>>live from Copenhagen, Denmark. It's the Q covering Nutanix dot next 2019. Brought to you by Nutanix >>Welcome back, everyone to the cubes Live coverage of Nutanix dot Next I'm your host Rebecca Knight alongside my co host Stew Minutemen. We have two guests for this segment we have. Mika will lose. She's the art director for Nutanix Thank you so much for coming on the show. >>Thank you for inviting me >>And we have Satish Ramachandran, Global head of design at Nutanix Thank you so much for coming on. So it's always so much fun to talk to really creative people, particularly in this technology world. I want to start the conversation by asking Michael first where you go for inspiration and who do you talk to? What he read? What kinds of things do you look at to inspire you to and then bring them back to your job here in Nutanix. So I strongly >>believe that inspiration come from everywhere. No matter where you go is an architecture or you go to the supermarket and you look on packaging or you read a book and you think about images or even just social media. And there is so much variety of different opinion and different cultures to get inspired from. Even from this conference, we took inspiration from Copenhagen, the city, and from Swiss design or from California and divide in the mid century. I put, like not in construction, but like architecture. Er, um, we created this really Sundwall the supreme the best day ever. And I was actually reading a book with my kids, the diary of a wimpy kid. And I was like, Okay, you know what? We can make something really fun out of it. We can take like a page from a diary and create Sabrina Best day, something like that. >>It was truly everywhere. >>It's really every. >>How about Yusa? Tish >>men? It's two parts, actually. I think one is the inspiration when it comes to the aesthetics of design. So to a large degree, I'm a huge fan off minimalism, everything from Japanese paintings, for example, where with two or three strokes, you have a stark on the water. The Bauhaus movement clean, elegant lines very minimal to the point, and even the Scandinavian architecture, for example, is quite minimalistic and very clean. So that is one angle on what we strive to do in terms off getting to minimal, clean, simple. But in the other portion of inspiration is actually comes from empathy because, you know, it's the you know, I care deeply about the human condition, even pre Nutanix sort of teenage angst that never left me right. And ah, so in a sense, is a lot of empathy. Toe what people are going through in terms of technology, how they're using it. How can we make their lives easier? How can we bring about some joys in their life and to a large degree, the secretary working? You know, I t, um, has bean sort of underserved design wise for many years on de. So there's a lot of inspiration that comes in the form of motivation in order to do something for people there. >>Well, yes, it's a teacher, I'm wondering, can help connect the dots with us. I think of minimalism and obviously ties to this simplicity Nutanix and remember in the early days, talking Nutanix to make something truly simple from a technology standpoint usually has a lot of work, and we've been talking to the executive team about, you know, in this multi cloud, highly disperse. Tear it even harder today. So how does some of those core design principles make their way into into Nutanix is world. >>You want me to talk about the process? You know, I >>think >>the process is quite straightforward. I mean, you start with understanding the space, understanding the experience that exists in the space. You don't start with the feature or the product. That's the first thing you start with the people. So you started with a very human centric manner on. Okay, What are they trying to do? What are they trying to achieve and how do you get them in the simplest possible manner to do that? So we have this thing that we use called intentional our design, which is one off our design principles. Very. How do you get someone who has an intention to fulfill their intention with the least amount of effort? And the effort in the middle is what we label less friction constantly. So we talk about trying to become friction less and so on. So the process for that is you start with the person what they're trying to get done, and >>from there you actually >>work all the Muslims in the organization. So design, basically at that point takes on the role of a facilitator by bringing in, you know, engineering product management design itself together and all in service off the user to create an experience, right? So it starts with, you know, formulating the requirements together with engineering and product management. It's address it, then converging on these things by creating prototypes than testing these things with users and so on and then figuring out really what is essential, what can be thrown out and how to keep it really simple. And that's how we build product, basically. >>So that's so. As you said, it starts with this point of empathy, and that is this collaborative process between the engineers and the artists and design team. How would you say that design is more part of the Nutanix philosophy, just rather than the simple, simple, easy, elegant products itself but the entire company? How would you say it's it's built into the philosophy? I actually think this is >>why Nutanix is so unique in our space because we don't just look at the technology we looking at a whole package of design and technology, the left brain and the right brain together. And it comes from our leadership because, dear, it is the great advocator for design. He's really believing in the importance of it, not just a pretty rap on something, but it's something that is meaningful and and really able to provide a full experience for our customers. >>Yeah, meet me how maybe I love to get you both of your commentary. There's a new AH advertising campaign that was launched. The video was in the keynote yesterday. >>It >>all together now it is very colorful, and it is very diverse and at the same time, even, you know, I'm a technology guy. I will often roll my eyes when I see a certain advertising, but to articulate to the world, it's like, Okay, how does my database and multi cloud and all these things play together? Well, way we anthropomorphized though those technology pieces into people on dhe. You've got photos that you can do there, so bring us inside a little bit as to how that you helped the messaging eso some, you know, pretty complex pieces underneath. >>Yes, we're very excited about this campaign. I have to tell you. We worked very hard to conceptualize it and bring it out to the world. And we were very excited to be able to share it here. That next the thinking behind it. Waas, you know I to world is complex and here in Nutanix, we really try to offer a simple way to remove this complexity. So what is a better way than just take those I t concept and business an application manners and personalize them and make them fun. And when you think about Public Cloud, what do you mean? What does it mean to you? How do you envision it when you think about a database? Do you think about the strongman that carrying the cylinder and you >>make it a >>campaign Maur You humanize it, you make it accessible to people and you make it fun And this is what we're trying to do We're trying to delight. Our customers were trying to empower them to be able to do their business in a better way, and that was our goals provide simplicity, choice and delights. >>And as you said, it's