Off to the Valley

Evan Burkosky: At somewhere
in the process, there should

be a human in the loop,

circuit breaker that steps in and
stops the AI processes and checks it,

augments it and makes sure
that everything is on track.

And that also creates a reinforcement
loop so that the AI can learn from

human judgment and experience.

Hello everyone.

Welcome back to season
two of Off to the Valley.

I'm your host Prateek Panda,
and today we are joined

by Evan Burkosky, co-founder
and CRO of Kimaru.ai.

Originally from Vancouver Island,
Evan spent summers working on his

father's fishing boat, exporting
catch to Japan, which led him to move

there in 2003 to explore importing
Canadian seafood and teaching English.

Since then, he's founded four
businesses led market entry for a

global SaaS platform, and now uses
AI to revolutionize supply chain

decisions in Tokyo service industry.

Evan, it's fantastic to have you with us.

And I'm also particularly excited
that you are from the Vancouver

area, which is where I am.

Thanks very much for the intro.

Yeah, it was, it was a great
experience growing up in Vancouver.

Summers, you know, working in the family
business, fishing, allowed me to get a

lot of initial business experience and it
was also a great way to pay for school.

So, I really enjoyed that and it gave me
the foundational experience for starting

my own businesses, you know, observing
how my parents around their business.

Prateek Panda: So when you moved
to Japan, did you move, with

your parents or was it just you?

Evan Burkosky: No, no, it was, I set off
after university and I had studied, you

know, business and marketing in school
and I had this idea that I could go

to Japan and, you know, pay the bills,
teaching English like many people do.

I initially went on a,
a working holiday visa.

But right from the start I'd had this
idea that I could help import Canadian

seafood and better market it in Japan.

When I was growing up, it was the
bubble period, in Japan, and we sold

the majority of our seafood to Japan.

This idea that Japan is
the next country to us.

It's just over there, across the ocean.

We're selling all of our fish there.

But I was also aware that we sold
through a very complex supply chain.

There were, it felt like 50 different
middlemen between, you know,

the fish that we caught and what
actually got to people in market.

So my initial hypothesis was that I would
go to Japan and help create a more direct

import route and then help to, you know,
market and promote Canadian seafood in.

Prateek Panda: That's amazing.

I mean, typically, Japan is
probably not the top of the list

for somebody to move from the west.

I mean, there are a few challenges,
language being one and, of

course a lot more, you know,
cultural differences as well.

So, you did have experience
selling, you know, Canadian

seafood to Japan and probably that.

That created some sort of familiarity,
but do you think there was, anything

else that was sort of a challenge when
you thought about moving to Japan?

Did it come across to you at any
point that, Hey, this place is going

to be very different from what I'm
used to, do I really wanna do this?

Evan Burkosky: No, actually, I was
just excited about the adventure.

You know, I was young, I
was right outta school.

I wanted to go see the world
and I was inspired by, I suppose

there's a spirit of entrepreneurs
in my family, both my parents, you

know, running small businesses.

And I had an aunt who had been to Japan.

She actually, had been sailing
around the world, know, going on

all sorts of adventures and stopped
in Japan at one point and told me

all sorts of interesting stories.

So, I suppose it was sort of with a spirit
of adventure that I wanted to go and see

the world and Japan was the first stop.

I actually didn't envision initially
that I would stay for my entire career

in Japan, but it's now been 22 years.

So, the time went by very quickly
and I felt that I could be, you

know, very useful in Japan, which
is probably why I stayed here.

But the original idea of importing
seafood into Japan, although I got

a lot of help from the Japanese
government initially from the, Japan

External Trade organization or jetro,
they gave me quite a lot of advice.

What I learned in the first year was
that, I was really, I was unprepared.

There were far too many complexities,
the need for developing personal

relationships in order to business.

Deeply woven into the fabric of
society and business and, I simply

didn't have the language skills.

I, I really underestimated,
how much Japanese would be

required in a business setting.

I suppose I naively assumed that
people would speak more English than,

certainly than they did at the time.

So there were quite a
few hurdles to overcome.

