SPEAKER_00 0:01

And welcome to the InfoTech Podcast. I'm your host, Jimmy Huber, and this is the podcast that discusses the intersection of technology and business. We've had a lot of MSP leaders on lately, and today is no exception. My guest today is Oscar Diaz. And Oscar, I'll I'll let you introduce yourself. You've got a great story. We were talking earlier. You're from Venezuela. You moved to California. I mean, you've got um you know roots there in Canada as well. You've you've been kind of all over if I'm piecing it together, right? Uh so please tell us your your origin story, um, how you you came to Techbound and you know how you how you got here basically. I'll I'll let you rip.

SPEAKER_01 0:42

Yeah, I know for sure. Thank you for having me on. So yeah, no, but probably uh long story short, so yeah, I'm from Venezuela, originally from Venezuela, and I moved to Canada, uh to Calgary in 2011. And then it came directly, actually, from from Venezuela to to Calgary. Uh amazing city here. So yeah, it's a beautiful city. And uh my background comes from uh telecom, telecommunication. I used to work in Venezuela at a big telecommunication company, something similar to here in Canada, to Rogers Tellos, Bell, or in the US, uh Sprints, Verizon. And then spent 10 years there. I moved to Calgary and started working, doing some contracting work as IT. And that's uh when uh came the idea about uh let's bring enterprise uh services, enterprise IT to small business. And that was the initial idea about tech bound. So yeah, so then around that time I incorporated tech bound uh with that philosophy, and from that moment on, we we have been uh growing. Uh we uh uh started working with regular IT, then cloud and then security, now AI. And uh the company has grown to the point that we're offering services across Canada, we're working as well in South America. Uh we're looking into potentially start now getting into the the the US market. So it has been a very interesting uh journey so far. And then yeah, there is a lot of things good to come still. The the thing at the one of the thing, interesting thing is that before the thing, it was just me. And then now we grow to a point where we are on 20 people plus 20 people, and then it's uh yeah, it's pretty exciting all the the all the the things that had happened in the last uh 15 years with the tech bound.

SPEAKER_00 2:32

Sure. Yeah, that's really interesting story. I mean, I think a lot of people hit boundaries a lot before 20 people. Um a lot of small businesses, I think, you know, they hit those limits and they can never, you know, kind of move through to get to that level. So what do you think you attributed to that? I mean, obviously you probably didn't hire 20 people in a quarter, right? Um so how what what was your journey like to get to that point?

SPEAKER_01 2:56

Well, I guess it's a combination of the what your uh the the clients ask from you in terms of new requirements, what they're expecting to from you, and also the natural growth, right? So the uh as you start getting more clients, you need uh more uh manpower help in order to serve those clients. And especially uh in our countries here in North America, so we're pretty big countries. So for us to serve someone here in Calgary is different than serving someone in Quebec in the East Coast. So uh it's basically that's what trigger uh triggers all the growth in terms of headcount. And as well as uh as you as the companies start growing, complexity comes. Not just uh technical complexity, but also uh accounting, bookkeeping, finances, uh dealing with banks. So then you need to bring other set of uh skills, people with those skills in order to deal with those situations. Same as uh marketing. Before I didn't have a uh marketing department, and uh and the person that's running the marketing right now uh for TechMound is uh someone that used to work with me uh a long time ago. And then um and I have to literally beg her to come over and to deal with this. So uh now she's been working with me for all this time. But yeah, it's kind of a the natural progression of business. And as we start adding new services, different people, new different skill tests will come.

SPEAKER_00 4:26

Yeah. Yeah, I think we've seen that at InfoTech too. It it's easy to add a technician as you add clients, you know, on the technical side. But at some point, you're right, the back office is a huge need. You have to hire people that don't necessarily directly affect you know revenue, uh, but there's no way to grow past that, right? So I feel like once you get on the other side of that, it maybe becomes a little bit easier, at least that kind of stabilizes. And it sounds like you're you're already there and have everything built out.

