IT Insights US Spotlight Series: Consulting

In this episode of the Future Processing US Spotlight Series, Vinay Patel and Bernard Williams from OIC Advisors, bringing their extensive corporate leadership experience, sit down with Mike Zamarski and Konrad Bałys, our tech and digital transformation consultants, to explore the evolving role of consultancy and technology in delivering business value. Hosted by Paula Lipnick, the conversation dives into:

– the best methods of achieving the right mix of consultancy and tech expertise to deliver measurable outcomes and business value,

– the advantages of tackling increasing business complexities with a tech-driven consultancy,

– strategies to enhance communication and streamline collaboration between tech and business teams,

– predictions for the future in an AI-driven, hybrid-work environment.

This discussion sheds light on how organisations can combine strategic advisory with technical expertise to achieve measurable, long-term results.

Mike Zamarski: Welcome to the discussion. I thought that we could do quick introductions first, uh, so welcome. I’m Mike Zamarski and I’m acting as a digital transformation consultant for Future Processing for the past four years. Previously I’ve been an owner of 15 businesses in three countries on two continents and with that experience mixed with my accountancy background, uh, what I can do for Future Processing is to help FP and their clients to clash great ideas with business reality to create value that can be turned into reality. And in my free time, uh, I’m a Rancher; I own a small ranch in Poland where I do breed cattle, sheep, and laying hens.

Vinay Patel: My name is Vinay Patel, I’m a co-founder and COO of OIC Advisors and we start the company really to [do] everything that Mike said except for the ranching part. The, um, businesses are really challenged right now to succeed in the age of digital transformation and one of the things that we feel we really bring to the table is the speed and velocity of change. Um, so that’s a key tenant of all of our operations; everything we do is really structured to get our clients as rapid progress as possible to help them achieve their operational velocity. Prior to, uh, the OIC Advisors, uh, company, we, uh, met in Cisco—so Bernard and I as well as our third co-founder Christine Briggs, we were all at Cisco. Uh, I spent about eight years at Cisco across many different roles in Professional Services, product management on product service lines, and really got a chance to work firsthand, uh, with our clients and really got to do amazing things there. Um, prior to that I spent many years in Enterprise IT roles, uh, service provider roles so, um, really have been very lucky to work with really good clients across and hopefully I can bring that knowledge to our clients in the OIC capacity.

Bernard Williams: Bernard Williams, I’m the CTO with OIC Advisors. And as Vinay explained, uh, we are focused on helping organizations improve, uh, their ability to deliver value quicker to their end customers. And, uh, that’s for me that’s been a passion for the past 25, 30 years no matter what organization I’ve been in. I’ve been focused on helping to optimize processes and help the organizations digitally transform. Uh, we take a Hands-On approach and, uh, we have, uh, led, uh, small projects all the way up to Enterprise scale projects, um, uh, impacting millions of users. So, uh, I’ve learned what works and what doesn’t work when it comes to organizational transformation and I’ve got all the Battle Scars, uh, to prove it. And if there’s a way that a project can fail, I assure you that I have found it and have, uh, experienced it. And so, um, we love to bring that knowledge to the table so that other people can benefit.

Konrad Bałys: So I’m Conrad Bis. I’ve been working at Future Processing for actually 15 years so I, uh, it’s a long journey which started from the software development, uh, Tech lead and recently leaning more to the consultant consultancy and, um, Solutions Architects. So, uh, I went with this company a long journey, uh, when it was much smaller and infant to, to, to the, to the current, uh, size. And at this time I solved a lot of business problems, uh, using the technology. Deep inside my heart I’m still a software developer but on the outside I, I’m more you know solution architect and, and consultant.

Paula: My name is Paul[a] and I’ve been in technology for over 10 years. My current role as an agile coach makes me very interested in all things that optimize practices and so I’m very excited to be here today to have a discussion with Future Processing about all the Innovative things that they’re doing. I’m going to go into the first discussion question: Why should companies choose you over large firms? How do you ensure the right mix of business advisory and Technology?

