Episode 05: Practical Paths into Applied AI with Brandon Galang

Down to a Science is presented by Galang AI. The views expressed by guests are their own, and guest participation does not constitute endorsement of Galang AI or its products or services. Despite the shared surname, Brandon has no relation to Galang AI. In Episode 5, Brandon Galang, GTM Engineer at Vercel and author of the Substack Leverage Loops, joins Kevin G. Libuit to talk about why being technical no longer depends on writing code. Drawing on a path from industrial engineering to product management at Intel, Amazon, and Wonder, Brandon argues that engineering is really the ability to keep iterating toward a solution. Kevin and Brandon discuss how long-form writing and Amazon's press release FAQ shaped Brandon's thinking, why working well with agents takes something like "theory of mind," and why Brandon would rather overload an agent's context window than under-explain. They also debate whether "taste" is a useful idea in the age of AI, how to break out of the new mean when everyone can build, and how Brandon found a side door into Vercel when every job posting draws hundreds of applicants. They close on the hidden cost of shipping too many tools, how Brandon decides which AI tools are worth learning, and how universities might prepare students for an AI-shaped workforce. Show Notes: https://dtascience.com/episodes/episo... Music licensed through Soundstripe. Code: 2ABVRZT155WBCFJX Chapters 00:00 Engineers iterate toward solutions 00:31 Meet Brandon Galang 02:08 Why long-form writing 05:15 Amazon's press release FAQ 07:52 Writing with AI 10:02 Technical vs. non-technical 11:05 What it means to be an engineer 13:51 From product manager to working with agents 15:11 Theory of mind for agents 18:11 Memento and the narrow world of agents 21:18 Personal agents and persistent context 23:35 Choosing an AI platform 25:25 Taste vs. convergence 30:08 Breaking out of the mean 35:03 Finding the side door to Vercel 37:00 Getting a hiring manager's attention 43:49 AI rewards tinkerers and generalists 47:58 The cost of shipping tools 50:26 Keeping up: the video game controller model 53:22 Find the bottleneck 55:20 Preparing students for an AI workforce 1:00:57 Where to follow Brandon