I really had to take some time to learn,
the language and, and the culture and

to develop personal relationships that
made the whole concept more viable.

Prateek Panda: That's amazing.

And you've gone from, you know, running
more of a traditional business to now

something that's completely tech powered.

How did that switch happen?

Evan Burkosky: Yes.

Well, it was an interesting evolution.

So, the original import idea
turns out to be very difficult.

There's actually quite a lot of
protectionism in the industry,

in order to, you know, build
very strong supply chains.

There are long, you know, generational
relationships that have been built up.

The marketing components
though was, let's say

experienced far fewer headwinds.

It was much easier to get,
the marketing piece going.

And because I had studied what we
would now say, the found are the

foundations of digital marketing in
school, I knew how to code a little bit.

I knew how to build out basic,
you know, email campaigns and then

rudimentary search engine optimization.

That took off.

And so, for seven years I ran a marketing
agency that specialized in multilingual

website development and then SEO and
SEM and advertising campaigns and so on.

And we have the opportunity to work
with quite a large number of let's say

well-known brands throughout Japan.

It coincided with the
boom in inbound tourism.

And so we worked quite a lot with,
businesses in the Niko Ski resort

area, up in Hokkaido, the Hokkaido
government itself, and then several

pre fixtures that were engaging
in inbound tourism promotion.

So that that evolution from
developing multilingual websites

into, the current Kimaru platform,
which is designed around AI driven

decision augmentation, essentially
echoes the industry's evolution.

We went from building websites
to observing how people use the

websites, using that analytic
data to gather large data sets.

And then engage in AB testing
optimization and eventually use all of

that big data to power personalization
and recommendation algorithms.

So my career somewhat echoed the overall
ad tech and MarTech evolution, into using,

again, those data for machine learning,

essentially the underlying algorithms
that power advertising online.

And with the latter part of my
career before, or sorry, more

like the middle part of my career.

Before founding Kim was identifying best
in class ad tech and MarTech, and then

helping bring that to the Japanese market.

So I did quite a lot of, market
entry consulting and then became

the country manager for several
Silicon Valley and Israel based

tech startups to help them build out
the team here, run the go to market

strategy and get a footprint in Japan.

But in order to solve very specific
problems like helping with digital

transformation, helping to use this
growing body of, let's say technology

to solve very specific problems,
and that, you know, was a very

interesting and transformative process.

But essentially it was all around helping
Japan with its digital transformation.

Prateek Panda: That's amazing.

So basically there are no shortcuts.

Evan Burkosky: There are no shortcuts.

Yes.

I had to learn everything, sort
of from the ground up and just

constant study, at all times.

And I would say, if you want to be
an entrepreneur in Japan, that's

the key is just always be studying.

Prateek Panda: So talking about being
an entrepreneur in Japan, for all

of our listeners, right, a lot of
them are entrepreneurs themselves.

A lot of them are, kind of on
the path to entrepreneurship.

What is exciting about Japan, if you
were to give a few reasons why Japan

should be a good consideration place,
apart from obviously your market

being there, if at all, but if for
other reasons also what could be some

motivating reasons to be in Japan?

Evan Burkosky: Well, Japan is an
incredibly well structured society.

It's an excellent place to do
business, but it has quite a few

large looming economic problems.

I think everybody is aware
of the declining birth rate.

And so the declining working population,
in order to maintain, economic prosperity,

Japan really needs to engage in this shift
into more, automation augmentation, better

usage of ai, better usage of overall

digital technologies as well as hardware.

Japan excels at hardware, but lags
behind in the digital world in many ways.

So it's currently this, implementation
of AI into the physical world

that I think presents the greatest
opportunity for people, to help.

And I think that has to be the,
the key, the key to any business is

trying to find a large problem to
solve and then being as helpful as

possible in solving that problem.

And if anybody is thinking about,
building a business in Japan, helping

to solve that declining, you know,
worker population issue, that's

a massive problem to focus on.

Prateek Panda: Is it, easy or difficult
to sort of sell to Japanese, businesses?