Bernard Williams: I think that the primary reason that companies should choose, um, and you know just speaking for OIC Advisors but you know also, uh, you know a company like Future Processing, um, we have been there and we have done that and we have seen what works and what doesn’t work. And it’s one thing when so I’m not saying that I’m long in the tooth but you know we’ve been around a little bit and so, uh, not to ever, um, issue someone that is has not had a lot of experience in the field but what when you have that, uh, that experience you see: hey you know in these situations here is what can work and here’s a way to quickly get to the result that the customer is looking for and here’s the things that the customer really cares about such as business outcomes. It’s very easy as a technologist to focus on how amazing this solution is but the solution isn’t a solution unless there’s a problem to be overcome. So we choose to fall in love with resolving the problem versus coming up with the solution. And so as, uh, as OIC Advisors we come in and we focus on resolving the problem. And the problem that we love to fix is shrinking the time from that amazing idea to Value delivery—you know shrinking that. So and we call that operational velocity; in improving an organization’s ability to meet their value proposition for their target customer and their ideal customer profile in the shortest amount of time. And so, uh, that’s why I would say an organization should choose OIC Advisors.

Mike Zamarski: And this is exactly why we felt in love with OIC instantly because when Future Processing was trying to explore the options how to move to the, um, Western markets mostly, we were looking for a partner who would understand this corporate business world, uh, very intimately. At the same time, uh, as we wanted to get to know this world better and evolve from our history which was just a software house, um, we knew that we need to find someone who is very open to how the ground the battle trenches really look like. And this is where we do come on board as we also do, uh, think that bringing value to the customer is the ultimate goal for any software company to Aspire to. At the same time this is quite difficult for a company which is built on Engineers only. So this is why the partnership between two organizations—one which stems from the engineering background, the second one one that stems from the corporate world that do have this Common Ground inside—is so valuable and can bring so much unique value to our clients, understanding both sides of the aisle with no value being Lost in Translation. And this is critical when you do go to these large companies; they only think about the business perspective and so much information and value gets lost in the translation as you need to, to explain things and translate it to this alien engineering language. And as we know this language in the metal and we have such a good relationship with OIC, this is why this additional, uh, value layer for our clients is being generated.

Konrad Bałys: I totally agree and I saw this journey at [Future] Processing because I’m so long here that, uh, Our Roots are the very engineering software specialist who who are able to do amazing stuff but yet to Define what is the this amazing, what what problem business problems you would like to solve. And, uh, currently any cooperation, any any cooperation with the client, uh, focuses not only on the solving the problem but also doing it with a, with a fun. I, I mean that the engineers are still have a lot of fun when solving the problems and if you understand the client problems and you can you know support that you you’re writing so code or you’re integrating something you’re doing something Technical and in the end you you see this big rocket launching, yeah, or you see this successful, uh, acquisition or or any other project—that’s re really rewarding. And, uh, I can speak not only for myself but also for my other Architects colleagues, we have quite big community group of or Architects that, uh, this personalized approach, uh, to, to, to the client, the the the Business technical people who are close to the business are are really our, uh, strength, yeah.

Vinay Patel: I would add, um, I think those are all wonderful points. The one thing we’ve seen is that these days clients can see through very shallow presentations, um, you know fluffy of PowerPoints very very quickly. And so when you look at what separates us and both OIC and Future Processing whether it be on the business advisory on the consultancy side or on the technical delivery side, we get results quickly because we truly as Mike and Conrad mentioned we really tried to get to an outcome. And you know rather than just interviewing, um, you know the traditional days of interviewing, uh, you know 20 people in an engagement, putting all that documentation together and polishing it up and putting it into fancy graphics and you know having a big readout and you call that a consultancy—I mean those days are gone. And I think you know there are a lot of Consulting companies out there are already obsolete they just don’t know it yet. Um, getting into a state where you can proceed side by side and your one team delivering those results getting to a stage where your end clients are truly seeing value and true business value. That combination of business value with the technology has to be you know the the the goal every day. So yeah that’s what we pride ourselves in and, uh, same thing on our side too Mike. Like we partnered with OIC and FP because we’ve seen you have those same types of you know [agile] deliverables you have that value-driven mindset and I think it’s a it’s a very wonderful partnership.

