779 Right? 370 00:19:13,349 --> 00:19:18,029 And again, that's extreme, but it's translating the question and, and a 371 00:19:18,034 --> 00:19:22,679 checklist is like collecting, uh, the, uh, the requirements for any project, right? 372 00:19:22,679 --> 00:19:22,829 It's. 373 00:19:22,874 --> 00:19:23,444 W. Curtis Preston: Right. 374 00:19:24,194 --> 00:19:27,044 The context that I remember in the chapter was we talked about that 375 00:19:27,044 --> 00:19:31,184 process that we, that we had at that company where you and I worked. 376 00:19:31,754 --> 00:19:37,844 Um, that was, it was a very rigid process for developing a new product. 377 00:19:37,844 --> 00:19:38,924 And it was, you know, there was the, 378 00:19:39,144 --> 00:19:42,514 Jeff Rochlin: we were working together in aerospace and you have to remember 379 00:19:42,519 --> 00:19:46,284 that aerospace is one of those businesses where if you miss a step 380 00:19:46,284 --> 00:19:49,194 in the process, things go bad, right? 381 00:19:49,194 --> 00:19:53,124 Everything has to be measured and, and has to be checked 382 00:19:53,129 --> 00:19:54,624 off on to make sure it's safe. 383 00:19:55,399 --> 00:19:59,844 , Um, they took a lot of that and they've translated that down into their IT 384 00:19:59,844 --> 00:20:04,914 processes, which by the way, are the same things that they give you in ITIL right? 385 00:20:04,944 --> 00:20:10,074 If you're an IT person, which is a 34 letter word in most certainly 386 00:20:10,079 --> 00:20:15,474 creative companies to drop it l um, it teaches you the idea of 387 00:20:15,534 --> 00:20:17,244 things have to be structured right? 388 00:20:17,244 --> 00:20:20,064 There's a, there's a right way to do things and you just need 389 00:20:20,064 --> 00:20:21,204 to try to follow the right. 390 00:20:22,689 --> 00:20:27,279 In the case of the aerospace company, part of that process is make sure that to 391 00:20:27,369 --> 00:20:31,089 keep you on track, check in with people all the time, and make sure that they 392 00:20:31,089 --> 00:20:32,829 agreed that we're still on track, right? 393 00:20:33,129 --> 00:20:38,019 I, I spend a month collecting, um, the project plan and what the 394 00:20:38,019 --> 00:20:41,709 requirements are, and then I send it out the stakeholders that are 395 00:20:41,709 --> 00:20:45,579 gonna need to use this later and say, Just tell me did I get it right? 396 00:20:45,579 --> 00:20:46,689 Is this what you wanted? 397 00:20:47,049 --> 00:20:48,759 And they come back and go, Yay. 398 00:20:48,759 --> 00:20:50,079 Or they come back and go, No. 399 00:20:50,079 --> 00:20:50,439 And then you. 400 00:20:51,434 --> 00:20:51,994 W. Curtis Preston: Right. 401 00:20:52,464 --> 00:20:55,164 Jeff Rochlin: you check in and you do the same thing, right? 402 00:20:55,164 --> 00:20:59,574 You come back and say, Okay, we're moving along this way, and is this still okay? 403 00:21:00,114 --> 00:21:01,824 Um, or did your plans change? 404 00:21:02,164 --> 00:21:04,564 Prasanna Malaiyandi: So totally makes sense having this board that 405 00:21:04,569 --> 00:21:06,484 you go check back with, right? 406 00:21:06,514 --> 00:21:07,474 Figuring out process. 407 00:21:07,814 --> 00:21:11,594 What are some examples of, uh, requirements or 408 00:21:11,599 --> 00:21:13,934 questions you would ask Right. 409 00:21:14,474 --> 00:21:16,574 For specifically around backup, right. 410 00:21:16,754 --> 00:21:18,224 As you're going through this process. 411 00:21:18,944 --> 00:21:19,424 Jeff Rochlin: yeah. 412 00:21:19,484 --> 00:21:23,834 Um, the very first question I always ask, and it's the hardest question 413 00:21:23,834 --> 00:21:26,804 for any business to be able to answer, is, what is acceptable downtime? 414 00:21:27,314 --> 00:21:27,584 Right. 415 00:21:27,944 --> 00:21:33,134 If, if, if something happens, we can't control it, what can you live with? 416 00:21:33,194 --> 00:21:33,554 Right? 417 00:21:33,674 --> 00:21:35,234 I realize it's always gonna be zero. 418 00:21:36,134 --> 00:21:40,649 . But now dig down deep in your heart cuz it's gonna happen and 419 00:21:40,649 --> 00:21:42,059 tell me what's acceptable on that. 420 00:21:42,209 --> 00:21:42,659 Right? 421 00:21:42,779 --> 00:21:47,849 Um, and remember that I can give you as close to zero downtime as humanly 422 00:21:47,849 --> 00:21:49,439 possible, but it's gonna cost you a lot 423 00:21:49,454 --> 00:21:51,524 Prasanna Malaiyandi: That that's, that's exactly what I was gonna ask. 424 00:21:51,524 --> 00:21:55,244 It's like, do you then tell them, Hey, by the way, you won zero downtime, 425 00:21:55,244 --> 00:21:57,344 it's gonna cost you 5 billion. 426 00:21:58,064 --> 00:21:58,334 Right. 427 00:21:58,334 --> 00:21:59,324 Or something like that. 428 00:21:59,324 --> 00:21:59,474 And 429 00:21:59,539 --> 00:22:03,319 Jeff Rochlin: So for me, you always present it in multiple stages, right? 430 00:22:03,319 --> 00:22:05,749 There's the, this is, this is the worst. 431 00:22:05,754 --> 00:22:06,739 You don't want to do this. 432 00:22:06,739 --> 00:22:09,199 This is survival mode, how much it'll cost. 433 00:22:09,289 --> 00:22:09,759 This is. 434 00:22:10,214 --> 00:22:13,124 This is like gold plated, the greatest it'll ever be in the world. 435 00:22:13,304 --> 00:22:15,764 Once you get this, you'll be the happiest person ever. 436 00:22:15,914 --> 00:22:17,474 It's gonna cost you this much. 437 00:22:17,624 --> 00:22:19,994 And then this is probably the answer you want. 438 00:22:20,024 --> 00:22:21,794 This is the middle, this is the price, right? 439 00:22:22,274 --> 00:22:24,584 Um, but you always go back to the business and the business 440 00:22:24,589 --> 00:22:26,864 has to decide how critical is it? 441 00:22:26,864 --> 00:22:29,804 And it, and it could be for this piece of the business, right? 442 00:22:29,804 --> 00:22:33,434 For my, for my call center, I need a hundred percent uptime because 443 00:22:33,644 --> 00:22:36,764 worst case, they can write the order down on paper and we can key 'em in. 444 00:22:37,624 --> 00:22:42,634 Um, whereas, you know, for the database service, if it's down for an hour, 445 00:22:42,634 --> 00:22:47,164 it's down for two hours, maybe that's okay, as long as I can recover it to 446 00:22:47,164 --> 00:22:48,784 within a, a certain period of time, 447 00:22:48,829 --> 00:22:51,109 Prasanna Malaiyandi: And would you say that that's probably 448 00:22:51,199 --> 00:22:53,449 the most important question? 