Is do you need some sort of a local
partner to do that or do you think

people are more open to buying
tech or software from anybody?

Evan Burkosky: You absolutely need,
a local partner, local connections

or at least to spend the time
investing in building relationships.

Japan is quite unique in that it,
it's not, let's say, business is not

structured to be quite as, winner take
all competitive as say the North American

market, just as point of contrast.

In Japan, people would prefer
to do business with people that

they know and trust even if it's
not the absolute most competitive

cutting edge technology per se.

So let's say that, probably a good
way to explain that is that the

longevity of the relationship is more
important than any short term wins

that you might get from technology.

And so if you're entering the Japanese
market, it's very important to

leverage any personal relationships
that you might already have.

People who can give you a personal
introduction or to develop relationships

with partners, it's quite often the
channel partner plays is integral

to any go to market, strategy.

And that might look like, systems
integrators, if it's a technical

solution or it might look like simply
finding people that can give you a

personal introduction, if it's more of
a, let's say, hardware based solution.

Prateek Panda: So, that's
interesting, right?

So it could seem like a sort of
bottleneck, but is there some, or are you

aware of any incentives that the Japanese
government is doing now, especially with

entrepreneurship in general in Japan, but
also trying to attract more foreign talent

to come in and set up businesses in Japan?

Evan Burkosky: Yes, absolutely, because
of that declining worker population

issue and because of, I think increasing
awareness that Japan has fallen behind

a little bit in digital technology, the
Japanese government is creating quite a

few initiatives to improve, to encourage
startup entrepreneurs to come to Japan.

In fact, in our case, with Kimaru, the
current startup, we were greatly, assisted

and enhanced by the, JETRO startups team.

So again, that's the Japan External Trade
Organization, different team that I worked

with 20 years ago, but very, very active
team now called JETRO Startups that has

worked to bring several leading class
accelerators to the Japanese market.

And in our case, we were accepted into
the Alchemist, Japan inaugural cohort.

We graduated from class one in December.

And we are now actually currently
going through the Alchemist US program.

That's been extremely helpful and
not just in, you know, the fact

that it comes with, you know, equity
but becomes, or equity investment.

But it comes with coaching and
an excellent alumni network.

And the ability to create really this
bridge between, Silicon Valley and Tokyo.

But it, it's not just the
one accelerator program.

JETRO has been bringing, several
best in class accelerators to market.

There's 500 Global and Antler
and Techstars and Plug and Play.

All of them are getting government
support and in many ways,what's probably

most important in the Japanese market,
which is not just financial support,

but more like cultural acceptance.

I think we're reaching a really pivotal
time in Japan's startup ecosystem

where the average person is becoming
aware of the concept of startups,

what it really means to create an
innovative business that can be very

intrinsically motivating to work at.

And so this is, becoming a, a critical
change agent in Japanese society

where it's now becoming okay to be
an entrepreneur, for much of the past

three generations, really since Japan
rebuilt during the, you know, economic

miracle, after the second World War.

For the first time in three generations,
there's this cultural acceptance, this,

sort of top-down permission, to go and
start something new and maybe even be

a little bit disruptive of the, let's
say the old Japan in infrastructure

or the existing infrastructure, right?

It's not just, this government, let's
say push that's creating that acceptance.

It's also the realization of the
large incumbent corporations that

they need to be, they need to move
faster, they need to be more adaptive

in order to be more resilient and in
fact, that was the original, let's

say, driving force behind creating.

What we do is helping,
Japanese corporations to be

more adaptive and resilient.

And we do that through
improving decision making.

Prateek Panda: On that note, let's talk
a little bit more about Kimaru, right?

You've mentioned it's a decision
intelligence platform for supply chain.

Can you share like a real world
example and, tell us what Kimaru does?

Evan Burkosky: Yeah, so very specifically
having worked in Japan, as I said,

with the agency, and then bringing
tech companies to the Japanese market.

I've worked with a lot of Japanese
corporations on their digital

transformation and that meant,
implementing both MarTech and, Ad

tech software as well as, quite often
helping with the overall tech stack.

