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Growing Pains
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Mortal Kombat 2 was a great time
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Transcript
Introduction and Brian's Work Project
00:00:24
David Isaacs
Welcome everyone. It is May 6th today at time of recording. As always, i'm joined by my friend, my colleague, our friend, our colleague, Brian.
00:00:34
David Isaacs
Brian, what's going on, man?
00:00:36
The Big Dog
Oh, not much, man. Just ah trying to get ready for this project. I got at work coming up. Biggest in my career, biggest in my life, but it's been pretty slow at work. So, you know, don't got much on my updates on myself other than just maybe some tips and tricks. But, you know, you know how we do it out here in these streets.
00:00:59
The Big Dog
How are you,
00:00:59
David Isaacs
Yeah.
Dog Training Challenges and Anecdotes
00:01:00
The Big Dog
sir?
00:01:01
David Isaacs
Yeah, it seems like you're just kind of treading water until the big kickoff.
00:01:07
The Big Dog
Yeah, Monday at 11 a.m. m Eastern Standard Time.
00:01:11
David Isaacs
Nice. um Yeah, I mean, kind of the same. Not too much going on. I know were talking before this of, you know, the the whole dog chronicles and yeah, just kind of learning and being patient.
00:01:29
David Isaacs
Like I was saying, she's very smart, so she knows what she's supposed to do, but is also testing boundaries a lot to see if she can get away with not doing it. Um, you know, like she's supposed to sit and wait anytime a door gets opened and she'll sit and wait. I go to open the door. I turn around and she's standing right there behind me. Um, she's supposed to, if I'm in the office, like in my computer chair, she's supposed to be behind me.
00:01:59
David Isaacs
she's not allowed to go under the desk, like under my feet, because I don't want there to be a, you know, if I'm not paying attention or something and like try to roll the chair back and run her over. or what have you. So I try to keep her behind me.
00:02:12
David Isaacs
But she will like start at one side of the room and will crawl thinking that she's being stealthy. So I hear her and I turn around and you know she's two feet closer to me or um she'll take her ball and like drop it like by my feet.
00:02:33
David Isaacs
to try to put me into a choice of like, well, I can go get it or you can pick it up and you can throw it to me. Um, she's pretty good at, she's pretty good at the place command.
00:02:41
The Big Dog
That is...
00:02:44
David Isaacs
I think that one's easy enough cause it's generally around when she's going to get fed. So she knows she's going to get fed if she goes to her place on the couch and waits. Um, but the leash she does not do well with, um,
00:02:59
David Isaacs
Whoever at the rescue said that she does well on the leash was clearly lying.
00:03:05
The Big Dog
Right.
00:03:05
David Isaacs
So we
Health Scare and Dog Care
00:03:06
David Isaacs
got a like freedom harness. It's like a harness that clips in front of her chest.
00:03:11
The Big Dog
Yeah, that's pretty popular these days.
00:03:13
David Isaacs
Yeah, so it's supposed to help. like Anytime she tries to pull, it pulls her towards me. um
00:03:17
The Big Dog
Right.
00:03:18
David Isaacs
or you know, gets her to turn around to look at me. Um, so that was helpful, but yeah, she hates it cause she doesn't have as much, um, like freedom and she doesn't like how it turns her when she does pull.
00:03:26
The Big Dog
Graham.
00:03:32
David Isaacs
Uh, we just tried it out today and it it worked out pretty well. Uh, besides the fact that she hated it, but hopefully like the, the problem I think with her sometimes is the frustration gets her out of like her polite dog phase.
00:03:46
David Isaacs
um So she just acts out due to the frustration. So I'm trying to introduce things or set that foundation of like the expectations so that she knows with some of the commands, she has a pretty good idea of what she needs to do. And she's starting to get into doing them more often without trying to test boundaries.
00:04:08
David Isaacs
But there's definitely a few other things. So I did meet with a dog trainer this past week. And it's relatively expensive, but I think it's helpful at the age that she is right now that she is kind of in this rebellious phase.
00:04:26
David Isaacs
And, you know, just kind of work with her and work with the trainer, but also make sure, you know, I keep the same expectations. I keep the same structure. You know, you're getting fed this amount at this time.