SPEAKER_01 4:52

Yeah, so we're going to now we're we're we're in the phase where we need to uh make sure that the processes that we have right now are the right ones, change the ones that are not working, create a new ones into now we we have to be more efficient. So because the it doesn't make sense that's uh to add more overhead as you bring more clients. We have to be able to serve our more clients with the current overhead.

SPEAKER_00 5:19

Yeah. Yeah, no, I I totally get that. Um we were talking earlier, and you mentioned a couple different verticals that you guys had, which I thought was really interesting. So um, you know, infotech tends to be like a jack of all trades. We we have a lot of different industries. Um, and one of my goals as we grow is to develop some more specialized, you know, skills to go after, you know, the dentists or what have you. Um you guys have already done that. Um sounds like you have law firms, which I mean that that's a little more common, but you've also got First Nation police services, at least for my American audience. I bet you there's hardly anyone that even knows what that is. Explain that a little bit to us, what that is, and kind of how you found those verticals that um sounds like were pretty underserved.

SPEAKER_01 6:03

Yeah, so I I guess the the the equivalent in the United States is the Native Americans. Here in Canada is uh First Nations, right? So and and here in Canada, um there are 36 uh self-administrative police services across Canada that serve the First Nations. What mean is that you have a nation, uh let's say it's um uh the Blood Tribe Police or the Blood Tribe, which is in here in Alberta, south of the Alberta. So they have uh their own police department. The same goes with uh Mohawk of Ghanawag in the East Coast in Quebec. They have their own police department. And there are around three, uh 36 across Canada doing the the uh service of their communities. They're really good, they're amazing in terms of how they they approach to law enforcement, because the way they do it is that they get involved, very, very involved with the community. So the way they proceed is completely different to as a regular uh uh police department. But anyway, so they were they have to to uh they have a lot of regulations, a lot of uh uh compliance that they need to follow, not just on the province that they're operating uh from, but also from the federal government uh as well, in order to be able to operate. So they they are they're expected to operate at the highest level possible, not just for the police department, but also technically speaking. So therefore cybersecurity, IT, compliance, that kind of thing. So that's a very interesting. Uh we found out uh about them because one of them uh uh approached to us and we started working with them, and then I realized that they from the point of view of uh technology cybersecurity, they were underserved, and then uh we we saw the opportunity not just to have a business, but also to help them to grow as well. And they have been successful, really successful uh really for the last 10 plus years.

SPEAKER_00 8:03

That's awesome. So would you say that informed like your marketing and like your growth then? Because once you get one of those, I assume you it's easier to get more. I mean, they're gonna refer you, you're gonna learn more about their needs, their specialities, um, or is it kind of something that just kind of fell in your lap and you went with it?

SPEAKER_01 8:21

Well, it it kind of so is yes, to your point is once uh one of them starts working with you, the if you're doing a good job, then the the world starts uh going around. Uh this particular industry uh works a lot uh based on trust. So even though that one of them can say yes, take bound is the best, they will not believe it. You have to wait. So it takes time. But eventually, once you start basically showing up, they get they get the they uh they get to know you, they do they they see what you're doing with other police agencies, then they start getting the trust and they start working. So it's it's good, it has been more around from the marketing perspective, is to just to show up showing up with uh to the events when they're uh when you get invited, just to always be always be present. It's gonna be more like that. Uh with it's different with the other, probably, in my opinion, the other verticals that you have to do a particular campaign, uh call them, sending things, uh trying to schedule a meeting. This one is more show showing up, they can see you, and then they they can see that you're a trustworthy person. And um yeah, that's pretty much the way that has gone so far with uh with in this particular niche.