Paula: I’ve got another question: Given the increasing complexity of Technology Services, why do large consulting firms struggle to adapt while technology-driven firms like yours Thrive?

Konrad Bałys: Okay, so maybe like one of the first factors—there’s going to be multiple of of those factors—but the first factor is that every, uh, company that deals with technology needs to adapt. It has to be embedded in their core, uh, because if you are not catching up with the world then you’re done. And trust me, uh, technology goes much much faster than any market and any business on it. So obviously businesses need to adapt and the need for adaptability in and flexibility in the business is extremely important but still the rate on which the changes are, uh, coming through is nowhere as fast as in technology. So that would be a very good starting point to be able to catch up with the knowledge at the fastest rate possible which, uh, technology companies have in their core, yeah.

Bernard Williams: I would say sometimes technology, especially new and emerging technology, it might even be a hindrance to organizations because it takes a lot to really adapt and to embrace technology to make those business outcomes faster. Um, one of the reasons you mentioned you why why we’re successful is that we weave that technology into the fabric of the organization. So sometimes just saying okay so we’re partners with many technology companies you know HubSpot, Teamwork, Scaled Agile and there lot of places where that’s the right technology that the company needs to improve, for example, their services delivery; they can get value from their services faster or their product time to Market can shrink if they incorporate some of these agile Technologies. But that process of embracing and really adapting yourself to leverage that technology for what it can do—that takes time and there’s also a lot of organizational inertia. There are a lot lot of people that are just really you know happy to do things in a particular way in a particular tool in a particular process. So having that goal in mind—this is how we want that outcome to be, these are the tools we want people to use but this is how we want them to use them and this is how that technology needs to become a part of that organization—those are places where we really spend a lot of time. Um, you know you have to tell the organization what success looks like you have to help them Envision it and then you have to really continuously tell them many many times. We have to you know drop some of the old tools so we can adopt a new tool. So I think technology by itself itself is great but it cannot be the only focus for any type of transformation project; it has to become the core of that process around which you really evolve.

Organizations differ in their ability to adopt new technology so by organization type, so is there a particular type of organization that is better at adopting a new technology or or transforming than another type of organization? And I would submit to you that it has nothing to do with organization type but it has to do with management competen[ce] and it has to do with the the organization’s ability to execute. Which you know is different from you know you could be a break manufacturer and because you have an incredible ability to execute you can adapt adopt new technology, uh, versus you know, uh, Microsoft where have worked in the past and, um, uh, sometimes the the cobbler’s kids have no shoes. And so it is very easy inside of, uh, large technology companies to assume that you are amazing at adopting and, uh, and rolling out New Technology Solutions and doing digital transformation and that’s simply you know not the case, yeah.

Konrad Bałys: And it’s I think very important to highlight that not all of the new technologies are worth, uh, you know in in corporation because, uh, it happens and I I’ve seen it many times that, uh, the salesman of big companies who invent something new new technologies they would like to sell it and they promise that it will solve all your problems but, uh, in the reality for real clients when you would like to adapt those which are on the you know marketing papers very bright and elegant Solutions which works which work they in reality aren’t that that that good, yeah. So it’s very important to have like a real background, uh, from the real time scenarios real time, uh, implementations and, uh, you can choose and sense is this going to help your client when you adapt this one or not? Is it suitable for your size and and your, um, your your your budget, your time scale, your the problems you have? So I I believe that Technologies should solve the problems and I would rather say that the problems should be, uh, solved using the technology but it’s not the technology, um, itself as a destination. And I I believe that sometimes big company big Consulting companies are selling you know big products technology products because of the marketing not because they are worth, uh, being implemented at certain clients, yeah. So yes.