449 00:22:55,114 --> 00:22:56,474 To always start with 450 00:22:56,627 --> 00:22:57,047 Jeff Rochlin: Yes. 451 00:22:57,127 --> 00:23:01,687 I, I believe it is because, um, it drives everything else right. 452 00:23:02,122 --> 00:23:04,492 W. Curtis Preston: The thing is downtime is sort of measured in two D. 453 00:23:05,167 --> 00:23:05,917 Ways, Right? 454 00:23:05,917 --> 00:23:09,157 So there's downtime in terms of like how long the system is down. 455 00:23:09,157 --> 00:23:12,427 There's also downtime in terms of how much data we lost, right? 456 00:23:12,427 --> 00:23:18,277 So we translate that into RTO and rpo, which I, I know we already did a, uh, 457 00:23:18,457 --> 00:23:23,797 a podcast back to basics podcast on, Um, so that, that's the big thing is, 458 00:23:23,977 --> 00:23:29,767 is making sure that whatever it is that we're getting ready to design that. 459 00:23:30,952 --> 00:23:33,622 We're designing it based on the requirements that business 460 00:23:33,622 --> 00:23:34,942 came, you know, they gave us 461 00:23:34,947 --> 00:23:37,317 . Jeff Rochlin: But that's why you have your review board meeting because 462 00:23:37,317 --> 00:23:39,777 you go back and you feed it back to them every once in a while and say, 463 00:23:39,777 --> 00:23:41,187 Right, this is what you asked for. 464 00:23:41,187 --> 00:23:41,607 Correct. 465 00:23:41,967 --> 00:23:43,047 Cause this is what we're gonna build. 466 00:23:43,047 --> 00:23:43,347 Right. 467 00:23:43,347 --> 00:23:43,767 We're good. 468 00:23:43,767 --> 00:23:47,337 And you do it multiple times so that at the end of the day, if something, 469 00:23:48,627 --> 00:23:51,297 Assuming you did everything right and the system performs the way you 470 00:23:51,297 --> 00:23:55,857 expected to perform, and they come back and go, What the hell, man? 471 00:23:56,097 --> 00:24:01,047 You can look at them and go, Six times you came back and said this was acceptable, 472 00:24:01,512 --> 00:24:02,112 W. Curtis Preston: Yeah. 473 00:24:02,352 --> 00:24:02,742 Yeah. 474 00:24:02,742 --> 00:24:03,852 Six times. 475 00:24:04,132 --> 00:24:09,502 you and I both agreed that a six hour RTO was acceptable because a two 476 00:24:09,502 --> 00:24:11,692 hour RTO was gonna cost us 3 billion. 477 00:24:12,562 --> 00:24:15,562 You and I agree, remember that I have it in writing here. 478 00:24:15,742 --> 00:24:19,822 And so the, the fact that this, you know, that we met a six hour RTO is good 479 00:24:20,482 --> 00:24:20,972 Jeff Rochlin: yeah, 480 00:24:21,232 --> 00:24:22,272 Prasanna Malaiyandi: and it's documented. 481 00:24:22,762 --> 00:24:24,202 Jeff Rochlin: yeah, yeah, exactly. 482 00:24:24,222 --> 00:24:27,832 It's, it's, you know, there's a, there's some element of you're 483 00:24:27,832 --> 00:24:31,282 covering your own ass when you're doing it right, But we all have to. 484 00:24:31,732 --> 00:24:34,162 Be sure that we're delivering what the business needs. 485 00:24:34,162 --> 00:24:37,492 And that's why you have to understand what the business does because if 486 00:24:37,492 --> 00:24:40,192 you understand what the business does and somebody comes back and you know, 487 00:24:40,492 --> 00:24:43,103 you're in a business where you're talking to customers constantly and 488 00:24:43,108 --> 00:24:44,702 somebody comes back when you ask them. 489 00:24:45,202 --> 00:24:48,802 Um, what's acceptable and they go, ah, if we're down for a day or two, that's fine. 490 00:24:49,012 --> 00:24:50,212 You know, they're wrong. 491 00:24:50,272 --> 00:24:52,282 You know that they're not telling you the truth. 492 00:24:52,642 --> 00:24:54,652 You know that they're trying to give you the easy answer. 493 00:24:54,862 --> 00:24:57,652 And if you understand what the business does, you can look back 494 00:24:57,652 --> 00:24:59,482 at them and say, But wait a second. 495 00:24:59,512 --> 00:25:01,882 We answer calls 24 hours a day from customers. 496 00:25:01,882 --> 00:25:05,992 You're okay with not answering calls 24 hours a day for those customers? 497 00:25:06,472 --> 00:25:08,992 Uh, at which point they go, Oh, no, no, I don't mean that 498 00:25:09,367 --> 00:25:12,577 W. Curtis Preston: I, I did, I did work with a business once, 499 00:25:12,667 --> 00:25:15,337 Jeff, that had a two week rto. 500 00:25:16,807 --> 00:25:18,247 You know what, You know what it was? 501 00:25:19,087 --> 00:25:21,187 They, they were a paper mill. 502 00:25:21,667 --> 00:25:21,957 I. 503 00:25:22,537 --> 00:25:26,797 And they were like, If the computer sit down for a couple of weeks, we don't care. 504 00:25:26,977 --> 00:25:29,497 Like we're, we're gonna keep cutting down trees. 505 00:25:29,617 --> 00:25:33,007 We're gonna keep turning it into pulp and we're gonna keep making paper. 506 00:25:33,257 --> 00:25:37,207 If, if you can't, if you can't bill anybody, uh, what 507 00:25:37,417 --> 00:25:38,647 They'll still need paper. 508 00:25:38,677 --> 00:25:40,837 We'll be, that was their attitude. 509 00:25:41,017 --> 00:25:44,467 And so for them, a two week RTO was fine, you know? 510 00:25:44,617 --> 00:25:46,087 Uh, but yeah. 511 00:25:46,117 --> 00:25:49,297 But it goes back to the first thing we started with it, it goes with 512 00:25:49,297 --> 00:25:51,087 what kind of business you are. 513 00:25:51,807 --> 00:25:52,197 Right. 514 00:25:52,197 --> 00:25:55,887 Most businesses, you start using the word day 515 00:25:57,742 --> 00:25:58,072 Jeff Rochlin: They're, 516 00:25:58,097 --> 00:25:58,967 W. Curtis Preston: in your rto. 517 00:25:59,217 --> 00:26:01,247 They're not gonna be okay with that. 518 00:26:01,822 --> 00:26:04,102 Jeff Rochlin: If you're in a retail business, you know, and you're down, 519 00:26:04,162 --> 00:26:07,162 you know, you're, you're running a big, uh, online catalog service and you've 520 00:26:07,162 --> 00:26:11,782 got call centers all around the world taking calls from people or websites that 521 00:26:11,782 --> 00:26:16,132 are, you know, taking, uh, selling movie tickets, let's say, which I have a certain 522 00:26:16,137 --> 00:26:17,692 amount of experience within the past. 523 00:26:17,697 --> 00:26:17,962 Right. 