Nobody knows what their AI actually returns

Thank you, Micolas. I'm really happy to be here and looking forward to our time together.

Okay, so I guess it was the driving factor to take that decision was based on my experience in the corporates. And also the realization that when you're in a corporate, when you are backed up by a certain structure, a certain kind of a financial support Certain global resource that is available to you, then implementing certain things become those models of for that you are implementing may be very powerful, but it becomes easier for you to do, given that you are willing to work hard and you are willing to kind of do a lot of things hands-on. But what I realized was the same model, if can be implemented successfully to companies who do not have some of these supports, say, for example, a global footprint or a deep pocket or any of those or a brand recognition, then it becomes difficult for them to implement such a model which could have been really taken them. Ahead of time. And that was my challenge. So I wanted to, whatever I learned from my corporate days, I wanted to implement that not with big corporations. Yes, in a B2B space, but not with big corporations. But it was mostly for middle market and even startups and absolutely small companies. Sometimes owner-driven, sometimes just a few people, sometimes just some few scientists who are very passionate about what they have done or invented. But they do not know how to commercialize it, how to take it forward as a business.

You know, I think all of us have somewhere a dream and it comes at different stages of life. With some people it might come very early, with some people it might come late, some people it might come because you are kind of stuck somewhere and you want to change course. So I guess that's the part which kind of driven me that okay, I want to do something of my own where I have a little more. flexibility of doing whatever I want to do. So from there it came. But then no matter how much you plan things, I think the first break comes through some kind of a partnership or some kind of an opportunity that knocks at your door. With me also it happened that way. It was not I cannot simply say that it was very much planned. I had really planned that this is the kind of industry I would like to target. This is the kind of partner I would like to have. It all happened Very serendipitously in some way. Because I was so when you do your own stuff, one of the things that you have to keep in mind is when you were doing the same thing as a corporate leader with the same qualities and all of these things that you have been able to do, you are viewed differently. But the same person, when you are to do it independently, the world doesn't look at you that kindly. There is a lot of questions that are there and you have to go an extra mile to kind of prove yourself. So that means that your individual personal marketing, networking is a much bigger thing that you have to do. When you are a company, you have a support to do that. You have to be a part of that support, but you still have to do you still have a support. But when you are alone, and especially you are absolutely new, you got to do it a lot more. So networking was a part of that. And in one such networking event, when I was also a guest, I was not even a part of that networking team or a member of that team. I was a guest. I was I was invited to visit to to attend one such meeting of theirs. And there I meet this gentleman who was also a guest, who was also not from that that group. And when the meeting was over, he kind of comes up to me and he says, Hey, do you have five minutes? Can we talk? We were both guests. So I spoke and two minutes after two months after we had signed a joint venture with them. So sometimes that's what happens. I have not planned that this is the company with whom I'm gonna work and this is going to be my first client or partner, whatever. It happened, but the rest of it was ready. So it just kind of, you know, it took off from there.

I would say all my engagements start with a discovery. And one of the things about that discovery is that one of my main objectives of the discovery is basically I would like to involve that company or that person in the creation of what he's trying to create. I'm not an advisor. Or I'm not talking from any pedestal. I think he or she or that person absolutely knows his business, is just not able to kind of put things in a kind of a structured way or whatever. But he knows his best. Or there are many things without his engagement, I will not be able to solve. So I think it always starts with a discovery when. I would like to involve him in trying to open up to me with his issues. And I think from where from there it starts. And right from the beginning, I would like to engage him in the creation of a strategy. It always starts with something, right? A mandate. You can call it a strategy, you can call it a plan, you can call it, you know, next steps, whatever. But I would never do it as if. This is what I think you do it, I tell you. No. He would have to participate in that. And I would just probably be more like a facilitator helping him. But when it comes to some of those which are subject matter expertise, say he he needs to do an AI implementation. That is where I bring in my subject matter experts, and then they do that part of it. So that is this is how I would start. In just before this call with you today, with meeting with you, I had a meeting with one of my technology partners, and we were talking about a very similar situation on enterprise level AI. And we had planned an enterprise level AI solution because that is what is missing in the market. We are talking about functional AIs. We are forgetting the last mile where we need to humanize that. Humanize technology in a way where technology is still a tool, and I'm the human being who should be able to find the right way to leverage the strength of that technology. Right? That's what we were working on. And then we talked about this part that sometimes we take for granted certain things. But we might have to even go a step further to see what we are taking for granted. Let's just go back there and see: is that right? Sometimes we take for granted a particular strategy and we are asked to implement that strategy. Maybe sometimes you need to question if the strategy fits with the rest of it. Maybe the strategy itself requires a certain level of modification, then the value chain from there. becomes much more relied.

