Ep. 25 - Crafting Success with Steve Laham | Devs:After Dark

Hasbro was a massively fun place to work. We got toy drops where you'd walk in and there'd be toys on your desk. They had their own internal shop, toy shop, that had all off-brands you can't find anywhere else. Lightsabers everywhere.

They would've had to defer my check to the store. Just be like, yeah, we're just paying you in toys.

That's pretty much it.

Hello and welcome to Developers After Dark. I am your host, Nick, with my co-hosts as always, Dennis and AJ. Today we have a very, very special guest, someone who I've worked with since the day I got here and even got to talk to before I even worked here, which was an amazing thing, which just goes to show how comfortable HubSpot and the people here make you feel even before you get in the door. So it's gonna be a very, very good episode. But before we get into that, I will let our guests introduce themselves. Let me mention just really quickly, because I just saw this on LinkedIn the other day and I thought that was really kind of fantastic. The HubSpot Academy turned 13. So that was excellent. Yes. And again, if you haven't taken advantage of this, 'Cause as I mentioned a couple times, when me and AJ, when we're talking with a couple of friends who are developers, they assumed that there was a price point to using HubSpot Academy that you had to pay to use it like it was a subscription, like a Lynda.com or some of the other ones that are out there. And no, we had to tell 'em, we're like, no, just go there. There's courses for certifications, you've got Sales Hub software, you've got content marketing and a lot more, social media marketing as well. So you can just go there and all of those things are there for you. So you don't have to pay for anything. So happy birthday to the HubSpot Academy.

Happy freaking birthday. Teenage years.

Absolutely, right? Isn't that fantastic? And for those on audio, obviously you can go to academy.hubspot.com and you'll find everything you need there. For anybody that really, really wants to watch really good podcasts, I mean, they can always go to our website as well. And that's dev.to/darkpod.com. You'll see every episode once it's published. It'll be right up on there, and then also on the HubSpot Developers YouTube channel as well. And don't just go to the YouTube channel for us, although that would be fantastic. I would feel really, really honored. But there is so much more that you'll be able to learn when you go there. You've got videos from other developer relations people like Hannah, Brooke, Bree, so much stuff, so many Summaries, rollups, everything is all explained in videos. I've even got a couple of them up there where I, a couple of marketplace things, you know, a little near and dear to my heart, I throw up there as well. So, you know, go there. It's really probably one of the coolest learning tools because it's not only, it's not only this kind of thing where it's, there's short form and there's long form. So there's like just a myriad of things that you can learn there. And then not just learn, but there's tips and tricks, right, of tools that you're probably already using in HubSpot. that you probably didn't know you could do.

Yeah, I'm really excited about it, Nick. I just want to plug this. Bree is putting up a series, I think, of 4 videos right now on the end-to-end development of App Guards. So from the authentication all the way to the deployment, which I am really excited about. I put the first one up yesterday, and I think I'll have the next one up on Monday. So, you know, stay tuned for that.

That is awesome. Yeah. And then Not to mention that that was one of the things we mentioned in the Spring Spotlight as well when we had Ricky on and we talked with the company about the people as well. So I mean, there's just plenty of stuff going on right now, and those videos are going to be remarkable in helping you learn and then catch up and just kind of know what's going on. So along that same pipeline though, with knowing what's going on, you should definitely check out developers.hubspot.com/changelog. That's where you're gonna pretty much get not only what's going on now, but there's upcoming as well. when it comes to things with regards to, you know, the developer and the developer community. So you're definitely gonna wanna check that out.

It's not—

it doesn't hurt to stay up to date with everything. So—

Indeed.

And I wanna mention just really briefly, we'll probably go into it a little bit more detail in like further episodes, but it is, we can officially mention that HubSpot launches its first CRM deep research connector with ChatGPT. So I mean, all you gotta do is honestly, if you Google HubSpot and ChatGPT or HubSpot and OpenAI, you are going to see company news on top of company news on top of coverage of said company news all over the place. You should definitely go check it out because it's one of those things where it was like, I believe it was mentioned that over 75% of users right now, HubSpot users, are using ChatGPT already. So it was almost like, hey, peanut butter, jelly, let's put it together, right? So it was one of those things. But definitely go check it out, do a little bit more, uh, read into it a little bit more because I know, um, as long as you have a paid ChatGPT subscription, you'll be able to use it with your HubSpot tiers. So that's fantastic stuff. And that was— I had just a shout out to one of our other HubSpot podcasts, right? It was the— I believe it was— which one was it? There was the Daily Hustle or the Hustle, right?

It was the Hustle. Yeah.

They were mentioning that just not too long ago. So it was one of those really, really good, fantastic things that, like I said, something's happening new every day. So you definitely need to pay attention.

So yeah, they demoed it. There's a— when they're doing the live thing, they did a nice demo of it too. It's great. Yeah.

No, so it's— I mean, if you're— I'll tell you right now, if you miss a day, like if you get food poisoning for a day, you're going to miss a million things, right? I could tell you that from experience. But without further ado, enough about me. The reason why everyone is here and the reason why we're excited today definitely is because of our guest, someone we all know very well, we've all worked with, and Let me let him introduce himself. Steve, why don't you tell everyone who you are and what you do?

Hey, Steve LaHam, Director of DevRel at HubSpot. Been here since 2019, so I've had 5 and change blissful years, uh, riding the HubSpot train and, uh, really excited to be here. I've listened to almost every episode, and so going from a fan to a guest It is very exciting. So thank you.

You can retire now. You can retire now, friend. You did it.

Going on my resume, LinkedIn. This is— we've done it. I've done it all at this point.

Dennis, could you please clip 6 minutes? I was going to ask you, Steve, I wanted to start off by asking because like you went from— and I wanted to ask if there was like a sort of like a mind shift that has to happen or like a thought process that has to change. But you went from As being the director of DevRel currently, but you were the man, you know, the manager and basically the director of the ecosystem quality.

Yeah.

Was there a shift like in mindset that you had to go from like managing a group of people to then a group of teams? Because I was always curious about that because I'm personally not, and I mean, we've, me and you have talked about this personally, but with myself, I'm just not, I'm more of like, I like to put my head down in the sand and like, I work with teams, like in a team, but like managing multiple teams has to be different than just managing people in a team. Am I off on that?

