2021 – The Importance of Client Collaboration in Tech Development with Hack Tech’s Mariam Chtchyan

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1:05With us right now, Mariam Chichian. Mariam, you are the chief operating officer of HackTech. You're found on the web at GoHackTech.com. Mariam, it's great to have you. Thank you so much for the invitation and having me today. I should point out that you are also, you host a podcast. It's on YouTube and Corporate Evolution Tales. We'll talk about that a little bit later. Tell me about HackTech. Sure. So I'm working in HackTech already for eight years and HackTech itself is in the market for nine, almost 10 years. So what we are doing is we are providing with dedicated engineering teams and we are positioning ourselves as engineering partners for different companies as well as individuals.

1:54And we are basically helping people ideas to become truly like in real life, being able to have the product live on software and mobile application. Yeah. Well, what's going on in the industry right now in terms of like, I don't know, I mean, obviously, this is what you do every day. I would imagine, again, just kind of given the services you provide, you know, around IT consulting, development, a lot of movement with AI, I suspect. But what are clients asking for? Yeah, so I was thinking you will not ask about the AI, actually. But yes, that's the right point. A lot of people are now asking about AI products and how they can transform generally their processes as Hack Deck is specialized in digital transformation.

2:48So we are supporting on automating processes. Plus, we are doing consulting before even starting anything, doing like on the engineering side. So we can review the process that you have and suggest the changes that will help you with the process of being improved or automated or made it faster, etc. So related to AI, there is definitely in market this legend about AI giving solutions to everything, but that's not so. But we have actually several projects or products on our site that are AI-based. And basically, the requirement or the requests are really, there are a lot of requests on AI and having the tool integrated or using them for project management or generally for the delivery.

3:37Yeah, well, I would imagine being able to fulfill as well. There are probably better tools available so we can create better outcomes for clients, maybe hit deadlines a little bit easier, maybe able to include things in scope that maybe historically were priced out. How is AI empowering the back end? Yes, definitely. So this is such a good point to discuss. we have actually objectives on our side, which we are giving to ourselves like key results that we are reviewing each quarter. And AI is actually, I think these last three quarters, we are concentrated on gaining the better knowledge on any department in our company related to AI and how we can use the tools for, as you mentioned, like for project management, for development and all those sorts of work.

4:34And what we have right now is we have a lot of integrations that are provided by the tools that we are using for development, as well as project management and product management. For example, in JIRA, there is an amazing amount of integrations and extensions that are helping, that are AI-based. And basically, they are supporting on more appropriate data and also having the reports generated in better way. Risk management is done really well with the help of AI tools. And of course, also the engineering side and QA, which is basically testing the product. They also have their tools that are used for tests and test cases and all that stuff.

5:19Yeah. When a client's coming to you, how fleshed out do you generally like to see a project? I'm just curious, if a client's going to bring this to a developer, should they have this completely planned out and completely spec'd out or um you know is it reasonable that there may be some gaps and they're like well we don't know exactly how to get that done but like this is kind of the idea um what do you typically see and and what's kind of recommended no not at all there is no need to have a plan or any imagination of uh specific steps that there should be that's why we are providing with product managers and ui ux designers that are helping with their shape meetings and discovery uh discussions where they are basically guiding you by market research uh competitor research and all that stuff that's helping us to support the client with having better idea of what's going on what we should do what we should take into account and all that stuff.

6:29So there is no need at all to have that plan under your hand. That's actually what we are providing with. It's just about the idea that you have on your side and coming to us is, hey guys, I have this idea of this product. I'm not sure how we can do that, but this is what I want to see at the end. So that's basically it. Sure, sure. When it comes to hiring, you know, someone that can, you know, developers, you know, let's say someone is shopping around and they're talking with different developers, maybe they've gotten a lot of email pitches from, you know, developer agencies, and they're like, okay, well, we're going to talk to these four different developers.

7:13What questions would you recommend a potential client asking from their development partner to help them in that decision-making process? I think the first question should be about bringing the idea and understanding how the company itself is imagining how it should be developed. because a lot of companies out there are saying, yes, we have developers, but they don't have that experience of product management specifically, which HackTech is very strong in, because we have that experience of only reviewing the product, as I mentioned, reviewing the market and understanding it, even before developing.