SPEAKER_00 9:40

Yeah, I love that. I think trust is a huge thing in our industry. I mean, the amount of data that we deal with and people's you know security and like without good IT, businesses at a at a minimum are gonna be uh not as technically advanced. They're not they're not gonna have an advantage. At worst case, I mean, they don't stick around. Um so yeah, trust, I think, and the relationships that you build are are huge. You mentioned something too that you know you guys are are not just local. You're you're all over, right? Um I think you even mentioned that you want to get into the US markets. How do you do that from a remote perspective? I know that um we're pretty focused at InfoTech on Central Illinois, like I said, being boots on the ground. People still, I think, value us getting in the door and like having that face-to-face. But it's hard to scale that. At a certain point, you have to either open up other locations or expand out of your local area. You guys have clearly done that, continue to do that. What's your approach to that? How do you go from, oh, like if a printer breaks and it's a remote location, I mean, what do you do? I mean, you hire somebody locally to that market. How did you guys expand and kind of go down that path?

SPEAKER_01 10:48

Yeah, so it is um so there are two things here and the way that we're uh approaching to this. Uh obviously, as I mentioned at the beginning, trust is something important. We will need to start from scratch in the US to start building trust. Uh there are different ways to do that. Uh, but besides that, the approach uh for service, it would be right now two things. One, looking to potentially opening uh uh an office there, uh, for example, in somewhere in Florida, for example, if we decided to go to Florida, but also uh at the beginning, we will rely heavily in our peer group. So I have a peer group uh that uh we meet every week uh and to to and we help each other to try to held accountable and try to grow the business. And and if there is somebody that I'm gonna trust to serve my clients is the people in my peer group.

SPEAKER_00 11:43

That's cool.

SPEAKER_01 11:44

So and they're across in the United States as well. So and and same and the same way. If you have a client here in Canada for whatever reason, they're gonna trust me to help them with Canadian clients. So that would be one way to do it in a uh, let's say in an easy way, but eventually we'll have to open shop in in the US to have a formal presence.

SPEAKER_00 12:04

Yeah, that's awesome. Yeah, we're we're in a peer group as well. And I would say that, you know, it is possible to grow an MSP without a peer group, but it is a lot harder. And it takes you longer to get further. Um, I think you guys mentioned you're involved with Robin Robbins. Um what has been the biggest advantage for you in peer? I don't know how far into your career you you joined that, but at least for us, that was a game changer to get in a room with people that were technically competition, but not really, right? Different markets, start picking other people's brains and like really helping you understand industry, um, you know, tribal knowledge, and and it was a huge for growth for us. What's your experience been?

SPEAKER_01 12:42

No, it has been great. Uh we we joined in 2019, right before COVID. And uh in we, for example, in for us in during COVID, uh it was a great time, believe it or not, from business perspective. We we we grow uh during COVID. But the point being is that from that moment on that we joined uh TNT, we you can see actually what was the the the aft the before and after in terms of growth, mindset, uh operation, how would we approach uh to problem challenges is that and uh that's very uh has been very helpful. Also, we learn a lot a lot uh about marketing, and mentioned us about mindset and how to approach things. And I think uh also very important is that once you get in the room with people in the same industry, uh uh I uh uh I always say to other other uh other business owners in different industries that they should be in the peer group because at least worst case scenario, you learn. You're not the only one struggling, that everybody else is struggling or having the same issues. So and that helps because then that you don't feel they don't feel that you're alone in this uh almost like a therapy session. That's correct, yeah. So that's correct. So and then uh but it from that moment on, so yeah, it's been really helpful a lot. So and you can tell actually, you can if you see TikTok uh from 2018 from what it is right now, you will see when the the change happened.

SPEAKER_00 14:09

Yeah, that's really cool. So you so 2018, you got six plus years. Would you say um that I guess I would assume you'd recommend that to other people, but if if you're looking at a younger entrepreneur getting into MSP space, you know, maybe four or five years in and they're on the fence, right? What would you say to them, like to the Oscar in 2017?