524 00:26:18,322 --> 00:26:22,432 And that opening weekend for the next Star Wars movie is coming up and 525 00:26:22,432 --> 00:26:24,472 your systems go down for 10 hours. 526 00:26:25,222 --> 00:26:25,612 You. 527 00:26:25,612 --> 00:26:26,842 Yeah, you're in trouble, right? 528 00:26:26,842 --> 00:26:29,812 Cause you know that that money is going to go somewhere else. 529 00:26:29,812 --> 00:26:31,672 It's not like they're gonna sit there and go, Well, I'll 530 00:26:31,672 --> 00:26:33,172 keep hitting return until I can 531 00:26:33,337 --> 00:26:35,017 W. Curtis Preston: yeah, it's not like they're gonna not 532 00:26:35,022 --> 00:26:36,457 buy tickets for that movie. 533 00:26:36,577 --> 00:26:37,027 Right. 534 00:26:37,117 --> 00:26:38,827 They're gonna, they're gonna do that. 535 00:26:38,947 --> 00:26:40,177 Um, gosh. 536 00:26:40,177 --> 00:26:42,277 You remember when we used to stand in line, Jeff 537 00:26:42,892 --> 00:26:43,702 Jeff Rochlin: Yeah, I do. 538 00:26:43,822 --> 00:26:46,222 You know, there was, there was a certain charm to it, but 539 00:26:46,477 --> 00:26:50,137 W. Curtis Preston: Yeah, I remember standing in line, like, you stood 540 00:26:50,137 --> 00:26:52,177 in line to stand in line, right? 541 00:26:52,177 --> 00:26:57,007 You, you got up there, there's a big line and you're like, you, you know, it's one 542 00:26:57,007 --> 00:26:58,717 o'clock, you want the four o'clock show? 543 00:26:58,717 --> 00:27:00,817 And they're like, Oh, the four o'clock show already sold out. 544 00:27:01,057 --> 00:27:04,877 Okay, so I guess we're doing the seven o'clock show and uh, and 545 00:27:05,017 --> 00:27:08,827 you bought tickets for the seven o'clock show at one o'clock, right? 546 00:27:08,917 --> 00:27:13,237 And then you went and did something with yourself for the next six hours. 547 00:27:14,347 --> 00:27:14,407 Jeff Rochlin: Yeah. 548 00:27:14,527 --> 00:27:18,217 W. Curtis Preston: Anyway, Sorry, two old guys remeniscing about back in the day. 549 00:27:18,787 --> 00:27:24,487 Um, so you, Yeah, you, you, Jeff, in the next section, in the chapter, you 550 00:27:24,487 --> 00:27:26,107 talked about drawing up multiple designs. 551 00:27:26,107 --> 00:27:29,347 I think that you hinted at that already about the, here's the 552 00:27:29,347 --> 00:27:30,337 one you definitely don't want. 553 00:27:30,337 --> 00:27:32,077 Here's the one you're probably not gonna pay for. 554 00:27:32,077 --> 00:27:33,937 And here, you know, here's the Goldilocks zone. 555 00:27:34,292 --> 00:27:36,392 Jeff Rochlin: People want to feel like they have choices. 556 00:27:36,482 --> 00:27:42,242 It's part of just the way life is, right, And everybody wants gold plated, but 557 00:27:42,332 --> 00:27:44,582 they don't want to pay for gold plated. 558 00:27:44,972 --> 00:27:50,762 So the best way to show them is there aren't, you know, I'm not narrow minded. 559 00:27:50,762 --> 00:27:52,292 There are multiple ways you can do this. 560 00:27:52,562 --> 00:27:53,832 You can solve this problem. 561 00:27:54,467 --> 00:27:58,127 And at different cost levels, and I'm gonna leave it to you to decide how much 562 00:27:58,127 --> 00:27:59,717 money you wanna spend based on that. 563 00:27:59,747 --> 00:28:00,137 Right. 564 00:28:00,527 --> 00:28:05,327 Um, and then just from experience, uh, I know that you present three layers 565 00:28:05,357 --> 00:28:10,067 because there, you know, it's, there's a little psychology involved in it. 566 00:28:10,072 --> 00:28:12,737 It's like when you write a budget, there's always something in the budget 567 00:28:12,742 --> 00:28:16,397 that you're willing to cut because you know they're gonna come back no 568 00:28:16,397 --> 00:28:19,217 matter what, and they're gonna ask you to cut something out of the budget. 569 00:28:19,517 --> 00:28:22,577 It's almost like a goodwill kind of thing, right? 570 00:28:22,657 --> 00:28:25,237 Prasanna Malaiyandi: So far we've kind of been talking about like the requirements 571 00:28:25,237 --> 00:28:26,887 are a little bit in stone, right? 572 00:28:26,917 --> 00:28:29,827 Sort of, uh, the business comes, gives you the requirements, you 573 00:28:29,827 --> 00:28:31,777 come back with the proposals, right? 574 00:28:31,777 --> 00:28:35,767 But as we all know, like business needs and requirements change, right? 575 00:28:35,767 --> 00:28:36,007 And. 576 00:28:37,267 --> 00:28:41,677 How do you sort of account for those changes as you're like, 577 00:28:41,887 --> 00:28:43,327 so you had these three options. 578 00:28:43,327 --> 00:28:46,477 They picked the middle option, business requirements change. 579 00:28:47,227 --> 00:28:47,497 Right? 580 00:28:47,497 --> 00:28:48,817 How do you sort of incorporate that? 581 00:28:48,817 --> 00:28:51,787 Because you can't be like, Hey, by the way, we already started on our way 582 00:28:51,787 --> 00:28:54,907 and so now you have to wait 12 months before we can incorporate those in. 583 00:28:55,027 --> 00:28:55,957 Jeff Rochlin: We're agile now, right? 584 00:28:55,957 --> 00:28:56,887 We don't actually. 585 00:28:57,322 --> 00:29:00,922 We don't build projects that we set a two-year goal and then we check 586 00:29:00,922 --> 00:29:04,342 in at the end of year two and say, Here's what we've got to find out. 587 00:29:04,342 --> 00:29:05,152 We got it wrong. 588 00:29:05,392 --> 00:29:08,482 The biggest challenge in that space to me is when you're at 589 00:29:08,482 --> 00:29:09,742 the foundation level, right? 590 00:29:09,742 --> 00:29:13,432 It's like if I'm building a house and we've designed the house and we've 591 00:29:13,432 --> 00:29:16,432 decided the bathroom's gonna go here, the kitchen's gonna go there, right? 592 00:29:17,302 --> 00:29:21,112 I'm running pipes now out of the foundation to go to those places. 