00:04:41
David Isaacs
um You know, when it's time to settle down, you need to settle down. um and and some of those things, but it otherwise it's been good besides her eating grass.
00:04:52
David Isaacs
She got a piece of like clumped up grass that sticks underneath the lawnmower and sometimes it'll fall out you know if you mow the grass when it's wet. In Michigan in April, is ah you can't really get around. If you want to mow the grass, it's going to be wet typically.
00:05:13
David Isaacs
um
00:05:14
The Big Dog
Right.
00:05:15
David Isaacs
So she ate a piece of that. And, uh, the other night, like she was bad all day testing boundaries, like very energetic, like just trying to keep her, you know, reined in.
00:05:27
David Isaacs
Um, and then, yeah, she had eaten that grass and I was doom scrolling, trying to figure out and, you know, what's going to happen and what's going wrong. Like, I got to go to bed. It's Sunday night. Like, of course this, you know,
00:05:40
David Isaacs
dog never wants to have an accident or do something that like when the bed is open, you know, it's always on the weekends or at nighttime that like something happens.
00:05:51
David Isaacs
So, um, I had to go to bed and luckily, you know, I, my mom's around, so she was up with her and she ended up puking. Um, I guess puking twice, um, in the morning time, like going to the bathroom was kind tough on her.
00:06:07
David Isaacs
So we just fed her a bland diet of chicken and rice for a couple days. and Luckily there was a different reason that she had gone to the vet last week. So they'd given us some prescriptions for this
Parallels Between Parenting and Dog Training
00:06:21
David Isaacs
mass that she had.
00:06:22
David Isaacs
Turns out I spent 320 bucks for it to be nothing, which I guess isn't too bad considering it could have been a lot. I could have spent that money. It could have been a lot worse.
00:06:34
David Isaacs
um Sable talked to the vet and she's like yeah well she puked it up like we're not too worried about it like you know poisoning or what have you um so she Monday was pretty slow moving um until like later on in the day and she started like getting her energy back um so yeah the problem is iss like the expectation that she was gonna get
00:06:42
The Big Dog
Right.
00:06:58
David Isaacs
you know, chicken for every meal now, which, uh, luckily went over pretty, pretty well. She's not like turning her nose up at the kibble that we've given her.
00:07:10
David Isaacs
Um, but yeah, I mean, it's, it's quite a big undertaking. I knew that going in, um, but yeah, some of those times it's just, um, you know, pretty difficult to,
00:07:26
David Isaacs
to deal with. And, um, I don't know if it's similarly with kids, but they seem to, like when you're stressed out, like they seem to pick up on it and want to push your buttons more.
00:07:38
David Isaacs
And I know they don't mean to, but it's just like the timing of it always matches up that way.
00:07:39
The Big Dog
Oh, yeah.
00:07:44
The Big Dog
Yeah, maybe sometimes it is, especially when you get ah as your kid gets older. um My son's pretty receptive to like our habits. So it's like think he knows when we're annoyed. He kind of just pushes it up because he's just is seeking attention. so he like.
00:08:02
The Big Dog
wants to try and get that attention any way he can. Like, he's kind of just at that age and just really turns turns the volume up on it, and seems. Sometimes, I think, like you said, it's kind of just pure coincidence. But,
00:08:16
The Big Dog
ah yeah, there's growing pains. You know, you got to... kind of grow together, but you're, you being the, the human in this case, uh, and I'm meeting being the dad, it's, uh, we, get we do have to set the expectations and we just follow through, being a parent dog or human. Otherwise, um, it's all about finding the best route.
00:08:43
The Big Dog
Um, and it takes a lot of effort. It's not, it's not an easy task. So, um,
00:08:51
The Big Dog
Yeah. my My son today ah didn't we he wanted spaghetti. um so he made spaghetti and then all of a sudden he's like he takes a bite. He's like, I'm all done. No, you're not all done, pal. Like you need to keep eating. And it took I don't know.
00:09:10
The Big Dog
It felt like an hour. it was really only like 10 minutes to like finally get him to continue eating. But it's sometimes nighttime is a challenge. I think that goes for dogs and humans like just trying to find new things every day. So.
00:09:27
David Isaacs
Yeah, I think the problem is just got to be consistent regardless of how you're feeling. um You know, consistently patient, consistently um having the expectations with them, like not letting them get away with something um because they should maybe if they don't know, but like that's the expectation that you have.
