Rethinking Validation, with Sree K

Welcome back to another episode! Today, Dori sits down with Sree K, a life sciences industry professional with over 18 years experience that spans roles in testing, validation, IT, Business, and Quality. As an expert in test automation, Sree is a huge advocate for automation in validation and modernizing our approaches to software compliance.

Sree is also very active on LinkedIn, providing his followers with unique and insightful life sciences related content, and illustrating what an exciting time it is to be a part of this industry.

You can follow Sree on LinkedIn here, but in the meantime, put in your earbuds and enjoy another great episode of Software Quality Today!

*Disclaimer: Podcast guest participated in the podcast as an individual subject matter expert and contributor. The views and opinions they share are not necessarily shared by their employer. Nor should any reference to specific products or services be interpreted as commercial endorsements by their current employer.

This is a production of ProcellaRX

Transcript

Sree K: 0:56

Thank you very excited to be here.

Dori Gonzalez-Acevedo: 1:35

It's been a while since we chatted, so we it's always nice to be able to catch up to while we're doing some of these podcasts. Yeah, you've been active in in, in posting and doing some new live LinkedIn stuff. So how was things going? And I would like to know how things going and where you are and how you came to be in this industry.

Sree K: 1:56

Okay, great questions. I think it's really exciting times to be in this industry, I think I would start from there. People who are looking to join this side of work in our industry, this is the best time to arrive. And that's the message I've been trying to portray in my when I talk to new people, or I try to share something LinkedIn, things like that. Because I mean, I've been in the industry for 18 years. And a lot of the time I felt, as I heard you also in other podcasts and people say what you actually do is kind of boring, or doing the same stuff over and over again. I think the reason CSA guidance coming out it's exciting time to be in this industry and make really some change, right? I mean, some of us have that in us. We didn't have something to refer to, but now you have something to refer. So go make that change.

Dori Gonzalez-Acevedo: 2:49

Yeah, so it's, I know, you and I both have been in the mindset of doing risk based approach for many, many years. Right. But it was a lot of resistance we had had for folks that say, Well, is this really going to be accepted? Or is this going to be okay, and so what are your some of your thoughts around the CSA guidance? And and how does that does this help that conversation?

Sree K: 3:14

It does, right? So I think one of the key aspect is to understand the key players in the game, right? Especially when you talk about validation, you're dealing with three schools of thought, you have a business team, you have an IT team, and then you have the quality team or CSV if it is part of that, right. So my early conversations has been like, you know, people want to see how others are doing wait and watch and then implement our, you know, last farm, especially this, like, hey, we have enough resources to do what we were doing in the past, right? They don't need to change anything, we have enough time we have enough resources, but what they miss is they could allocate their resources to more mission critical activities, if they approached you to their space. Right. I think that's the part which is missing. And I've been very vocal about it. And also you in some, in some cases, it is about doing and showing it right. So luckily for me, I had the good fortune of doing a lot of automation testing projects before. And once the customer sees that kind of savings, yes, you have to invest a little bit in upfront, like the first year or so. But then you see the values in the second 30. And you don't have to keep the same team or in all right. So that's one of the big, big savings I've seen. And also these days as I write and talk to more people I see a lot of acceptance from all different angles, someone or wait and watch, but already some use cases coming from the space approach and how each of the customers have been benefited. Right. So people have started reading those and then especially my focus area right now is to work with small and midsize farmers. So since you know, in one way they're disabled advantage is an advantage because they don't have the systems built in, they don't have the linkage of, you know, doing this in one way. So they're open, an open mindset, they are ready to listen to what is happening newness, try the new stuff, because their intelligence also get to the get the product of the dog to the market as fast as possible. Right. So

Dori Gonzalez-Acevedo: 5:21

because they're smaller, they're more nimble. Right. And they're given that they're smaller, they're, I think, we can make the logical assumption that they're closer to understanding the why the product is what it is, or when why the urgency to get things done. Right. Yeah. Whereas when you get to the big enterprise, you know, organizations, that journey to the end goal is further away and less tangible.