No, no, you're right. And, you know, it's funny, I don't think there's like a moment when it's like, oh yeah, like this is happening now and you have to totally shift the way you're thinking. Or even like when you think about anyone's career, If you're staying in the same company and you're kind of like following a linear progression, it's not a great idea to like jump into something, be like, okay, this is all new. This is all fresh. Like, I'm gonna totally change my approach. My approach has been always kind of the same, which is like, I love jumping in and solving problems. I love like fixing teams. I love rallying around a mission. I love smashing groups together and like coming up with new, amazing efficiencies.

Like, Yeah.

That stuff's really exciting. And then slowly I actually turned from like that mode to like becoming a fan of your own team. And I would say that like, you know, that things are going well when you work with people, yourselves included, where you're like, oh, I'm such a fan of that person. Or like, oh wow, like what they're doing is so cool.

Mm-hmm.

When that happens, Suddenly you realize like, oh yeah, like I, I don't need to really manage them now. I just want to clear the way for them and I want to clear the way for the work that they're doing and give opportunities. And so you, you know, some people say you have to like pull back. I wouldn't say pull back. It's just that you're kind of like now focusing a little farther down the road. That's all.

It sounds like this is the ideal situation. Have you dealt with the not so ideal situation where there was a lot more of the You know, you pushing?

Present company excluded, naturally, because, you know, yeah, these are all—

don't look at my LinkedIn, uh, 10 years ago. But like, yeah, like, it's, it's hard. Um, I think depending on the company, there are different types of appetites.

Mm-hmm.

So some companies, they have an appetite for, uh, conforming to a very rigid and strict vision of the future. And for some people, I mean, that is awesome. I used to work with someone, I won't mention his name, uh, but he used to come in, you know, every day at like 7:00 AM, read the paper at noon and leave at 3:00.

Yeah.

And I would talk about promotion. I'd be like, are you, you ready? He's like, no, no, no, no. I'm thrilled where I am. And this individual did amazing work. And it was like, okay. Yeah. Like, and the company really wasn't looking for that. And he wasn't looking for that. It's like, okay. But I think that gets old after a long time if you're someone like me that loves new, loves innovation, loves change, loves to embrace career advancement, loves to help and mentor. And so you have to fit your sort of personal goals with the goals of the company and make sure there's a nice overlap. And when you have that, and I certainly have that at HubSpot, Amazing things can happen and long-term blissfulness occurs and good stuff goes on.

Do you think it's all— I'm sorry, Nick, I'm— I will always interrupt you with all these questions. Do you think it's always been that way for like, uh, a generation ago? Because I feel like it's more, you know, the— you go to— it's cookie cutter. You have like this process, you step by step, you step, step, you know, you follow that. The 7 to 3 guy probably was, you know, designed for the a generation ago society? Do you think it's changed quite a bit?

Well, first of all, how old do you think I am? I'm like 25. So I don't know. You mean when I was like 15? That's weird.

He's just Dennis LaPorte, Dennis.

Yeah, that's a weird question, but I understand what you meant by it.

The next performance review is going to be brutal for Dennis.

But no, so like today, Again, I think this is like, uh, if you are someone that, that loves change and you love innovation and you love to see things move down the pike and not sort of stay stagnant, this is your era. Like, this is the next decade. You, you are going to thrive. Um, and so like, I love, I love like the question, like, um, uh, are we willing to change? And it's like, that's so funny. Like, are you willing to change? It's change or kind of like go away, change or become obsolete, change or not great stuff happens. So it's not really the question of like, you know, should we change? Can we change? It's like, nope, nope, nope. Change is happening. What are you gonna do about it? How are you gonna react? And so you're right, Dennis. I think like the, certainly for me, and I hope my team and, and I think HubSpot has embraced this in our sort of dynamic approach to work-life balance and flex time. You need to figure out how you can match your life with this like amazing era of change that we're in and figure out what works. And that could mean, you know, a podcast on the treadmill. It could mean listening to something on your way to get the kids. It could mean you stop work early.

Yeah.

know, for a block of time in the afternoon and pick it up later at night. Um, I think the 9 to 5 era is dead personally.

Yeah.

And, um, I just know myself not having— and so, so everyone knows I, I work from home most of the time. Um, I work in the, the greater Boston area. So by removing 3+ hours of traffic a day. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. I do a lot more work. I'm not just, you know, and I think that, and I know that about myself. And so I can only assume what that means for other people that have younger children and have more dynamic families and more responsibilities. And they could be taking care of a parent or a sick loved one or something. And so, um, there's change in the way we work, which is awesome. And that perfectly matches to the innovation and technical change that's coming down the road to us all. Good answer.

I couldn't agree more. If you've ever ridden the L in Chicago, uh, back and forth to work, and yet you get to cut that out of your day and work remote, it's, uh, it's pretty, it's pretty amazing, let me just say. But, um, I was gonna, I was gonna say, I, it's hard to argue with the 9 to 5, 7 to 3, however, like, being, you know, it's hard to argue that to try to keep it, you know, because I've always said to myself, like, okay, well, the work-life balance is going to be shut it off, shut it off, shut it off. And it's, you know, as Dennis said, like a generation ago, maybe, you know, the 9-to-5 person or the 7-to-3 works. I think it's a— I think it becomes like a double-edged sword, though, because of like the amount of things from a technological standpoint that are happening. Because it's like, okay, if there was a new programming language that just came about that everybody was all abuzz about, or however you want to phrase it, it's a little bit more different than right now in the stage we're in where it's automation and AI where it's even if you don't work in the industry, you're being affected by it on a daily basis. Like, we were just, you know, I was just in a doctor's office not too long ago where the doctor even said like, hey, do you mind? I'm going to start my note-taking app while we do, you know, like the— for like a routine checkup. But it said okay. And it's like, even if you wanted to get away from it, like, that's what, you know, we work on that, some of that stuff here at work. You're getting it in real life even when you're off the clock. So it's, yeah, I mean, I couldn't agree more. And I'm happy that that's kind of dead. But then, you know, there's always that kind of, like I said, double-edged sword where you're inundated with it. So it's a hard, you know, it's a hard—

And you can, like, if that's your thing, right? Like, if your thing is, no, no, no, I know myself. I need to be in the office sitting in my chair at 9 and I need to walk out at 5. And for me personally, that gives me the most connection. I'm the most productive. I'm the most. I'm the most. I'm the most at that time. Oh my gosh! Like go for it. Absolutely go for it. But I think again, it's all about sort of flexibility and fitting the right people to the right working model. And I have to say, in an age where a lot of companies are leaning into back to office, you know, HubSpot's one of those companies that's saying like no, like we. We are committed to a hybrid model. We understand what that looks like for our employees, and we want to make sure that works. We have awesome offices, by the way. They're pretty, pretty cool, and you should go in. I mean, they're awesome. Uh, and I do actually, you know, take, take, uh, take them up on that offer pretty often. But, um, yeah, I think it's just a different model right now. And, uh, there's nothing wrong with that. There's nothing wrong with saying like, yeah, I need to be in the office 9 to 5. Cool.