593 00:29:21,112 --> 00:29:21,982 You can't come back to. 594 00:29:23,017 --> 00:29:25,987 Three weeks later and say, I've decided to put the bathroom at the totally 595 00:29:26,387 --> 00:29:29,347 opposite end of the house cuz I've already poured the concrete and that 596 00:29:29,347 --> 00:29:30,727 pipe is not gonna move on its own. 597 00:29:30,807 --> 00:29:33,567 Prasanna Malaiyandi: Yeah, well, Or well not move on its own. 598 00:29:33,567 --> 00:29:34,797 And I guess that's the thing, right? 599 00:29:34,797 --> 00:29:39,147 Is it's okay to go back and say, Yeah, this requires sort of like a redesign 600 00:29:39,147 --> 00:29:41,757 or a rethought re-implementation, right? 601 00:29:41,757 --> 00:29:44,907 It's gonna affect your timelines for sure, but if that's what 602 00:29:44,907 --> 00:29:46,107 the business needs, we could. 603 00:29:46,852 --> 00:29:50,242 Jeff Rochlin: So I think it, I, I think the best way you deal with this kind 604 00:29:50,242 --> 00:29:53,212 of thing is in the ordering of how your project is established, right? 605 00:29:53,542 --> 00:29:56,962 You've gotta get the core, the solid infrastructure that isn't 606 00:29:56,962 --> 00:30:00,262 going to change, um, done first. 607 00:30:00,262 --> 00:30:02,992 And you have to make sure the buy off is there and you have to keep 608 00:30:02,992 --> 00:30:06,652 going back and saying, Right, we're going to build this network. 609 00:30:06,652 --> 00:30:11,272 We're going to buy this kind of storage, We're going to buy these kinds of tape. 610 00:30:11,947 --> 00:30:16,147 We can go back and change out systems and how they operate. 611 00:30:16,147 --> 00:30:21,067 We can change schedules, we can add, but if you turn around after 612 00:30:21,067 --> 00:30:24,577 that check is written and say, I don't want to use that anymore. 613 00:30:24,997 --> 00:30:26,917 I can't get you that money back, right? 614 00:30:26,917 --> 00:30:27,577 You've spent it. 615 00:30:27,967 --> 00:30:32,108 So you need to be sure your foundation is solid in what you're trying to 616 00:30:32,113 --> 00:30:33,427 build on, and you need to know that. 617 00:30:34,897 --> 00:30:37,522 Um, features can change, right? 618 00:30:37,792 --> 00:30:42,652 But the core foundation of it has to be once you've started laying it down. 619 00:30:42,727 --> 00:30:42,937 Prasanna Malaiyandi: Yeah. 620 00:30:42,937 --> 00:30:45,367 And I, I guess Curtis, this would probably be your. 621 00:30:45,742 --> 00:30:46,732 Pitch that you would say. 622 00:30:46,732 --> 00:30:47,302 It's like, Hey. 623 00:30:47,302 --> 00:30:50,602 Yeah, but with the SaaS like service, you may not need to put 624 00:30:50,602 --> 00:30:52,822 all that money up front, right. 625 00:30:52,822 --> 00:30:54,352 To pay for something. 626 00:30:54,352 --> 00:30:54,562 Right. 627 00:30:54,562 --> 00:30:58,042 It does give you some amount of flexibility to be like, 628 00:30:58,092 --> 00:31:00,822 W. Curtis Preston: That that dynamic scaling up and down is definitely a 629 00:31:00,822 --> 00:31:07,542 real value of a SaaS product, but like any other product you, you have to take 630 00:31:07,542 --> 00:31:09,522 into account a little bit of the future. 631 00:31:09,852 --> 00:31:10,272 Right. 632 00:31:10,662 --> 00:31:14,772 And you know, the one, the one challenge, I'm gonna say, a backing up to a SaaS 633 00:31:14,772 --> 00:31:20,412 provider is to just make sure that we've, we've calculated in the laws of physics, 634 00:31:21,247 --> 00:31:21,447 Jeff Rochlin: Mm-hmm. 635 00:31:21,852 --> 00:31:23,442 W. Curtis Preston: Because if you, if you've got, if you've 636 00:31:23,442 --> 00:31:27,942 got 10, you know, petabyte and a T1 line, it's not gonna work. 637 00:31:28,242 --> 00:31:28,632 Right? 638 00:31:28,842 --> 00:31:33,972 So as long as we've ca love, as we're not at the upper edge of your bandwidth 639 00:31:33,972 --> 00:31:40,572 utilization, you should be able to grow, uh, significantly on the back end without 640 00:31:40,572 --> 00:31:42,642 having to have a change on the, on the, 641 00:31:42,757 --> 00:31:44,907 Jeff Rochlin: But again, but again, that's the foundation, right? 642 00:31:44,907 --> 00:31:48,207 That's the, that's the core infrastructure that you have to agree on up front. 643 00:31:48,597 --> 00:31:49,917 How much data do I have? 644 00:31:50,367 --> 00:31:53,317 How fast do I need to get it up to that damn service in the cloud? 645 00:31:53,937 --> 00:31:57,057 And do I have enough bandwidth and capability to do that? 646 00:31:57,117 --> 00:31:57,537 Right? 647 00:31:57,927 --> 00:32:00,897 Um, and those are the things that become immutable in the beginning. 648 00:32:00,897 --> 00:32:01,807 You lay 'em down. 649 00:32:02,187 --> 00:32:04,707 You understand them, and then you can build on top of it whatever 650 00:32:04,712 --> 00:32:06,867 you want because you have a foundation that'll support it. 651 00:32:07,167 --> 00:32:10,167 You can't turn around though afterwards and say, Well, I didn't really have 652 00:32:10,167 --> 00:32:13,767 that much network bandwidth, and it turns out that in order to get that much 653 00:32:13,767 --> 00:32:17,307 network bandwidth, I have to have this, pay this guy over here to dig a tunnel 654 00:32:17,307 --> 00:32:21,657 underneath, you know, the, the biggest avenue in town to run a fiber optics to my 655 00:32:21,657 --> 00:32:23,037 building, and I'm not gonna pay for that. 656 00:32:23,037 --> 00:32:25,767 So I guess we'll have to figure out how to do it without the bandwidth. 657 00:32:26,127 --> 00:32:26,337 Right? 658 00:32:26,337 --> 00:32:29,007 That's when it, that's when the tower collapses and none of it's ever. 659 00:32:30,432 --> 00:32:33,342 W. Curtis Preston: Yeah, so I, I'd say that, So we, so 660 00:32:33,342 --> 00:32:34,782 we, we got the requirements. 661 00:32:35,202 --> 00:32:39,582 We've got, um, and we, we've, we've done this iterative process of going 662 00:32:39,582 --> 00:32:42,682 back to the stakeholders to make sure we understand the requirements. 663 00:32:43,032 --> 00:32:46,452 We've built out theoretical system. 664 00:32:47,022 --> 00:32:51,852 The, the next phase that I think is, is really important is to make sure. 665 00:32:52,857 --> 00:32:57,567 The product that we, that we're supposed to be buying does what it 666 00:32:57,567 --> 00:33:00,447 is that it was supposed to do, right? 