In this episode of the If Then Podcast, Debo Ray interviews Jesal Gadhia, the head of engineering at Thoughtful AI. They discuss Jesal's background in tech and how he got to where he is today. Jesal explains that Thoughtful AI focuses on revenue cycle in healthcare, helping providers navigate the complex US healthcare system and get paid. They also talk about the developer marketplace model at Thoughtful AI, where customer engineers partner with the developer marketplace to build solutions using the company's SDK and APIs. Jesal emphasizes the importance of measuring cycle time, keeping technical choices simple, and delivering value quickly. He also discusses the distributed nature of the engineering team and the importance of in-person meetings and time zone overlap. Jesal shares his strategies for maintaining culture in a remote team, including written communication and transparency.

‍

Takeaways

• Thoughtful AI focuses on revenue cycle in healthcare, helping providers navigate the complex US healthcare system and get paid.
• The developer marketplace model at Thoughtful AI allows customer engineers to partner with the developer marketplace to build solutions using the company's SDK and APIs.
• Measuring cycle time, keeping technical choices simple, and delivering value quickly are key priorities for the engineering team at Thoughtful AI.
• In a distributed team, in-person meetings and time zone overlap are important for building cohesiveness and collaboration.
• Maintaining culture in a remote team can be achieved through written communication, a well-organized wiki, clear OKRs, and transparent metrics.

Chapters

00:00 Introduction and Icebreaker

01:48 Jesal Gadhia's Background

05:22 Thoughtful AI and the Problem it Solves

06:33 How is the engineering team organized and what is Developer Marketplace Model

09:46 Measuring ROI and Rationalizing Investments

11:19 Measuring Engineering and Product Success

13:23 Simplifying Technical Choices and Focusing on Speed

17:47 Developer Experience and Metrics

19:24 Measuring cadence

22:45 Measuring developer experience

23:41 Managing distributed engineering teams

‍