Mike Zamarski: And to Bernard’s Point, um, and our pre previous question actually this shows why a partnership like ours is brings so much value because as we can see, uh, it’s like the the fabric, uh, the different threads do weave through. So from one end we have this I believe that there are differences in how companies can adapt based on the market they work in. For example banking is quite slow. I do stem from the accounting, uh, background and really the, um, possibility for, uh, the law for example to change change it just takes so much time so the the cycle of adoption is really very very long while technological companies they need to even Microsoft they need to scale to their client need sometimes in the matter of minutes for example if the load is increased, uh, significantly then obvious Microsoft needs to provide the services that can adapt to client’s needs. But at the same time you have this—the first one was horizontal weave—the vertical, uh, is the management and the company is being built in so, um, because there are so many threats and factors that need to interweave with each other—some of them stem from the technology and some of them stem from the business—this is why it’s so so important to have multiple perspectives and multiple focuses. And this is where the partnership brings to the table its unique, uh, viewing point where we are able to adapt as a, um, joint venture much faster than any company that’s that is being built in only one dimension as we have more Dimensions to our partnership than that.

Paula: I love hearing that. What I’m hearing is that you develop a partnership and you’re doing this from your years of experience in the field and that helps you know your customers better than they could possibly know themselves?

Mike Zamarski: To some extent yes but at the same time it’s so important not to be behave or act like we know the business better than our clients. What we do excel at is providing excellent Frameworks and excellent methods of communication and excellent ways how to streamline the domain knowledge the clients already possess or they don’t know they possess on it’s missing a few spots and we can fill in the blanks and then turn this gigantic area of knowledge into something that can be transferred into into the results. So it’s like putting a spotlight on what matters, yeah.

Konrad Bałys: And information structurization, yeah. To get from all this chaos and all of this mess like the real decision what to do, yeah. What is the the strategy, what is the road map, yeah?

Vinay Patel: The company doesn’t make money by implementing new technology; they use that technology to deliver their end products or services. So I think that’s where you know we really provide the secret sauce. They know their business of their products and their services better than anyone else. We know how to integrate you know those new tools how to help them operate faster how to get to that end State better than anyone else. So I think that combination—and then within us though we focus OIC focuses a lot more on the operational side on the organizational design and on the delivery and the value acceleration and FP, um, is the best in terms of the technical implementation and the technical architecture and the strategy. So I think that marriage really combined with the knowhow of the, um, companies that we work for I think that, um, that is really the secret towards getting outcomes, uh, delivered as quickly as possible.

Paula: And it leads me a little bit into our next discussion question: What are you doing daily to help ensure collaboration between Business and Technology teams?

Vinay Patel: I think there are many things that we do daily. Um, just as as one example we’re working with very large company that has a transformation project underway to really change a multi-billion dollar product line and for them there are so many different stakeholders; it’s a very matrixed organization. So, um, from a daily perspective the first thing we did was to establish a transformation office and this is very much more than a like a traditional PMO structure. So it’s more than reporting, it’s more than tracking and creating you know status updates blockers things like that. Uh, a transformation office is really about Communications, about aligning multiple stakeholders, about gaining consensus and using those communication channels to then help overcome obstacles overcome inertia and to help communicate you know project status and overcome those different challenges. So I think establishing a Cadence with your business partners and your technology Partners, um, within the company as well as outside the company—a transformation office really brings those different elements together so we try to do that even for small projects. It may not be a huge office but at least having those functions that really, um, are are centered around Communications of that entire project to all stakeholders within the company or the organization. Um, you know that Communications is the key. I think you have to continuously beat the drum you have to repeat the message you have to celebrate successes and then you have to gain that sense of urgency across the organization at all stages.

Bernard Williams: I like finding the bright spots and, um, uh, you know like Vinay just talked through you know celebrating the successes. I I think that’s important because, um, people like to be, uh, recognized and rewarded and hey you did a great job you did. And so whenever I see great examples of effective collaboration you know I’m talking it up: hey thank you very much for sharing that information here’s the outcomes of being able to effectively, uh, have cross team collaboration. And oftentimes what we’ve seen in organizations that we have been supporting and helping is that that cross team collaboration is a huge detractor from their ability to deliver value. Uh, those people in that other team you know they’re not as good as us and you know you have this Silo mentality and information isn’t flowing from left to right through the organization in order to deliver that value. So whenever we see, um, great [efforts] of cross team collaboration I tried to you know shine a light on it and say that’s that’s the behavior we’re looking for that’s great stuff.