So I worked quite a bit on the consulting
side, often alongside systems integrator

partners to implement systems like
ERP, enterprise resource planning, CRM,

customer relationship management software
and so on, which are core building blocks

of a digital transformation strategy.

But through that consulting process,
what I always found was, there's

a lot of preference for, existing,
let's say rule-based processes.

Processes that have quite often been
in place since the seventies, are very

time intensive and often quite analog.

And because they've worked for so
long, there's a real resistance

to change something that's a
fundamental part of doing business.

But there is a change agent coming,
which is, the world is moving at

a faster and faster plate pace,
industrial age, into the information

age, and you have move very quickly to.

Plus, even if you build an excellent
system, there's so much, there are so many

change factors in today's business world.

It introduces this chaos factor
that's very hard to keep up with.

So what we realized is, both me
and my co-founders, both through

our consulting practice and through

previous projects that we'd worked
on and technology that we built, we

realized that what Japan needs is a
faster decision making process in order

to be more adaptive and resilient.

And based on both the machine
learning technology that I'd used at

previous companies where I've been
manager, and our CTO Dr.Hareesh's

fundamental research and the PhD
that he did while he was working at

Panasonic in the R&D lab there in Osaka
as well as our, our third co-founder

Sinjin's experience in logistics.

and previously working at Microsoft, we
saw that there was this need for improving

the overall decision making cycle.

If you can make faster decisions,
then you can be more adaptive

in times of chaos, and therefore
you can be much more resilient.

And, as we, identified this need for
better decision making and then found

the research of, our advisor, Dr.

Lorien Pratt, and her decision
intelligence methodology we saw a way to

combine the fundamental research that Dr.

Harish had been doing with the
emergence of the agentic layer so that

we could build decision intelligence
agents to work alongside people and,

improve the overall decision making
process through decision augmentation.

That solves many fundamental problems
in many different business processes.

But we saw that the best application
of this technology would be to the

supply chain and logistics space.

Because Japan is still a
powerhouse in manufacturing.

And if we can improve the
overall manufacturing logistics,

ability to get product to market.

Then that's somewhere that we
could be extremely helpful.

So the original hypothesis was to improve
Japan's supply chain decision making

process help move from the existing
rule-based processes that are very analog,

mostly done in Excel spreadsheets to
this new decision intelligence platform.

But as we dug into that, we
found that it's not just Japan.

The entire global supply chain
runs mostly on spreadsheets.

Even if companies have implemented a great
ERP system or they have good business

intelligence tools, they might have all
sorts of great dashboards built out.

All of that is still very
reactive and backwards looking.

It doesn't allow for forward looking,
more prescriptive methodologies.

And so if we look at the evolution of
the industry, it's been from descriptive

analytics that tell what happened, to
predictive analytics that tell what's

likely to happen to prescriptive analytics
that tell us what we can do about it.

So our platform, Kimaru decision
intelligence platform, tells what's

likely to happen, makes recommendations
on what to do about it, and then works

with the human decision makers in a
feedback loop to improve the accuracy

of those recommendations over time.

Prateek Panda: So one of the interesting
things that I caught on from this

was, in general, right, like AI
tools are getting super popular.

There are so many different AI
agents being launched every week, a

lot of people are obviously worried
about AI replacing human jobs.

One of the things that you mentioned
a few times was that of augmentation.

And, you've mentioned that, your
idea is to use AI to augment rather

than replace the human insight.

Can you share a little bit more about what
your vision is with AI for Kimaru, but

also, you know, in general, what do you
think is the trends for AI in general?

Evan Burkosky: Certainly.

Well, I think what we're seeing, in market
right now is a natural backlash against

over automation or over reliance on AI.

There's been, of course, the
initial, excitement and hype

around the development of LLMs.

And of course, people
associate AI with LLMs today.

Although the reality is, you
know, a platform like Kimaru uses

multiple different types of AI
in combination working together.

And much of what our platform is
built on is the more workhorse, AI

that's been in market, running product
recommendations on Amazon and, and

advertising algorithms for 10 years now.

