Nerd Show and Tell: Meet Joey Hensen Font Awesome's Controller

Aug 8, 2023

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In this episode, we chat with Joey Henson, the Controller at Font Awesome. Throughout his career, Joey has been working in the startup world, which has lasted most of his time, but he has found himself feeling the strain of burnout since the birth of his son. According to Joey, there can be a lot of pressure in the finance world. Everyone works long hours in an effort to justify their existence in a world that's pretty stressful. Font Awesome, on the other hand, is not like that at all. Joey has noticed a difference in the work culture between Font Awesome and other startups, as the environment at Font Awesome is more relaxed and supportive. This is largely due to the founders' approach to work-life balance and that management understands the effects of burnout and wants to prioritize the well-being of their employees. Having a good work-life balance has enabled Joey to have time for his family and to enjoy a reasonable work-life balance.

Although Joey currently works at Font Awesome in a role that isn't tech-oriented, in his spare time, he enjoys learning SQL, Ruby programming, and Ruby on Rails in addition to his regular job at Font Awesome. Joey also shares how he helped find a Harry Potter themed metaphor to help explain Font Awesome Kits, how he has lobbied for the development of a Harry Potter themed icon set, his obsession with nutrition, fitness, and his journey towards better health over the past few years.

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TIMESTAMPS

0:03:50
Reflection on the Challenges of Working Long Hours

0:05:27
Self-Development and Quality of Life at Font Awesome

0:08:43
Tech, Finance, and Harry Potter Icon Pack at Font Awesome

0:11:13
Exploring Harry Potter Lore to Explain the Functionality of Kits

0:18:34
Dungeons & Dragons and Nutrition Habits

0:20:20
Counting Macros for Optimal Health and Fitness

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HIGHLIGHTS

In a previous Snuggle, we were talking about metaphors or some way to describe how a kit works. And I seem to remember an allusion to Harry Potter lore would maybe be a good way to explain it. I think we discovered that there was confusion among folks between whether a kit is populated like it's a container that's full of something, or if it's empty and you add to it. And what we came around to say was more accurate is that a kit comes fully loaded with everything you might want to use.

Yeah, it is. So Hermione, the beaded bag, it had an undetectable extension charm on it. They used that multiple times in the books and the movies. And it is it's kind of like the DND bag of holding where you can pull out a lot of stuff if you know what's in there. And it comes pre loaded. That works. So, like with Hermiones, the best analogy I could think of was they needed a ton of books and they needed clothes, and when they needed that, Hermione said, oh, let me grab that. Let me just get that out of this bag here. And that's kind of how the kits work, too. You're 100% right. I remember that conversation now where it's, hey, you don't have to worry about it. We've already got it handled for you, and we're going to make it super easy for you to get that out of there.
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NOTES

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