7:53So first of all, understand if the company with whom you want to collaborate have clear idea how to make your ideas to more of something touchable like story epic anything that will help with the planning the stuff the other thing is about the tech stack because generally there are companies that prefer one stack and it is basically like there can be a lot of issues if the tech language is not appropriate to the product so the product maybe like loading slower or anything like that. So it's about the tech stack, like how many languages they are using, if they're open to or flexible on using other tech stack instead of like the one that they are thinking of.

8:40So these may be the two questions that there will be. You have a particular interest and kind of passion for project management. And what's been going on in that world? Again, I'm sure that a lot of the tools that are available hopefully are a little bit more AI enabled. There's a little bit more intelligence involved. But what are some of the major trends just on kind of like the project management, PMP side of things? Yes. Well, I think a lot of things changed specifically after COVID. and also like the soft skills that were added for project managers. But besides having appropriate soft skills is also something new.

9:27I noticed recently that it's about technical knowledge as well. So before it was not about like it was only about soft skills and having management skills. Right now, it's also about having the technical knowledge. So you are able to communicate with programmers on their language so that you can have that better imagination and understanding of what's going on. So I think one thing that now is changed and a lot of project managers are struggling with or they are learning right now is actually having the technical knowledge. And when I'm saying technical knowledge, it's about the programming. If it is AI, so it's like the stuff related to AI or if it is specific programming language like Python or anything like that is, again, something that we need to learn right now.

10:17Yeah. Tell me about, with HackTech, what types of clients you typically work with? What types of projects you usually do? Is there kind of a range where it's like, well, you know, I don't know if you do really small projects, if you do enormous projects. Can you tell me a little bit more about the scope you typically follow? Yes. So HackTech, we are very flexible on that part. We don't have any specific understanding of what is the project that we prefer because we are really open to any project that will gain us a new experience, plus that we can share our experience with the client as well. So nothing specific on the size, though we are preferring to have a long term partnership, which is also helping with cultural fit and basically having the other opportunities.

11:08So we had a lot of clients that visited our office and we went to them to visit their office. So it's kind of like the partnership that is based on friendship. So we prefer to have long term partners. But of course, we are also considering helping small startups as well. Yeah. What is the so if someone says, listen, you know, there's a project we've been looking at doing. What is the typical engagement path? Like, do you talk about it at first? Like, what goes into that? Yes, definitely. So we have very specific process that we are following when we have new customer. First of all, first several weeks is only about product itself, like discovery stage, when we are discovering, discussing what is the expectation, setting the goal, setting the acceptance criteria.

12:00So it's all about product management. and also like tech lead is also involved. This is the person that is basically advising on tech stuff, how the solutions can be given. And after that, like three, four weeks after those discussions and the market research, we are starting the main engineering part when we are already estimating the work that was discussed. We are planning stuff. We are pushing it to several increments so we can have the deliverable parts of the feature or the product. And we are going from there. Of course, we have also maintenance mode, and we are supporting even when the product is already released.

12:39So we are supporting on the updates, upgrades that there are after the product is live. Mariam, your website is GoHackTech.com. We also, actually, before I kind of finish up with that, But we also have a link to your YouTube series, which is a podcast. It's called Corporate Evolution Tales. You mind telling me a little bit about that? Yes, definitely. So as I mentioned, HuckTech is specialized on digital transformation, and we are helping companies. So my decision was to, why not to share that experience with the world? Because a lot of companies or individuals are thinking about digital transformation, but they don't have enough experience even to find a good company.

13:24So what I did is I decided to do this podcast that is helping basically on sharing the experience that I have and my guests have with the audience so they can understand and imagine digital transformation better. Plus also know about the companies that can help them with it. Yeah, that is linked up to our friend that's listening right now. If you click around in your podcast app, we have a direct link to that YouTube channel so you can watch that. Ah, now go hacktech.com. When somebody visits the website and they want to have a conversation or at least, you know, kind of explore potentially working together, what do they do?

14:05So there is a lot of fields that you can click on just to contact with our support. We are getting the emails right after you will send us any message. Plus we are very active in LinkedIn and Facebook. So I think you can easily also message us with the help of these platforms. So we can schedule a call. We can have a quick discussion about stuff even before starting. So if you have any questions you are considering to have an engineering team, we are open to the discussions on those platforms as well. Yeah. Awesome. All right. The website, gohacktech.com. Mariam Chichen, you are the chief operating officer.

14:46It's been a great conversation. Thank you so much for joining us. Thank you so much.

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