667 00:33:00,777 --> 00:33:03,987 So we're talking about things like POCs and pilots. 668 00:33:04,407 --> 00:33:07,467 Jeff Rochlin: I, I do the POC early, right. 669 00:33:07,467 --> 00:33:13,197 I do it like before I even, I go back to, if the business comes back to me and 670 00:33:13,197 --> 00:33:16,257 says we need to update backups, I go out and start doing the POC on the backup of 671 00:33:16,262 --> 00:33:21,267 products before I come back and propose here's what I think the solution would be. 672 00:33:21,267 --> 00:33:21,657 Right. 673 00:33:21,867 --> 00:33:29,037 Um, you know, There are the sales guys and there are the sales engineers, right? 674 00:33:29,967 --> 00:33:32,397 Don't listen to anything the sales guys have to say to you. 675 00:33:32,397 --> 00:33:33,957 Cause the sales guys are sales guys. 676 00:33:33,957 --> 00:33:34,707 That's what they do. 677 00:33:34,947 --> 00:33:38,007 Let them buy you lunch and then don't worry about it. 678 00:33:38,487 --> 00:33:41,367 Find yourself a good sales engineer who's attached to the account. 679 00:33:41,997 --> 00:33:43,137 Connect up with them. 680 00:33:43,317 --> 00:33:46,527 They'll give you this straight answer, and then give them your real 681 00:33:46,527 --> 00:33:50,537 world, your real world scenario, that's kind of where I come from. 682 00:33:50,537 --> 00:33:50,807 Right. 683 00:33:50,812 --> 00:33:55,157 If you're gonna, if you're gonna go to the trouble of selling me a service 684 00:33:55,247 --> 00:33:58,757 up in the cloud somewhere, then it should do everything it needs to do. 685 00:33:58,877 --> 00:33:59,297 Right. 686 00:33:59,987 --> 00:34:00,287 And. 687 00:34:01,907 --> 00:34:04,637 Go on a tangent, which I know you'll cut cuz you hate when I go on tangent. 688 00:34:04,642 --> 00:34:06,017 So I'm keeping you from doing other 689 00:34:06,022 --> 00:34:07,862 W. Curtis Preston: It depends on the value of the tangent, Jeff 690 00:34:08,327 --> 00:34:08,987 Jeff Rochlin: um. 691 00:34:09,992 --> 00:34:14,132 When, when people, especially the non-technical people go off 692 00:34:14,132 --> 00:34:15,482 and think of the cloud, right? 693 00:34:15,692 --> 00:34:18,902 They think the cloud is a solution for everything, right? 694 00:34:18,902 --> 00:34:22,322 I want to go store things in the cloud, so I will just copy all of my 695 00:34:22,322 --> 00:34:27,022 data up into the cloud and things will be wonderful, and it's like, No, you 696 00:34:27,232 --> 00:34:29,902 copy your stuff up into the cloud and all you're doing is you're handing it 697 00:34:29,902 --> 00:34:31,252 off to somebody else's data center. 698 00:34:31,582 --> 00:34:33,532 That doesn't mean it's properly backed up. 699 00:34:33,772 --> 00:34:36,922 That doesn't mean it's redundantly stored in multiple locations 700 00:34:36,922 --> 00:34:38,062 in case there's a disaster. 701 00:34:38,512 --> 00:34:41,662 You still need a systems engineer to look at the problem and come up 702 00:34:41,662 --> 00:34:45,082 with a solution within the context of the cloud as if it was your own. 703 00:34:46,817 --> 00:34:49,247 But, but cloud is a marketing term, right? 704 00:34:49,247 --> 00:34:53,267 That we sell to people who don't understand technology about a, 705 00:34:53,327 --> 00:34:55,517 here the solution is there, baby. 706 00:34:55,517 --> 00:34:59,267 Just buy this and, and, and your life will be better and everything will just 707 00:34:59,267 --> 00:35:02,447 W. Curtis Preston: It, You know what you need, Jeff, In that 708 00:35:02,447 --> 00:35:04,317 scenario, you, you need a Prasanna. 709 00:35:06,197 --> 00:35:08,237 That is what Prasanna does. 710 00:35:08,477 --> 00:35:12,287 So, you know, he's actually, he's actually, you know, I'm gonna say he's 711 00:35:12,287 --> 00:35:18,287 more technical than I am, and when we talk about current cloud technology, 712 00:35:18,677 --> 00:35:23,807 uh, he's actually making things happen and actually understands that stuff. 713 00:35:23,807 --> 00:35:25,247 So you need somebody like that. 714 00:35:25,252 --> 00:35:29,117 Like, it's not, like the cloud doesn't just like, Oh, 715 00:35:29,117 --> 00:35:30,647 we don't need any IT people, 716 00:35:31,807 --> 00:35:32,297 Prasanna Malaiyandi: Okay. 717 00:35:32,762 --> 00:35:35,042 W. Curtis Preston: We just need different kinds of IT people. 718 00:35:35,297 --> 00:35:35,777 Jeff Rochlin: Right. 719 00:35:35,777 --> 00:35:38,867 But you would be surprised at the number of C level and especially 720 00:35:38,867 --> 00:35:40,607 financial people out there who think. 721 00:35:41,627 --> 00:35:45,347 By buying into a cloud service, they can throw away their data center and they 722 00:35:45,347 --> 00:35:47,087 no longer need as big an IT department 723 00:35:48,002 --> 00:35:48,362 W. Curtis Preston: Yeah. 724 00:35:48,677 --> 00:35:48,827 Jeff Rochlin: there. 725 00:35:48,872 --> 00:35:49,442 W. Curtis Preston: might, might 726 00:35:49,447 --> 00:35:51,482 need as big, but Yeah. 727 00:35:51,587 --> 00:35:51,797 Jeff Rochlin: Yeah. 728 00:35:51,797 --> 00:35:53,837 you're gonna eliminate certain positions, right? 729 00:35:53,837 --> 00:35:55,967 You're gonna eliminate the guys that are handling your hardware. 730 00:35:56,027 --> 00:36:01,127 But, um, there, there is this perception and that's why everybody 731 00:36:01,127 --> 00:36:02,867 thinks the cloud is cheaper, right? 732 00:36:02,917 --> 00:36:05,767 In many cases it's more expensive than running your own data 733 00:36:05,767 --> 00:36:06,607 center depending on what you're 734 00:36:07,127 --> 00:36:09,337 W. Curtis Preston: It, It, definitely depends on how you implemented it. 735 00:36:09,337 --> 00:36:09,637 Yeah. 736 00:36:09,967 --> 00:36:10,447 Jeff Rochlin: Right. 737 00:36:10,477 --> 00:36:10,807 But, 738 00:36:10,812 --> 00:36:12,967 Prasanna Malaiyandi: talk to Corey Quinn or follow him on Twitter, right? 739 00:36:12,967 --> 00:36:13,777 That's his big thing. 