00:09:52
David Isaacs
So you don't want to you know, allow them to get away with something and then, you like keep testing those boundaries and see what else they can get away with and, and stuff.
00:10:03
David Isaacs
And similarly to us, like give ourselves grace sometimes to give them grace to, you know, with, the dog it's like yeah she's very food motivated we've been trying to take advantage of that um the problem is it's like she's um whatever other trauma that she's dealt with in her life of not knowing when her next meal is going to be so it's like she ever going to grow out of that is she ever going to stop trying to eat things outside that she shouldn't be eating i'm not entirely sure but you know the thought is that
00:10:39
David Isaacs
I got to set the expectation and hopefully, you know, one day she learns like, Hey, I'm safe. i'm comfortable. i being fed. Um, it's a regimented schedule for my feedings and that. So yeah, maybe she'll come around for it.
00:10:54
David Isaacs
Um, but yeah, some of those days it's just harder to really be patient and, um, you know, if they're acting out, it's like, it's not maybe not their fault.
Balancing Work and Parenting, Is It a Learning Experience?
00:11:06
David Isaacs
that how much they want to act out is aligned with, um, a day that was pretty stressful. Um, so you can't really, uh, still got to just be patient, I guess.
00:11:20
The Big Dog
Yeah. I mean, we're, I'm still discovering new things every, every day about being a dad and my son's growing. I mean, he's five years old. He's in that mode where he's going to want to learn how to do anything and everything that he can.
00:11:35
The Big Dog
And whether he realizes it or not, he's can test our patients. And, you know, my wife and I are working on in communicating to each other. Like when we're feeling stressed or overwhelmed, um, you know, somebody might have to take over. Um, it's, so it's growing pains for us and our relationships. it's Also growing pains in our, or and our relationship between each other and with our son. So it's a whole trifecta. Um,
00:12:05
The Big Dog
Well, like you said earlier, it's, it's all about consistency and, um, setting the right expectations with your son, yourself, your, your, your partner, um, and just openly computing, communicating that and making them understand. So, um, with a, with a dog, maybe a little bit different, like they are very much food and or activity driven. So, you know,
00:12:32
The Big Dog
um I don't really have much tips for, for in the way of dogs. I've, uh, it's been a long time since I've had a dog of my own. So, um, but with kids, you know, it's, they're always kind of looking for a new way to get, at least with my son, and he's always looking for a new way to get attention from us. Cause he's a relatively shy kid. So he doesn't necessarily get that at so at school from other kids. So, you he's looking for,
00:13:03
The Big Dog
I guess to feed that or, uh, not feed that stimuli, but, um, just get that, get that attention. I got lost for my and word on that one, but he just, he wants that need filled and, you know, it feels like he's also at that age where he he's just like,
00:13:26
The Big Dog
pedal to the metal from ADM or whatever time he gets up to the time he goes to bed at like 830. So, um, keeping up with that is a full-time job in and of itself. Um, but you gotta be ready for the challenge. You gotta be open to new things and just making sure that obviously they don't hurt themselves or, um, but you know, you you set your boundary in a way that is healthy for both people. And, um you know, you kind of just go one step at a time. Like, there's no right answer for any of the these things. It's, you know, I don't necessarily call it doom scrolling. Maybe you're just looking out for tips and tricks. But, you know, for my kid, I'm always looking up things of, to paraphrase how to be a better dad to him, you know, I'm always looking for different ways to connect, different activities to do around either the house or just looking for events that maybe we can go to go to the park, all these types of things to kind of just like run out his energy and keep him healthy and, and always engaged. So, um, I feel like I spend more time than I actually do. you know, I exaggerate times a lot. feels like I'm work 40 hours and I come home 40 hours, just trying to keep him alive and, you know, full activity ahead. And then I go,
00:14:49
The Big Dog
go to bed at 10 30 or whenever I go to bed and wake up and repeat you know sometimes it's like a Tasmanian devil lifestyle or just kind of spinning out of control until we go to bed so we we make the best out of the situations that we have and know that we're just better being better people and shaping our kids to be better people too
00:15:01
David Isaacs
you
00:15:13
David Isaacs
Yeah, and i not to compare dogs to people, but I think in a higher level, like your children in general, but I think from a higher level, like it's kind of all the same mix of things, right?