SPEAKER_01 14:31

Yeah, I mean, uh you have to do it. I always say, I mean, it's difficult. It's difficult because it requires time and money. So to put uh to give you an idea, yeah. So for when I when when I started with uh TNT, so we had to put, I don't know, our I think that our first well that I think we pay like a twenty thousand dollars at the moment. Oh wow and that was crazy for me because that was first time ever that I put so much money into something around similar to this. It was crazy. Even I had to chat with my wife. I say, hey, I gonna do this, are you okay? And she was. So but best decision ever. So that's uh like my wife always says, I'm um I'm breaking barriers. So and now I did it now and all end, all uh on this and on the part of the marketing and investing in the company. Reinvesting in the company. So the sooner you do it, the better. Because uh then uh if you don't have anything built at the very beginning, you don't have any baggage, then it's gonna be easier for you to make changes. That's it. But if you are like a 20 years in the mar uh in in and you're running your company, the way the whatever you're being running that company, and there you go into this, it's gonna be, in my opinion, more difficult to make changes because it's gonna completely challenge your worldviews and the way that you're being doing things. And not everybody's ready for that. The other thing is time. So all the information that's uh and the and I have uh when I go to another uh speaking engagement with my uh peers here in Canada, um I yeah, I'm being asked before going into stage if I'm okay sharing what I'm doing. And I say yes, I'm fine sharing everything that what I'm doing because I'm 100% sure that 99.999% of the people there, they're not gonna do it. Yeah. Because it requires time, requires uh a lot of uh uh mindset changes, a lot of changes in the company, and that it's not everybody is in the right place to start making changes. Well, those types of changes.

SPEAKER_00 16:33

So what what can you do to help people get to that point? Because I completely can relate to you. I think um all of us owners, you know, we at a point in our business, we did everything, right? And so you tend to get the mentality that, you know, you're the best one to do all the tasks. And then you hire employees, and it's like, well, they can do it kind of as good as me, but not as good as me. And then sometimes that leads you to be the throttle, right? So uh you're completely correct, I think, in there's a mentality shift. You have to be vulnerable, you have to have an open mind, you have to maybe even understand or be open to the possibility that other people could have a different perspective. And you could be wrong. I mean, we'll none of us are perfect, right? Um, so how do you develop kind of those emotional uh chops, I guess, to get to the point where you are in a position to help to accept help and to accept advice from others? Because I think that's the power of peer, is that you go into it with an open mind. And if you know an entire room of people are saying one thing and you're thinking something else, it might be you is the problem, right? Uh but that's not natural for us. How do you navigate that?

SPEAKER_01 17:40

Well, that's it, that's interesting. Yes, you're right. I think the first step is to be humble and recognize, be aware of your limitations or one's limitations, right? So that's one thing. So once you recognize that, that's uh that you need to learn from some from other people, then you're gonna be in a better position. The second thing that needs to happen, and this one is the most difficult one, because uh even for people that I guess are open-minded 100% and they're on a sponge that are ready to absorb everything, still it's complicated. It's ego. Because the one that the ego is the one that is between you and uh and uh your goal, right? Because for example, I'm uh and the one uh before I was the one doing everything, right? So if uh uh now I have a bunch of people working with me, and I'm 100% sure not all of them are gonna, especially I used to do servers, for example, used to work with servers. And the guys are uh in charge of the servers right now, I'm 100% sure they're not gonna do the things the way I do it. Right? Yeah, yeah. But I had to trust that they know. And if it's something is not working quite well the way I want it that it works, then I have to make sure to learn from them potentially what they're missing, what what information they need from me in order to for them to do it the way I want it. So and let it run. So that basically uh takes you to go take you to delegation, right? To be able to delegate tasks so you can focus on others and other things. So and and that that's the challenge. But once you get to that point, you cross that bridge and you're comfortable and just help to guide your team, then yeah, the company has to grow. Has to. There is, I mean, it it it is uh it's just physics. The inertia is gonna take you there. But if you're not uh if you if you're not aware, you have your ego is too big, and and you you are you cannot delegate, you're one of those people you think nobody is better than me, yeah. No you're stuck. It's gonna be always a one uh a one-one shop. So always.

