In this episode, I am in conversation with Jeremy Kriegel, a UX leader and the host of the Saving UX podcast.Jeremy sharesGetting into UX accidentallyStarted in the mid 90s, Undergrad in CMU, Art and EnglishStudying electronic and time based media and working with robotic sculptureA friend asking for help with creating a websiteHiring friends and colleagues to start an agencyGetting introduced to HCI and taking a more formal approach to learning UXHow his stint with Xerox was a great learning experienceMoving on to various companies across industriesOne common theme has been agile ways of workingWorking with xerox printers that were complex -- from tree to book - and managing the various steps and interactionsThe relevance of user research and how or why many organizations do not do thatAbout creating processes that meets a team’s needsHow creativity is part of everyone’s workJeff Patton’s guidance on creating a holistic vision in  lightweight way and a tree analogyShares a story about an experience with working on a poker platform that needed to comply with new taxability regulations in FranceHis thumb rule of gathering inputs from 8 people, for a more comprehensive understandingQuantitative gives a lot of what, but not why..Letting go of internal bias [not asking leading questions etc]Why role based personas approach need to be re-looked at, to identify inflexion points to understand how their needs change over timeLearning from the model used by many gamesThe benefit of not optimizing for first use experienceHelping the user stay focused and accomplish their goals; with post-pandemic, how can UX discipline help not only stay focused, but also provide breaks to refresh themselvesJeremy Kriegel is a UX leader, very active on various professional forums.He is also the host of the podcast ‘Saving UX’https://www.linkedin.com/in/jeremykriegel/

In the second part of the podcast episode, Gayatri Kalyanaraman is in conversation with Rohit Salecha, Security Engineering Manager in Disney+Hotstar and book author of GitOpsRohit continues to share the areas that he’s planning to learn in terms of Web3 He shares how he ties complex technologies and the necessity that has driven him to learn it as he’s responsible for security He shares some of the key areas he wants to improve in being a manager for other team members as well as give back to the community that has helped himRohit gives a nugget of wisdom to keep coding and continue to learnRohit Salecha is a technology geek who loves to explore anything that runs and understands binary. As a security engineer he is passionate about learning the length,breadth and depth of technology.Being more on the defensive side he has evangelised secure software development at various organizations for more than a decade.Rohit is driven by “everything as code” mantra and strongly believes that the security team must strive towards making themselves irrelevant. In his free time he is either reading books or watching movies. He is a fitness freak who loves to jog,swim and cycle on different terrains.More details checkout his linked in page - https://www.linkedin.com/in/rohitsalecha/https://rohitsalecha.com

In the first part of the podcast episode, Gayatri Kalyanaraman is in conversation with Rohit Salecha, Security Engineering Manager in Disney+Hotstar and book author of GitOpsRohit talks about his passion towards electronics and how he was experimenting in many of the areas. He also shares how he joined the software journey by accidentRohit believes that every engineer out there needs to be exceptional in what they do, but also know how to do basic coding. When he talks about coding he’s not only discussing about software as Java, C++ but also no code, system design level understanding as wellRohit started as a software engineer in Mastek and realised that he was passionate about how the embedding security in the software modules that he was developingAfter a few years of being a software engineer, he join NII consulting with specialisation in secure software. In each step, he talks about the want to expand his knowledge and thirst in this areaRohit is the author of the book GitOps and he shares some of the key challenges that he encountered in writing the book including creating a fully functional design, code and keeping up with the versions of the software modulesRohit Salecha is a technology geek who loves to explore anything that runs and understands binary. As a security engineer he is passionate about learning the length, breadth and depth of technology.Being more on the defensive side he has evangelised secure software development at various organizations for more than a decade.Rohit is driven by “everything as code” mantra and strongly believes that the security team must strive towards making themselves irrelevant. In his free time he is either reading books or watching movies. He is a fitness freak who loves to jog, swim and cycle on different terrains.More details checkout his linked in page - https://www.linkedin.com/in/rohitsalecha/https://rohitsalecha.com

In this second part of my conversation, Bill Hall, President of Simulation Studios sharesSome of his professional failures when he was given large responsibilities at a very young ageHow sims enable executives to get a feel for the impact of their decisions and learn from that experienceThe role of software in the simulation exercises he runsA quick walkthrough of how a sim is runAspects of an organization that need to be built into a simulationQualities that would help someone be like BillNo fear of failure or encouraging failure as an opportunity to learnGiving things a go and learning from the experienceHow he communicates with all levels of roles in any organizationHow he understands the context of an organization quicklyUsing butcher paper to spatially and visually organize his thoughtsTaking a break and breathing in nature - to organize thoughts and doing a brain dumpCascading learnings in an organization by training learners to also be trainersRelevance of simulation based tools to enable high performing teams quicklyWhat he readsLimits of simulationBill partners with companies and individuals to build highly strategic mindsets resulting in accelerating change. Utilizing business simulations, leadership development, and business coaching, Bill helps shift mindsets and build skillsets resulting in driving positive change more quickly and with less friction. Currently President of Simulation Studios, Bill closely partners with companies and people in all types of corporate development scenarios. Bill has successfully worked for and with companies such as Apple, Sony, Boeing, Lockheed Martin, Korn Ferry, Caterpillar, Sephora, and many more. Prior to Simulation Studios, Bill managed Skype’s global strategic software business, was in executive marketing roles at AOL and Nortel, and enjoyed working with Steve Jobs on various strategic projects during his 15+ years working with Apple where he was a five-time Apple MVP, and a Golden Apple Award winner. Bill authored a #1 Training and Development Amazon best-selling book, been featured in major publications and podcasts, and earned an MBA in Entrepreneurship and a Strategy Execution certificate from Harvard Business School. Bill spends the majority of his time with his family in the San Francisco Bay Area.  Book Link:https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00CMBP1TA Forbes Articles:https://www.forbes.com/sites/forbescoachescouncil/people/billhall1/?sh=373b957726aa Contact Info:Contact at SimulationStudios.com and ask for BillLinkedIn www.linkedin.com/in/wphall