00:15:29
David Isaacs
It's like all living things need you know sunlight, water, and food.
00:15:29
The Big Dog
Oh yeah, for sure.
00:15:33
The Big Dog
Right.
00:15:35
David Isaacs
um But depending on whatever it is, if it's a... you know, children obviously need a lot more stimulation, um, really get on your nerves sometimes.
00:15:49
David Isaacs
Um, but yeah, with dogs, it's, it's kind of similar and, uh, you know, they have their phases and they're going to act out. Um, and yeah, test your, uh, test your nerves every once in a while.
00:16:05
David Isaacs
Um, I was saying like I had a had a volunteer opportunity today through work and um i signed up for it i thought it was just like putting together stem kits for elementary school kids and ended up being like you know we're sitting in the classroom like with a table of kindergartners um so it's a two-part event and first part was today and apparently i'm being I'll be with the same kids tomorrow, but
00:16:36
David Isaacs
um like the one the one kid, and they're all kindergartners, so you know take it with a grain of salt, but he was very... the you know We're using paper and wood blocks to make a bridge, and there's a car in the bag.
00:16:55
David Isaacs
Well, he didn't like that car. He wanted the other car that was in like the you know extra materials in case anything was missing. uh so i gave him that car and we're trying to go through the workbook and figure out okay well how many washers if you build this bridge how many washers would it take for it to fall off um so i have three kids there and he's like I'm going to build a ramp. And I'm like, okay, man, i think you do you like, yeah, we're it's science supposed to be fun. Let's experiment. Like, yeah, you can build a ramp if you want.
00:17:30
David Isaacs
Um, and still trying to keep the other two engaged and like the lesson of what we're trying to do. But, um, by God, was he off the walls. um so that was the first experiment the second experiment was using so it wass supposed to be like structurally sound things so like you build a bridge with a piece of paper like it's not it's pretty flimsy it's not gonna work um so why don't we try a another piece of paper and we'll fold it over and we'll put it on the the bridge.
00:18:03
David Isaacs
and Then the third step was like, all right, well, if we crinkle the paper, like do we think this will be better and why do we think this will be better? At the end of the lesson was like, well, triangles, if you you know kind of crinkle the paper to make it like a fan, they're more structurally sound than squares. so The next one was like, okay, well, if we make a cube versus if we make a pyramid, like which one is more structurally sound?
00:18:28
David Isaacs
Um, and he was very good at that one, but, uh, there were, it was marshmallows and toothpicks. So the teacher had let them know like, well, you can eat a couple of marshmallows once you're done, but you, you, we got to get through the experiment.
00:18:45
David Isaacs
Um, so got through the experiment and the teacher let them know the, all right, well, you can eat a couple, but put the rest in the bag and those no marshmallows made it into the bag.
00:18:58
David Isaacs
you know, the, the bag that they were allowed to take home to do like the experiment at home. Um, so that was kind of funny, but at the end of it, I just go to the teacher. I'm like, yeah, none of the marshmallows made it. Even before I said anything, she's like, I'm sorry that you, um, like you had to deal with them and like, no, it's okay. It just, um, I just kind of feel bad because the other two children, like trying to keep engaged and trying to go through the lesson. And he's, my car is a rocket ship now.
00:19:31
David Isaacs
I'm like, all right, okay, that's that's good. But it was harder to kind of, it was very overstimulating trying to work through because they're working at different paces. And You know, when is it a good time to to help them or ask them, like, do you need help? Would you like help?
00:19:50
David Isaacs
Like, you know, ask these questions. Well, how many toothpicks does it take to make a triangle? How many sides does a triangle have? How many sides does a square have? It's like if we, you know, structurally, if we try to push on this cube or if we try to push on the square versus if we try to push on this triangle, like which one feels stronger?
