Venturi's Voice: Technology | Leadership | Staffing | Career | Innovation

Steve Thair is co-founded of DevOpsGuys. Steve founded DevOps guys in 2013 after a 20+ year career in IT infrastructure and operations to help organisations simplify the management of their online applications by leveraging DevOps practices to improve the delivery, performance and time-to-market of the entire software development pipeline. He blogs extensively on DevOps at the DevOpsGuys Blog and has presented at numerous meetups, webinars and conference to evangelise the benefits of DevOps. DevOps Group The DevOps Group delivers IT transformation at the speed of disruption, by building DevOps capabilities within its clients. Enabling businesses to continually meet the relentlessly increasing demands of delivering great digital customer experiences. As a next-generation digital business with hands-on experience at enterprise scale, DevOps Group’s services enable clients to stay ahead of the tech curve, empower transformation leaders and unlock business agility. Podcast Steve explains the hippo principle and how it can affect your business. Andy asks Steve where he gets his ideas from. They discuss building a DevOps community and how one can leverage the open source tech community.

“You mentioned focusing on the outcome. That’s something that’s really important when we talk about being busy. Being busy isn’t an outcome, its a problem. If we are focused on outcomes then you see things like meetings as toxic because they limit your potential output. But simiraily just diving in to working on something and working really hard on it, also is something that isn’t the wisest approach. You need to step back and think about things. You can follow that through to your personal life as well. What do you actually want to achieve as a human being?” Ryan talking about the advantages of smart working Ryan is CTO at Shift Commerce Ryan brings agility to mid-enterprise-scale retailers. He has over 15 years experience developing for the web, and an undying passion for web performance. His pragmatic and performance-led outlook means that—on the rare occasion that he does wear a shirt—his sleeves stay firmly rolled up: even as an exec, his favourite place is right there in the thick of things with his team. Shift Commerce SHIFT is the first ecommerce platform to successfully combine the speed and affordability of SaaS with the flexibility of hosted solutions. Podcast Ryan talks to Andy about the role automation is increasingly playing in everyone’s lives, why culture is important for business and why we should never glorify being busy but instead focus on smart working.

“The first type of question I often get asked is about marketing. People come to me and say ‘now that we’ve built this thing, how do we let people know it exists and how do we differentiate ourselves from the rest of the market?’. The second type of question I often get asked as a mentor is ‘How do I grow my team? Who do I hire next? What type of person do I need given the problem I have today?’.” Peter describes the common questions he gets asked when mentoring in the workplace. Peter Wang is CTO at The Mighty. Peter is helping build a global healthcare community to provide safe and supportive spaces for patients and caregivers to connect with one another. With a large proportion of the population suffering from chronic health conditions Peter’s goal is to make access to health services as easy as possible for this demographic. The Mighty The Mighty is a digital health community created to empower and connect people facing health challenges and disabilities. They have over 2 million registered users and are adding a new one every 20 seconds. Their stories and videos are viewed and shared more than 90 million times a month. Podcast Peter sat down with Andy to talk about the growth of boot camps and how tech can be used to disrupt the education sector. They also discussed the role of the mentor in a modern company and the evolving role and style of leaders today.

“I refer to this concept as sympathy for software, if you don’t have some sympathy for what is hard and what is easy about software I think it’s difficult to authentically manage clever people who are doing that as their deep skill set” Matthew Sinclair is VP of Engineering (London) at BCG Digital Ventures. BCG Digital Ventures invents, builds and invests in startups. Matthew’s role within this incubation firm is to oversee the growth and launch of its technology startups. Years spent consulting organisations on their technology strategy and product development has made him a perfect fit for this role. Matthew has worked for companies ranging from 50 staff members to 500. He’s able to pick out pain-points in a businesses technology strategy before they’ve even happened. And is skilled at communicating solutions to these flaw in terms all members of the business can understand. Show Notes: 0.30 Building startups with money. 1.41 Getting inspired by a diverse working environment. 3.35 Past experiences shaping your current skills. 5.39 The different management styles in the UK and Australia. 7.40 Getting people on-board with your ideas. 9.21 Australian rules. 10.47 Transitioning from engineering to management. 14.37 Completing an MBA in business. 17.08 Celebrating failure. 22.15 Putting time and money into innovation. 25.08 Matthew’s blogging side-project. 30.09 Talking about the book ‘Flow’. 31.02 Being creative whatever medium you’re working in. 33.30 Directions to Matthew’s blog.