740 00:36:14,587 --> 00:36:14,917 Jeff Rochlin: yeah, 741 00:36:15,077 --> 00:36:15,567 W. Curtis Preston: Yeah. 742 00:36:16,207 --> 00:36:18,997 Jeff Rochlin: so anyway, that was, that was my tangent, but I thought it might 743 00:36:19,042 --> 00:36:20,392 W. Curtis Preston: That was a good tangent, Jeff. 744 00:36:20,872 --> 00:36:24,862 Um, alright, so the, so the final thing here of, of, you know, of, of, 745 00:36:25,972 --> 00:36:31,222 in this chapter was about documenting and implementing the new system, right? 746 00:36:31,987 --> 00:36:32,407 Jeff Rochlin: Yep. 747 00:36:32,467 --> 00:36:35,997 The job, the job that nobody ever wants to have to do is documentation. 748 00:36:36,022 --> 00:36:36,832 W. Curtis Preston: yeah. 749 00:36:36,982 --> 00:36:38,632 Um, you know what, 750 00:36:39,927 --> 00:36:40,347 Jeff Rochlin: You, 751 00:36:40,702 --> 00:36:41,272 W. Curtis Preston: that about? 752 00:36:41,272 --> 00:36:41,602 Right? 753 00:36:41,672 --> 00:36:43,612 Do do I have to, do I have to document? 754 00:36:44,107 --> 00:36:44,467 Jeff Rochlin: Yeah. 755 00:36:44,467 --> 00:36:45,037 You have to. 756 00:36:45,157 --> 00:36:45,757 Sorry. 757 00:36:45,817 --> 00:36:48,547 You know, cuz it's like that's your proof of life, right? 758 00:36:48,547 --> 00:36:53,227 You have, you have it down in writing, you have a plan that you're working from. 759 00:36:53,227 --> 00:36:54,787 It's the checklist, right? 760 00:36:54,877 --> 00:36:57,067 And it's visible to everybody. 761 00:36:57,067 --> 00:37:00,397 You can hand a copy to somebody and say, I want you to read this, and then 762 00:37:00,402 --> 00:37:03,337 I want you to sign on the bottom of it so that I know that you've read 763 00:37:03,337 --> 00:37:04,777 it and you either agree or you don't. 764 00:37:05,512 --> 00:37:08,062 And then if they take it and they just sign it and hand it back 765 00:37:08,062 --> 00:37:11,152 to you when there's something in there that they didn't like or 766 00:37:11,152 --> 00:37:15,562 that they didn't expect, you look at them and go, You signed for it. 767 00:37:15,562 --> 00:37:15,922 Right? 768 00:37:15,922 --> 00:37:17,962 Would you sign a contract without reading it? 769 00:37:17,962 --> 00:37:19,732 Would you, You know, 770 00:37:19,867 --> 00:37:20,797 Prasanna Malaiyandi: all the time. 771 00:37:20,797 --> 00:37:21,487 I agree. 772 00:37:21,942 --> 00:37:22,612 Jeff Rochlin: Written. 773 00:37:22,822 --> 00:37:27,932 The written documentation, especially the design documentation is actually kind of 774 00:37:27,937 --> 00:37:29,632 like a contract with your customer, right? 775 00:37:29,962 --> 00:37:31,342 Your customer being the business. 776 00:37:31,852 --> 00:37:32,212 W. Curtis Preston: right. 777 00:37:32,332 --> 00:37:34,132 Prasanna Malaiyandi: this design document, right? 778 00:37:34,912 --> 00:37:37,912 It, I'm guessing it also sort of restates, Hey, here are all the 779 00:37:37,912 --> 00:37:40,792 requirements that I built against, Right. 780 00:37:40,792 --> 00:37:43,462 That we had agreed to during the sort of the checklist and 781 00:37:43,462 --> 00:37:44,752 those initial discussions. 782 00:37:44,752 --> 00:37:45,082 Right? 783 00:37:45,412 --> 00:37:48,562 And these are sort of the requirements that this design satisfies. 784 00:37:49,497 --> 00:37:49,582 Jeff Rochlin: Yeah. 785 00:37:49,972 --> 00:37:54,262 When you, when you write that initial document once, once everybody has 786 00:37:54,267 --> 00:37:57,112 blessed it and signed off on it, you may never go back to it again. 787 00:37:57,117 --> 00:37:57,322 Right? 788 00:37:57,322 --> 00:38:00,232 You may never have to go back to the printed document, except for the 789 00:38:00,237 --> 00:38:04,552 fact that it's part of your completed set of things you need to have. 790 00:38:04,557 --> 00:38:06,682 That's just there for the future. 791 00:38:07,012 --> 00:38:07,282 Right? 792 00:38:07,552 --> 00:38:11,482 And if you've ever been involved in any kind of construction, right on the back 793 00:38:11,482 --> 00:38:15,082 end of the construction, there are the as-builts, right there is the actual 794 00:38:15,082 --> 00:38:19,492 design document in the blueprints of the building as it was completed by 795 00:38:19,492 --> 00:38:23,272 the contractors who did all the work that you stick in a box somewhere and 796 00:38:23,277 --> 00:38:27,142 only go back to when you're trying to figure out where that damn wire that's 797 00:38:27,142 --> 00:38:30,382 powering your wifi, uh, device is running. 798 00:38:31,057 --> 00:38:33,217 Because that's when you need your as-builts, right? 799 00:38:33,217 --> 00:38:35,407 You need to understand how things are wired. 800 00:38:35,587 --> 00:38:37,627 This becomes the as-built for the project. 801 00:38:37,777 --> 00:38:41,497 It gives you esoteric details that you really don't care about until 802 00:38:41,497 --> 00:38:44,737 for some reason you need to know about it, and then it's there. 803 00:38:46,252 --> 00:38:48,922 W. Curtis Preston: When I, when I think about the value of documentation, I'm 804 00:38:48,922 --> 00:38:52,702 speaking in this case more operational documentation than design documentation, 805 00:38:52,702 --> 00:38:57,142 but I go all the way back to when my oldest daughter was born, right? 806 00:38:57,322 --> 00:39:06,292 I was in Delaware, uh, and uh, I was at the hospital in my wife's delivery room. 807 00:39:07,327 --> 00:39:12,847 Nina was born, She's, you know, brand new baby, and I'm, I'm standing in, you 808 00:39:12,847 --> 00:39:16,267 know, in New Father Bliss Zone, right. 809 00:39:17,407 --> 00:39:24,577 And the phone rings in my wife's hospital room and you know, this 810 00:39:24,577 --> 00:39:26,047 is pre-cellphone days, right? 811 00:39:26,407 --> 00:39:30,427 And, um, I, um, I picked up the phone. 812 00:39:30,427 --> 00:39:36,097 I'm like, Why is this phone, It's the bank on the phone, and I. 813 00:39:37,462 --> 00:39:43,582 What, And they said, Well, well we have this restore, uh, that we need to do. 814 00:39:43,612 --> 00:39:47,632 I'm like, I am in my wife's hospital room. 815 00:39:48,952 --> 00:39:51,742 And they're like, Well, we don't understand abc. 816 00:39:51,772 --> 00:39:52,552 And I said, Well, 817 00:39:53,137 --> 00:39:53,347 Jeff Rochlin: Yeah. 818 00:39:53,512 --> 00:39:55,822 W. Curtis Preston: did you read the documentation? 819 00:39:55,882 --> 00:39:58,552 Is there a problem with the documentation? 