00:20:11
David Isaacs
um it was supposed to be an experiment like that but you know trying to guide them through the lesson and trying to keep you know all three of them engaged as they're working at their different paces was kind of tough um in doing that but uh i just thought it was funny and uh the t and when we were going through the the bridge exercise the teacher had come over like asking the one um the one boy about if he was you know being good i'm like yeah he made a ramp and um the car is now a rocket ship and she's like okay um but yeah i mean that's just
00:20:52
David Isaacs
like I knew going into it, um, that was go be tough. It was gonna be, you know, kind overstimulating, but it's kind of fun. You know, it's just a fun experience.
00:21:03
David Isaacs
Um, and trying to, you know, the very, very sponges, very much sponges for knowledge and just trying to learn, you know, trying to get them more engaged with like, you know, this is what we do if we experiment, like if the bridge collapses, it's fine. Like we failed, but that's how we learn. and
AI in Work Culture: A Learning Process?
00:21:22
David Isaacs
Um, I do think a lot of that can be, you know, retaught to me.
00:21:26
David Isaacs
Like it's okay if you fail.
00:21:28
The Big Dog
Yeah.
00:21:29
David Isaacs
it's, you know, we're experimenting with this. Uh, so even with, um, you know, requests I get at work, that's kind of the, one of the more fun things that i have. It's frustrating, but also fun because you get that sense of accomplishment when you're experimenting with, um, you know, for me, like specific data pools or visualizations or, um,
00:21:51
David Isaacs
you know any sort of code that I'm trying to run and I'm trying to generate. And I have the ah knowledge of like this looks right or this doesn't look right or how do we make this better? How do we improve this?
00:22:04
David Isaacs
you know Before it actually gets the end product. so yeah Sometimes in the middle, it's like, well, why isn't this finished yet? Well, I experimented with a whole bunch of different things. I failed a whole bunch of times, but this is the output.
00:22:20
David Isaacs
I think sometimes too, it just kind of goes, it just gets overlooked of, you know, all the frustration, all the failures, all the, you know, re revamping, remapping you know, specific joins and calculations and things to actually get something functional that's, you know, takes a whole bunch of complicated things and, you know, bubbles it up for that specific audience.
00:22:50
David Isaacs
Um, but yeah, in the same mind too, like, yeah, we're just experimenting. if it's, uh, uh, changing a different sleep schedule or getting ah a better, uh, sleep hygiene or diet or exercise routine or something, it's like, yeah, it's okay. We're just experimenting or,
00:23:09
David Isaacs
putting together a podcast where we're, uh, you know, just kind of experimenting with, you know, what works best and, um, what people gravitate towards.
00:23:14
The Big Dog
Yeah, building.
00:23:23
The Big Dog
Yeah, I mean, going back to the kid building his dream for the car and the rocket ship, that's ah it' like five, six-year-old just one-on-one. It's like there are some there are some kids you're you know who maybe learn and learn as they go, but and some kids maybe just have it of learning to what the assignment is and just doing it.
00:23:47
The Big Dog
But there's just some kids who just want to build a ramp for the rocket ship. You know, that's, that's like my kid. He is very good at academically, but when it comes to like a fine motor skill, things like art and, um, writing, it isn't he he was, he's struggling with that.
00:24:04
The Big Dog
So he has like no interest in it and kind of just does his own thing, but loves playing with, i mean, he's in preschool right now, but he's, uh,
00:24:08
David Isaacs
Thank you.
00:24:13
The Big Dog
ah Loves playing with like a little baby there and they like this little it's not very big but it's like a little free house isn't the right word but there's like this little structure that you can play with and play in there and he loves going up there but um yeah I mean kids kids and animals that we kind of have guardianship or ownership over um can teach you know they teach us a lot when you know they kind of force us to learn, learn by failing.
00:24:46
The Big Dog
Um, you know, like today I was building a web scraper cause I was just feeling incredibly lazy and didn't feel like manually looking for images, product descriptions and other things for this pretty high end line that we have. Um, we just got some new, um, Hans Grohe, um, which is a very high end, um, faucet brand.
00:25:09
The Big Dog
And, um, I spent like I don't know, a couple hours trying to build ah a web scraper that would go through Google. Um, cause the URL structure for this site that was scraping was all over the place.
00:25:24
The Big Dog
And so i was just kind of go trying to go through Google, but then after like 50 attempts, I would get you know, recapture. So then I don't have to pause for 60 seconds. And anyway, it was probably one of the most sophisticated software things I've ever wrote, even though it was probably less than 50 lines of code.
