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

John Cline is Senior Engineering Manager at Blue Apron. Is it important that managers retain their technical skills? How do you keep yourself grounded when the company you’re working for is expanding rapidly. Should we be providing alternate career paths for individuals who don’t want to go into management? John Cline draws on his experiences in program management, event planning, software development, public speaking, strategic leadership, and team development to answers these questions. Show Notes: 1.05 John’s background and career development. 3.05 Working for Ebay. 5.16 Transitioning into management. 8.35 Transfering your skills from a small to large company. 11.35 Joining a company during a period of growth. 13.23 Looking at technological change from a macro perspective. 16.40 Do managers still have to be technically savvy? 17.55 Technical and management skills. 20.50 Career paths for those who don’t want to get into management. 23.49 Do you still work on side projects? 25.17 Carving a career out of software development. 26.51 Technology as a viable career path now. 30.26 Under-represented groups in tech and tech education.

Mark Weiss is a senior software engineer at beeswax. Mark has mastered a multitude of coding languages during his career. A software developer through and through his passion has always been solving problems with code. Mark is also a proponent of the tech sectors open source, sharing community. Host of his own podcast, Using Reflection, he has combined his technical expertise with communication skills to share what he knows with as many people as possible. Mark knows that software engineers don’t exist in a vacuum and stresses the importance of inter-team communication on this podcast. Show Notes: 0.33 The community culture that has developed around tech. 5.07 Developing a thirst for knowledge. 7.04 Recognising and improving personal flaws. 11.36 Factors that can you accelerate your career. 14.37 The difficult parts of leadership and management. 20.14 Working on your soft skills. 27.56 Beeswax position in the ad-tech space. 36.20 How ad-tech is shaping the internet.

Noelia Martinez is the Head of Data Science and Astrophysics at Unbound.com Noelia’s has worked in both a corporate and educational environment. Her wide range of experiences has made her an expert at being able to apply data to any scenario. She is an advocate of using data to tackle global problems such as; pollution and climate change. Noelia knows that the only way to protect our planet is through the application and use of data. Show Notes: 0.32 Noelia academic research. 4.01 Does the ‘data scientist’ role even exist? 4.53 Why did you move from academia to data science. 8.23 What was the biggest shock for you when you moved careers? 12.29 Will automation allow people to stop doing boring tasks. 15.38 Noelia’s opinions on earth day. 22.44 Global warming shouldn’t be a political issue. 24.06 Consumption factors around reusable factors. 26.17 What can we do with data to influence global decisions?

Aubrey is Head of DevOps at Arcadia Group Aubrey counts DevOps amongst her biggest passions. Her past experiences have seen her working for the likes of likes of Pizza Hut and Travel Lodge. Aubrey enjoys reducing the friction between development and operations, especially the SRE model that emerged from Google. Aubrey is a massive advocate of creating a company culture that is supportive and innovative. She hasn’t always led a team this way though. She used to evangelise ‘cutthroat’, target driven methods to get her team’s projects completed on time. In her own words: ‘for those who knew me by another name, I am immensely sorry for being a massive asshole’ Aubrey discusses why she changed her attitude for leadership on today’s show. Show Notes: 0.29 Being a member of the software development club. 4.47 Collaborating with tech talent. 7.15 Celebrating failure. 9.28 Creating career paths for technical people. 13.46 Reducing bureaucracy and increasing innovation. 18.20 Dress down in the office. 25.46 The pressure to perform. 28.16 Staying ahead of innovations in the tech space. 32.01 Getting excited by Kubernetes.

Morgan Craft is CTO at Hickory. Managing a mixed team of psychologists, data-scientists and machine learning experts sounds like a daunting prospect. Not for Morgan though, he has 14+ years of development experience under his belt and knowledge that ranges from psychology to coding. Morgan is also a firm believer in the necessity for continuous learning and enjoys mentoring his peers and helping others grow professionally. We’re the students on today’s podcast as Morgan chat with Andy about disrupting the education sector, making sure you staff remember their training and starting startups. Show Notes: 0.30 NYC, the startup hub. 4.20 Finding a location where you can hire the best talent. 5.30 Morgan’s career progression. 7.27 Working with YCombinator. 8.21 Getting involved in a startup. 10.20 Don’t give attention to unproven technology. 14.08 Working at Hickory. 18.13 Education is primed for disruption. 23.19 Educating peers about GDPR. 28.06 Discussing memory. 29.22 Hickory’s tech ops stack. 31.30 Mentoring your team. 35.18 How do you set your company meaningful goals.

Geoff Cunningham is Data Science Manager at Masternaut. To say Geoff has had a varied career is an understatement. From testing materials in Kazakhstan to reading Aerospace engineering at Cambridge he has a strong background in analytics and statistics. He has ended up working in data science and view’s his varied career as a great asset to both himself and his company. Show Notes: 0.29 Geoff’s varied background. 4.58 Taking a gap year and working throughout uni. 7.51 Data as a viable career path. 10.22 Money being the driving factor for new data professionals. 14.50 Changing careers. 17.31 The value of teaching yourself. 19.13 The cost of education influencing career decisions. 23.36 Weighing up the value of university. 26.12 Clearing up the misconceptions about data science. 28.54 What do you enjoy most about data science. 35.02 Getting to grips with the interview process.