Mike Zamarski: And what Vinay and Bernard said, it’s a very known, uh, always problem that happened since the beginning of humanity. What has changed is the way we can facilitate this communication. So we are at the level of c civilization where this communication it’s even harder harder than previously due to the amount of communication channels and so on so I completely agree with their point. Uh, on top of that it’s really important to Cascade down this communication to the day-to-day teams that do work on software delivery as, uh, when you have a look in the past like 20 years ago 15 years ago, uh, imagine you had a big client the only thing the engineers were interested in was, uh, looking at their task list and Performing the task. And the humongous difference between pre, uh, the network boom or pre AI even was that you could do that; you were creating art for art basically. Right now it’s important to take the, um, the idea the value the vision the concept that is being meticulously, uh, perfected on every of these government meetings and then translate that into the day, uh, today of the engineer as, uh, we need these Engineers to ask questions. And what differentiates Future Processing from most of the companies that we can, uh, experience on the day-to-day basis when we have the behind the curtain stock, um, in the industry is that we do put a very strong effort on being able to Cascade this message, uh, in a very shortened, uh, way of course to our Engineers so they do understand what they are doing and why they are, uh, doing what they are doing. And actually this is actually Conrad who told me told me a very good framework for that we should ask ourself, um, to ourselves two questions every day: so are we doing the right thing and then after that are we doing the right thing right? And I think this is what it boils down to in the trenches you need to know why you are doing these tasks you need to empower your engineers to be able to ask questions to press the red button if they see okay this doesn’t make sense in the context of the business value the client wants to achieve maybe we could do something cheaper maybe we could use some of the outof thebox solutions maybe we could fiddle with the quality because the business goal doesn’t require The Artsy, uh, quality they need to, uh, achieve their business purposes and they don’t need a golden tool to do that they just need stick for some of the parts. And empowering our Engineers to be able to ask these questions because they do understand the context context and this context is being regularly curated with our clients allows us, um, to be much more efficient and to deliver value faster. Same as Bernard said this is the key how to deliver the proper amount of value and how to deliv deliver it fast, yeah.

Konrad Bałys: Thank you thank you Mike. Uh, you said what I would like to say with with similar sentences and I can bring up a short metap[hor] for this one: that three people are building something and you ask the first person what are you doing? I’m carrying the bricks. And you’re asking the second person what are you doing? I’m building the wall. And you are asking the third person what are you doing? I’m building the cathedral. And what Mike said this Cascade of the information from the business what are you doing and what for you’re doing this, uh, this stuff is really important to Cascade, uh, this information to the development teams because if they don’t understand, um, what is the goal what we would like to achieve it is very hard to in today’s world to to have a successful outcome. So our day-to-day activities are to bringing the key person from the project, uh, closer to the business as close as possible to to get this information and propagate cascaded, uh, to to to the development team so everybody can, uh, make an improvement and everybody can highlight some ideas to to to do something better quicker faster or or or in other way which would be more beneficial.

Mike Zamarski: Yes and it also enables us to fail faster in the Project Life Cycle because failing fast is is critical. It’s very cheap to fail fast to test hypothesis to test ideas and make mistakes way where where they don’t cost much time and money, uh, and all of us here combined we made so many mistakes as I mentioned previously. Uh, so this is why why it’s so important and we know that we want to teach our clients how to fail in safe environments so they can make the most innovating the best fit in the market the most valuable, uh, product for their customers because the worst thing they can do is to fail when they already launched the Market.

Paula: I love that. So what I’m hearing is that by increasing the cooportation you’re increasing the speed as well bringing everyone together.

Konrad Bałys: Correct. And also it’s about filtrate, uh, doing the filters on messaging so every level of organization or the project needs to get the proper amount of information in the proper, uh, time and only then and only then they are able [a]ble to function as one single organism to bring what our clients require the best value for their money.

Paula: I have another discussion question: What’s changed in the past few years? How are these changes going to impact the future? Do you have any predictions?