SPEAKER_00 19:42

Yeah. I think people don't realize that either. Like they maybe started a business because they wanted to be their own boss or whatever, and they end up building themselves a job and almost a prison. I mean, can't get away, can't go on vacation because everything runs through you, and that's a tough spot to be in. But to your point, yeah, once you get over that hump and you start what what's the EOS term, delegate and elevate, I think they say. Uh yeah, it it becomes, I would think, a little bit easier once you get over that hump. As long as you don't regress. I I think you do have to stay on it because at least my tendency is to jump back in. And it got to the point, at least at InfoTech, where like me jumping in was making things worse. It's not that I could do better. I'm actually a detriment, right? That's a gut punch.

SPEAKER_01 20:24

Uh mentally uh probably at some point if you if that happens, uh uh people uh and your team might say, Oh, you know what, we're gonna take your credentials away. The only thing that you have access to is your email. That's it.

SPEAKER_00 20:36

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 20:38

Oh, what is that?

SPEAKER_00 20:40

Yeah. Yeah, we're we're all on our own journey, but I think, yeah, it's almost an excellent an existential crisis when the owner comes to terms with, oh crap. Like it is me, I am the problem. Obviously, we want to grow, but that's gonna be involving changing how I think about things. Um, but yeah, it has to happen.

SPEAKER_01 20:58

Um Yeah, and to your point on that one is that that happens to me recently. Um I I realized so with with one particular task that I I said, I suck at it. I completely suck at it. I it's not working because I'm the one creating the problem. So and I and I tell I and I told my team, and then I step out, we have to invest money to fix the problem. But uh I was willing to do it because I I realized, okay, at least we need to try this because I know it's not working because of me. Let's see if this will make it work better. I might be wrong, I might be right. But if I'm right, perfect, everybody wins. If I'm wrong, well, we need to find a different way to fix that problem.

SPEAKER_00 21:40

Yeah, you gotta start somewhere and try. And I gotta believe that if if you've got the right people on your team, they're probably a little bit repressed. If you're doing everything and you're not giving them permission to step in and help in maybe roles that they are better at than you. So when you get that ball rolling, I think not only do you have less on your plate, but other people then have the opportunity to step up. And you know, it becomes a win-win. It's just not easy to go to go through that process.

SPEAKER_01 22:04

No, it's not easy. It's not easy. Especially for business owners, not easy at all whatsoever now.

SPEAKER_00 22:09

Yeah. Yeah. Um, I want to talk about trends a little bit. I try to make these uh, you know, the current events and as relevant as possible for however long these are out on the internet. But um AI seems to be a buzzword these days. I don't want to belabor it too much, but I I always want to get people's um perspective on that because it seems like we're in this transition period where you know you've got one end of the spectrum, everyone's freaking out. Oh, I'm gonna lose my job, my kid's coming out of college, he's not gonna have a job because AI is taking over. There's that kind of fear-based, you know, side. And then the other side is trying to monetize AI, trying to figure out how to integrate it and actually build value for businesses. And from what I can see, we're not quite there yet. Like there's no silver bullet. Um, what's your perspective, Ben? You know, not just in Calgary, but like in your customer base. I mean, is it a is it a nice to have type of thing? Are there people going all in on it? What's the what's the sense that you have here in the next you know six to twelve months to for 2026?

