BTS: Behind the Scenes of the Best Place to Build Podcast | Episode 18

1. 0:00 – 3:21

   Introduction and Purpose of the Podcast

   1. SPSpeaker0:00

      [mellow music] Hi, my name is Amrit. We've heard that IIT Madras is the best place to build. [upbeat music] So we've come down to the Sudha and Shankar Innovation Hub. We want to meet some people. These are builders. We want to talk to them about their work, and also ask them: What makes IIT Madras the best place to build? [upbeat music]

   2. SPSpeaker3:05

      Hi, for today's episode, we are going behind the scenes. So why did this podcast come about? Uh, nobody asked us, but we are saying it anyway, and, uh, some of the details of what we do here. So my name is Amrit, uh, with me is Piyush.

   3. SPSpeaker3:17

      Okay. Hi, Amrit. So, um, what are we talking

2. 3:21 – 3:45

   Origins and Evolution of AskIITM

   1. SPSpeaker3:21

      about today?

   2. SPSpeaker3:22

      I think we can start by talking about what is Ask IITM, and why did we get here.

   3. SPSpeaker3:26

      I remember our initial phrasing being, it's a digital successor to the counseling that used to have happen ten years ago, right?

   4. SPSpeaker3:33

      Yeah, counseling stopped in 2009. 2025 is the fourth year of Ask IITM, and I think we made... I think most of the videos, you were involved in, right? Like, uh, 300 videos?

   5. SPSpeaker3:43

      350 videos.

   6. SPSpeaker3:44

      Okay.

3. 3:45 – 6:55

   Challenges and Insights in Content Creation

   1. SPSpeaker3:45

      When we started in the beginning, we were like: "Oh, people are very impatient. Nobody watches more than one minute." And then actually, as a content team, if you could put content consistently, you get a lot of data, and you start realizing that there are a set of people who are looking at longer stuff, who want to deep dive. There are things that you can't really explore, uh, in one minute, two minutes.

   2. SPSpeaker4:07

      And we were also sort of thinking that in terms of the student aspects, we have mostly covered everything. I-

   3. SPSpeaker4:14

      I remember this moment in, uh, very vividly in, uh, the demo day at Bangalore in 2024, where, uh, we were-- we had a three-hour-long presentation and about 200 people. We presented everything, and then at the end... And we were talking of Hyperloop, which is in my background, right? So it's a real thing, that there is a Hyperloop project at IITM, and, uh, there is a track at the other campus. Uh, and, uh, this parent, uh, sort of after the event, uh, uh, came up to me and said, "Why were you guys lying about this?" And we weren't, obviously we were not lying, but so much of cognitive dissonance, like, we are talking about these amazing things that are happening, but somehow the audience is like, "Yeah, I..." Uh, they're stuck in the past, like

   4. SPSpeaker5:00

      Exactly, and

   5. SPSpeaker5:03

      Uh, US...

   6. SPSpeaker5:03

      ... But we showed it. We invited Suyash to the podcast-

   7. SPSpeaker5:12

      Yes

   8. SPSpeaker5:13

      ... who was-

   9. SPSpeaker5:13

      Yeah

   10. SPSpeaker5:13

       ... who started the Hyperloop team in IIT Madras.

   11. SPSpeaker5:15

       Yeah, and Professor Satya also. It took us a while to figure out how to set up the frame and what is the background and what is the art direction on it, and...

   12. SPSpeaker5:23

       I remember you being so particular about this feeling that has to be there, about people leaning in and-

   13. SPSpeaker5:28

       Yeah

   14. SPSpeaker5:28

       ... you know, an egotistical conversation about-

   15. SPSpeaker5:30

       Yeah

   16. SPSpeaker5:30

       ... people just boasting about this.

   17. SPSpeaker5:32

       Because, uh, because in podcasts today, uh, I mean, there are a lot of podcasts that are run by really rich billionaire,

   18. SPSpeaker5:40

       Mm. And I think that humility sort of is also ingrained in how people learn to build over here, by failing consistently at things, and then suddenly something sort of... I mean, not suddenly, but something sort of cracks, and they're able to make something happen.

   19. SPSpeaker6:06

       Correct.... and, uh, the reference point for our podcast was, uh, that sports podcast, I call, uh-

   20. SPSpeaker6:13

       I think-

   21. SPSpeaker6:13

       Breakfast with Champions.

   22. SPSpeaker6:14

       Yeah, Breakfast with Champions.