Sree K: 5:47

Yeah, I think there's good and bad to eat as well, right. So you know, enough, the reality check I had in my career was, I worked for Big Pharma for 15 years. And then I wanted, I did a lot of different roles in our major change, I thought, I can make these kinds of changes in a smaller pharma faster, and I can learn faster. But some of the challenges remaining small farmers already you you feel when you go to small farmer, you, you may be working with AI, ml, and all this new stuff. But then I had this reality checking off my experience where they were still paper based, right? So there was not even a single tool for doing electronic validation, for example, like, so. Yeah. I mean, they have their own challenges. But I think from a philosophy standpoint, right, it is easy to have these kinds of conversations about risk based approach, why we are seeing this what kind of benefit you would see there is a guidance to refer to an FDA themselves have been more vocal thing I have seen in the last couple of years about this approach. They're working very closely with our industry. So it's not that the customer is hearing this story from one side right now, just as consult, and you bring that here, these are the best practices for industry, they're also seeing that FDA is agreeing to their approach, and they themself are partnering a little more. So I think it's a win win situation. That's why I'm really excited about what's happening right now.

Dori Gonzalez-Acevedo: 7:06

Yeah, so the, at the end of the day, one of the things you mentioned is around the the automation, right, and that has the capacity, we have the capacity to be able to change that the efficiency with a CSA model, right, if we truly apply that in the way that it's intended. Right. And, and I think there's a hesitancy to to do that on a grand scheme, because like, organizations can't have that impact of that change from a business process perspective, right? Because one thing is to say, we're going to change the methodology, right? Or, or or refocus that. But then the other part of that is how much training that needs to happen in order for that to to be done, right? What are the third parties that interact with us that already know our business processes, and then that has to change the tools and electronic tools, right, or that need to be modified according to like, it's like a ripple effect, that while the upside and benefits could be there, that you had said it was a little push for, like automation change, like, typically, a major automation practice is a huge push. Right, that then diminishes over time? I think the similar sort of conundrum I think we're struggling with is how much to invest in doing a better business process from the very beginning. Right, or altering that or changing that. So do you like what are some of the things we can communicate to folks about the benefits of moving to a newer approach?

Sree K: 8:55

Yeah, you're absolutely right. Right. But what I think is, it's all in the thinking initially, without seeing, right, that's where they have the fear. Yes, consultants can come and talk about, hey, we have implemented this in this area, or this customer. And these are the benefits, we can show those in a super good slides to show but the customer believes would only come when they actually see. So I think the best approach in my experience is, you know, pick a small project, maybe a GXP, or small, non GSP project, right? So they're the amount of validation you do is comparatively little lesser than, let's say, critical three parter. So your turnaround time is less. So you could immediately show the benefits, right? In terms of percentages when you show that, hey, you're using a, let's say, example of cloud software. And software product vendor has three releases per year, right. So you have a set of regression test cases, let's say you're not planning to do any announcements, right? are a little bit of announcement like 10%. So in those cases, if you have a regression suit, to Today, you may be using five testers, I mean, those regressions sold for four for a month every month. So you're basically spending three months of your year five testers engaged, right? The actual work is nothing but just re running the existing scripts. But if you automate, you can reduce the number of testers to in this example, write one tester. And then the execution itself is reduced from, you know, one month to a few weeks or a few days right. Now, the, the hindrance I have seen in this kind of exercise is more from to be harnessed, right, from quality essential because they, in some cases, they are not up to date on the technological advancements, to be fair to them, right, because not so much of education and training has been focused in that part of the group or they're busy in audit and other stuff. But what I have seen is, in my experience, when I worked with the quality team, it's also because they don't have an automation procedure, right how to do automation. So humans typically always have a CSV, or a testing procedure, but not automate so. So what I did was we brought experts from outside and helped write something and then they could use it for a small pilot project. So if you did a small, and then build a bridge that showed recourse, the other organization showed them the benefit and smaller GXP projects came into picture, and then the big gap. So now, I because I still have contacts in those organizations today. And then I still hear from that, you know, a lot of benefits they are reaping from that exercise, which was done like five years back. So I think the initial assistance will be there. But I think you need to pick a small project as a case study. And, you know, when that confidence that the your experience from outside may not, you know, may not give get give the game, give them the full confidence to go out with that. But if you do that the smaller one, I think you can still win.