00:25:42
The Big Dog
um uh, really at the end of it, I really didn't want to get what I accomplished, but I at least tried, you know, and i made a pretty viable scraper line of code that I can repeat for probably anything else. That's not, doesn't have to go through Google to scrape a site. And so, um,
00:26:02
The Big Dog
I was so proud of myself at the end of the day. it was frustrating that I kind of spent a couple hours just building this and that just no matter what edits I made, you know, it I just couldn't really get it to function that i function as expected. But, you know, i came away with knowledge at the end of the day of one, I can do that without really necessarily, you know, looking for AI or, you know, I was kind of just doing the old school way of Googling it and trying to figure it out on my own. So Um, maybe not very cash money of me to waste two hours of my company's time, but you know, I got to kind of had to do it. And, you know, it's the project that I want to finish by Monday for this upcoming kickoff and, um you know, any means, almost any means necessary, but the key takeaway me is I learned something and I, you know, was proud of myself for writing that code. So, um, always something to be learned,
00:26:59
The Big Dog
in situations like that and you know kind of just goes along with being a dad almost you know it's like I fail a lot I sometimes get angry with my kid and he's not really doing anything that's not in ordinary but that's just kind of my first reaction but you know being the opposite of a quarterback you know you don't sometimes always go with your first read you know you got to work through your progression that just goes goes with life of can't always give your kid your first reaction because if that were my case, I'd probably just yell or laugh at everything that he does, you know, and it's supposed to be like the opposite. Right. So just trying to find the balance, um, work life, being a good dad, um, being a good husband, know, I still working on that aspect of it too.
00:27:49
The Big Dog
life is is, funny. And there's only so many hours in the day that you can devote to these things. And sometimes other things get prioritized, which may hurt other people's feelings. And it is what it is. But, um, I think we can always take solace in that if you put your best foot forward, you know, always going to have a good feeling about it. so
00:28:12
David Isaacs
Yeah.
00:28:15
David Isaacs
Yeah, you got to think of the shareholders, Brian. The shareholders, what are they going to do when they they learn that you've spent two hours of the company time?
00:28:19
The Big Dog
Yeah.
00:28:25
David Isaacs
um but no i mean i get in the whole ai discourse and stuff and people are like asking me like oh have you used copilot to um to do analysis on this i'm like no because it'll literally take me more time than it would if i was to just do it um like it
00:28:26
The Big Dog
Oh, yeah.
00:28:44
The Big Dog
Right. It's like you Yeah, you work through your prompts and it's like, I could have just probably have done this by myself and figured out in the same amount of time orla or less, so...
00:28:56
David Isaacs
Yeah. Or, you know, when that knowledge of like, well, what is it supposed to look like? Or what are we trying to solve? Or similarly, like with the experiments of, you know, how much time does it take me to actually plan out like a good path forward for the steps that we need to take to make this scalable in the future?
00:29:22
David Isaacs
and you know what does that look like and once you can get down to that then yeah i will use ai but i'm not gonna one shot it with ai i'm gonna go and fact check it make sure i'm giving it good responses and good foundation or if i feel like i don't need to use it then trust that i don't need to use it um
00:29:45
The Big Dog
Yeah.
00:29:46
David Isaacs
Yeah, I mean, that's just kind of the general discourse, I think, in most company cultures. And, you know, my companies look different, but they've taken on a pretty good attitude about it and using it for, you know, augmentation of people's work so that we can experiment more, um do things faster, figure out better ways to do things. But, you yeah it's just kind of the the hard part of having that conversation of well this process was i mean it it has gaps ai can't fix these gaps um like we're seeing the issues that come up from holding on to this process as a whole um like we it needs a revamp like before we can even you know
00:30:36
David Isaacs
And we can use AI to revamp it, but we need to to figure out what the the best path forward is.