820 00:39:58,552 --> 00:40:00,952 They said, Oh, we haven't looked at it. 821 00:40:00,952 --> 00:40:01,582 Slam. 822 00:40:01,582 --> 00:40:04,062 I just slammed down the phone, , I. 823 00:40:04,822 --> 00:40:08,902 The, I had good documentation and that was, you know, I, I was like, I'm good. 824 00:40:09,412 --> 00:40:13,372 Jeff Rochlin: I, I regularly go to developers when they're writing software 825 00:40:13,372 --> 00:40:17,272 that I'm involved in having to support and telling them that, um, because 826 00:40:17,272 --> 00:40:18,952 I run operations as well, right? 827 00:40:19,222 --> 00:40:22,222 And telling them that, um, it is in there enlightened self. 828 00:40:23,242 --> 00:40:27,262 To write good documentation for their product because I will call them at 829 00:40:27,262 --> 00:40:28,762 two o'clock in the morning on Saturday. 830 00:40:28,792 --> 00:40:33,292 If it breaks and there's something broken, not only will I call you, I'm 831 00:40:33,292 --> 00:40:36,712 gonna make sure I have your wife's cell phone number as well, and I 832 00:40:36,712 --> 00:40:38,302 will call her if you choose not to 833 00:40:38,587 --> 00:40:39,827 W. Curtis Preston: I call your mom 834 00:40:40,252 --> 00:40:44,392 Jeff Rochlin: Cause if the, I would, Cause if the business is flat out, down 835 00:40:44,392 --> 00:40:48,832 on its ass and I have the CEO of the company who's going to come looking for 836 00:40:48,832 --> 00:40:51,342 me because I'm responsible for operations. 837 00:40:52,087 --> 00:40:53,307 What am I gonna tell 'em? 838 00:40:53,587 --> 00:40:55,387 Sorry, the software doesn't work. 839 00:40:55,447 --> 00:40:56,977 We'll get back to you on Monday. 840 00:40:57,487 --> 00:40:57,817 Right? 841 00:40:57,817 --> 00:40:59,197 It's like, no, it doesn't work that way. 842 00:40:59,647 --> 00:41:03,787 Um, and that's why everything, the better the documentation is, the 843 00:41:03,787 --> 00:41:07,107 less the operations guys have to go and bother the people who wrote it. 844 00:41:10,912 --> 00:41:13,162 Prasanna Malaiyandi: It just going back to the earlier thread that 845 00:41:13,162 --> 00:41:17,842 I was on, how do you ensure that cuz things will change, right? 846 00:41:17,842 --> 00:41:18,832 The system will change. 847 00:41:18,832 --> 00:41:19,912 The designs will change. 848 00:41:20,662 --> 00:41:23,482 Is that part of the process that any time like you get new 849 00:41:23,482 --> 00:41:24,952 requirements or anything else like. 850 00:41:25,552 --> 00:41:27,602 Always go back and update the documentation. 851 00:41:28,252 --> 00:41:28,552 Jeff Rochlin: Yeah. 852 00:41:28,582 --> 00:41:29,602 Should be, should be. 853 00:41:29,602 --> 00:41:30,262 Without a doubt. 854 00:41:30,262 --> 00:41:33,652 And if it's happening during the development process, you take it 855 00:41:33,652 --> 00:41:37,222 back to the review boards so that again, everybody's aware of it 856 00:41:37,222 --> 00:41:38,452 and everybody checks off on it. 857 00:41:38,452 --> 00:41:38,662 Right. 858 00:41:38,662 --> 00:41:40,162 That they're okay with the change. 859 00:41:40,462 --> 00:41:42,322 That it's not a surprise to finance. 860 00:41:42,322 --> 00:41:42,622 Right. 861 00:41:42,622 --> 00:41:47,272 And it's not a surprise to, uh, facilities operations that you're, 862 00:41:47,332 --> 00:41:48,592 you know, all of a sudden gonna re. 863 00:41:49,477 --> 00:41:52,807 Uh, the, the waterlines or something like that to make it work? 864 00:41:52,852 --> 00:41:57,082 W. Curtis Preston: Yeah, I, I would say it's your job as the technology side 865 00:41:57,082 --> 00:42:01,702 of things to watch what's happening with the business side of things and 866 00:42:01,962 --> 00:42:04,252 to see if there are changes, right? 867 00:42:04,462 --> 00:42:06,802 If all of a sudden to, to use your world. 868 00:42:07,002 --> 00:42:11,652 Jeff, you know, you are normally doing 10 movies at a time and you happen 869 00:42:11,652 --> 00:42:14,892 to be in some quarterly meeting and you hear that, They're like, Listen, 870 00:42:15,192 --> 00:42:16,752 we're gonna double production. 871 00:42:16,962 --> 00:42:19,092 We've, you know, we've had some great sales and we're 872 00:42:19,092 --> 00:42:21,102 gonna do 20 movies at a time. 873 00:42:21,432 --> 00:42:23,352 You're gonna be like, um, 874 00:42:24,112 --> 00:42:24,172 Jeff Rochlin: Yeah. 875 00:42:24,732 --> 00:42:24,942 W. Curtis Preston: Right. 876 00:42:25,212 --> 00:42:28,452 You know, current capacity is based on 10 movies at a time. 877 00:42:28,602 --> 00:42:29,922 I'm gonna need twice as much 878 00:42:30,292 --> 00:42:35,122 Jeff Rochlin: yeah, I guess examples in my life of that were like, um, I was working 879 00:42:35,122 --> 00:42:38,782 at Disney at the time and, uh, I sat in a meeting and they said, Hey, we're gonna, 880 00:42:38,842 --> 00:42:40,402 we're gonna release this one in imax. 881 00:42:41,872 --> 00:42:44,933 You know, sitting there going, Wait, I have a system that's designed to 882 00:42:44,938 --> 00:42:47,002 create two K frames on the back end. 883 00:42:47,032 --> 00:42:49,342 I don't even know what IMAX is at this point. 884 00:42:49,762 --> 00:42:52,402 Or, Hey, we're gonna start doing 3d. 885 00:42:52,732 --> 00:42:54,982 That was like, ah, right. 886 00:42:55,172 --> 00:42:59,012 When it comes to things like storage, right, The transition from, 887 00:42:59,012 --> 00:43:00,422 we're gonna do two k, we're gonna. 888 00:43:01,202 --> 00:43:03,662 4k, we wanna do these special formats. 889 00:43:03,992 --> 00:43:06,722 Oh wait, we're gonna start doing live action visual effects. 890 00:43:06,932 --> 00:43:10,292 That means we've gotta shoot, you know, real film back plates, 891 00:43:10,352 --> 00:43:12,212 uh, that you're gonna put stuff on top 892 00:43:12,212 --> 00:43:12,422 of, 893 00:43:12,469 --> 00:43:14,749 W. Curtis Preston: The point here is that you need to be keeping an 894 00:43:14,749 --> 00:43:17,449 eye to going back, sort of bringing this all back to the beginning. 895 00:43:17,789 --> 00:43:21,959 Your organization, what is its function, right? 896 00:43:22,139 --> 00:43:26,279 This, that idea works for businesses, it works for government, uh, right? 