Dori Gonzalez-Acevedo: 11:57

Yeah. Makes some interesting points. But tree, let's circle back around. So how did you even come into this industry? Like, this is not something you go to school for? So what's your journey here?

Sree K: 12:08

Yeah, so I did not know anything about validation. So I graduated as a computer science and engineering. So I did a little bit of programming initially for back in Sector back in India. So I graduated India. And then I traveled to Germany for an assignment to do. But it was a pharma company who was doing sample oriented pipetting, the blood tests, so I was writing software for them. And since I was only one in their office in Germany, you know, I had to do some testing around it. And they asked me to do system testing, that's when I get into the testing part of things. And then an opportunity came in the US with a big farm. And then I came here because they show they wanted both development and the testing experience. And then the testing. Organization was part of the quality group that time and the statics and bandleader redeposit, they said, Hey, you have testing, we have this process, learn this process, everybody attesting to that, and, you know, we call it validation, understand these regulations, you know, study these, right and follow these approaches. So I did that. And, you know, I came to actually start a testing center of excellence to that customer. That was the first one and then we grew to more than 100 people over over 10 years. So it does mean that, but I think I'm an accidental revelation person. But eventually what happened was that I started loving the team I was working with, and then it also gave me a lot of opportunity to as I mentioned before, right? There are three organizations you always work with, you can work with ITT, we can work with the business team, we can also work with the quality and so these are three pillars of any farmer organization, right. So the exposure you get, and the learning you can, if you're willing and open minded, is tremendous. What has happened to me was as part of quality of research for a while, then moved to IT side, and then also the business lead for a bit by implementation. So I was able to step into those shoes and see how they think. So that's when I, you know, when I became a consultant, myself, and I was able to think, you know, now my conversations are more accommodating, I would call because I kind of understand where they come from, right? Why this ask for something, you know, they ask for things like that. But so yeah, so there was also the creative side of Midori, which always thought okay, yes, you do the validation for two years right and you keep repeating like the you just widened. Basically you started with one point and you're doing temperance but we're not doing going deep enough you're only I realized this when I came out, started reading this actual FDA validation documents ESA guidance doc Gam documents, not many people read they just picked something from this slide. No, no, I myself question was how did I survive in this industry? By not really reading the actual Bible? Right. So Now, that's something which I tried to embed into the team asking them to read. You don't have to read these documents in entirety every day. But as a daily practice, what I do is I read this guidance every day, at least one page one page every day is because every time I reread it, there is some some new person in new, which is having a better understanding of what they are trying to see. Right? Because FDA always says it is their current understanding, they are not that prescriptive. So you can make things out of it. And you know, yeah, that's right. And so the prescriptive part, which is why part of why Priscilla X is originally is prescription for software quality? Because it is, is an interpretation, right? Even doctors, right? Do you do not, there's not one set answer, you can ask, you know, various doctors all skilled within their there, but they have different approaches to how to solve a patient's ailments, it's the same thing. Obviously, yes, there are some go to things in life critical situations where you're going to prescribe something, something specific, but other things, you know, daily kind of maintenance and health and well being can be achieved in many, many different ways. And it doesn't work for everybody. Right? So, you know, I like what you're saying, and also taking part of education, even in a in a trusted advisor like yourself, right, that knows, kind of the basic principles is doing a daily practice of reaching, reaching out and educating yourself, and then seeing how that applies. You know, that is also part of an enriching culture of learning. And in so when I hear you say something to the effect of, you know, so it's not often I hear this often, right, that the quality team often is the ones that perhaps need some guidance, or education or some kind of dialogue, right? It's, it's