Mike Zamarski: Well that this is a rough one and also a tricky one because we we could come up with with some very wild predictions and I can guess that some of these would be very accurate. And maybe instead of asking a question how, uh, what changes are awaiting us, uh, maybe the critical question here is how can we prepare for all of these changes that we are not able to predict? With the AI being on the horizon with really varying opinions how it’s going to change the industry my own opinion is that it’s going to change, uh, the the ecosystem as much as the automotive industry did. That’s going to reshape how, uh, the world is being consumed in its entire entity. So I think that things that we partly did mention about so being extremely agile being able to adapt being able to to collab collaborate being able to shift, um, focus very fast, um, are the four best predictors for the skill sets that we need to, um, curate and nurture within the organization as these soft maybe soft skills are going to be much more important in the future with the way that technology develops and the ability to leverage technology that’s going to surpass any best Minds in the planet very soon. Um, that’s going to be critical, yeah.

Vinay Patel: I think, um, you know just as you as you talked about it the the few things that popped into my mind Paula the, um, last three four years you know what are the big changes that we’ve already seen? So AI is definitely at the top of the list. Um, this concept of work from anywhere hybrid work you know just the the companies that 5 years ago would never have even fathomed that someone could work outside of the office are now you you know allowing that. And you know there’s all these things from a technology perspective that have come up you know zero trust and you know all these different networking, uh, security things that have evolved to allow that. Um, and then automation. So again just working across Network boundaries the, um, outage of CrowdStrike that happened you know a couple of months back I mean that just the the thing that’s underlying all of these three they’re sort of tangential that to me the one thing underlying all those is trust. So how can you trust that your vendor that is providing hyper automation that can instantly you know submit code to every corner of the planet how can you trust that that’s going to be valid and not you know break the world? How can you trust that you know your employees are going to have safe secure access everywhere they go wherever they’re working, um, and have that continuity you know to make sure that they’re productive? And then in AI I think, um, you know one thing that I read that really stuck with me last week, um, Satya Nadella from Microsoft published his annual letter and one of the things in there was how do we earn trust you know he said trust is earned not given so how can you ensure that the AI tools that you’re using are built upon a foundation of trust you know the governance the Providence the data security, um, you know protecting your data when it’s used in all these different models. Um, you know there are a lot of things out there but I think the companies that will succeed and will Thrive no matter what field they’re in are going to be the ones that can earn the trust and prove that they are trustworthy.

Konrad Bałys: I would say that the best way to predict future is to invent it, so nice yeah. So, uh, I I I’m I’m not sure if I’m good at predictions so I would like to be involved in some world changing I think, uh, projects which could influence how the future would look like. And, uh, to me the recent changes and as [Vinay] has said already this geopolitical and economical situation of the world AI and and working from many locations it it changed a lot and it was just like 5 years. Uh, so imagine what could happen in in 20 years but but I think that, um, the AI is is something, uh, we should focus, uh, to. I I’m I’m not seeing maybe the Terminator scenario the from the movie Terminator maybe not this way but, uh, I would say the high unemployment would be a really problematic in the nearest, uh, near nearest Future due to, uh, the AI. So if we can think about, uh, how to solve such issues, uh, maybe we can solve it with another technology I don’t know but that would be I I think that the most important issue to to solve in the upcoming five 10 years, uh, I guess. And for now as a technology company, uh, it’s a it’s a great opportunity to enroll such, uh, such Tools in everything we do, uh, if it of course makes sense as we said previously if it can help our clients to to boost the business and in increase make growth. Uh, that’s that’s I think the obvious path, uh, in the nearest radar.

Mike Zamarski: I I think this is really important what you said Conrad so about big shifts in employment. That’s, um, at the same time a big threat but at the same time it’s a huge opportunity and I will reference to my previous, uh, comment about the, um, AI being the revolution of the size of the automotive being introduced. Um, and after that happened for example horse shoe was not relevant anymore and what did happen to all of these people who did that or who took care of horses they just changed their profiles a new, um, the whole new Range Services some did right some some changed their profiles others were just like I can’t do that I’m gonna you know retire or they went broke. I I agree that there are always, um, coll[ateral] there is always collateral damage to Revolutions and this is a revolution and there’s going to be some but with the rest, uh, you’ll just have to embrace the changes and just imagine how much possibility is going to happen in the next few years and that that’s amazing, yeah.