I think The biggest misconception probably is, and I don't know whether to use the word misconception, but it's a level of our understanding of What or how to use AI. At the end of the day, AI is invented by human beings, right? It is still a tool. I mean, progressively it has moved in a direction in which it is sometimes very easy to kind of think that it is not a tool, but it's a human being itself. I mean, we are almost seeing every other day. A new avatar of AI. Initially it was a speed, it was a scope, it was a scale, all of that. But now we are seeing it starts thinking. Suppose you are the user of that AI tool. After some time, that has figured out your personality, your right style of writing, your style of approaching a particular thing. And you tend to think, my god, he knows me, he he's me. But That is where I think we have to have a very clear understanding of what it is. Yes, at a certain way you have it has probably created kind of a digital twin of yours. And a lot of people think that that's almost you, but that you is a constant changing factor, and your thoughts are changing. So as long as you are aware of the fact that. Use this, everything that this is doing today, but at the end of the day, don't you should still use your original thoughts when you are implementing it with your digital twin or with your AI partner. As long as you do that, it's fine. And then you can get the best of what AI can do. They can do a lot of things. Imagine, I mean, I personally tell you. Writing proposals for clients used to be an used to be quite a thing which which would take time and I would tend to kind of procrastinate that writing a pro writing a proposal would take five days from the day you have talked to the you know the client and the client said I need it tomorrow and there was will be some always some reason to delay it. Now I can write five proposals in one day, thanks to AI. But obviously I'm inputting a lot of my prompts.

Which are based on my so many years of experience. So the proposal comes out really well. But those are true advantages of AI. But when you look at AI at a more enterprise level, that is where lies the real challenge. That how do we, if there are five different applications where you're using AI, maybe each one of them functionally are superb, fantastic. But if you ask most people who are using AI in such five, six, seven different applications and you ask ask them at a at your level, at the ROI level, tell me what is ROI of this overall AW AI implementation that you are doing. Most people have no clue. And that's where lies the challenge. I'm talking about the last mile. That's the last mile.

As I said In our kind of services, I think it is very important because we are in a part of our services, advisory. And I do think advisory is probably a misleading word, but what I'm trying to say is that we always try to involve the client in what we create for the client. Our most powerful inputs are when the clients open up to you. They are f they feel us as a safe space to ex, you know, share their vulnerabilities and their real fear, their real shortcomings. That is when you co-create a solution where you completely involve that person. So this is has been our marketing marketing effort all along. It is never that we go with a real well created pitch. But we do create a pitch which is probably in a way an enabler for them to participate with you. And and that's where the whole issue becomes clearer and we are able to together find some kind of a sol solution, which may be baby steps, which may not be that one day you find a the entire solution. And then we also do what is called pilot to scale. We invariably start with more of a pilot level engagement and then test it out and then scale it from there.

So as I've grown older, a couple of things happened, and as I've gone through a especially in the last few years, through a world which is highly disruptive in many ways, it has become clearer to me that the world is very full of inequity. There are equity is what is missing in some basic things of life. Healthcare, food, education. You know, we talk about terms like global south, global north, and all of that. But the fact is those challenges are almost universal, irrespective of whether you live in global south and global north. That global north people would love to think that it's all problems of global south. It is not. I mean, I can show you communities in this city, in this country, which are As much challenged as the global south communities when it comes to education, healthcare, food, so many things. So I think in the next 12 to 14 months, 24 months and and beyond, one of my focus area is really to try to solve some of these inequities in life, in terms of population and in terms of what I believe is basic stuff. Healthcare is a basic stuff. So I have created what is called a global health equity collaborative where I am working with partners in other parts of the world in creating global health equity, especially with underprivileged people. And how we could, with a very limited budget, involving communities, involving committed service providers, whether doctors, nurses, whatever, create that kind of a health equity with people who are do not have fancy insurance or none of those. Okay, and I've I was very pleasantly surprised that in countries where there are more limited resources, they come up with more innovative solutions, which can then be replicated even in very advanced countries.

So one is that, one is education. And when I'm talking about education against, I'm talking about absolutely small young children level education, a lot of focus on education of girl child. So that's one thing I'm working on. And of course, as I said, health, education, basic other things like food and stuff like that. They're all interrelated somewhere. So social determinants of health is an area where there are other other determinants of health. Health is not in isolation. Suppose you are somebody who has to think about putting food on the table for your kids, right? You would then make a choice that I have a doctor's appointment, do I take care of that for myself, or I do something else to make sure that your my children are fed? So these are challenges, practical challenges. And that is where I would like to focus more and more. I've been sitting in the board of some of such companies, but I've been also involved in as I said from my company in a global health equity collaborative which involves Latin America, India, US as well, and some parts of Africa. In the workforce, I have been involved, and it's very initial stage in trying to look at a workforce. So by another 10 years, the global workforce would have 40% people coming from Africa, from the continent of Africa. 40%. That's a number. But does it mean that that 40% workforce is actually productive, actually ready in terms of many things, in terms of their education, training, all of that? in terms of their health, in terms of their mental stability, mental health, they may not be. So there has there is a huge amount of work required to do to take care of that. You cannot universally do that. You have to collaborate with local people, local companies to do that. So that's another area where I'm trying to work on something. So these are some of the things that I would like to do in addition to you know the regular work of TBS.

I know. I think the best way to reach out reach me out is to through my email. Which I think you have so yeah.

Thank you for having me and I really enjoyed this conversation and good luck to you as well.