how to how to have that dialogue in a learning sort of mindset, right? It's not that all it are right, or not all business people are right, or quality people. Right, right. But how do we have this dialogue? Right, where we have different perspectives? Yeah, everyone comes to it from from different parts of the organization or different, you know, histories, right? So you were in a pharma, and now you're out, you're like, some do the opposite. Some are only ever been, you know, in one place or the other. And having, not being forced to try on different perspectives, really limit our way of thinking. And I think one of the, you know, the critical thinking piece that, that the the new camp guidance has come out with, is is important, right? Because I think that that was missing from the original kind of risk based approach. We said, We want a risk based approach. But what did we see? We saw a bunch of checklists come out and not getting down to some details, right. And so what do you think the future of, of this is given? We're in an industry that is typically, you know, again, generalization, but typically slow to do change in these sorts of operational changes that we're talking about? Yeah. What do you see is future? Yeah, I mean, as I mentioned before, at least now I see the future is really bright for anyone who is trying to enter into this industry, right? And I'm also not generalizing right. When I say quality needs some kind of exposure, I will given a class example, in my personal life. So I went to MIT meet this. So initially, when I started my career, right, in validation, I used to get this FedEx packages from India, like test is excellent in the big packet. So I was the evaluation lead. So my role was to take these packets, take a shuttle go around the buildings in the campus and get into a quality person. So I go to this site, carry one laptop, right? So I don't have an external monitor at that point of time. So I go to this quality person, he has got two big monitors, and well qualified persons. And I asked him what I do. And he said, you know, comparing these documents with just send us a soft copy, like basically looking from my document, the other admin matting, and I said, Okay, fine. So, when he left the company, after 1015 years, I went back to this person to say goodbye. He was doing the same. Instead of two, he just had four monitors. He said, Yes, my right. So I felt bad. But I think that's one of the user persona, right? I mean, when you talk about the future, right, I think the it in that aspect, I believe, again, I'm talking from my experience, you know, not to generalize right has been lucky in where to get exposed to these new technologies, right? Same with business, right. So so they have a legacy. A system, they may move into clouds. So the other festivals to start engaging in the quality typically comes at the last, I think there's based approaches one very, very good way of getting this quality up in the discussion. And I'll tell you an in class example, recently, when I'm doing this risk based approach, right, the first thing I do is do a brainstorming session where quality is also involved. And we talked about them, right, hey, this is a stimulus. These are the requirements. These are the impact of product quality, and patient safety. And now we category. So this exercise we do as a team, including quality, they always have this feeling, at least in my experience that Hey, you come to me at the last moment, saying that somebody has classified this is high, medium low, and you're giving me this evidence, I'm not happy about it, right? Or you're giving me only five days to do my review. I think, at least in my recent, my recent experience has been positive that the organization realize that quality has to be upfront in those discussions. So that's a welcome change. Because when we do that, they also get to know the technology, right? So in my example, I told before, that person may get to know what the team is trying to do from day one and start putting his or her perspectives. And that could actually give them a better compliance after the end of the day. Right. So it's a welcome change. And that's one of the reason I also encourage my friends or whoever reaches out to me earlier, as I told you, right, and somebody asked for validation. You know, it's kind of a boring, not people. Because, as you mentioned, it's a slow. In our industry, it's considered slow perceived to other industries. Because, yes, typically, our drug would take anywhere between 10 to 15 years. Yes. Why? And then they can COVID has changed things a little bit, which is good. And that's where we are going ahead, right. But there are still in older ways of doing it. So I think, yeah, the perception changing is one of the thing we all as consultant, Kenyan, especially, that's something which I tried to portray in the LinkedIn or try to draw some cartoon just to show that you can also have fun.