But the, the key point there, I think
is, as people got excited about seeing

LLM applications and, you know, this new
generation of AI applied to the workforce,

I think people were very excited to
be able to, you know, outsource a lot

of, let's say manual processes to AI.

And there is quite a lot of,
potential efficiency improvements

that comes from automating processes
But We can't automate everything.

And so let's say that in any process where
you want to bring AI into it, whether

it's a decision making process or even
something like robotic process automation,

let's say in a warehouse environment,
for example, what you need to do is set

the circuit breaker at the correct level.

At somewhere in the process, there
should be a human in the loop, circuit

breaker that steps in and stops the AI
processes and checks it, augments it and

makes sure that everything is on track.

And that also creates a reinforcement
loop so that the AI can learn from

human judgment and experience.

And what we're finding is that,
initial vertical AI agents initial

automation that, is an evolution of
the previous, rule-based, automated,

automated processes that are in evolution
make cases of ERP or RPA systems.

They're setting, let's say
their temperature settings

a little bit too high.

So that circuit breaker tends to very
high in the loop, if there is one at all.

So, what we've seen as necessary and what
we've built into Kimaru, is the ability

to set that human in the loop, circuit
breaker, at lower points in key processes

without creating too much friction.

So we do that through a visual UI that
allows for the AI to easily make a

recommendation or ask for human input
at the right point and for the human

user to very quickly interact with
AI tools through visual interface

and move the process forward again.

So as long as we build those, augmented
processes into the workforce, then we

retain the ability to capture all of
the creative problem solving, critical

thinking and human judgment, which is what
humans are great at, in combination with

the, automation processes, data cleaning,
data ratification, the correction of

data, the aggregation of data that
AI is, is really, really good at.

So, that allows for AI to take over a lot
of the manual processes and reduce the

cognitive load on the decision maker and
allow that to decision maker to be much

more effective and much more adaptive
and creative in their problem solving.

Now that's specific to a decision
intelligence platform like ours.

But for really any AI augmented
process, even if it's simply writing

marketing content, you don't want
to outsource, outsource the entire,

let's say, blog post, to chat GPT,
you could use it to augment your

process, but you have to be there.

I would say at quite early
stage in that, in that process.

So you want to set your circuit
breaker to be very early in essentially

every sentence, every paragraph,
you should be, working alongside

the AI in an editorial process.

So I guess, the best way to think
of it is that the workplace of

the future, essentially where we
are right now is humans and ai.

agents working alongside each other
and the better we build out the

user interfaces and user experiences
for this workplace, of the future

the more effective we can be.

Prateek Panda: I think that's great
advice, and especially the fact that you

could think of introducing a human in
the middle, to sort of make sure that

the entire AI process is well augmented.

I think that's great advice.

Thanks for sharing.

And we'll switch gears a little bit.

So you, as a Canadian, you've you
know, built a life and career in Japan.

And you've been there 22 years now.

You are at a stage where with the
Alchemist Accelerator in the US

you're also trying to figure out,
a move or a launch in the US.

How are you thinking about this?

A lot of founders around the world
want to move to the US and because

that's where the market is or
where they see the most potential.

Maybe there is something for
them to learn from your journey

and how you are approaching,
your entry into the US market.

Evan Burkosky: Certainly.

So we designed Kimaru to
be global from day one.

And the idea was to, you know, both
bring this solution to the market and,

and help solve decision making for the
largest number of people as possible.

And also create the example of a
Japanese startup that, that could

be global right from the start.

Right?

Because, quite a lot of Japanese
startups tend to focus on just the

domestic market because it's quite large.

It's the world's fourth largest
GDP, but then that tends to create

a culture which makes it hard for
them to expand globally in future.

So, we advocate for building the
global mindset right from the start.

So right from the start, we've
tried to build a structure which

we think is going to work globally.

Our first expansion point
beyond Japan is the US.

And so we're doing a concurrent
North America and wider

APAC, go to market strategy.

And what I've seen work very well for
companies like us, which, you know,

it's very close to a traditional
SaaS model or software as a service,

but in our case it's a SaaS plus AI.

