Presales Podcast by Presales Collective

In this episode, Jack Cochran sits down with Yasmeen Hyder, an enterprise solutions consulting leader from Atlanta, to explore a game-changing approach to working with AI: speaking to it instead of typing. Yasmeen shares how she uses voice-based AI interactions as a thought companion and coaching tool to enhance decision-making, reduce mental load, and work more efficiently in her presales leadership role.
Follow Us
Connect with Jack Cochran: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jackcochran/ 

Connect with Yasmeen Hyder: https://www.linkedin.com/in/yasmeenhyder/ 

Links and Resources Mentioned
Join Presales Collective Slack: https://www.presalescollective.com/slack 

Sol/Con 2026 (Chicago, August 2026): https://www.presalescollective.com/solcon-2026 

Presales Collective Podcast: https://www.presalescollective.com/podcast 

Key Topics Covered
Voice AI vs. Typing: Why Speaking Creates Higher Bandwidth Communication

AI as Thought Companion Rather Than Answer Engine

Yasmeen's Career Journey: Healthcare to Pharma to Tech Presales

Overcoming the Behavioral Change of Talking to Your Computer

Stress Testing Leadership Decisions with Voice AI

Using AI as a Coach: Asking for Questions Instead of Answers

Time Compression Benefits: 60-90 Minutes Down to 15-20 Minutes

Addressing Zoom Fatigue: Voice AI as Reset and Grounding Tool

Negative Prompting Technique for Better Outputs

Personal and Professional Applications Beyond Work

Timestamps
00:00 Introduction
02:45 Welcome Yas
05:45 Why talking to AI
08:02 Setup and behavioral change
10:57 Writing vs. speaking
15:27 Rubber ducky but better
16:28 Stress testing leadership decisions
20:46 Using AI as a coach
22:36 Addressing Zoom fatigue
26:00 Personal life applications
30:19 Closing and contact information

Jack Cochran and Matthew James welcome Kintan Brahmbhatt, CEO and co-founder of Olto, to discuss how AI agents are fundamentally reshaping the presales workflow and buyer experience. Drawing from over 12 years at Amazon building personalized experiences for Alexa, Amazon Music, and Prime Video, Kintan explores why B2B buyers receive generic "Acme Corp" demos while B2C consumers get highly personalized recommendations, and how product-trained agents can finally close this gap economically. The conversation goes beyond productivity gains to examine how buyers, products, and SE roles have evolved rapidly while metrics, compensation plans, and tooling have remained static. 
Follow Us
Connect with Jack Cochran: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jackcochran/ 

Connect with Matthew James: https://www.linkedin.com/in/matthewyoungjames/ 

Connect with Kintan Brahmbhatt: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kintan/ 

Links and Resources Mentioned
Join Presales Collective Slack: https://www.presalescollective.com/slack 

Sol/Con 2026 (Chicago, August 2026): https://www.presalescollective.com/solcon-2026 

Olto: https://olto.com/psc  (3 months free promotional offer mentioned)

Key Topics Covered
Why AI Timing Is Better Now: Moving Beyond Productivity to Workflow Transformation

The Personalization Gap Between B2C and B2B Buyer Experiences

What Olto Is: Product-Trained AI Agents Across the Revenue Journey

Kintan's Amazon Background: Building Personalized Experiences at Scale

SE Capacity Economics and the Unspoken Rule About Qualified Deals

How Product-Trained Agents Differ from Generic AI

The New SE Workflow: Agents Handle Discovery, SEs Focus on Sense-Making

Evolution of SE Metrics, Compensation, and Tooling for the AI Era

Implementation Challenges and Change Management

The Future of the Presales Profession

Timestamps
00:00 Welcome
04:04 Now vs a year ago
05:40 What is Olto
07:52 B2C vs B2B personalization disconnect
11:15 Agent capabilities and limitations
21:35 Future of the solutions roles
28:26 Key takeaways from solutions leaders

Presales teams are being asked more and more to do post-sales work. This isn't a fad or something we're doing in the short term. This is a significant change for the broader profession of presales and solutions consulting. What was once occasional support for implementations or customer renewals is now becoming formal job responsibilities for solutions consultants across the industry.
 
In this episode, Jack Cochran sits down with Shamil Turner, Global Technical Solutions Leader at Figma and Presales Collective advisory board member, to explore why this shift is happening and what it means for the future of presales.
 