Dori Gonzalez-Acevedo: 22:01

Yeah, so tell us about our cartoon, the cartoons. You're an artist. So tell us a little bit.

Sree K: 22:07

Yeah, I mean, I don't call myself an artist. So it's something which I used to do earlier drawing. And then I started this doing intentionally when I started training my team, because after a while, as you know, it's also part of a leadership style, right? So you see a team doing the same mundane routine stuff, and they get bored easily, right. And they also have a question in themselves, Hey, I see all those technological automation AML happened there, I want to be there. But I'm stuck here, right? A lot of my team members used to feel that I used to draw cartoons to show them the evolution of the foundation, right and show them, hey, the future is bright, things have changed, at least Yes, the pace of the changes, and it will slow compared to what you see outside. But the other way to look at is this industry is really strong, right? It actually doesn't fluctuate that much, if you look at the recession, or the other things happening across our industry. So you know, if you're looking for a stable, secure carrier, this is a really good industry to be in, you just need to keep an open mind also tight adapt from outside what you can bring in. But it's a very stable industry.

Dori Gonzalez-Acevedo: 23:16

It is it's very exciting. And I know that ways in which people learn also matter, right? And so I love what you're saying about your team and trying to engage them in different ways. I've been trying to do similar stuff, right? Because over my years of understanding folks, we all have different strengths, right? And so in ways of comprehending information, and being able to handle that, and our judgments, or unconscious biases that we have, right, and so how to engage our teams in a way that, especially as consultants, right, to elicit more information from our customers, right, so that we can help craft a better end solution, or what is, you know, what is the next best thing for, for those individuals, rather than a cookie cutter sort of way of repeating over and over and over. But it helps the teams to be able to engage in different ways, whether it's some like the whiteboard, right? So you know, and some, like listening to things and some like other things. And so knowing knowing who you're working with, and trying to reach them in different ways, I think, is great.

Sree K: 24:34

Yeah. And I would also sorry to interrupt to ask him that I plus Peter, I know like being an industry leader, you also lead big teams and get to talk. I also listened to you talking about authentic leadership. You know, I let go so what are some of your thoughts around that? How do you do you motivate your own team? Like what are your experiences in that friend? I would like to hear that.

Dori Gonzalez-Acevedo: 24:57

Yeah, so I What I tried to do the best I can each and every day is lead by example. Right? I think that is the most important thing for me as a leader, as I've grown as a leader is also to be more confident and comfortable in, in showing up with my ideas, right. And so creating the space for my team to be able to share their ideas, too. And I'm hoping to record soon in a couple of weeks, with some some folks about this topic, specifically, because I do think that there's some, you know, generational gaps here, right, where, in our industry, there are a lot of seasoned veterans that have been doing this for a long time. And I think we need to be curious about what else could be going on? How is that possible? What is the potential there and really acknowledging that we, I don't know I seek to fail every day, I was just talking to one of my consultants this morning about this, like, seeking to fail every day really helps me evaluate myself around my imperfections, and I'm not perfect. And so and what, what needs to be tweaked, or we saw in my learning process, right? So if I'm not thinking about what did I screw up today? I'm not growing. Yeah. Right. Like, I don't feel like I'm growing as a human. And so I tried to do that with my team, giving my team that also the tools to be able to make decisions within the self conformed groups, like the true agile sort of methodology that best I can, you know, agile is something from a theoretical perspective I really, truly agree with. And it's really hard to do. You know, in its purest form, right. So what does that look like? Right? Having all stakeholders completely and totally on the same page with all the same skill set and all the right to be able to contribute all that? Well, that's, that's unrealistic, right? But that is the ideal agile team, right? So. So instead, it's getting to know each other as capacities, and then what and how to utilize them to the best of their ability. And I know, for me, when I am doing what I do best, I am in that constant flow. Right. And that makes not only myself successful and feel fulfilled, but it also motivates those around me. And it's a ripple effect. Right? And that's what I kind of call that authentic leadership. Right? i It's an acronym, you know, really, iced tea, I have called and maybe I'll put this in the show notes. Around, you know, for from a quality perspective, we need to have trust, education and accountability, right. From a from a true quality perspective. And then the ice part is an interconnectedness, empowerment, and a dialectical conversation. And I think this is really important by having the there is no right or wrong. Right? These are all kinds of states of being and then you choose, we're choice makers to figure out what are we going to do with all that? Yes. Right. And I think that's what's exciting around the CSA. So I share in some of your enthusiasm around it. I think it's a insurgence to be able to question. It's an insurgence to be able to, you know, break down some historic baggage, potentially that doesn't serve us in any way anymore. Right? And how do we figure out a way to really create something new? Right and so another thing about Purcell is I was really very intentional around rethink, reshape and remake? Because it's, it's a learning process, right? It really is. It's what works now might not work in a month from now. Yeah. And as a compliance and quality kind of person. I can see how that that may make one nervous. But if you kind of embrace the fact that we're doing this together, right, that we're we're making these conscious choices to to pivot together, then I think it reduces our overall compliance risk. Right. And the risk that we have, not only to our product, Safety and Quality, right, but but for the overall process. Yeah, and I think it makes sense but I think that's one of the learnings out of COVID. But I'm I'm not sure that some of that sticking. What do you what do you think? What were what was your some of your takeaways from COVID? And do you what do you think about them today?