So there's a little bit of a hybridization
and a new business model there.

It's still similar to the seat or
consumption type pricing of a traditional

SaaS platform, but in our case, augmented
by this, the win-win that comes through

creating value for the end user.

So essentially that, that's our
business model, but it allows us

to be remote, distributed and work
through, what I call GTM nodes.

So we have various teams, quite
small teams in strategic regions,

and we're building out, the go to
market team for APAC here in Tokyo.

And then we're building out
our go to market team for North

America, in Austin, Texas.

And that was partly because of,
some proactive tax incentives,

that Texas has put in place.

And, partly the proximity to
food and beverage and supply

chain in North America.

So as a regional hub, that works
well for us, but we're also

in the accelerator program.

Alchemist US is based in San Francisco,
and of course, that's a hub for tech.

So we have these small teams, two or
three people in these various regions,

and then we work asynchronously
across time zones, mostly using Slack.

And so my office is essentially
my laptop and Slack.

And if I have that and together
with my phone, I can work anywhere.

So even in the past couple of months, I've
been in four or five different countries.

And, just, just working across these
time zones, syncing up with our

team whenever we can, and we plan
to continue building out these nodes

or launch centers, GTM centers in
other strategic geographic regions.

And continue to run this
asynchronous workflow, essentially

using tools like Slack.

Now there's a huge difference in each
geographic region culturally though.

So one thing that we have to do in Japan
is sync up with the speed of business.

Sales cycles here tend to be about
three times longer on average than

they would be in North America.

And that's mostly because sales requires
developing personal relationships,

quite often working with partners.

In this region it's much more of
a channel partner led strategy.

Same thing.

In Taiwan, for example, I was there
a couple of weeks ago and we're

developing our channel partner strategy
there and looking to, get into an

accelerator program there so we can
build out the same regional nodes there.

But to get back to your primary
question about North America,

Silicon Valley, I think requires
understanding the speed of

business that's required for the
most competitive market in tech.

You have to learn how to do
everything at Silicon Valley speed.

T hat's probably the most difficult
thing I would say for Japanese

startups going, to Silicon Valley.

That's probably the hardest
thing for them to get used to

is just the speed of business.

So whether it's creation of your pitch or
the speed of your sales cycles, or really

the speed of your product development,
everything has to be at least three times

faster than what people are used to.

And I think that's the natural outcome
of an highly competitive market.

And one reason why Silicon Valley
is such a powerhouse for tech.

Prateek Panda: That's amazing, Evan,
thank you so much for sharing those

insights and as we get closer to the
end of this recording, I wanna ask you a

few more fun rapid fire style questions.

So what's one startup that you admire
a lot, obviously apart from your own?

Evan Burkosky: I've been
quite impressed by, Sakana AI.

There are also, they're a team of
expat founders or foreign founders, ex

Googlers that started here in Japan.

They're building out some very
interesting, unique AI models,

and I think they're going to
solve some real problems here.

And they've been in, in the media, so
I think they're helping to create the

around a Japanese startup that's
designed for global to table.

Prateek Panda: All right.

Entrepreneur life can be hard, more
often than not, everybody says it's a

rollercoaster, but more often than not,
there are more lows than there are highs.

What do you do to unwind
or keep yourself positive?

Evan Burkosky: One's
mental health is critical.

You have to take time for that.

I had, this is my fourth startup,
and so, you know, in, in some of the

previous ones, there were highs and lows.

There were some very tough periods.

One thing I found is that as a
founder, you have to ask for help.

And you don't necessarily have to
be this, I suppose growing up in the

fishing industry, I had the idea that
the captain of the ship is infallible and

always has all the answers and doesn't
have to ask for help from anybody.

That's not always the case.

As a founder, you do have to ask for help.

And so you have to get good advisors
and good mentors, and, and you have to

be willing to, to ask for assistance.

In fact, I went through a period where
I tried to shoulder far too much and it

caused negative repercussions throughout,
you know, personal and business life.

