RICKY: KIRIN! Kirin, Kirin, Kirin. So great to finally get some time with you.
KIRIN: Great to meet you.
RICKY (EYES DARTING AROUND THE ROOM): Cool... cool, cool, cool.
RICKY (WHO THE FUCK IS KIRIN?): SO!
Kirin smiles nervously.
RICKY (WHY ARE WE MEETING?): Sooooo...
RICKY (GOD DAMNIT RICKY. YOU NEVER PREPARE. BUT YOU KNOW WHAT. THAT'S WHAT I LOVE ABOUT YOU. LET'S WING IT BABY): SO!
RICKY (CLAPPING EXPECTANTLY): I'm excited for this!
KIRIN: Yes, I've been looking forward to finally getting my project!
RICKY: YES! Of course. Project. You need a project Kirin. Project. We've got some great projects here. On this team. And I'm about to give you one! A great one.
RICKY (SILENTLY, TO HIMSELF): Come on Ricky, this man needs a project. Give me a project. Give me a project.
RICKY: Your project is... your project is...
RICKY (TAKEN, WIDE-EYED, CLOSE TO YELLING): YOU'RE PROJECT IS... PORTING OUR HR TOOLING MOBILE SUITE TO LOW-END ANDROID PHONES FOR BUSINESSES IN DEVELOPING COUNTRIES!
RICKY (SILENTLY, TO HIMSELF): Did you just improv that Ricky? You're a god damn pro.
KIRIN (DEVASTATED): Great!
RICKY: Super great, Kirin. I'm really excited for you. You see, as a product manager, my ear is always on the pulse of upper management. And you know what the harsh truth is Kirin? They don't respect us. They think, "Human Resources Internal Tooling? That's a team? What the fuck do they do? How much are we paying them?" Hell, if I hadn't bombed my placement interviews, you think I'd be here? I belong on the Foogle Video team, Kirin! Or AT LEAST, News Feed Optimization. God!
RICKY (SIGHING): Whatever. What's done is done. We're here now, and we've got to make the best of it. And that means making upper management respect us. HR Tools needs an image overhaul. We've got to think like upper management, Kirin. What do they want to see?
KIRIN: I'm not sure.
RICKY: I'll tell you what they want to see. Expansion to third world countries. Emerging markets. That's the new hot topic these days. Indonesia, Kirin. You know where Indonesia is? Neither do I. Nor do I have the slightest clue what people do there, Kirin. But according to our data scientists, they're all using Foogle. And they're really into it. All day every day, scrolling, on the app, doing God knows what, trading coconuts and shit I guess.
KIRIN (TAKING NOTES): Got it.
KIRIN'S NOTES:
- INDONESIA. COCONUTS?
RICKY: The thing about emerging markets is they're all using these garbage phones on terrible wifi. So all the big teams-- Video, Marketplace, News-- you know-- they're all racing to get their bloated, first world, apps to run on these tiny screens with shitty internet and 10 megabytes of RAM or whatever. Why? Because think about how many Indonesians there are. Billions, Kirin, billions! They know that if their product launches out there, engagement will quintuple, upper management will cream themselves, and they'll all get huge promotions.
Now, I don't know if you know this, but our metrics are abysmal, Kirin. We have one hundred god damn users. Pathetic. Video has two billion. TWO BILLION. And once they hit Indonesia... God, it'll be a blood-bath.
KIRIN: But our team makes internal tools right? It's just to help Pagii's human resources staff. And there's only a hundred people on HR. Don't we kind of... max out at 100 users?
RICKY: You think the Assistant VP of Internal Infrastructure is going to take that bullshit excuse? These guys don't care, Kirin. They want to see numbers. Big numbers. Write that down.
KIRIN'S NOTES:
- INDONESIA. COCONUTS?
- BIG NUMBERS
RICKY: You gotta think bigger, Kirin. Visualize with me. You're an Indonesian coconut refurbisher. One of your employees is turning fifty three. He's going to die soon. Life expectancy probably isn't great out there. He needs to find a new employee. How is he going to do it?
KIRIN: Ask around, I guess?
RICKY: Ask around? These people aren't neanderthals, Kirin. Jesus. No. He's going to take out his 2008 Motorola ShitBrick, load up the PAGII HUMAN RESOURCES SUITE, press the "RECRUIT" button, pay five grand, and BOOM-- we scrape the whole internet, LinkedIn, Twitter, Instagram, Blogspot, everything. We search every computer with an open port in every corner of the world to assemble a list of potential candidates, perfectly tailored to the opening. He pays another five grand, and BOOM-- we'll use neural networks to generate a custom orientation video for his new hires. Let's say we screwed up and the new guy's an asshole. He pays another grand, and BOOM-- generate the workplace harassment paperwork and a severance package structure. All on his crappy 2G connection. The future is coming, Kirin. And it's coming fast.
KIRIN: Is... is all that really possible?
RICKY: I give the visions, Kirin. I'm a seer. The "How", and even the "Why", really, are just details. That's a mystery for you to figure out. And it's a beautiful mystery, Kirin. God, I'm jealous of you engineers sometimes. But we each have our own paths, and deep down, I wouldn't trade what I do for anything. Anyway, I've gotta run. All the best. Let's get it done by H2, yeah?
2:48 - RICKY POINTS A FINGER GUN AT KIRIN AND MAKES A CLICKING SOUND WITH HIS MOUTH WHILE EXITING THE MEETING ROOM.