Shamil brings a unique perspective to this conversation: he was the first SE hired at Figma, built their entire solutions engineering organization from the ground up, and has now transitioned into a post-sales technical leadership role. Together they discuss the strengths that SEs bring to the table that has a profound impact on a company-customer relationships AFTER the sale has happened, and how this plays out in a new role that has been emerging over the past year, the Forward Deployed Engineer.
Whether you're a leader making organizational decisions or an IC just getting started, this conversation will help you understand how the world of solutions is evolving.
Thank you to Saleo for sponsoring this episode!
Follow Us
Connect with Jack Cochran: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jackcochran/ 

Connect with Shamil Turner: https://www.linkedin.com/in/shamil-turner/ 

Links and Resources Mentioned
Join Presales Collective Slack: https://www.presalescollective.com/slack 

Sol/Con 2026 (Chicago, August 2026): https://www.presalescollective.com/solcon-2026 

Presales Collective Podcast: https://www.presalescollective.com/podcast

Saleo: https://saleo.io 

Key Topics Covered
The Growing Trend of Presales Teams Doing Post-Sales Work

Historical Context: How SEs Have Always Supported Post-Sales

Forward Deployed Engineer Roles in Consumption-Based Models

Why Presales Skills Are Valuable for Customer Onboarding

Shamil's Journey from First SE at Figma to Global Technical Solutions Leader

The Convergence of Pre and Post-Sales Functions

Career Implications for Presales Professionals at All Levels

What This Means for the Future of Solutions Organizations

In this episode, Jack Cochran sits down with Darlene Volas, a senior solutions engineering executive, to explore what it truly means to be an AI-enabled SE in 2025 and beyond. The conversation moves well past basic ChatGPT usage to examine sophisticated operational workflows, custom automation tools, and practical implementation strategies that enhance both efficiency and quality of work. 
 
This episode was recorded during Presales Collective's 2026 AI-Powered Presales Summit on March 19th, 2026. Pro and Pro+ members can view all of the recorded sessions on-demand in the PSC Knowledge Hub: https://www.presalescollective.com/knowledgehub 
 
Follow Us
Connect with Jack Cochran: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jackcochran/ 

Connect with Matthe James: https://www.linkedin.com/in/matthewyoungjames/ 

Connect with Darlene Volas: https://www.linkedin.com/in/darlenevolas/ 

Links and Resources Mentioned
Join Presales Collective Slack: https://www.presalescollective.com/slack 

Sol/Con 2026 (Chicago, August 2026): https://www.presalescollective.com/solcon-2026 

Presales Collective Podcast: https://www.presalescollective.com/podcast 

Perplexity: https://www.perplexity.ai/ 

Claude by Anthropic: https://www.anthropic.com/claude 

Cursor AI coding tool: https://cursor.sh/ 

GitHub Copilot: https://github.com/features/copilot 

Gong conversation intelligence: https://www.gong.io/ 

ChatGPT Enterprise: https://openai.com/enterprise 

Obsidian note-taking: https://obsidian.md/ 

Firebolt database: https://www.firebolt.io/ 

Key Topics Covered
Personal AI Usage Evolution: Moving Beyond Google Replacement to Creative Applications

Three Buckets of AI for SE Leaders: Operations, Team Workflows, and Technical Implementation

Daily Meeting Preparation Automation and Custom-Built AI Applications

Operationalizing SE Teams with Repeatable AI Workflows

Quality vs. Efficiency Trade-off: Better Preparation Rather Than Less Time

Building Technical Credibility Through Hands-On AI Coding

The "One More Thing" Problem and Where Human Expertise Remains Essential

Data Security, Governance, and Vendor Considerations for AI Tools

Why AI Won't Replace SEs: The Irreplaceable Human Element

Hiring AI-Native SEs: What to Look For Beyond Basic Tool Awareness

Timestamps
00:00 Welcome
02:41 How AI conversations have evolved
06:30 Three buckets of AI usage
12:40 Efficiency versus quality improvements
18:40 Building credibility through AI coding
21:07 The one more thing problem
30:59 Why AI won't replace SEs
36:45 Q&A session
39:20 Closing remarks

In this episode, Jack Cochran welcomes back Manisha Raisinghani, Founder and CEO of SiftHub, exactly one year after her first appearance on the show. Together they explore the dramatic shift in how AI is being used by solutions engineers. Manisha shares what it means for SEs to become Forward Deployed Engineers, how vibe coding is changing live customer interactions, and what enterprise leaders are getting wrong about AI adoption. She also offers concrete first steps for SEs and SE leaders who feel like they're behind.
Thank you to SiftHub for sponsoring this episode! Visit sifthub.io to learn more.
Follow Us
Connect with Jack Cochran: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jackcochran/

Connect with Manisha Raisinghani: https://www.linkedin.com/in/manisha-raisinghani/

Links and Resources Mentioned
Join Presales Collective Slack: https://www.presalescollective.com/slack

SiftHub: https://sifthub.io/

Sol/Con (PSC Annual Conference, Chicago): https://www.presalescollective.com/solcon-2026 

Paytm (referenced in board discussion): https://paytm.com

Key Topics Covered
How AI Shifted from Co-Pilot to Workflow Orchestrator

Vibe Coding and the Forward Deployed Engineer

Democratizing Institutional Knowledge

AI Transformation at Enterprise Scale

Making SE Value Visible with Data

Where to Start if You Feel Behind

Timestamps
00:00 Welcome & Intro
03:58 One year later: the headline shift in AI and SE workflows
07:20 Vibe coding — what it is and why SEs should care
10:23 The rise of the Forward Deployed Engineer
14:01 How SiftHub has evolved: from retrieval to reasoning
20:23 Lessons from the Paytm board on enterprise AI adoption
24:43 Sales: the most blamed, least understood function
28:40 First steps for SEs and SE leaders who feel behind