After that experience to help encourage
founders to ask for help and to help

create the structure for that, i, I
volunteered for several years on the

board of directors for, Tell Japan,
which is a mental health organization

that runs a support lifeline and,
a, clinics in Japan for assistance

for anybody who's struggling.

And anybody listening to this
podcast in Japan, if help in English,

please do reach out to Tell Japan.

It's a great way to get some assistance.

For those, you know, elsewhere around
the world, don't hesitate to try

using apps like Better Health or just
reaching out for counseling services.

The other thing is just
take time for yourself.

I found that living in Tokyo was too busy.

And the sort of constant, always
on energy of being right in

the city was too much for me.

So a few years ago, my wife
and I moved down to the coast.

So, we live an hour south of Tokyo,
and because I grew up on the water,

I get a lot of, let's say, recharging
and relaxation from marine activities,

surfing, sailing, you know,
snorkeling and that kind of thing.

So, living in an environment here where
we're at the beach and I can do that

regularly, that, that really helps.

But for people who are in a more
urban environment, you know, go

out for a run or find ways, get a
little bit time for yourself and

reset and maintain your balance.

I think that's the most important.

Prateek Panda: Yeah, I think, very
rightly said, and more often than

not, the entrepreneurship journey
is celebrated when people are

like always running, always busy.

We've sort of over the years
made that the normal thing to do.

And more often than not, people are,
struggling to share times when, you know,

they're struggling, and they need help.

Right.

So you talked about this in one of your
other answers also, is to be more open

about asking for help and helping not
always, in business as well as, if you

are having a tough time, you know, thanks

for, you know, you shared so many
resources and every place has

something that you can access.

So definitely access those resources,
do things that, give you that energy.

Right.

One last question before I let you go.

What's an emerging tech trend that
you are very excited about that you

see evolve over the next five years?

Evan Burkosky: Well, the discipline,
the field and the software

category of decision intelligence,
I think is extremely exciting.

So, have to give a shout out to Dr.

Lorien Pratt, who helped to coin and
popularize the term decision intelligence.

And her book, well two books actually,
Link was her first book and the second

one is The Decision Intelligence Handbook.

And her blogs, at her website, they're
extremely helpful in helping us understand

this emerging, discipline that really
helps to bring AI into the workforce.

Essentially what decision intelligence
is, is causal outcome modeling.

So, understanding our desired
outcome, the actions we can take

to achieve it, and then the levers
that we can pull to affect that.

And then building out our, let's
say machine learning or AI models

to help model that out at critical
points as opposed to the old method of

processing all data that we can find.

And then trying to mine it for insights.

So, it's much more effective, much
more compute, lean and efficient.

I think that's the most interesting
emerging trend because it will

allow us to get through our current
growing pains around stochasticism

you know, the unreliability of
LLMs, these wonderful, you know,

rocks that can now appear to think.

But aren't, aren't yet structured in such
a way that they can really reliably be

applied to business processes or require,
systems like decision intelligence

in order to be structured correctly.

So, if anybody is interested in
the application of AI to real

business processes and improving
the right reliability of these

processes, I highly recommend
researching, decision intelligence.

Dr.

Pratt, Cassie Kozyrkov, there are
several thought leaders in this space,

so, definitely check those out or, or
reach out to me on LinkedIn and I'll

give you some, book recommendations.

Oh, and quick shout out to David
Pidsley, analyst at Gartner who

just, launched a summer reading in
decision intelligence post and has

an excellent reading list there.

Prateek Panda: That's awesome, Evan.

Thank you so much for sharing
your insights as well as all

these amazing recommendations.

A ton of value in this episode, for sure.

Thank you so much again
for taking out time.

It was amazing talking to you.

Evan Burkosky: Likewise.

Thanks very much.

Really appreciate the opportunity.

Prateek Panda: And that
wraps up today's episode.

Before we sign off, I would like
to thank you for your support

and thanks for tuning in.

If you loved today's episode.

Then don't forget to subscribe to this
podcast and never miss an episode.

Be kind, be happy, challenge the norm.

I'll see you folks again for the next one.