Awesome.

Go for it.

Yeah, I know for me, like, the flexibility time is great because, like, I'm a night owl. So, like, I've always been one of those people where, like, at night I'm on it. Like, I'm way sharper, like, because I've just— I've had the day to go. So, like, there's times where, like, sometimes there'll be, like, a thing that needs to be done and I'll be like, I'm gonna work on it a little bit here, but I'm gonna take a break and then, like, I'll come back to it at night. And then usually it's like a whole new, you know, it's like when you walk away from a project when you're frustrated, you come back with a clear, like, clear mindset. But yeah, like you said, like the work-life balance of things, I want to say it's since, like with cell phones and stuff like that and people being always connected, that's where we've seen that shift of this. You know, before the 9 to 5 was an easy thing because you couldn't get emails after work. You couldn't, you know, no, there was no like Slack on phones to have conversations.

Yeah.

And that's where I feel like that turn happened for a good thing because it's like, cool, I can take care of what I need to here. Like, there's been times where I'm like, hey, I'm walking the kids to school, but I'm still actively involved in conversations that are happening and like, you know, strategizing and stuff like that. And I just think that that makes it just much better working-wise overall.

A good support system too helps. And I, and I bring this up because I believe there's been at least, correct me if I'm wrong, Steve, maybe a dozen times where I've gotten messages from you saying like, why are you still on?

Actually, that goes for all of you. That goes for all of you.

I got one from Steve last night about that.

Like, why are you answering me?

Yeah, why are you answering me? Like, what the heck? Uh, and, and, and actually, this is like a good segue. So like, um, you need to have like 2 things in order to make the hybrid thing work. You have to have a team that you trust implicitly, which I do, and you have to have a team that is like uber responsible, which I do. And so if I was talking about being a fan before, like trust and responsibility.

Yeah.

allows as a leader, and you are all leaders, like it allows you to focus on other things rather than like having to quote unquote manage your team.

Mm-hmm.

And talk about freedom. When you have that, you can focus on like the important stuff and you don't have to focus on time and you don't have to focus on all those other things. So if people are listening to this, like, geez, I really wanna be like a leader and I wanna like, you know, what quality should I look for in, in a team? trust and responsibility go a very, very, very long way.

Yeah.

And, um, you, you know it when you have it and you know it when you don't. Uh, and so we, we have a pretty unique team, uh, at HubSpot, and I'm excited that, uh, I'm excited that we'll be able to put together such a comprehensive group that's focused on helping such a great community of people and developers.

Let me throw you a softball question here. True or false? This will be easy. True or false? DevRel has grown over the last few years here at HubSpot.

That is true, Nick. That is very true. Well, I've paid the big bucks.

That's been—

You've done your research, clearly. Yeah, actually, AJ, you were here when I got here.

Yeah.

2019, was Devra like 7, 8?

Yeah, let's see, in 2019, I want to say it was, there were maybe 5 or 6 of us, I want to say. And I think that included Elizabeth Ricciuto at the time, who was director.

That's right.

Yep. Yeah, it was definitely like, it wasn't the size of the team we have now, that's for sure. It was definitely, I would say, under like, we'll say minimum 8, maximum 10, as we were going through 2019 into 2020. But yeah, like, it is just really growing. I mean, DevRel as a whole industry-wide has also started getting more prominence into the, like, the limelight of like, hey, like, this is the voice of the developer internally, you know, because like the role of advocacy was always like, oh, you know, rah rah, but it's way more than that, really.

Yeah.

Look underneath of like what everybody thinks advocacy is. And that's where like we've seen that huge, like just uplift of like just everything that we're doing internally.

I agree. We're 3 or 4 times bigger than 2019. So we've grown now, we're in the upper 20s in terms of people in DevRel. And it's not just the people we've grown, it's like the capabilities have grown quite a bit in terms of like what we offer our communities, our developers, our builders. You know, as a lot of people know, we have a team focused on, you know, quality, and that means like marketplace quality. So like integrations, apps, templates, modules, a whole slew of other things. If there's stuff our community is building and it needs to be in our marketplace or in our ecosystem, like we want to help you do that. We have a team focused on community. We have a team focused on partners and making sure that they have what they need. We have solution architects. I heard a rumor we had advocates somewhere. I don't know where those are.

Yeah, you never hear from them.

A couple of those floating around somewhere. That video guy, he really doesn't do much. We have a lot of folks and it's interesting, DevRel I think is starting to change a little bit. with AI. I mean, what isn't changing with AI? But I think the model that DevRel used to be was promotional. And so it would be like, we would try to make sure that as an industry, we were supporting our communities and promoting what was happening and making sure that things were kind of out there. And I think it's just evolved into so much more. The stuff that is coming out of our group in terms of tooling, in terms of events, in terms of integrations, in terms of code samples, in terms of— like, there's just— I mean, there's a very long list that I can talk about. But to me, it just seems like there's a big shift happening right now. And we're kind of riding that wave like everybody.

Where do you see it going? Because like, I'll be honest, like, before I even got here, The concept of developer relations, I had zero concept of it, right? Like, for me, it was, you know, maybe a group of 3, right, at my last— at my previous job. And the developer relationship or the developer relations was, hey, you built this, someone has a problem with it, or someone doesn't know how to use it, go tell them what to do.

Right.

Like, there was no, like, structure, there was no programs, there was no— where do you see from where it is right now, which obviously is just exponentially growing. Where do you see it in the future?

I mean, it's kind of a— that's the question everyone wants to answer, right? It's like, where the heck is this train going? Like, everyone's like white-knuckled onto this AI innovation, this shift, this emerging technology, rightfully so, because it's changing so much. I guess I would say like, I can see like 2 things. When I started my career, I was actually in QA. So I graduated with, well, I'll start back a little bit. This is gonna be a very long answer, so let me shorten this. So like I went to college to study accounting. I flunked my first accounting course that I took and my professor was like, you're not a good accountant.

No.

Hey, same. I did the same thing.