SPEAKER_01 23:09

So it it is it is uh it's a tricky question, right? Uh because I mean, from one point of view, you'll see with AI, we're trying to figure out as an industry, humanity, whatever you want to call it, what to do with something that we had never dealt with in the past. The the closest thing that everybody, uh the philosophers and the experts in the the matter is that they can compare it uh against is the industrial revolution. Yeah, that it was amazing for humanity in the long run because industrialized everything better, liver standard, everything, but there was a lot of people that was left behind, right? But there is nothing like this that has happened in the past uh in the history of humanity. So we we don't know exactly how that's gonna play out. We don't know. So in that sense, you have in one camp you said you have people that says it's gonna be all doom and gloom, and then you have the other people that say it's gonna be the best thing ever, right? So we don't know, nobody knows. So now the challenge for people like me right now is that this technology is the one that we have access to, the the large language model, right? So one way or another, everybody have access to it. Okay, so if uh, for example, in cybersecurity, with cybersecurity we used to block things. For example, you cannot access the website, you cannot access this attachment, we can't restrain this. With AI, we can't. So you have access to ChatGPT, Gemini, Cloud, free versions, web versions. And then all the users, uh everybody have enough curiosity to start using it. Point being is that I have uh business owners that are my clients and their managers, they're using it. And they're thinking, for one way, they start asking questions. All right, how could we use this internally? But also then the other on the other front, I have people say, this is amazing. We don't need A, B, C, and D because AI will do everything. So then the where the challenge comes is to have those two those conversations with the with your clients and say, yes, it's an amazing technology because it is, but it's not the silver bullet. If you are not careful, you're gonna create problems. So it's like the other day uh in the news the uh there was a startup company that was using claw and someone did something wrong, or the AI understood something wrong and deleted everything, right? Yep. So if you're not if you're not careful, careful, then it's gonna be madness. So point being is, yes, is we we we are having conversations, and sometimes we we're having conversations, not because we started the conversation, it's because we were forced to have the conversation. Uh but I think at the end, uh we're gonna try to uh with companies like the MSPs, technical companies that are responsible, that they will try to guide the whole process in a responsible manner to implement potentially AI, not because of the sake of AI, but because it's something that uh it might resolve a business problem in the company. I think that's where the value will be. In terms of people losing jobs, yeah, probably that uh again, it's kind of a comparing that against uh industrial revolution. Yeah, there will be people that will lose their jobs, definitely for sure. But there are other jobs that will be created that we don't know today what those jobs will be.

SPEAKER_00 26:44

Yeah. I think you hit the nail on the head there. There's so many things to pick up on. My theme, I think, and my takeaway is that look for the opportunity, right? And be security-minded. The fear factor or whatever, it's it's not going anywhere. So, you know, yeah, if you're a horse and buggy type person and you see a car drive by, don't be afraid of the car. Like learn more about it. It's they're just tools, right? It's it's yeah, the industrial revolution, that's a great, none of us were alive really for that, 1800s or whatever, but it changed the world. And I think this is this is the next thing. Um, and I I have to believe there's probably some fear in our client bases too, that we can kind of already be the trusted advisor and help them navigate some of those things. Um, I think that we're in very early stages still of seeing what the capabilities of AI are. Like it's very new, like it's it's and there's new things that come out constantly. The curve of change seems to be really, really steep, even in even relative to other things, you know, that we've seen. Um, so yeah, I I think you're spot on there. Um, and it's it's good to have a sense of calm, I guess I get from you. Like, hey, we don't know. Like it, there's this fear of missing out. It's like, well, we don't even know what it is yet. Like it's still so early. So um, yeah, it sounds like you guys are are all for that. And I think that uh the people that get ahead uh in AI are the ones that are gonna be open-minded and yet cautious. Like it's almost like you need both. You don't want Claude deleting everything and you're oh yeah, we were the first to do all this stuff, but it we got screwed, you know. But you don't want to be lagging behind either and be like, well, now I'm, you know, I'm got to catch up over the next year or two. So uh how how do you help customers, I guess, kind of maybe thread that needle and you know, not be afraid and yet not be left behind?