Sree K: 29:58

Yeah, and I loved The opportunity COVID has given us to work remote, let me because I have two small children has given me so much time to spend with them and also pursue my passions outside of life. So I feel blessed with COVID code a couple of times, but then I think the you have to see the past T radius, we have lost so many lives and a lot of near and dear ones, but it's part of your life, right? I mean, we are all here to go one day. So someone who believes in the positive aspect of things and you know, take every day as it comes. I also like what you just said about, you know, doing something new every day and also connecting to the, you know, the audience or in our audience, if you will. So, for example, you and I have been hearing this CSA for for at least two years continuously, right. So we also want to get something new. Right. So another thing I did last week was, you know, and everyone has been talking about this tag GPT. And, you know, things like, I was trying to think, what is competencia CNDP chat GPT, I actually wrote a LinkedIn article, a couple of days, back, and a lot of people came and say, this is interesting, because there's nothing comes in between, though, but I was just trying to what I was trying to do is take the interest in people, right, and then write something rated so that people can at least read CSA stuff, right? So you don't have to look at CSF from one angle all the time, right. So also, for you and me, we also want new things not just to teach, but also to free ourselves new things, we also don't want to get bored, doing the same thing. So I think we all have to look outside in ways where we can bring that new ideas into what we do every day. So you know, and also, some of the things which I also learned, and then I tried to share with what I interact with, especially the my team members is that, you know, do something outside of work. You don't have to spend so much time at work, and then to try to do your secondary, you know, the other passions, because when you do that, for example, you play sports and right, you bring the leadership skills and some of the team skills you bring to the table. So, you know, all this helps.

Dori Gonzalez-Acevedo: 32:16

Yeah, you're right. And so I was asked a couple days ago about so. So, you know, what is this with all the women and validation and the DEI stuff you do? And I said, Well, that is intimately tied to, to what I do, as a business as person because it's important to me, it's part of my value system, right? And so I've worked to be able to align those together, back to the authentic leadership, right? Like, I can't not do that. Without the other, right, both have to be present in order for me to fully show up as the leader that I want to be. And so I think that's super important. And that leads me into I know, You've been mentoring, folks. And that is also a passion of mine. So tell me, how is that going for you?

Sree K: 33:05

Yeah, it's been good. So one other thing I am doing is the LinkedIn audio events. I do that every Monday for one hour free event. And sometimes people have come and asked me, Hey, why do you do it for free? Right? We're going to create a training, things like that. And I thought to myself, I've been whatever I have learned in this industry, I've learned on the job, and I got paid for it. So why Why should I, you know, ask someone to pay for something which I share my learnings with? I got paid for it. So I think it's not about the money part of it. But it is more about connecting to other people. Because, you know, yes, you do work in an organization or let's say, five organization, but there are still more organizational people who are looking. And you can also learn, right? So in some of my calls. To bring into perspective, right? You have to do things to fake right. And I didn't know anything about when to now and sometimes it is just one person all the time, sometimes it is 10, right. So you have to take things in stride. But then I just had this experience in my 30 when I believe like someone came only in the last 10 minutes. And it was a very fruitful conversation. I had so much learning from that person in the last 10 minutes. Because you're here so much of experience implement in this and in sharing lots of ideas, which I took to the next event, right. So I think yeah, so, you know, I know, like you may be doing the same with your podcast and other events you do as well, where you began to some of the learnings and then that helps you write the names.