00:30:46
David Isaacs
so
00:30:47
The Big Dog
right yeah i mean haven't i just i since i've kind of taken i guess like a step more into like the admin administration side of like it slash like web team like e-commerce so whatever you want to call it um i've you know had to learn have learned more about like taxonomy and taxonomy hierarchy and how data is structured um from like that standpoint and you know building out road maps for this this project and dates that we want to hit or at least time ones that we want to hit and like um you know to add add to the ai discourse like i kind of consulted it for like okay like what does the successful website look like you know
00:31:39
The Big Dog
zero to three months, three to six months, and then six months to a year after this kind of ah redesign or or launch, if you will, like, like what do metric, like what are metrics that we should look for? Like what are, should I be asking stakeholders? And it gave me like this chart that was just like all over the place. Like it repeated itself several times, even though I asked it to omit it and, you know,
00:32:06
The Big Dog
I'm not the probably the most efficient person when it comes to prompting these things, but like, I like, I was getting to the point where I had I was like bringing this to my one-on-one and I showed my boss. She's like, what does this even mean? And I go, I have no idea. Like, I don't know what a product map is supposed to necessarily look like. I can look one up on Google, but if i were to kind of decipher it one for one on you know, what our product,
00:32:31
The Big Dog
the metrics that our site should need. Like I, you know, I wouldn't be able to do that. So it's kind of when I had done this draft with AI and she's like, yeah, I don't like doing AI for any of this. was like, well, apparently I don't either. Cause this was a horrible experience. Like this was just like prompt after prompt of getting rid of things and adding things and getting more clarity. And it was just like, it was just not efficient. So, um,
00:32:55
The Big Dog
I just brought that kind of question to my, my weekly meeting. I was like, well, what does a successful website look like to you after this is like, like essentially asking like, what are our goals and what are our plans in that timeline? Like I said before and like that opened up the discussion. So um there's definitely, I'm, I I'm with you, you know, David, I'm like,
00:33:21
The Big Dog
I still work at the company. where We're very much trying to figure everything out. And, you know, when we don't have voices from certain key stakeholders, as chat GPT likes to refer to it all the time, of you know, it's kind of hard to have a plan going forward. And I was finally able to kind of flesh those out in that meeting. So, um,
00:33:41
The Big Dog
You know, that's just one way for me to learn or you know, what I learned from that is don't trust AI for something like that. Just go with your gut instinct and get the information from everyone who you need opinions from or or input from and kind of go from there. Then that's when you can kind of feed it in AI. And once you get it more down a funnel, I guess it's long winded way of saying that.
00:34:07
David Isaacs
Yeah, today I managed to do something in four hours with AI that would have taken me 15 minutes if I just did it myself.
00:34:14
The Big Dog
yeah pretty much
00:34:15
David Isaacs
That's the ah the basis of this. But yeah, I mean, I think that's just the general discourse. And similarly to what I was saying with like, you know, planning, thinking, you know, what is the best way to go about this?
00:34:28
David Isaacs
How do we challenge like the AI's output? When do we know like you know this is something that I can do myself and it's not going to take a whole bunch of time? Or you know some of the other some of the other processes and things that have been brought up before of you know what do we you know, how do we use it? When do we use it? What is it best used for? Like, really just missing out on like the whole aspect of like, well, we need to think about this. Like, what problem are we trying to solve?
00:34:59
David Isaacs
What is it going to take to get there? what is, you know, step one, step two, step three look like? What does version one look like? What do we expect version two to look like? You know, um Is this something foundationally with a process that can't be solved?
00:35:15
David Isaacs
Why can't it be solved? It's you know a trade-off that we have to make if we want to try to do something differently and accept acceptance of those trade-offs.
00:35:22
The Big Dog
Right.
00:35:24
David Isaacs
So I feel like a lot of times, you know that's where a lot of the work um where the work lays of like okay well we have to figure out all of this before we start to work on something you know if it was just me like yeah i would think i would take time i would figure it out you know and i would go in with an action plan to be able to get it done and To your point, like, yeah, I did. I was able to do that with AI couple weeks ago, but similar thing, like most of the time that it took to figure out, you know, like, what's the best way to do this?
00:36:04
David Isaacs
What are we trying to solve? How do we capture things? How do we test to make sure that it's actually working, that there's no gaps? Yeah. which just comes from the kind of the domain experience of knowing some of that.
00:36:17
David Isaacs
And I do think we're kind of at a point too, where like we're expected to use it. So people are like saying like, yeah, I used, I used it for this or use it for that.