it's this ample anthropomorphizing of this. If you've a database where a person what would go with the database person look like it's the cloud Where Human? Yes, exactly. And it just I think they just >>make make it fun and you make it unique and you create something that is different in our scene. And nothing, That's what we're trying to do. >>How do you work together with the engineers? I mean, I know you said. You gather in a room and you are thinking about the end user. How does the customer experience this? But how do artists and engineers communicate? I mean, is that Is that ever a challenge or >>not? Really? No, not really. Actually, it's, Ah, it's a three legged stool. Basically, there's ah, and you know, if you put marketing in there as well for the awareness piece, which precludes anything that we you know the customer uses, it actually becomes a four legged stool. But in terms of building product, it's a three legged stool, which is product management, and they're trying to figure out what is the product market fit, and that's what they bring to the table. The engineer's coming and as we're dreaming up stuff, they're thinking, Is this stuff buildable or not? You know these guys dreaming way too much, right? And so it is a colonization. So and I think that's the crucible in which the best creativity actually comes out. It's not designing isolation where, you know, design dreams up something and the rest of the folks build it. It really isn't that so. We are, actually, in a sense, the way I see it, we have the glue and we formed the Crucible for the colonization. And and in that, you know, good things come out. >>So we hear you are in Denmark, which is design savvy, fashion forward, food obsessed and eyes cultivating that sense of well being in comfort and coziness. What kinds of things are you going to take with you from this conference itself? What are you seeing? What's interesting to you? And how are you gonna bring that back to Nutanix? >>Honestly, for me, I think it's just the warmth of the people in the community in here. They were so invasive and and and kind. And we got a chance to work with a lot of people when we were building this conference. And and to me it's all about the human connection and I think this is something that I will definitely carry with me when we go back to Nutanix. And we were trying to think about our next dock next conference. And you know how we can bring some of that too there as >>well? Yeah, it's to teach anything on dot next Copenhagen, and you know, you're from Berlin, so you're in Europe and get gets a different, you know, cultural input. I >>think they're still. I think >>there is still some stuff. I think around the accessibility mainly for me, like the hotel we're staying. And, you know, first thing I noticed was, you know, that's bringing on, you know, when you have to open the refrigerator, for example, or the closet door And it, I mean, that first thought was like, you know, they have already designed in the accessibility. And then I liberate that back to product, and I think you know how we doing on accessibility. And of course, you know, everything around you here is pretty inspiring in terms of architecture and so on and so forth. So that's a gimme, really. And you see that a lot of it in Germany so that it isn't as much new, but in terms of the conference, it's very heartening that will come this fire. You know, I don't know. Miami many years ago, which is my first conference, you know, we were like all of 600 people, and now we are 4500 here. So in a sense, it's very heartening. And people seem to embrace the, you know, the vision that we're putting foot. Yeah, you know, around convergence off many, many things. >>How deeply technical are both of you? Um, I understand. >>I understand the technology. I understand the struggle. I understand what we're trying to achieve is a company. It doesn't mean I can go and do a demo on stage, but I think it's important to understand the technology of the company that you work for in order to represent it truly and in order to convey the message that we're trying to tell because we are a storyteller. That's what we do. We take the message and the technology, and we bring it out to our customers. So it's important. >>I'm a dyed in the wool engineer s o. I was I mean, my cases where I was an engineer for a fleet to the kids. You know, you take running engineering teams, that kind of stuff. And then I stumbled upon design. So I have a very deep understanding off engineering and what it takes to build stuff. But I have another side of me which is generally around. Empathy, experiences, you know, human interaction, human behavior. What makes people take what frustrates them, those kinds of things. So for me that we design has beena synthesis off many off my interests, and that's why I fell in love with it and have stuck around. >>One of the biggest issues in Silicon Valley and in the technology industry at large is is the skills and the right people the talent gap? How much of an issue is that for the design teams within these technology companies? Because you are looking for so many different skills people who can grasp the technology but then also have this more creative spark Innis to them to how hard is it to find the right people? I think it's a little bit >>of a challenge, but I think we're very fortunate to have amazing teams that understand technology and design in the connection between them. So I know I feel very fortunate with the people I get to work with. Their very there are amazing. Yeah. >>I mean, it was hard in the beginning when we when Nutanix was 150 people or something on the brown. Nobody knew. So then it was very hard to find the right people and to also simplified the vision and to sell it. I still remember spending with every new hire. I would be the first guy they would talk to. And I spent two years in two hours on a whiteboard, talking of taking borders, a technology problem on translating it into an experiential problem. And speaking to really this is very hard to design for and that's where the challenge lies, right? But what a period of time we have successfully built a brand which is a Nutanix design brand. And we have done a ton of things that I'm actually very proud off establishing relationships with universities, even on the social media, having a website, having a proper blawg, various things. When Now we are recognized in the enterprise space as a place for designers to go and work. And there is a certain combination. I figured out where which makes for a good designer in the space. Because if you take people with too little off a technology background, then the ramp up is very high. S o. If you typically you find somebody who's got done some amount of technology than the prior company or in school. And there are people like that. There are plenty of them. And then they moved on to design. And that seems to be the right mix because they can understand the empathize both on the technology side and also on the design side of things. And that makes for the right combination. >>And it's not >>too bad to find people. >>And I think >>technology can be talked. But I think passion and carrying is that part of it is hard to find >>be innate skills. Yeah, exactly. Great. Well, Miguel and McHale and Satish thank you so much for coming on the Cuba and fun and enlightening a conversation. Thank you so >>much. It's great to be here. Thank you so much. >>Thank you, guys. >>I'm Rebecca Knight for stew Minutemen. Stay tuned for more of the cubes. Live coverage of Nutanix dot Next