   23. SPSpeaker6:14

       So that was the frame that we thought matched the vibe we want really well. Amazing. So glad we did this.

   24. SPSpeaker6:24

       A lot of you have, uh, asked us in your messages that, what do we keep in these cups? Uh, we will reveal this at the end of the episode. [laughing]

   25. SPSpeaker6:34

       [laughing] Nobody has asked us that. Nobody.

   26. SPSpeaker6:41

       A- and since a lot of you have been wondering, these plants are indeed fake. These are not real.

   27. SPSpeaker6:46

       They're IKEA plants. The table is IKEA table, chairs are IKEA table, the cushion is IKEA. Amrut is not IKEA Amrut. Anshuman, uh,

4. 6:55 – 9:10

   Guest Selection and Scheduling

   1. SPSpeaker6:56

      we should start by talking about who do we call, how do we select, or how do we decide who to call?

   2. SPSpeaker7:02

      We call anyone who agrees to travel to Chennai. [laughing]

   3. SPSpeaker7:06

      Okay, but... No, jokes apart. So we-- So I think when we started thinking about who would we call on the podcast, the first thought, which both of us unanimously agreed on, is that we don't have a dearth of builders in IIT Madras ecosystem.

   4. SPSpeaker7:24

      We were just- W- actually, we were... It was the opposite. Like, yeah, plenty.

   5. SPSpeaker7:28

      How do we order the-

   6. SPSpeaker7:30

      Yeah

   7. SPSpeaker7:30

      ... guests?

   8. SPSpeaker7:31

      Yeah.

   9. SPSpeaker7:32

      And the idea is to call people who have been part of the IIT Madras ecosystem. T-they might all still be a part, or they might have graduated. Uh, thing is, the- once you have been a part of this ecosystem, you never actually leave.

   10. SPSpeaker7:49

       Yeah.

   11. SPSpeaker7:49

       You are always engaged, connected in some way or the other.

   12. SPSpeaker7:52

       As you said in the beginning, there's a problem of plenty. So it's not really about selecting and not selecting, it's about figuring out who to call first and who to call next.

   13. SPSpeaker8:00

       I think, uh, as you said earlier [chuckles] one of our issues is that, uh, because we shoot it in Chennai, and I guess it doesn't come across to the audience, but we actually shoot at 7:00 in the morning and 9:00 in the morning, because CFI, as a space, gets extremely crowded and noisy, and it's not fair for us to go and tell someone, "We are gonna occupy this place for four, five hours." First shoot starts at 7:00. So because of that practical constraint, a lot of people we can't call.

   14. SPSpeaker8:26

       Yeah, and, yeah, g- getting, uh, people's schedule to align with the shoot dates, then making them... Um, and most of these people who are busy in building, they, I mean, they are busy, and traveling to another city just for, uh, this, at times, gets difficult. But I think we have been very fortunate in, uh, in a way that most of the people who we have asked, they have been able to-

   15. SPSpeaker8:51

       They've been able to find

   16. SPSpeaker8:52

       ... find time and, uh, turn up for the shoots.

   17. SPSpeaker8:55

       Yeah, yeah. I mean, luckily, there are lots who are staying on campus, so I mean, yeah, it's not, it's not impossible. But, yeah, somebody staying in Delhi or Bangalore or US, uh, scheduling-

   18. SPSpeaker9:07

       Yeah

   19. SPSpeaker9:08

       ... is a big concern.

5. 9:10 – 12:16

   Research and Preparation for Episodes

   1. SPSpeaker9:10

      Um, the other thing that I like that you lead and you manage is the research process.

   2. SPSpeaker9:16

      In, in a couple of episodes, the topic of their, uh, the area of their, uh, work-

   3. SPSpeaker9:22

      Yeah

   4. SPSpeaker9:22

      ... has been so complicated that we have to educate ourself. We have had to consult other experts in the-

   5. SPSpeaker9:27

      Yeah

   6. SPSpeaker9:27

      ... field to be able to-

   7. SPSpeaker9:28

      Like, please explain what this person is talking about.

   8. SPSpeaker9:30

      Yeah.

   9. SPSpeaker9:30

      Or if they send us their, uh... Sometimes the guest will send us a list of their publications, and these are, like, all conference papers or research papers or journal papers, and we have to literally, like, go through and figure out, "Acha, what does this mean?" And then...