Richard Jarvis Director of Big Data Solutions UK & Ireland at DXC Technology. Richard has worked in IT & telecommunications for 15 years and is currently mentoring and directing a team of 25 people. He is leading teams spread over several continents using cutting edge technologies leveraging Hadoop, Spark, Angular, Electric Search and more. Richard enjoys sharing his technical knowledge and is a regular speaker at events. Show Notes: 0.33 Pushing yourself to be creative in the top level of business. 3.52 A more customer-centric model is in demand in the 21st century. 4.58 Staying technical as a business leader. 5.49 Creating alternate career routes for those not wanting to go into management. 7.36 Finding the best leaders. 10.17 The ‘one company man’ is dead. 13.44 What makes people stay at a company for a long time. 18.21 The freedom to move around in your career is empowering. 21.49 Don’t lie on your CV, show a willingness to learn. 23.38 Having the ‘right attitude’ as a new hire. 28.10 Characteristics that make a great data professional. 31.24 Reading recommendations from Richard. 33.29 Do you need a genuine passion for what you’re doing to truly be innovative.

John Rouda is host of the Geek Leader Podcast, a TEDx speaker, and currently the IT Director at INSP LLC. John is a self professed geek leader. He has spent his professional life inspiring, educating, and motivating leaders the world over. In recent years he’s shared his expertise on stage at TEDx events. For those unable to catch him in person he also hosts leadership podcast ‘ageekleader.com’. John wouldn’t class himself as a natural born leader. Initially, he was more comfortable cutting code than leading a team. But through his own determination and drive he progressed through a journey, gradually learning the skills necessary to become a head of business. The journey started with his podcast and snowballed from there. John believes the path he took is open to anyone, technical or not. All it takes is a first step. Show Notes: 0.36 The most enjoyable aspects of making your own podcast. 3.22 Improving with incremental goals. 7.03 Teaching a concept to others as a way to strengthen your own knowledge. 11.40 Redesigning the way we work. 14.19 Building the 21st-century office around technology. 19.13 Having multiple skill sets on your résumé. 21.05 John’s route into technology. 24.39 Why technical people often struggle in leadership. 29.38 Picking up the reins of leadership. 30.48 Seeking out mentors to help on your leadership journey. 33.39 “Owning” your career.

Azat Mardan is Head of front-end development at Indeed.com and Co-Founder at Node University. Azat knows coding has the power to change lives. That’s why he founded Node University. As an advocate of teaching coding skills, Azat is an expert in instructing through a variety of mediums. Teaching people online, in person, and via books has made him a skilled communicator. He infuses his infectious enthusiasm for programming into everything he teaches. Azat Mardan has taught over 1,000 software engineers in-person and even more online through ebooks and video. He has published 14 books and dozens of online courses and has more than 15 years of experience in web, mobile and software development. Azat has a Bachelor’s Degree in Informatics and a Master of Science in Information Systems Technology degree. Show Notes: 0.59 Azat’s work at Node university. 6.05 The diminishing return of education. 8.20 Corporations, education and hack reactor. 13.56 The institutionalised dream of a one company man. 14.33 creating transparency in business. 15.29 Using software to oust bureaucracy. 18.14 Educating people using video, text and in person. 22.12 Adapting attitudes and behaviors to learning. 25.05 The rise of remote working and its effect on legacy companies. 26.14 Growth hacking? 29.57 Writing and creating content. 32.44 Creating content as a way to keep on learning. 35.17 Staying ahead of your peers. 37.54 Seeking feedback for your work.

Omari is Chief Product Engineer at yoti. A hacker at heart, Omari has been tinkering with computers and code since he was thirteen. He started his career as a web developer but as the years went on his passion migrated towards product engineering and strategy. Working on solutions that provide new ways for people to interact with the digital world is what makes Omari tick. Omari has worked across the entire business spectrum; from technical product development to database management. He has a broad set of technical skills and the entrepreneurial acumen to apply them in a way that’s in line with a company’s wider business goals. He uses those skills on today’s podcast to discuss building software teams and how computer games and DJing kept him focused on his career. Show Notes: 0.29 Professional career breaks. 4.29 Taking a disciplined approach to business. 5.54 Developing good habits for business when growing up. 7.41 Remaining focused throughout your career. 9.52 Traits of great software engineers. 11.18 Omari’s approach to team building. 13.41 The best team building environments. 15.38 Embracing and celebrating failure. 17.31 Are technical teams under more pressure now? 19.30 Becoming more commercially aware as a technical person. 21.45 Moving into management. 24.44 Staying hands-on in a management position. 26.12 Keeping up with evolving tech. 29.32 Detecting false opinions online.