SPEAKER_01 28:25

Yeah, so is the uh well, I I my approach is uh is with cautious. I uh I compared this uh uh with uh cloud, when everybody wants to go to cloud and there was companies popping up everywhere offering cloud services. I do remember, and here in Canada, there was a company, I don't remember the name also, but not gonna name it, that they were offering cloud servers, very, very cheap. At that time, not even Azure existed. It was just Amazon, I believe Google was doing something, and they were these guys were starting offering uh very, very cheap cloud. And then my clients wanted to jump on it and say, okay, let's go there. And they were going to just say, yeah, hold on, hold your horses here, let's just check with them to see what it is. And then once I started talking with them, understanding how why was it uh so so cheap is because there were no backups, there was no uh um uh stability, they were not responsible for everything, for anything. So it's just you were you were buying as it is. That doesn't work. You say, no, we cannot go that. That way we need to stay on premise for the time being. So that's the same way with uh AI. So the way that we're approaching with our clients on this is that, okay, you want to look into AI, the ones that we ask us or the ones that we approach to. Okay, let's see what area in the business you have a problem. Let's see what uh that problem is, if it's impactful for your business, if it's fixed. Uh let's define, let's understand what the process and the pro all the processes uh uh uh associated with that problem, understand what success looks like, understand what the KPIs look like, uh and uh understand everything so we can measure success. And we understand what the actual problem is. Once we do that, then we will see if AI might be a solution for it, because it now might it might not be as well. So if it is, then we start working and implementing something AI related because we know at the end what we're trying what we're trying to fix and how we can know if it's giving uh return of investment or nothing. So if you're up, if you don't go that way, in my opinion, then you're gonna be you're gonna end it up by one of those statistics that says that 95% of the AI projects don't work.

SPEAKER_00 30:31

Yeah. Yeah, that's great. I mean, I think you should be doing that anyway, right? Learning your customers' workflows, the intricacies of their business. And then AI is just kind of another tool in your tool belt, right? Um, to get further faster. If you're if you're coming in like with a shotgun approach and trying to just splatter, oh yeah, everyone needs Chat GPT, you can do whatever you want with it. I mean, that's that's gonna fall flat, I feel like, unless, like you said, you've got a plan, you've got uh, you know, an understanding of what the business need is, and then you can kind of fit that together. Um, just like uh you know anything else that we're doing in inside, you know, I think.

SPEAKER_01 31:07

Yeah, the other day I was um uh I was talking with uh and a colleague about about this, and uh, and I and uh and I mentioned to him for me the AI projects are IT projects. And why? And they're gonna base uh and this comment is based on uh a book that I read, uh uh AI Playbook, if I'm not mistaken. They were they describe what UPS did uh to implement uh uh AI. And that was way before using uh Chat GPT, so years ago. AI has been around for more than almost 60 years. So and the way they approached to this, it was to that problem and implementing AI was exactly like this. They were trying to fix a particular problem. So they the they identified the problem, they identified uh how to uh what the process are around it, what the KPI, all the things that I just mentioned to you. So, and this in essence, that's an IT project. Uh because you need every even if you're implementing a data warehouse, you need to understand what you're trying to accomplish, what you want to get. That's just an ABC of a regular IT project. So I think if we for me from that point of view, AI is another tool. It's not a strategy, it's another tool to help in a business strategy of some sort.

SPEAKER_00 32:24

Yeah. Yeah, I couldn't agree more. Um no, this has been great, Oscar. I I really appreciate your time today. I think uh if there's somebody listening here that wants to get a hold of you or you know, reach out, you've got a wealth of knowledge and you guys are are killing it, I think, in your industry. Um how would be the best place to get a hold of you?

SPEAKER_01 32:42

Yeah, the best way to to to to get a hold of me is just I go to the our website, which is techbound.com, and there there is an option to book an appointment. And yeah, if you can't, you're gonna go that that way, then it will schedule an appointment with me or someone on my team.

SPEAKER_00 32:57

Awesome. We'll definitely I'll tag that in the in the notes here uh on our show notes so people can get a hold of you too. Um it's really been a pleasure. Maybe we'll have you back on here for next season as well. I've I've really enjoyed talking to you today, Oscar. Thanks so much for being on. Thank you. Appreciate that. All right. That is our episode for the InfoTech podcast. Uh, we'll catch you next time.