Konrad Bałys: But one slight difference between the change which happened this 100 years ago and now is that any, uh, Revolution which happened was more of the, uh, jobs related to some kind of force mechanical stuff, yeah. So you you change the way you travel you change how you build something more automation but it was related to physical, uh, human strength and and replacement of that one with the AI the difference is that it changes at the mental level, yeah. So cognitive it’s like a cognitive revolution of the automation more more or less. So I think that the outcome with this revolution may be may be different than the with the previous ones.

Paula: I love that thought we do need to change the way that we think. One thing I think is interesting about when automobiles came to be and everyone was able to get one it was at a time when there weren’t a lot of Roads.

Vinay Patel: Yes yes finding opportunity you know that you I think Bernard mentioned it like the people that can take a look at some change and say hey this is an opportunity and you I’m going to go attack it I’m going to find a path through and I’m going to succeed rather than this is an obstacle people are you know putting things in here because you know they’re blocking what I used to do for you know X number of years. I think that mentality is critical. But, um, you know the the physical versus mental aspect that Conrad mentioned is definitely real and I think the thing that really takes away any excuses that people would have is just instant access to all information like no matter what feel you’re in. Um, you know at least, uh, from from, um, our perspective we can take a look at what’s coming and we know that okay this thing is happening and if I’m in an industry if I’m in a company if I’m in a team that doesn’t have that mindset of change that doesn’t have that mindset of transformation you know either you step up or you change teams or you find a way to overcome that because, um, you know there is no excuse because I think everyone has that access just like everyone else does and the people that are having that mindset that okay this is an opportunity to to get better those will be the ones that thrive.

Mike Zamarski: Brilliant. I would like to to CH challenge a little bit the the mindset, uh, argument that this is the first time we have the CH change in the mindset. As as as I mentioned I do own a ranch and, uh, in terms of for example farming just imagine that what a huge change mentally it was for Farmers to introduce tractors first it wasn’t just physical it was me it was a huge mental leap they needed to take and I think it’s tempting to say that’s the first time it happened in human history but I wouldn’t be so sure. I think that every Revolution comes with breaking a mental barrier and mental status quo and I don’t think this is much different than what happened previously it’s just from our perspective it’s different because we know everything that happened previously but I can guarantee you that to our predecessors, uh, it it the the every new Revolution Wasing okay fair enough yeah yeah.

Bernard Williams: The, uh, your last question, um, uh, was great and it made me go look up a quick stat here on, uh, um, the adoption of technology and so the one that, uh, I dug up real quick was you know what is the adoption rate of generative Ai and, um, it took so two years in, uh, we are at a 40% [ad]option rate. So across meaning that 40% of businesses, um, uh, two years after generative AI was released we’re using it. Um, so imagine where we are today because we know that number’s gone up significantly three four years in but, uh, it doubled the speed with which the internet was adopted and it took the PC almost 14 15 years to get to that level of adoption after it was, uh, introduced. And, um, I think that’s incredible when you could compare the PC to how fast generative AI is getting sucked up and when this comes out and gets updated for next year I would not be surprised if we’re in the 75 you know or percent or higher space. Um, and so when such life-altering technology gets placed into the wild I I can understand why some people are you know crying wolf saying know you’ve opened Pandora’s Box and you know think about the regulations that have to catch up it’s going to take years you’ve got you know, um, uh, you know various, uh, Bad actors out there in the world that are using you know the power for bad things and you’ve got amazing people using the power for amazing things. And so, uh, it is almost like a Cambrian explosion, uh, that is happening that we get to observe and and watch and so, uh, you know I I I think of you know when I’m you know 70 80 90 years old and look back and say I remember when they introduced generative AI remember that and what happened and how how it changed the world and so imagine what, uh, what things will have occurred as a result of you know having this tool available and just like you know the telegraph or the telephone and the things that were available because you could pick up a phone and call your family member you know that was on the other side of the country.

Paula: Mike Conrad Bernard it’s been an honor talking to you today about all of the Innovative things that OIC and Future Processing are doing and I’m looking forward to speaking with you in the future.

Vinay Patel: Likewise thank you for moderating thank you thank you take care.