Dori Gonzalez-Acevedo: 34:35

Because it's a it's a process, right, like and so every conversation informs the next and so it's very dynamic and you know, one of you know, as my learning is round and a lot of my I consider myself a systems person, right and that and part of that is because of how I grew up in this industry, right? Like, as a process engineer, chemical process and cheering developing and pharmaceutical ingredients with no, you know, processes in place. Really, it was all on paper, like we had to make it up. And that process of figuring out the system, like as an organization in an organization that I was able to affect all pieces of that because we were small. Yeah. Right. And so learning that system dynamic in real time, full hands on now, that's the type of learner I am, right, which may come to someone else by reading a book. Right, right. But for me, it was all hands in for men, you know, several years of really understanding how those systems and dynamics worked. And I think that was a huge life lesson, you know, that has carried me through throughout because all those organizations are organizations change, they evolve and move. And we need to be able to flow with that. It's interesting, one of my screensavers is one of those 3d chips shifting things, right. Like, it is like we're constantly kind of moving and evolving. And I think that that's exciting. It's exciting to me, I get that How am that might not be exciting to some folks. And, you know, the folks that I know in quality that a lot of this makes them feel uncomfortable is because they really like their boxes, right there. They like the the fixed box, where I'm more of a person than I like the the playdough box where you can shape it and shift it and mold it and change it. And one day it's a, you know, a tree and the next day, it's a boat or whatever.

Sree K: 36:42

Yeah, no, it's very true. Don't worry, what is it? Because we all have been asked to think outside the box right? Now, if you always stuck inside the box, right? There is only so much you can think outside the box. And I realized by experience, I was doing all this different stuff growing and all this stuff. And then one day, I realized I was spending like 1617 hours at work. Yes, I was helping a lot of people, but then the health was not there. They were not giving enough time to family. And then that's one of the things. That's why I said COVID has been a blessing, right? And then it kind of gives you that time to think, hey, is this how you want to spend your time here? Right? You just got one charter life? So yes, and then only when they came out of that box in really so much of opportunities. And there's so much, you know, areas you can grow outside the box. And there are, you know, our I think it's by design. And I've wrote this too, that, you know, they want you to be in the past so that you don't you know that I wrote something about that

Unknown: 37:48

topical, potentially geopolitical conversation that you and I can have maybe off, somebody needs to talk about it, right? I do. I absolutely agree with you. 100%. That is very, very true.

Sree K: 38:02

And I also seen some examples, right, in my, in my previous experiences, to the team mentoring aspect of things. While we were doing some validation process, I encourage my team to do certification, other stuff, which are not related. Now, what has happened is they asked me, What is the relevance, right? I mean, that's again, like thinking inside the box. Now, that box, I said, it may be helpful to you in the future, Right. Steve Jobs, right, you can only connect the dots backwards. So what has really happened like last couple of hours. So you wrote about this, like, I think four of my previous teammates, they got to better jobs in the area this week, or training that part of them that they came on time and some nights you actually wouldn't. But, you know, they're seeing even happen. So it's the same with with the mindset, which we're seeing that people, you know, want to be there because they feel safe, but only when they get out and get uncomfortable. I think then they will see. They don't have to be in there to get what they want. Yeah.

Dori Gonzalez-Acevedo: 38:58

So you said that the magic words. So the other key word for me is uncomfortable, right? We all need to be more comfortable with the uncomfortable. Exactly. And if we if we're willing to in it, there's a willingness, like, it doesn't mean that you have to sit in it all the time, right. But there needs to be a willingness to at least entertain the uncomfortable, whatever, right? Someone comes to you and say, yep, you know, what we really wanted to do try this different way. Or we want to, you know, take this different approach, and, and part of that learning needs to happen in order to figure out what is the next best thing, right. So there's an experimentation and part of that is also again, a character trait of mine, right? Yes. I anticipate being being in that silence. mindset of let's experiment a little. Let's tweak it. Let's figure it out. Let's try it on. It might not serve everyone right now. And we learned something We knew and we tweak it, and we will move on right in that sort of agile sort of way. Right? And the, the doubt that, my my pitfalls, what I see are folks that are wanting to not change anything, because it's always worked, right? Yeah, I Oh, I know, you know, I'm gonna use this paperless system. But you know what, I'm still gonna push out PDF, and I'm gonna put it in a document repository, or worse, I'm gonna put it over and Iron Mountain. And, and I know where it is. And it's 20 years later, and we still like, what? Like, for for what added purpose? Right? Where is that adding compliance? Right? It's not adding compliance. It's, you know, it's looking at things from a extremely risk based approach. And that's hurting everyone. Right? If we were to do that in COVID, right, and that was our stance, where would we have been?