Okay, great. So I'm in good company, AJ. So I was like, oh, okay. Yeah, that makes sense. So like, I'll do finance. And so I did finance and then like right at the end of my education in college, like they offered this degree for management information systems and basically it wasn't computer science, but it was like, how does computers back at that time, like how is that gonna affect business and what do you wanna do? I landed my first job and it was in QA, which I'd never heard of. They didn't really talk about QA in college. They didn't talk about it as even as a profession. And so for the longest time, for like the first 2 weeks, I thought I was in like the question and answers department. That's like, yep. Yeah, I'll admit to that. I'll admit to that. I just wanted a job. Okay. But someone's like, no, dude, you're, you're in quality assurance.

Like, hello.

I go, oh yeah, okay, cool. So that was a very manual job back then. And you would have test plans and you would click and you would look and you would record. And it was extremely manual. And that got boring after about 2 seconds. And so I became an automation engineer.

Yeah.

And so what that meant was like I was writing code to check code. I was writing code to check the UI. I was writing code. So it was like, That to me felt really great. Well, it was really interesting to me as I would progress through my career and change jobs. A lot of manual testers kind of looked like it was like the Grim Reaper coming. It was like, oh, this person knows automation. I don't. My job's in trouble because this person can do it faster and they can do more, which I could. I absolutely could. And it was repeatable and it was reportable and it was It was awesome, but it came with a lot of fear. And that was a big challenge actually early in my career is like you'd get to a company and people wouldn't really want to interact with you because they were afraid of what that meant. And I liken that now to sort of what's happening with AI because as I would come into a company with a lot of manual testers, in a year they were all automation engineers. They all had their jobs and we actually grew the team even bigger. And so I might've started as a couple of people and then in a year it was 5 automation engineers and all those people were still there. And so I think right now, let me get back to your original question, Nick. This is a long segue, but I think worth it. Like, I think what's happening now is we're seeing this, um, this kind of like wobbly adoption of this amazing technology. There is a little bit of a contraction happening around like, oh, should we be shrinking companies or changing? But I think what you'll see in pretty short order is I think you'll see an expansion of the workforce into areas that we haven't really figured out yet. An automation engineer wasn't really a thing a while ago and suddenly it is. And I think we're going to see something like that happen with AI. I do think it's going to be able to do things that people can do now. And I think that's a good thing because a lot of that stuff we want to get out of, of, get out of the day-to-day, especially if it's monotonous. Nobody even wants to do monotonous things.

Mm-hmm.

So that's the first thing. And then the second thing is, I really feel like, you know, you asked about what DevRel looks like. So I do think it's going to grow as I just talked about, but I think our focus is going to shift to, you know, right now we're working directly with developers person to person.

Mm-hmm.

That is going to be there always. But I think what we're going to add is we have to add a layer of abstraction into AI where now we have to enable AI to enable our developers. We have to enable, um, those components that make up, um, AI, um, to service them so that they don't have to come to us. They don't, they don't, We shouldn't be a deciding factor or holding them back in what they can develop. And the way we do that is by making sure that they can tap into every different component, every different LLM, every type of agent that's available so that they can get up and running faster without us slowing them down. So I think there was like, you know, some ratios changing around how much and where we help. But what I think you'll find is if we make that big leap, to putting our energy into enabling AI, I think you'll see our developers be able to work much faster, much more efficiently. I mean, you saw what just— we just released. I know, Nick, we were talking about this before with OpenAI. There's a new HubSpot connector.

Mm-hmm.

And this is a massive deal. We are, I think, the first CRM to be included They had a big livestream this past week. This is something that Karen Ng and Brian Gorbet and others have been pushing. Yamini talked about it. I mean, this is really, really big. The Developer Product Group had a massive hand in making this happen, as did DevRel. There are some folks on this very livestream that had a big hand in that. In my mind, I think you'll see more of this, and I think that was a really, really good litmus test into how HubSpot's gonna be showing up more and more. It's gonna be in the fabric of what AI is.

Excellent.

Yeah.

I, I, I think AI is just, it, it's such a big help too for people, cuz even those who aren't developers, like they have a chance to build, like you've got things like Lovable, right? And like V0. or for Vercel, where like it's just an idea and they can start building on it. Now I think like where like we see a lot of people talking also is where they're like, oh, AI is going to replace like developer relations. And I, I don't see that as a thing because you can have— and we've all done this, right? Like the vibe coding, as they call it. You can have AI generate something, but if you're looking at that code and you don't know what that code means, good luck trying to update, iterate, or improve. Because that's, that's where, like, I, I don't feel like it's a full replacement for a developer because you're going to have developer go, hey, that's great code, but you're missing accessibility on this, this, this, and this, and you're not doing this. And UI research show, like, it's going to take a developer way less time to get to the end goal using AI as like a supplement versus it as a replacement. And I think that's where a lot of people are scared that they're thinking replacement and not supplement.

I, I think this is the definition of developers. It's going to change, you know, generally speaking. It's, it's, it's gonna be in a good way, you know, like it's not gonna be like just looking here. It's more broad, you know, you're thinking a bigger picture than you used to.

I mean, I agree with you.

Yeah, no, I was going to push back on AJ's thing a little bit. I am going to create like a Nick bot that kind of combines HeyGen with a couple of other things where I won't even be here. I'll just, I'll be watching myself host the podcast, and then it'll be— I'll just— I'll be able to sit back and just, you know, drink.

You know, it'll be better. It'll be so much better.

Do we have that video handy of the one that you did with Nick and AJ where it's like—

Oh no, please no. It's so bad. It's like, it's— I'm literally talking and my hands are like doing things that have nothing to do with what I'm saying. And it was just like— but the bot will be, uh, food poison free, so we will be—

Yeah, you could just like Photoshop like a Zoltar like thing around him and it just looks like he's like the robot in like the middle point. It was great. It was great.

But this is like the— that's the Will Smith eating spaghetti.

Yes, yes, yes.

Exactly what it was.

It was fantastic. But like, you'll have to do another one in like 6 months and it's gonna be flawless.

We won't—

Yeah, it was pretty bad. It was along those lines, but it was a good attempt though. I did. So let me— not really, it's not really a pivot, but because we're talking about like things with OpenAI and combining with HubSpot or collaborating with HubSpot and What are some other— because for me, that's like a milestone or a pivotal moment, right, within a company. But specifically for you, are there any milestones or pivotal moments for you that have stood out? And maybe they're recent, maybe they're not, but just something where it's like it's impacted like the way you thought or who you are at this point?