Barry is CIO at Domino’s pizza UK. Barry has had a varied career working in finance, FMCG, manufacturing and, most recently, pizza. He spent 5 years as the chief information officer at Domino’s in Australia before moving companies only to return to the fold early last year. After 6 years at Parmalat Australia he is now the CIO of Domino’s UK. Domino’s, along with many other companies, is reacting to the changes brought about by data. Utilising data to its full potential is what separates good and great companies. Barry is responsible for ensuring Domino’s is getting the most out of its technology and data. Show Notes: 0.32 Finding talent that can help you achieve your business goals. 4.36 Ensuring compliance with GDPR. 7.16 Scoring some free pizza. 9.08 Domino’s the data company? 11.41 Using company culture as a vehicle to roll out change in a business. 13.48 When did companies become all about the data? 16.18 How has the CIO role changed over your career? 17.42 The software talent gap in the UK. 20.37 Why is there a software skills shortage in Britain? 22.41 Automation gives us the time to spend more time on business strategy? 25.08 Next-gen tech: The digital workspace. 28.34 Working in a ‘happening’ workspace. 29.47 Creating a collaborative work culture. 31.48 What keeps getting you out of bed every morning? 34.46 Finding a scene of purpose in your work. 36.10 Advice for those starting their data careers?

Scott is Director of product design at DAZN Scott has worked for prestigious companies including: Amazon, the BBC and Sky. He builds and leads great design teams that deliver world-class user experiences to global audiences. Working for such large corporations, Scott knows how difficulties it can be for teams to act autonomously. He also knows the best innovations and ideas come from teams that have been given the freedom to approach problems the way they want. He sat down with Andy to discuss how teams in large companies can be given the freedom to solve problems in their own ways. Show Notes: 00.31 Leadership leads to a sense of responsibility. 02.04 The big impact one person can have on your team. 03.37 Creating a team of diverse members. 05.58 Applying previous lessons to creating a team. 09.34 Is it impossible to create autonomy in a big organisation? 12.03 Where do product managers come from? 16.31 Tech up north. 18.27 Let's use tech to de-nuclearise the UK tech scene. 22.19 We need to celebrate failure. 26.56 Approaching your first leadership role. 29.54 Connecting with peers externally.

Sophie Theen is Head of HR & Talent at 11FS. 11FS is about to undergo a period of growth. Sophie joined the company to oversee this expansion. A HR professional with a background in engineering she is uniquely placed to understand the pain points associated with rapidly growing a tech team. Sophie’s passion lies in helping companies understand the importance of People, Culture and Talent as a key in success at the same time championing in Diversity & Inclusion. Show Notes: 00.30 The importance of HR and culture. 02.08 A good HR department is necessary to increase retention. 06.17 Has the tech startup culture changed how HR departments operate. 07.30 Cycling through staff to keep your culture fresh. 13.55 Working with churn. 16.13 Crunching the numbers in HR. 19.44 What makes a good HR professional? 24.19 Recruitment, HR and sales. 27.46 The role technology is playing in the HR process.

Dave is Head of Software Engineering at the LADbible Group. Although he is now technically ‘off the tools’ Dave still loves to code. A passion he has instilled into everyone that works for him and one he has gained through his years of experience as a Head of Software. The high demand for ‘good’ software engineers is a key talking point of the show. Nurturing talent and creating a work environment that allows employees to get satisfaction from their roles is something Dave strives for. Show Notes: 00.35 Seeking external feedback for your career. 01.41 Job hopping early in your career. 05.14 Retaining staff. 09.01 Transparency in management. 12.05 Moving into management. 19.54 Having a sense of pride in your team as a manager. 24.56 Manchester’s tech community. 30.03 Working lean and failing fast. 34.12 Making a creative space for you to try business innovations. 35.17 Approaching problems with a plan.

Alastair is Head of Product at Trint. At one point Alastair was the lead UX and Head of Product at Trint. Juggling these roles in a small startup was a challenge but he excelled at it.Thankfully, this didn’t last long and Alastair was able to build out the product team to the size of four in a very short space of time. He sat down with Andy to talk through this growth on the podcast and talk about he ended up as a Head of Product. Show Notes: 00.31 Working in Hackney and startups. 02.52 Alastair’s background and career progression. 05.12 How do you become a head of product. 08.33 What is Trint selling? 11.17 Building a business with constantly evolving tech. 14.57 Getting great feedback from your users. 18.25 Is it important to have a genuine interest in what you’re working on. 23.38 What keeps you motivated in your career. 27.29 Dealing with churn.

Paul is Head of Information Technology at Graham & Brown. Paul knows the best way to keep a company innovating is by listening to and encouraging ideas from its most junior members. Paul came to this conclusion after an abysmal work experience placement in his teenage years. This has led him to build innovative and engaging work placements to foster future talent. Show Notes: 00.33 Getting your work-life balance right. 03.00 Encouraging employee interests outside of work. 04.42 Creating a portfolio of work to augment your career. 08.19 How we treat employees: a generational divide. 11.39 Pauls career. 14.01 Alternate career paths for people who don’t like management. 16.57 Find someone who can ‘learn everything’. 21.53 Swapping jobs every few years. 24.54 Selling yourself on your achievements, not on your years worked at a company. 26.42 Tech moves so quick, how do you stay in demand? 32.19 Continually innovating. 34.00 How will tech evolve in the future.