In this conversation, Bill Hall, President of Simulation Studios sharesHow he used to be part of a bandThen deciding to go to college and doing some work for AppleGetting into roles that needed to turnaround organizationsImportance of getting people to be behind the turnaroundsGetting an inspiration to start simulation studiosThe importance of unlearning in a turnaround situation, along with relearn and learn newChallenges of changes in an organization across teams, geographies etcTechnology should not come in the way of learningTeam and learning architectures for transformationsUsing personality profiling tools, such as MBTIHow he got into simulations or games, as he calls themHow a typical sim session looks likeAttributes of an effective simIdentifying metrics and justifying investments for a turnaroundI asked how simulations help with individual contributors taking up transformation leadership roles.The answer to this question and more in the next episode.. When Bill starts taking about some failures he had faced in his careerBill partners with companies and individuals to build highly strategic mindsets resulting in accelerating change. Utilizing business simulations, leadership development, and business coaching, Bill helps shift mindsets and build skillsets resulting in driving positive change more quickly and with less friction. Currently President of Simulation Studios, Bill closely partners with companies and people in all types of corporate development scenarios. Bill has successfully worked for and with companies such as Apple, Sony, Boeing, Lockheed Martin, Korn Ferry, Caterpillar, Sephora, and many more. Prior to Simulation Studios, Bill managed Skype’s global strategic software business, was in executive marketing roles at AOL and Nortel, and enjoyed working with Steve Jobs on various strategic projects during his 15+ years working with Apple where he was a five-time Apple MVP, and a Golden Apple Award winner. Bill authored a #1 Training and Development Amazon best-selling book, been featured in major publications and podcasts, and earned an MBA in Entrepreneurship and a Strategy Execution certificate from Harvard Business School. Bill spends the majority of his time with his family in the San Francisco Bay Area.  Book Link:https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00CMBP1TA Forbes Articles:https://www.forbes.com/sites/forbescoachescouncil/people/billhall1/?sh=373b957726aa Contact Info:Contact at SimulationStudios.com and ask for BillLinkedIn www.linkedin.com/in/wphall

In this episode, I continue the conversation with Steven Aberle, founder of a company in stealth mode, working on domain aware, large language model based processing for very niche applications.In the previous episode, Steven spoke about his origin story and also how he got into and some of the technical challenges related to a domain aware large language model solution - and his patent in that area.He continues to share aboutHow the same engine can still retain some originality and uniquenessHow updates to the base model can happen, to mature the model over timeHow ingesting content from various sources is becoming easier with APIsThen the reverse podcast starts! The questions are Steven’s and responses are mineSteven asked about where young companies could go wrongFounders’ passionChemistry with the investorsScaling too fastHis own trigger to jump into this venture.. That it was born out of hating some of the persistent pain points in the area of workHis philosophy of ‘what you do is what you are’Fremen culture - from DuneThe importance of being frugal during the startup phase and being funded by customersHis experience of playing a CEO role; the moment when he made the decision and support from his familyYou must take care of the people in the community you are trying create and be fanatic about solving their problemsHis personal practices to stay calmNot measuring success only by monetary standardsSteven Aberle is the Co-Founder of The Rohirrim, a start-up bringing Domain-Aware Generative AI to the Enterprise. He has 18 years of leadership and executive-level technology capacities and is a recognized expert in unstructured data processing at scale. Steve holds the patent for Domain-Aware Generative AI, Generative Stitching and Vector-Attributable Large Language Models.