That's a good one. I have to tell you, if you like where you work, I think there's like a lot you take away from that job at different times of your life. And so if you're walking away and it's like, oh, I didn't really learn anything, I think you're not looking in the right places. There's so much, even the bad jobs, you know, quote unquote bad. I think, you know, over the last 10 years, I would say the one thing I've learned Spent a lot of my career sort of managing people and teams. I think one thing I would say is the phrase, like, there's no job too small. I think that that's one to embrace as a leader, as someone who is serious about their career. I worked at a very small company not too long ago, and the phrase I like to use is like, yeah, we were like, One minute pitching to executives and the next minute I was like taking out the trash because that's, that, that is actually like important.

Been there, done that. Yeah.

Yeah.

And so like, I think there's a tendency where you can get disconnected the more people that you have, you know, the bigger the team you're managing or if you're siloed in a particular area, I would say that's also kind of dangerous. I think like, pick your head up, look around. So for me, you know, pivotal moments is sort of like those moments, those growth moments I've had in my career where you take a group from some dysfunction and like not really having a clear mission or path and suddenly like It's super clear, it's super impactful, and now the team is thought of as in like a different light. That to me is so, so, so gratifying. I think it's what I like to do more than anything is like take complex things and make them simple. HubSpot, it's a very intimidating place to work, to be honest. And I when I first got here, I was like, oh, I'm in the wrong place. There's like, everyone has a master's degree. Everyone's like graduated from MIT. There are people here like running circles around everybody. It's unbelievable, like how many smart, talented people. And I'm like, well, you know what? Let's just see what happens. And you know, it turns out that also some of the nicest and most generous people work at HubSpot.

Yeah.

And the most empathetic and kindest. And so that's a place you want to work. That is, that is a place where you want to go to work every day and interact with people.

How did you find your voice? If you've all these smart, intimidating people, I know they're empathetic, but it's still smart and intimidating, right?

Yeah.

How did you, how did you find your voice?

I think everyone needs to have a mentor and everyone needs to sort of like have people that are guiding them through their career, informally or formally, either way. And, you know, like there's a phrase I hate, which is like, I'm a self-made man. I hate that. I hate that phrase for so many reasons. Like Arnold Schwarzenegger actually does like a great thing about this where like someone was interviewing him and they're like, oh, you're a real self-made man. He's like, self-made man? What are you talking about? Like, I'm an immigrant. I had people help me get my first job. They loaned me money. I slept on couches. I had someone pay my— for my plane ticket to fly out for Mr. America. Like, Self-made man, like that, that, that's not the right phrase. And so I would say, you know, every time you enter a company, look around, look who you can talk with and ask about everything without feeling dumb. Uh, cuz that's the other thing is like, you know, when you start someplace new, it's like, it's just like acronym salad. Yeah. And you're in a meeting and you're like, I literally don't know what anyone just said. It was just a bunch of—

I had to ask AJ, like the first week I was here, I had the amount of questions I was like, What does this mean? What does this mean? It was like, it was like a whole different— yeah.

I still have this issue.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

And like, you've been here a while, Dennis, and so you're like, I'm definitely not gonna ask that question because I've been here a few years. And it's like, nope, like that, that's bad. That is bad. So like, it's very challenging, but like, yeah, you need to find that person that can sort of like pull you along and also find like people that are, are, are like-minded and that are Generous in being vulnerable enough to be honest about their concerns and, and sh— and being generous and share their thoughts about problems and issues that they're having.

Mm-hmm.

Um, we're all just like little kids in big people bodies, honestly. And like everyone pretends that everyone's adulting, but like when it comes down to it, we're all just like kids.

Mm-hmm.

And so I feel like if you kind of lean into the fact that people want to feel included and people want to make sure that they enjoy who they're working with. So for me, getting the right teams together, solving hard problems, working on really cool, interesting things, and focusing on like a lot of change and adapting to that change, I love that stuff. So any place I get to work that has that, I'm very, very happy.

Let me pull on the— you had mentioned having a good mentor, right? Let me pull on that thread a little bit. Is there any advice that you've been given at any point or any juncture that's really stood out to you that's helped kind of shape maybe the way you are or the way you— your management style?

And Steve, I'm okay with you disclosing anything from our personal conversations.

Are you okay with that, Dennis? Yeah.

I feel like that's free.

It's really putting you out there.

And if you need to reference other episodes that I've done here, I mean, as part of that, that's— I mean, just We'll put in the show when I make the show notes bot that does my show notes for me.

Obviously, the first thing that's impacted my career has been Developers After Dark. That's the first and probably most important thing. Everybody should go back and watch every episode, not on 1.5 speed, on 0.5 speed. Really enjoy what you're listening to.

The first episode, all I did was talk about real estate the entire time. Maybe not, maybe not the first one. That was, that was the That was the rough pilot. I don't know how that got off the air, you know, but it's, yeah.

Um, well, I'll tell you, like, uh, I have made a career out of not staying in the same career. And I have, I love that. Um, I, you know, generally I want to work in technology. I want to work for great companies that are doing great things and I want to make a big impact. And so like, if you set that as your foundational element, I think it's easy to find great places to work and do your best work. But to answer your question, I want to relay maybe something, and I don't know who to give credit to. So I'm just saying this is not something that I came up with. This is something I heard on the interwebs somewhere. But the story goes that there's this company, I think in Switzerland, and they make inner tubes for extremely expensive professional bicycles. They're very expensive and it's pretty much all they do, but they have a real loyal following and it's kind of cultish. And every year there's this huge cycling race in Switzerland somewhere and this company shows up and it's like, okay, cool. So they want to make sure they have fresh inner tubes, bicycle, you know, tire tubes for like the people that are racing. And it's actually like, no, they, they barely have that. They actually show up with, uh, like sandwiches. They show up with like sports gel. They show up with like fresh water. They show up with shade for the families that want to come and watch. Uh, they show up with like a food truck. Like, they show up not to pedal their product. They show up because they love their community. They love the cult that they've grown. They love the brand of, of people that love their brand. Uh, and that, that really stuck with me, um, in terms of, of how I want DevRel to be as at HubSpot. Um, and I hope we are. I hope our community thinks that's how we want to show up, is that we're not there to peddle anything. We're not there with such a, you know, some like, you know, secret agenda. It's like, we are literally there to help our developers in any way we can. And that is expanding. Like, as we just talked about, like, a developer, as Dennis says, a decade ago, like, is not a developer now.

Right.