   10. SPSpeaker9:44

       Yeah. But it's been enjoyable.

   11. SPSpeaker9:46

       Yeah. Publicity helps, and we-

   12. SPSpeaker9:49

       Yeah

   13. SPSpeaker9:49

       ... we hope we are able to call-

   14. SPSpeaker9:51

       Call

   15. SPSpeaker9:51

       ... the founder-

   16. SPSpeaker9:52

       Yeah

   17. SPSpeaker9:52

       ... sometime.

   18. SPSpeaker9:54

       Yeah. Arvind, if you're seeing this, please come on our podcast.

   19. SPSpeaker9:58

       The final thing that I get from the team that's heading the re- that's running the research, is so well-structured that for me, it's... When I, when I start the podcast, it feels very comfortable.

   20. SPSpeaker10:09

       I can easily come across as really stupid.

   21. SPSpeaker10:12

       Always waiting for a comment saying, "Who the f- Who is this person? [chuckles] Why does he think he can interview, uh," whatever, Arvind and sir or something, so...

   22. SPSpeaker10:20

       Well, I, I, I think you have fared really well so far in the conversations.

   23. SPSpeaker10:24

       Two main ideas while, uh, uh, while deciding on what we are going to talk about. One is, since we are talking about build, we don't just want to, like, superficially touch upon the guest's work. We want to take a slight deep dive and understand, uh, the core tech, understand the product, the- their work slightly in more detail than, uh, we would. The other aspect that, uh, we tend to cover, uh, is, uh, their personal journeys. Because the work, the, the work they choose to do and how they do it, what they build, is always an outcome of the person that they are, the circumstances that they-

   24. SPSpeaker11:07

       And we have enjoyed it a lot. Whether it is, uh, Sharon talking about his love for sleep. [chuckles]

   25. SPSpeaker11:13

       Yeah, the personal stories, yeah-

   26. SPSpeaker11:15

       Okay

   27. SPSpeaker11:15

       ... they, they make the conversation much more colorful than-

   28. SPSpeaker11:19

       I remember Divanshu talking about, uh, how he was at IIT Kanpur. He thought he'll join IIT Kanpur, but just missed by a rank, and then his house is two hours away from there, and then now he has to come all the way to Madras because that's the course he got.

   29. SPSpeaker11:32

       Another thing, how, how the first robot that he built as his master's project was laughed at by the actual users, and that's what, uh, d- motivated him to build an actual, uh, robot that can be used by the manual engineers, and see where they are now.

   30. SPSpeaker11:48

       Yeah. Uh, my favorite story, though, is Anand Rajaram talking about how he named Junglee, because there was always... There was already a company called Ya- Yahoo!
6. 12:16 – 14:07

   Episode Release and Audience Engagement

   1. SPSpeaker12:16

      Indu takes care of, uh, the episode release once the edit is done.

   2. SPSpeaker12:22

      So, uh, I mean, the initial idea was that, um, we build some curiosity in the audience about, um, what the next guest is gonna talk about. So on Thursday, we have this teaser reel where, um, we have anecdotes, um, which are full stories within themselves. So they are segments from the interview that we put in into a reel, and then the next day, Friday, is usually our episode release. Like, it has always been that way. Uh, so our episode release also happens, like, um, through a reel on Instagram, YouTube, and, um, like LinkedIn. So we release across all the three platforms, and, um, there are obviously the captions and everything is, um, structured according to the platform, because the kind of audience we have on Instagram is pretty different, and the kind of content that our audience consumes on Instagram is pretty different from the kind of content our, uh, audience c- consumes on LinkedIn. So yeah, I mean, that's, um, that's basically pretty much it.

   3. SPSpeaker13:31

      I remember, uh, while doing the initial few episodes, we, as consumers, had experienced that sometimes captions are very clickbaity, and when you d- uh, go to the actual content, you are very disappointed, and we didn't want our viewers to have the same feeling. So we try to stay true to the actual content while we are writing the captions.

   4. SPSpeaker13:53

      It's very real, that's for sure. Like, um, I think that's something that has, um, helped us gain a certain amount of loyal audience, as I can see in my [chuckles] uh, YouTube analytics.

7. 14:07 – 16:11

   Behind the Scenes: Setup and Filming

   1. SPSpeaker14:07

      But yeah, obviously, like, we need our podcast to reach a lot more people, a lot of... And there's so many people who can benefit from it, because we cover such a diverse range of topics and entrepreneurs, professors, alums.