Hope you had a wonderful start to the new year.This episode is special for multiple reasons.This is one of the few episodes when I had the conversation with a guest in person - and that was also video recorded, with a fireplace in the background, on a cold day!You would be able to watch this conversation as a video on the PM Power youtube channel.This episode was recorded in November, 2022 - much before ChatGPT was made available to the public and the subsequent increased interest.My guest today, Steven Aberle, is a founder of a company that is in stealth mode, working on domain aware, Large Language model based processing for very niche applications.In this conversation, Steven sharesHow he joined the military half way through college and then went back to finish his studiesGetting interested in IT during the military serviceNavigating away from the back end to the front and, focusing on how the users interact with the systemsBeing in the Washington DC area, getting to work on Defense related areasWorking on defense proposals, that need to be technical, unique and bring out the uniqueness of the proposed approachCreating a piece of patented technology for domain aware generative AI, based on Large Language models and transformersThe challenge for small technology companies to break into the defense procurement spaceCouple of challenges with the open LLMsTrained on open content available, thereby missing contextual insights that are more valuableNone of the data that is generated, can be attributed to the source material [explainable AI]How he organizes his own learning even when moving across specialization areasIt is always about the dataHis exposure and experience with ETL approaches, including working with unstructured dataAbout being a full stack engineer, to be aware of many areasNot be as much of an expert as one may want to be in any one area, but connect the learnings to the new areas as wellHis approach for being a T-shaped individual, going deep into LLM, on how they are trained Transformers are the next big wave now, after the cloud a couple of decades agoThe concept or role of a solutions architect and how that may be implemented in a large language modelAspects related to LLMs and content / data more than just text, to also include images, figure descriptions etcHow generative AI has made the life of graphic designers / UX specialists much easierCapturing conversations with solutions architects, use a transformer to generate a proposal-language based outputHis answer to that question and a lot more - including questions he asked me, related to startups - effectively making role reversal - the guest becoming the host!Steven Aberle is the Co-Founder of The Rohirrim, a start-up bringing Domain-Aware Generative AI to the Enterprise. He has 18 years of leadership and executive-level technology capacities and is a recognized expert in unstructured data processing at scale. Steve holds the patent for Domain-Aware Generative AI, Generative Stitching and Vector-Attributable Large Language Models.

This is another year end special episode.As coaches engaged with various organizations and teams, PM Power coaches are always learning, adapting, helping others internalize good practices in work and life situations.We have the personal reflections of some of the coaches at PM Power Consulting on what they have learnt during the year and what they plan to learn in the coming year.As Shiv - Sivaguru - reflected on 2022, these were his thoughtsHe talks about  hybrid working modelHow he could start reading books againHow we handle longer podcastsWhat he would like to do for 2023Anantha Natarajan, or Anand, as he likes to be called, shared thisVision, Love and Courage : 3 words that are his key reflections of 2022How he learnt the importance of coaching in his lifeThe vital life lessons from his experienceFocus areas for the upcoming years 2023This is what JV, had to sayHow things have changed after Covid.How at Pm Power we found innovative ways to handle online workshopsHelping customers in their Enterprise Agile transformation journeyWhat we can expect in 2023Next, here are the thoughts from Zafar AhmedEngaging with people in person though technology had brought us together virtuallyMore and More organizations are embarrassing AgileIf Agile coaching needs domain knowledge or is it domain independentAlways Mindful, Vishu's reflections are next.Engagements and contributions in Agile transformation, leadership developmentHow fulfilling was Mindful leadership coachingBelow is the link to know more about our PM Powerian’shttps://pm-powerconsulting.com/experts/Also, watch what our PM powerian’s have to say  on YouTube https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC3F2N5Abhcz-OEcqg9B20OQ

This is a special episode.After a long time, the co-hosts of the show had an opportunity to get together to reflect on what the impact of this podcast has been on our own lives and ways of working.We also talk about what else or more we can do for you, our listeners in the coming year.We hope that this podcast has brought cheer and some inspiration over the last 200+ episodes and thank you for the love and support.Do share your reflections as well with us.You can subscribe to this podcast on your favorite podcast client, so that you don't miss any of the exciting episodes.You can also subscribe to the PM Power newsletter, S-curve - on LinkedIn. Thank you

In this episode, the conversation continues with Bhaktha Muralidhran, AVP, Unified Communications at Sompo International..In the first part, he shared:A brief history of some of the computer networking technologies based on his experienceWorking on some of the emerging standards at that timeExploring roles in sales and marketing supportPreferring to work with customers and solve their problems using appropriate technologiesI asked him about: how comfortable it was to be working with customers and supporting them, coming from an engineering or developer mindset?We continue the conversation with Murali sharing The importance of understanding the customers’ temperament, beyond technology glassesBeing comfortable with not developing cutting edge technologyThe experience of being part of a sales teamThe importance of considering the cost of solutionsHis move to the current role, working with a Japanese firmThe impact of covid on the collaboration infrastructureSome interesting metrics about when meetings really startThe shift from being an individual contributor in technology to an enabling roleSome options he considered from a career advancement perspectiveThe stress when one has to let team members goHis suggestions on what can be done to increase and improve the adoption of technology, to be more effectiveOver three decades of experience in software development in computer networking technologies and support. Experienced in managing a team of engineers. Led several projects from concept to delivery. Specialization: VoIP, Cisco Collaboration technologies, UNIX, Embedded Programming, TCP/IP, QoS, SNMP, Wireless, ATM, Frame Relayhttps://www.linkedin.com/in/baktha-muralidharan-2221344/