897 00:43:26,279 --> 00:43:31,589 So what is the purpose of your organization and what do you, what 898 00:43:31,594 --> 00:43:33,899 purpose do you serve within that purpose? 899 00:43:33,904 --> 00:43:34,234 Jeff Rochlin: Right. 900 00:43:34,234 --> 00:43:38,614 I can, I can promise you that the head, the, the, the chief creative 901 00:43:38,614 --> 00:43:42,394 officer at Disney is not thinking about the difference in storage capacity 902 00:43:42,394 --> 00:43:44,524 between a two K movie and an 8K movie. 903 00:43:45,359 --> 00:43:47,349 W. Curtis Preston: Yeah, it's not, not their job 904 00:43:47,779 --> 00:43:48,229 Jeff Rochlin: right. 905 00:43:48,319 --> 00:43:53,269 But you have to be listening to him to hear that he just said eight K, and go, 906 00:43:53,539 --> 00:43:57,859 Well, okay, I need to go figure out what that means, and then I need to go find 907 00:43:57,859 --> 00:44:01,189 the right executive who's willing to go ask him if he's willing to spend money on 908 00:44:01,189 --> 00:44:03,469 that or if he was just talking about it. 909 00:44:03,619 --> 00:44:05,809 W. Curtis Preston: This whole thing was about gathering the requirements, 910 00:44:05,814 --> 00:44:09,109 just making sure what your company does, making sure that you are doing 911 00:44:09,109 --> 00:44:12,979 the things that you need to do to, to, to meet those requirements. 912 00:44:13,339 --> 00:44:18,619 Um, and, and, and that, and that you should absolutely not be 913 00:44:19,279 --> 00:44:20,779 determining those requirements. 914 00:44:21,286 --> 00:44:23,416 You should not be determining retention. 915 00:44:24,146 --> 00:44:27,656 Recovery time, objective, rpo, any of that stuff that should 916 00:44:27,656 --> 00:44:29,366 all come back from the business. 917 00:44:29,931 --> 00:44:32,821 Jeff Rochlin: Yeah, be an active participant in your company, right? 918 00:44:32,911 --> 00:44:36,061 It's more, be more at your job than just your job. 919 00:44:36,061 --> 00:44:40,711 Understand what your business does, Um, understand why it's doing it, 920 00:44:40,741 --> 00:44:42,751 what makes it, you know, special. 921 00:44:43,286 --> 00:44:44,596 in whatever it is that it's doing. 922 00:44:44,596 --> 00:44:47,956 And when you understand all that stuff, you'll get to know the people 923 00:44:47,956 --> 00:44:51,496 in the business better because you know, like I said, the guy in 924 00:44:51,496 --> 00:44:54,016 customer service doesn't care about what's going on in the computer room. 925 00:44:54,196 --> 00:44:56,686 But if you get to know the guy in customer service because you understand 926 00:44:56,691 --> 00:45:00,076 what he's up against, all of a sudden you can build that relationship. 927 00:45:00,076 --> 00:45:04,456 That'll make it easier to get the info you need later and then document the hell out 928 00:45:04,456 --> 00:45:06,016 of it and make sure everybody signs off. 929 00:45:06,256 --> 00:45:10,421 So, Accountability is spread evenly across the whole 930 00:45:10,421 --> 00:45:11,921 organization at the end of the day. 931 00:45:12,011 --> 00:45:15,851 Cause you don't want to be the guy that everybody points to and 932 00:45:15,851 --> 00:45:17,171 says, Well, we're down for a week. 933 00:45:17,171 --> 00:45:20,591 Because, you know, he decided that we could be down for a week 934 00:45:20,591 --> 00:45:22,421 and go, No, here's the book. 935 00:45:22,741 --> 00:45:23,131 Right. 936 00:45:23,191 --> 00:45:26,761 And then you document it all through an inch of its life so that a, 937 00:45:26,761 --> 00:45:28,501 you have it as a reference, right? 938 00:45:28,501 --> 00:45:31,351 Cause other people are going to have to operate it if you don't want to 939 00:45:31,351 --> 00:45:33,661 be the only person who gets called at two o'clock in the morning cause they 940 00:45:33,661 --> 00:45:35,221 can't figure out how your system works. 941 00:45:35,491 --> 00:45:38,551 Then you describe to people how your system works so they can figure it out at 942 00:45:38,551 --> 00:45:39,901 two o'clock in the morning without you. 943 00:45:40,561 --> 00:45:46,111 Um, and that, um, all of the parameters are covered so that you can now move 944 00:45:46,111 --> 00:45:49,531 up to be the president of the company and the next guy coming in behind you 945 00:45:49,536 --> 00:45:51,781 will be able to just easily step into. 946 00:45:52,516 --> 00:45:55,426 Past role cuz he can just open the books and it's all there for 947 00:45:56,326 --> 00:45:56,806 W. Curtis Preston: I like it. 948 00:45:57,406 --> 00:45:58,306 Well, thanks Jeff. 949 00:45:58,756 --> 00:46:00,466 Always, always a treat. 950 00:46:01,066 --> 00:46:01,846 Jeff Rochlin: My pleasure guys. 951 00:46:01,851 --> 00:46:02,566 Thanks for having me. 952 00:46:03,166 --> 00:46:03,466 W. Curtis Preston: Thanks. 953 00:46:03,466 --> 00:46:03,896 Prasanna. 954 00:46:03,921 --> 00:46:06,616 I know between Jeff and I, you didn't get a word in edge wise in 955 00:46:06,691 --> 00:46:07,441 Prasanna Malaiyandi: That's okay. 956 00:46:07,501 --> 00:46:07,981 I, I 957 00:46:08,176 --> 00:46:08,836 Jeff Rochlin: He asks good 958 00:46:08,911 --> 00:46:10,921 Prasanna Malaiyandi: to the old man, old men 959 00:46:11,066 --> 00:46:11,626 Jeff Rochlin: Hello? 960 00:46:13,891 --> 00:46:15,691 Prasanna Malaiyandi: By the way, if you wanna listen to the two of 961 00:46:15,691 --> 00:46:19,831 them talk more, they do have their, another podcast, right, where you 962 00:46:19,921 --> 00:46:21,181 W. Curtis Preston: We do, we do 963 00:46:22,291 --> 00:46:24,721 the, the things that entertain us Yes. 964 00:46:25,021 --> 00:46:26,581 Is the name of our other podcast. 965 00:46:26,866 --> 00:46:30,466 Jeff Rochlin: May maybe, maybe Curtis will stick a link in in the, uh, show notes. 966 00:46:30,466 --> 00:46:30,706 Who 967 00:46:30,781 --> 00:46:32,581 W. Curtis Preston: maybe, maybe he will, Maybe he will. 968 00:46:33,031 --> 00:46:33,841 Uh, all right. 969 00:46:33,841 --> 00:46:35,551 And thanks again to our listeners. 970 00:46:35,761 --> 00:46:36,841 We're nothing without you. 971 00:46:37,111 --> 00:46:40,081 Remember to subscribe so that you can restore it all.