Now anyone can develop. You just need to be able to use your voice and tell AI what you want to do. So the definition of developer is changing. The definition of how you show up for community is changing. And I want us to be able to show up in a way that is really obvious how passionate we are to help our community reach their goals. Which are solving for our customers' goals.

Love it. Love it.

Yeah.

Steve always shows up to my family events with shade for us.

It's really— It's hot out there, Dennis. Someone's got to do it.

Just imagine Steve pulling up in like a Kona Ice truck, like every time there's like a family event, just like passing out snow cones or something.

Are there any—

now, because you have DevRel that's ever expanding. And then you have not just from a calorie standpoint or a workforce standpoint, but also from a visibility standpoint as far as like conferences, workshops, things of that nature. Are there any, for you yourself personally, are there any of those that you've attended or been able to go to that have really kind of, not that you would need like reenergizing, but like—

Yeah.

For me, those type of things that really does that. Like when we went to Inbound, like the last 2 times I've been to Inbound, it really like, Not that I was ever like kind of like downtrodden, but like it really kind of like my, it gets, you know, like you've heard me and AJ talk just to each other and it gets like the conversation mind racing stuff. So has there been anything that you've attended recently that's kind of done that for you?

I'll tell you, this will be like a shameless plug, but when, when our product team gets together for our summits, it is massively energizing. So yeah, like it, it's, you know, so, so in terms of like staying connected, um, I've been listening to Lenny's quite a bit lately. Um, that's a great podcast for those that, and I think there's like a pretty cool deal going where like they give you subscribe. I'm plugging Lenny, but like if you subscribe, like you get access to all this AI stuff.

I don't know. Yeah. This podcast's over.

Wow.

Fail, Steve.

No, no, this is a win. Uh, Dennis, we're there to support developers. Like, come on, let's, let's live, live to the true words we've spoken. Um, So like audio, I'm trying to take in as much as possible, probably now more than ever. I feel like everybody is just from like a, how do I get this stuff into my brain fast? I think audio is big. I think we've scratched the surface on audio in terms of what's capable. So I think that's one. The other thing is like, I really think this is a time of doing rather than listening. So I think in the past, there's been a lot of level-ups in terms of innovation and technology. And it's like, oh, I want to listen about that. I want to hear about that. That's fascinating. Tell me about what is an API and how does that work? And that's cool. And we could go all the way back like, oh, You know, we have internet on our phones now, right? Like, oh wow, that's, that's cool. But like in this scenario right now, where we are now is really more about, about like hands, hands-on, voice-on, like try stuff out, smash AI tools together, see how they work together.

Right.

Create a lofty goal for yourself. See if you can accomplish that with AI. Try something for your home, for your house, for your family, for your partner, for your kids. Try something that's interesting. Create a new diet plan. Figure out how you're gonna get your kids from soccer to kung fu, like, you know, karate to like, how are you gonna shop them all around to all of their sporting events? Like, there's a lot that I think people just need to invest in getting familiar with what it's like to work with technology that is literally being formulated, uh, right now. And it's not solidified, it's not done, right? So we're, we're in the midst of trying stuff out. Um, so get, get used to what that feels like for sure.

Yeah, back up to that summit business. I'm sorry. Oh God, I was gonna say, backing up to that summit, that, that FaceTime where you meet all these amazing peoples was one of the moments where my intimidation factor went down because Because you actually get to meet these people and form that real connection rather than have Slack messages where you don't know the feelings, what they're thinking. It's like, oh my God, this idiot's asking another stupid question. I'll answer, whatever. But no, you actually get to see them.

Well, Dennis, I explained, I explained I only had to ask those questions because my favorite thing in the Product Summit was seeing Dennis are hearing about Dennis getting completely crushed in table tennis by Dharmesh and Brian. That, that to me—

Another one right here. That was hilarious.

Dennis. Yeah, there needs to be a ping pong rematch happening sometime soon.

Yeah.

I think like, I definitely think remote work is challenging. Strictly remote.

Mm-hmm.

I really do feel that is hard. But there is this hybrid middle ground Yes. Where you're working remote most of the time, but then you get together with your team at these like particular moments and form those bonds, um, and hear about what they're working on and get to see the demos and get to see like what the future holds, um, for your company and your team. Um, you know, so for all those, you know, that are listening now, like HubSpot's, um, we have these product summits and we get together And it's like, it's an insanely fun week of getting together with your team, aligning on priorities, seeing what people are doing, forming those bonds, having a lot of fun. But you come back completely exhausted and energized at the same time. I don't know how that happens, but you are.

Yeah, you're right. I just love the collaborative nature cuz like we were all sitting there talking about something and it's like, oh, let's go to the whiteboard. And then you just started drawing a whiteboard and then anybody walking by was just stopping unless— and it was like gathering people. But like, that was one of the coolest things because it's like we're, we're just openly discussing concepts and like random engineers from different departments are coming up and being like, oh, that— and it was just so cool.

Yeah, yeah. People wanna, people wanna help. Like, they wanna— yeah, that's the one thing about HubSpot I've noticed is like, uh, I don't think I've ever asked for help and someone be like, oh, you know, Hey, like, not me, try this person. It's always like, yeah, yeah, I can totally help. What do you need? How can I, how can I jump in? What, what, what, what can I do to make things easier for you? It's, it's a nice place.

Agreed.

I think going back to a little bit when you were mentioning like, there's a, there's a complication level too of being able to, because like previously, because you mentioned the hands-on, Without just being able to jump in and like try something now, I think things are getting so much more complex that maybe back, you know, depending on what you were talking about, like I would just say in general, it's like, for example, like the first time I ever tried to use Cursor, right? It was like just watching something or having someone explain it to me would have been completely insufficient because you literally have to just get in there and look at it. mess with it, understand. It was just one of those things where just being, just an explanation wasn't going to cut it. I think there's very little now. There are some diamonds in the rough, don't get me wrong. For example, again, shout out to Prompt Armor where they have their AI security suite that you can take.

Yeah.

As far as it's like 6 videos, I believe it was. They— that, that they do a really, really good job. But there's very, very few and far things like that where you can just watch it to, to gain the concept of it without having to like actually start doing it like either while you're listening or before, do you know? So, um, I think, I think the complexities of the things that we're dealing with now versus previous— they're all hard, don't get me wrong, like anything new is going to be difficult— but I just think now because of the way everything is interacting and the way there's multiple— for example, just look at MCP servers, the interconnectivity of everything. Now it's not just one thing anymore. It's like the knowledge of multiple things now has to come into play at once. It's like being able to be like, hey, can you just explain this to me real quick? Yeah, that doesn't cut it. It's never going to.