   2. SPSpeaker14:23

      Mridul, uh, let's start, like, let's talk a little bit about like how we set up the frame and what are all the things that we do, like, yeah.

   3. SPSpeaker14:33

      Yeah, I mean, like for the setup preparation, I mean, our day basically start at 4:00 or 5:00. We reach here by 5:30, 6:00. It takes almost an hour to do the setup. I mean, it looks simple on the camera. In the final output, it may look like you okay, just put a table and chair and you are done, but, yeah-

   4. SPSpeaker14:51

      Yeah, nobody sees how much cleaning up we have to do. Like, uh, when we reach in the morning, the whole thing is basically a mess. I mean, yeah, that's okay, because this is a builder's lab, right? End of the day, students are here to build something, and the whole process is messy. But yeah, it takes a lot of effort to clean everything up, and then, then we have to start setting everything up.

   5. SPSpeaker15:16

      I mean, hiring a studio will be way easier and convenient for us. But, uh, the idea behind choosing CFI is we want to showcase that IITM, uh, Madras is a Best Place To Build. And what is, what is a better place to have the podcast? We have CFI teams here. We have Nirman here. I couldn't think of any better way- better place for this.

   6. SPSpeaker15:41

      Yeah, I have also seen this with a lot of guests who, after a long time, are coming back to CFI to shoot the podcast. First thing they do is they go around the whole building. They literally see each and everything, and the smile on their face is something else. So, Anshuman, uh, how does it feel to be on the other side of camera? Let's start by that. [chuckles]

   7. SPSpeaker16:06

      ...

   8. SPSpeaker16:07

      [chuckles] I want to get away. [chuckles]

8. 16:11 – 17:38

   Travel and Team Bonding

   1. SPSpeaker16:11

      Okay. So I wanted to talk about the trips that we do to Chennai to shoot the podcast.

   2. SPSpeaker16:17

      I think, uh, we are, from December onwards, every three weeks-

   3. SPSpeaker16:22

      October

   4. SPSpeaker16:23

      ... we are at least-

   5. SPSpeaker16:23

      October onward. We started in the-

   6. SPSpeaker16:25

      Oh, wait, October?

   7. SPSpeaker16:26

      October, yeah, October.

   8. SPSpeaker16:27

      We started October.

   9. SPSpeaker16:27

      I think this week-

   10. SPSpeaker16:28

       Yeah, this time we are here, and on Monday we were here. Today is Friday... uh, not Friday, Sunday.

   11. SPSpeaker16:33

       Two trips in a week, you and, uh, Amrit have done.

   12. SPSpeaker16:36

       Yeah, that also, like, we drove down both the time. It's fun. So whenever we get a chance to travel anywhere, we generally prefer to, like, come together, and, and it's fun, super fun, because in the car we end up talking about so many things, right? Yeah, and, like, Amrit has lived in Chennai for a very long time, right? That also, like, every time we are coming to Chennai now, he's putting in efforts to take us to different places, which are actually, like, those things, uh... These places are such places that you would only know if you have lived in a city for a really long time. And, uh, because of going to these places, you also start feeling that you know the city a bit more.

   13. SPSpeaker17:21

       And also that we, we do our shoots on weekends-

   14. SPSpeaker17:24

       Yeah

   15. SPSpeaker17:24

       ... and early morning. So once we-- most of the time we are done with our shoot on Saturdays and Sundays by, say, 11:00 o'clock, and then-

   16. SPSpeaker17:32

       And then we go-

   17. SPSpeaker17:32

       We have rest of the day to explore and-

   18. SPSpeaker17:34

       We go out in our cities, then we do something, something. Yeah, I agree.

9. 17:38 – 18:25

   Reflections and Streamlining the Process

   1. SPSpeaker17:38

      Do you remember, like, how much firefighting was done when we were releasing the first episode?

   2. SPSpeaker17:43

      Yeah.

   3. SPSpeaker17:44

      It was so stressful.

   4. SPSpeaker17:45

      I think by that time we rolled out our third or fourth episodes, we... It was fairly streamlined, although never 100%. We still continue to find out certain new things every ep- every episode or so, but, uh, largely under control, and that's fairly streamlined. There's a nice rhythm to it now.

   5. SPSpeaker18:03

      Yeah, we don't have to break, break our heads anymore. [chuckles] Like, everyone knows what they have to do. [upbeat music]

Episode duration: 18:25