Sree K: 41:05

Exactly. So sometimes you have to learn the hard way. Right. That's another thing. I want to connect this to your experiences in the conferences, right to what you have not been attending? I have listened to conference I have not been at in person, which I was planning to do very soon. But I know like, you have been to a lot of conferences, you know, as a speaker yourself. I mean, to the persona, which you just explain, have you seen such personas coming to these conferences and also take actions after that allow? What is your take?

Dori Gonzalez-Acevedo: 41:35

Yeah, so that so that's a great question. So yes, yeah, we do see, folks with with those personas coming out. I think this gets back to my quality tea aspect, right. It's the accountability. And one of the things that we've been rolling out at Priscilla X, our compliance coaching engagements, where we're helping keep customers accountable to their desires, each and every month, right? Everyone is overburdened, overworked, folks are asked to do things that are outside their scope of their day to day. It's an epidemic, right, we have a problem. And that's not going to change. But what can be helpful is to have outside coaching support, to vet through all of what is the biggest priority right now. Right? And from a quality perspective, sometimes it's hard to figure that out, because what's coming at you is all this all these asks, right, this has to get done, this has to get them this and no one's there to say, okay, take a deep breath. Right? And what is the most critical thing of this list? And what is the severity and really be able to then reprioritize and help coach those folks in these leadership positions, senior managers are in that sort of level to be able to say, I hear what you're saying, and go, I don't, we don't need to know about this, but we need to know about these three things. Right. And that, but having that accountability is not often in organizations on a regular basis, and also having someone as a consultant like you, are i doing that? With them with that outside perspective? Right. And I think that's been a huge change for some of my customers to be able to know that they can reach out and get a different take on things. How does, it's not that they're asking specifically, like, how does this company do this? Again, this is, quality is not proprietary, we're talking about philosophies and changes. It's not that that that what I'm going to say is going to be exactly what you do, but I'm give I'm offering you something, to then impact you in some way in which you are either more emboldened by what you already know, because most of us have a general sense gut instinct, and that gut instinct, most of the time is pretty good. But all the other noise, or, you know, my boss is gonna do this, or we're gonna lose this or, like, all those things tend to muck up that voice. And so so those are some of the exciting things that I'm doing, which I'm, I'm, I think needs to be embraced because I think it gets to this deeper conversation. Right? Yeah,

Sree K: 44:31

I think you know, it's also not just at the work, right. So, you know, philosophy, really, people have to just stop and think now if you're able to prioritize, because I have seen this, somebody who's not able to prioritize at work. They cannot also not practicing at home. But if someone is able to do that at home, then they can bring the same experience with it doesn't have to be two different lifestyles. You have to live with it. You're able to prioritize and make sure you have time for to play with your kids or have a family dinner. Right? So those are your priorities. So you you take that mindset to your work to you. Yes, you have 100 emails to read, but you can still prioritize and then work on the top five top 10. Right, and make those changes.

Dori Gonzalez-Acevedo: 45:20

So I'm really interested, I follow you on LinkedIn. I love your your chats, I love your cartoons. We should do this more often. And in the show notes, I'll leave links to all your your your specifics

Sree K: 45:37

and your resume then. Absolutely.

Dori Gonzalez-Acevedo: 45:42

Yeah, it's been a pleasure Sri. And I hope you we, we continue the journey, we can also continue this journey new ways LinkedIn, like you're, you're, you're playing with new stuff on LinkedIn all the time, which I love.

Sree K: 45:56

That's great. Yeah. Thank you. Thank you. I mean, I tried to explain and I also was looking forward to spend some quality time with you in kind of doing this kind of conversation. I think you both have been busy. So I'm glad that this this happened. And I also thank you to this for this opportunity. And looking for future candidates who have not been in person for the conference. I'll definitely would like to listen to one of your talk in person when the next chances and also, you know, be in touch.

Dori Gonzalez-Acevedo: 46:23

Absolutely. We'll see each other soon. Okay,