Totally.

There's an appreciation for that that I have that's just Because it forces you to think differently now. Just to really— the way I first started developing was just mess around with it and break it, learn what you did wrong.

Absolutely.

Then don't do it again because it's Friday and you're not going to be able to fix it till Monday. But yeah, it's one of those things where you can argue that there's good and bad points to it, but it is what it is right now and it's not going to change.

Yeah, it, it, it's kind of funny. Like, AI is an interesting thing right now because as you were saying, like, it is easy to get started, like, by coding, just telling, speaking what you want. But it's— I liken it kind of like the genie in a bottle where, like, you know, you find the genie, you rub the lamp, the genie comes out, it's like, 3 wishes, what would you like? And you're like, I want a million bucks. And then, like, a million deer show up, right? I think, like, AI is kind of the same thing where, like, Yeah. You're like, oh, okay. Yeah. I need to like redo my prompt a little bit. And so it's very powerful, like a genie, and you can do a lot, but you have to know exactly what you're asking for.

Yes.

And be comfortable to sort of be knowledgeable enough to, to know the answers. Because I think like, again, blindly going into, um, AI and just assuming everything is accurate is a recipe for disaster right now. Right now, I think this is like a—

this is fundamental to everything, right? Like, generally speaking, if I go in throughout life with just a simple, you know, prompt, so to speak, I'm not getting far, right? You know, it—

yeah. It's the title of my autobiography. Sorry.

It's okay.

It's okay.

Um, but let's, um, Because we're almost coming up on time, let's talk a little bit about Steve the person. Not Steve the director.

Oh yeah.

Not Steve the manager.

Yeah.

Steve the person. What are some of the things that you do to kind of unwind, to kind of— and again, like you said, the 9 to 5 is technically dead at this point or on life support. But what are some of the things that you do? Because like everybody has something and we always put it with a caveat too, because Let's face it, you're not gonna be able to get away from, 'cause one of the questions we used to ask like at the very beginning when we were first doing this was like, you know, pick a job where it was like no tech involved. And like every week that went by, and that was before like, I believe that was like before like AI was like now on everybody's lips in every sentence.

Yeah.

When we were asking that question. And now it's almost like it's a silly question to ask because it's impossible to not, but I mean, in those parameters, like what are some of the things that you do to kind of like, Just take a step back and kind of maybe recharge?

Well, I first actually, that's— I want to answer the question that no one likes to answer, which is like, what would you do otherwise? I really would love to understand how to be a blacksmith. That to me would be very like— I think if you talk to anyone in tech and they want to use their hands for something, like they want to do something physical that at the end of the day they can be like, I made this thing.

Yeah, yeah.

You know, we all, all of us are like dealing with bits and bytes. Like you turn off your laptops and like your job doesn't exist kind of thing, right? Like if you unplug, what are we doing? But like I would, I think like when I retire, I'm gonna do like a six-month blacksmith course.

And I love this.

That sounds awesome. But that's in the future. I think like right now my kids are of an age where we're having a lot of fun. They're 15 and 18. My daughter's going off to college soon. My son's in high school. And so I really spending, like spending a lot of time with them, my wife, and we do a lot of like family stuff together. So whether it's, you know, spending time on the water together, fishing, water sports, that sort of thing, or traveling, we do a lot of that. Even I'm still playing video games. I'm not afraid to admit it. Like, you know, Mm-hmm. I started with Atari and, you know, haven't stopped since then. And that's a great way also to connect. You know, my son and I were playing when he was younger. We were doing Minecraft and Roblox and, you know, you know, now he's playing NHL and we're doing things like that. So just very focused on that. I like to cook, which is fun. And just keeping busy, keeping up with the rest of my family because they're all super active right now. So yeah, it's a good— you have to find that balance though. Again, like the work-life balance, like everyone's life looks different. That's how my life looks. But yeah, I think there's like a really healthy balance in there. And if you find it, you know when you've got it.

So I am I'm with you on the video game thing. My son's outside the doorway, like reminding me every hour on the hour right now that Fortnite has a live event at 2 PM Central here. So I'm like, I'm like, I get it. I'm like, but you're not. I'm like, I'm working.

I'm like, it's okay.

Yep.

But yeah, no, I, I, I really do love that because it's, uh, and I like when you brought up the fact about like building something, you know. I always used to say, um, and I can't remember, probably countless, uh, conversations with AJ and even maybe with you, Steve, a couple times where it was like I always felt like, and this is not every developer, but like, and I don't mean this to be like the entire culture of developer, but like a throwaway product, right? Like, there were countless times I would build, you know, a website for a development or for a condo or something. And let's say the financing fell through. All that web work just went away like that. Yeah, maybe you could use it to refurbish it as a different thing later. But like, it literally was just like, almost like, you know, back in the days where it's like, you know, if your hard drive crashed and you lost all your information, it's like everything is gone in an instant. And it's very, you know what I mean? There's not something there where it's like, like if a toy broke or like if you had something like, like if an object, like, again, like if you were a carpenter and like a chair, a table like broke, it's like, it's there, I'm going to fix it. It's just the other, like from a digital standpoint, at least when I was developing, it was very— Um, it was throwaway. I guess there's no real better way to explain it but, yeah, throwaway. And it was— it almost was— at first it like really not depressed me, but it made me kind of sad. It really did in a certain aspect. Um, but yeah, like I, I kind of then, like, like you said, I started to gravitate towards thinking of like, I wanna— this is what I'm going to do for a career. I also want to do something elsewhere. And I was telling, I think, Adrian Dennis, like, I just randomly start building things out of PVC pipe now. Just— I like— it's just the weirdest hobby, you know, like Pool filters, fountains, like whatever. But it's something where it's like, I can look outside and it's still there. Whereas like the website I built for the real estate company I used to work for 10 years ago, it's gone. Like code's gone, it's gone. The Photoshop files are gone, everything's gone. And it's like, yeah, there's no legacy to leave behind on that one. So yeah.

You have to just make peace with that in the end, like if you can. 'Cause it, you know, while we're all doing our jobs, we are making a big impact on the world. We are making, I mean, obviously we're not doctors, lawyers, things of that nature, but like in our, in our piece of, of the earth, we are making an impact. It may not be as lastful as heirloom furniture, but like there is an impact. We are really helping people. We are helping businesses. We are helping making a mark with HubSpot and with any company you work for. So I think if you just like have that mind shift of like, yes, it's not that, but there is, it is an impactful thing. It feels good. That's deep, deep. So deep, Daniel. How did we get here?