00:36:28
David Isaacs
Whereas other times it's like, they don't really want, you don't really want to give AI the credit for things. And yeah, So I want to like seem like it did all the work and I get it because i i deal with,
00:36:42
David Isaacs
you know, arguing that point all the time of like, you know, this is not the hard part about it. Coding is not the hard part. Acceptance criteria, test cases, requirements gathering, what's acceptable of the requirements, like how does that,
00:37:02
David Isaacs
like all the work that gets done before the work begins is what takes the longest amount of time.
00:37:09
David Isaacs
And yeah, I mean, it is, for its use cases is very good. And I expect that to get better in the future. But as we continue to work and continue to try to solve problems and be able to experiment with more that AI allows us to.
00:37:29
David Isaacs
you know For my thought is like, yeah, I mean, maybe more of those discussions are going to be happening, but like for pre-work and maybe that becomes more of the bottleneck for trying to decide what problems we wanted to solve. What did we not have visibility to before that we think we need now, but who owns that process, who's there to escalate things when they notice something that the data is telling them to like get something prioritized and figured out and fixed um which i don't think is ever going to go away
00:38:08
The Big Dog
No, not, especially not in my business.
00:38:08
David Isaacs
as we
00:38:11
The Big Dog
There's always going to be different, you know, just data issues, uh, you know, product descriptions, um, hierarchical data, um, you know, taxonomy changes, especially if we move platforms, trying to understand how that interacts with the data that we have.
00:38:31
The Big Dog
um you know, like transitioning from like big commerce to Shopify. So like basically number two to number one, as far as e-commerce platforms was, I mean, it was a big change. Like, yeah, I mean the CMS, which is, know, content management system if for all the WordPress nerds out there, but um like they're very similar, but how they structure things are are very similar. Like ah big commerce was a little bit,
00:39:04
The Big Dog
I don't want to say easier is a little bit more open and how you can kind of structure your data. Whereas with um Shopify, they're kind of very strict, not the right word, maybe more focused on like the collections, quote unquote, that's kind of how they structure their data and like, they already have a lot of categories and things kind of laid out. So we kind of had ah spent a lot of time just switching over what we had categorized. So it lines up with that. So, I mean, to your point, there's, you know, at least in my business, there's always going to be no shortage of just kind of like change over work. And I don't,
00:39:42
The Big Dog
at least as of right now, I don't think AI is going to like be able to like speed speed that up or, you know, make that transition without getting some sort of specific, ah you know, agentic model going. So um yeah, i there's always going to be like communication that has to happen at every job that I don't think AI is ever going to solve. And, you know,
Reflections and Key Takeaways
00:40:03
The Big Dog
it's because every problem is going to be unique, um you know, and it's going to have a different kind of,
00:40:10
The Big Dog
requirement to increase if you're working on a site like i do where it's e-commerce of you know generating revenue or you know um you know solving warehouse issues and getting better flows going right like there's always going to be room for improvement both personally and professionally you know no no company or anything is is perfect everything's always changing
00:40:36
David Isaacs
Yeah. That's the growing pains that us as adults have to deal with. Like how to navigate this world and keep expectations the way that they are and find that balance between, you know, the best way to go about things.
00:40:41
The Big Dog
Exactly.
00:40:50
David Isaacs
And, um, yeah, just keep showcasing that point. Um, that like, yeah, just trust us and allow us to know, like we know how to get the job done.
00:41:03
David Isaacs
the Yeah, maybe eventually we can take on more. We can solve newer problems. We can solve things faster. But, you know, we're just learning as well. So, yeah.
00:41:17
David Isaacs
So um pretty much leave you all with that. um Brian, if you have any other closing remarks
00:41:27
The Big Dog
No, um I liked our discussion today. It went from dog eating grass to AI not working properly. But, you know, it's
00:41:37
David Isaacs
Yeah, perfectly perfectly abridged.
00:41:40
The Big Dog
yeah um but that's ah oh it was a good conversation. I don't have any closing remarks, so um I hope. I hope everyone has at least one takeaway from this episode. You know, feel free to reach out to one of us if not. But we'll talk to you all next week.
00:41:59
David Isaacs
All right. Thanks, everyone.
00:42:01
The Big Dog
Yep.
00:42:01
David Isaacs
Thanks, Brian.
00:42:02
The Big Dog
Bye, everybody.