The Distributed Truth

The GTM vs. Product Chasm with Richard Makara

Episode Summary

Welcome to another episode of The Distributed Truth. Today, Evan welcomes Richard Makara, CEO and Co-Founder of reconfigured.io, a data product that helps people edit SQL for improved data models and better data quality. In this episode, Richard articulates a crucial concept for understanding why so many software teams struggle with customer data issues: the gap in objectives and knowledge between product teams, who usually own data teams and tech, and Go-To-Market (GTM) teams. One is tasked with engagement and has room for deep, even esoteric, analysis, while the other is tasked with revenue and must execute rapidly at all costs. The alignment issues that arise from this disjointed mechanism are devastating to efficiency and growth. TRUTHS OF THE DAY RICHARD: PUT SOME THOUGHT INTO THE INTEGRATION “The integrations exist because they have to, but HubSpot doesn't care about Salesforce being, you know, populate it properly, and Salesforce doesn't care about HubSpot. So the integration is there to move data. But it's not there to move context, and context, again, is what makes these tools so powerful. It's not like you spin up a Salesforce instance. And then it's magically great. You actually have to put some thought design into it, you have to figure out how the automation works, which parts are automated, which aren't.” RICHARD: THOUGHTS ON DATA QUALITY "At the end of the day, data quality isn't an issue of a piece of a tool or software, it's, it's predominantly an issue of those who build the data, design it and then use it. So when we have humans involved, and when things are changing, you're always going to have data quality issues. We are unpredictable beings. And we can never expect every single person to behave in the same way. " Connect with Richard and learn more about his work: Richard Makara | reconfigured | reconfigured.io Connect with Evan to learn more about Syncari and The Distributed Truth podcast: Evan Dunn | Syncari | Syncari.com Make sure to leave a comment, and subscribe!

Episode Notes

Welcome to another episode of The Distributed Truth. Today, Evan welcomes Richard Makara, CEO and Co-Founder of reconfigured.io, a data product that helps people edit SQL for improved data models and better data quality. 

In this episode, Richard articulates a crucial concept for understanding why so many software teams struggle with customer data issues: the gap in objectives and knowledge between product teams, who usually own data teams and tech, and Go-To-Market (GTM) teams. One is tasked with engagement and has room for deep, even esoteric, analysis, while the other is tasked with revenue and must execute rapidly at all costs. The alignment issues that arise from this disjointed mechanism are devastating to efficiency and growth.

 

TRUTHS OF THE DAY

RICHARD: PUT SOME THOUGHT INTO THE INTEGRATION

“The integrations exist because they have to, but HubSpot doesn't care about Salesforce being, you know, populate it properly, and Salesforce doesn't care about HubSpot. So the integration is there to move data. But it's not there to move context, and context, again, is what makes these tools so powerful. It's not like you spin up a Salesforce instance. And then it's magically great. You actually have to put some thought design into it, you have to figure out how the automation works, which parts are automated, which aren't.”

RICHARD: THOUGHTS ON DATA QUALITY

"At the end of the day, data quality isn't an issue of a piece of a tool or software, it's, it's predominantly an issue of those who build the data, design it and then use it. So when we have humans involved, and when things are changing, you're always going to have data quality issues. We are unpredictable beings. And we can never expect every single person to behave in the same way. "

 

Connect with Richard and learn more about his work:

 

Connect with Evan to learn more about Syncari and The Distributed Truth podcast:

 

Make sure to leave a comment, and subscribe!