Well, with the, with the last couple minutes we have left, Steve, is there anything that you wanted to shout out, promote, and dig If you wanna tell people, is there any place people can find you?

Yeah. When are you gonna be at the next, you know, fair for your blacksmithery?

The Ren Faire? Yeah, I mean, that's fair, right?

You're gonna be— Yeah. Yeah. Blacksmith Con in New York.

People are gonna watch this podcast and be like, didn't I buy a broadsword from him once? I swear I recognize him from somewhere.

I just picture like when AI takes over, you know, like everybody joking, Steve's gonna be the only one not affected. He's gonna be wielding sword and shield.

Yeah. Full plate armor, shields, all—

there's—

I will tell you, I won't tell you who it is, but there is someone else on our team that is into blacksmithing right now. They do some mini pieces. Yeah, some trivia for you.

Wow.

Yep. So there's someone that does that on our team. And that's the other thing, like, our team is so diverse. You find more and more about people as you get to know them. Nothing to plug specifically other than, you know, if you want to find me, I'm on LinkedIn. You can locate me there. Otherwise, I think you'll see DevRel quite a few places this year. We have some interesting conferences lined up, interesting events lined up, and the content machine never ends. So you'll see, as you all 3 very well know, given that you're the authors of most of it, I would encourage everyone to take a look at what's being produced in the next few months given we are advancing so fast in how we're reacting to AI and what HubSpot is producing there. Excellent.

Beautiful.

Wanted to say thank you so much for coming on, Steve. I really do appreciate it. And a personal thank you too because, I mean, full transparency, speaking with you, I mean, AJ, obviously, I'll give you a little bit of credit for me being here, but But being able to talk with people, especially like yourself before I got here, just to, it wasn't really, wasn't like any trade secret talk. It was literally just saying like, hey, I'm Steve, this is what I do here and I like it here.

Yeah.

Just having a conversation with somebody. But it was absolutely fantastic. It kind of goes not just to how great of a person you are, but also too how great HubSpot is at bringing people like that together and then going out and then being able to attract more people like that. Not to say that I'm, you know, anything spectacular, but like, it, it is, you know what I mean? It's, it's, it's a, it's a testament to just like that whole chain and that whole process that's just, um, I don't know.

I don't—

I mean, other places might be able to claim they do something similar, but I, I honestly, at a certain point, because I've worked at other places, so it's not like it's this is the first place I've ever worked. That's a hard thing to replicate or even try to lie about doing. It really is. And I personally, I appreciate that. And I appreciate you taking the time out to just sit down and talk with me just to let me know how things are. It's like, no, great place to work. This is what you'll be doing. This is this. And it meant a lot because really, like I said, I came from just a place— I'll be honest, we didn't have a test server. It was a skeleton crew. It was just It was a big culture shift coming into a big company with a lot of structure and a lot of teams and that collaboration and having people like you being able to like usher people in and just, yeah, remarkable. Absolutely remarkable.

Well, that's nice. Really nice of you to say. And I'm just appreciative that you're all here. Like I said, you know, you have a great team when you suddenly switch to becoming a fan of your own team where you're like, oh boy, I'm a Superfan. That's where I'm at. That's where I'm at right now. So we must be doing something right. And thank you all for having me on.

I really appreciate it. Not a problem. AJ, Dennis, do you have anything else you want to know?

No, no, I think so. I did have one quick thing. And I, and this is, this was me like LinkedIn stalking, but also just knowing because I know you.

Sure.

So you were at Hasbro around 2012. And I believe the movie was also released around 2012. That was kind of Hasbro-ish as well called Battleship. Did you get to meet Rihanna or any of the other people that were in the movie?

Well, interestingly, um, it wasn't even just Battleship. Uh, that was the first Transformers movie.

Yeah.

Um, and I will tell you, Hasbro was a massively fun place to work. We got toy drops where you'd walk in and there'd be toys on your desk. Um, they had their own internal shop toy shop that had all off-brands you can't find anywhere else. Lightsabers everywhere. I mean, um, that needs a whole nother podcast. You should have me back on in 6 months. I'll talk to you about, about Hasbro and the Simpsons.

Yeah, they would have had to defer my check to the store. Just be like, yeah, we're just paying you in toys. That's pretty much it.

That was actually a thing. People would give back their checks on Friday because they'd head right to the store and walk out with bags and bags. The company store. Yeah, that's fantastic.

Yeah.

Well, thank you again, Steve, for coming on. This was fantastic. And yes, we'll definitely have you back again because that would be an awesome— that's what I love about doing this. I'll be honest, is it's like one episode is pretty much never going to be enough for anyone we talk to. And I just, I love the concept of like conversations like this that start like this and then can like move on into like multiple. It's just, it's a beautiful thing. And AJ and Dennis will tell you, and I'm sure Steve already knows, I love to talk just in general. Like, it just, it's just for me, I just, it's almost like therapeutic. And being able to have like really fun conversations like this is just, that's pretty much the pinnacle for me, honestly. I could retire tomorrow. Uh, it just, it's one of those things. But, um, but yeah, but no, thank you again for coming on. And I really do appreciate it.

Thank you.

And from the bottom of all of our hearts, like, we, this was great. And, uh, and you know what, and thank you for just being the director that you are because like, It wouldn't be fun going to work if you didn't. Like you said, the team, the group, the way everything runs and the trust, that kind of like that mutual respect thing is, I don't know, like, I think most people are lying about it. But like here, because I've lived it, it's, you know, I'm a believer. So.

Well, thank you all again. This was really, really fun. And I can't wait to hear the next episode and the secret guest that's on. I'll be listening.

We'll see. Well, I'll leave everyone with this because we've been talking a lot about AI and everything. The minute you start hearing about if you're down with MCP, the answer should be, yeah, you know me.

Oh my God, I need to end these episodes sooner.

This is the deep research I do. Obviously, I might have to use the OpenAI connection because it's not— I'm just telling you, this is the quality you're going to get from me.

That is the perfect—

just the height of the hair depends on how ridiculous the joke is getting.

I need to get a haircut so bad, it's like not even funny anymore. It's getting ridiculous. All right, here we go.

You just named our next MCP event, Nick. I said yeah, so thank you. I appreciate that.

That's great.

All right, well, thanks all. Thank you.