CTO Confessions Brought to you by IT Labs

From time to time, we come across a very niche organization. One that has evolved with the industry over many years. Well, Airport Information Services is one of those businesses, creating Flight Information Display Systems and Aeronautical Billing Systems for the industry. Rick Goold, the managing director of said company, joins us to speak to his journey as a tech leader and how he and his business have carved out a successful piece of the airport industry. Rick's career has spanned many evolutions of the IT industry, therefore he has a noteworthy perspective on things that have passed and things to come. Key Takeaways from the podcast are: • How AIS serves the airport industry and gets their products hitting the bull's eye • Ricks journey as a tech leader from early mainframes to the modern digital world we are immersed in • How as a business leader, you can set up feedback loops and let them have a life of their own (user groups for people who use the product) Our Guest: Rick Goold LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/rick-goold-698a8422/ Airport Information Services: https://www.linkedin.com/company/airport-information-systems-limited/ Intro and background music: Craig MacArthur - Power Shutoff (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x74iB_jtauw)

It's a shame we rarely get to speak to someone who oversees important aspects of an industry that many of us use. In the context of this podcast, it's the airport industry. Wouldn't it be great to take a peek under the covers of this business arena to appreciate some of its complexities, challenges, and direction? Well, in this episode, we are doing a bit of that peeking. Nicholas Woods, the CIO of the Manchester Airports Group (MAG) joins us to share his leadership journey. The challenges this industry is facing and aspirations for the future. To get an idea of Nicholas's leadership scope, MAG owns and operates Manchester, London Stansted, and East Midlands Airports in the UK. Not one, but three airports. Key takeaways from the podcast are: • Examples of leadership that worked and didn't work • Designing, operating and maintaining tech in an airport • Aspirations for the future of the industry Our Guest: Nicholas Woods LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ngwoods/ Website: MAG (Airports Group) https://www.linkedin.com/company/manchester-airports-group/ Intro and background music: Craig MacArthur - Power Shutoff (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x74iB_jtauw)

The world of technology opens up endless avenues of possibilities. It's an enabler and creator of healthy businesses (i.e., the bottom line). So, it's wonderful to come across a business that uses technology to create success in acquiring and selling unique items. And when we say unique, we mean one-off items. So, the guest of this podcast works for a business just like that. The VP of technology, Brian Powell at EVERYTHING BUT THE HOUSE (EBTH), tells us all about his operation, his team's challenges, and how they are solving them. Key takeaways from the podcast are: • Finding the sweet spot in Lean, Kanban, and Scrum to create high performing teams • Adapting to huge differentials in demand on a platform • The ins and outs of being part of a business that sells anything from old collectible watches to Picasso paintings Our Guest: Brian Powell LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/powellbriang/ Website: http://www.ebth.com/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/EBTHofficial Intro and background music: Craig MacArthur - Power Shutoff (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x74iB_jtauw)

For tech leaders heavily involved in the software development and deployment processes, ranging from embedded software to more user-facing applications, you'll love this. Anders Wallgren, the Vice President of Technology Strategy at CloudBees joined us to share a few things. Nope! Correction. Shared LOADS of things about the benefit and importance of having a smooth end-to-end development process. Being a software developer in the past (I'm a geek that managed to de-geek), I know the pains and benefits of getting this right. The investment in automation and auditing-as-you-go saves many headaches and Kerr-chings (money) over and over again. The system that Anders and CloudBees have created is just awesome. Especially for high compliance industries. Key takeaways from the podcast are: • How automation can become your implicit auditing • How tech leaders can enable companies to balance governance and developer freedom with a win/win scenario • The benefits of taking two steps back to make huge leaps forward in the efficiency of your value delivery Our Guest: Anders Wallgren LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/anderswallgren/ Website: https://www.cloudbees.com/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/anders_wallgren Intro and background music: Craig MacArthur - Power Shutoff (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x74iB_jtauw)

We all hope for a day when we don't need to mention, or even be surprised, when we see women leading in tech. But, until that wonderful moment arrives, we will celebrate a marvelous leader's journey and her leadership practices. Bela Labovitch, the VP of engineering at athenahealth, joins us to share her story and why she has much gratitude for her job. And importantly, how she makes the role effective and delightful for her people, the end customer, and the business itself. We also look at the problem that athenahealth is solving in the market and how it allows doctors and similar professionals to focus on what they love doing by adding ease and automation to important aspects of their business operations. Key takeaways from the podcast with Bela are: • The importance of metrics and measuring • The power of a tool we all have as leaders--mindfulness and how that can be enacted to great effect on all aspects of the role • How companies can help create more diversity within their companies and encourage girls and women into tech Our Guest: Bela Labovitch LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/bela-labovitch-333a7b/ Website: Cloud-computing in healthcare | athenahealth : https://www.athenahealth.com/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/athenahealth Intro and background music: Craig MacArthur - Power Shutoff (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x74iB_jtauw)

You would believe it, but four billion people in the world do not have an address. We take it for granted in first and 2nd world nations. But imagine not having a framework to get things to you. Shocking! This is why Emre Turan, the tech leader of UNL Global, leads the tech to create the internet of places. An addressing system to bring people out of address poverty. Maybe we in more modernized countries will adopt the same system. Thus creating a standardized global standard. Key takeaways from the podcast with Emre are: • The importance of creating a system that anywhere in the world can have an address • Making sure external outsourced teams are invited into the fold of a company. Please don't treat them differently • Using data to create self-healing maps • The importance of reading the book "Thinking, Fast and Slow" by Daniel Kahneman. It raises awareness around a bug that all of humanity has and will serve your leadership immensely. Our Guest: Emre Turan LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/eturan/ Website: https://www.unl.global/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/emre_turan Intro and background music: Craig MacArthur - Power Shutoff (www.youtube.com/watch?v=x74iB_jtauw)

We all see big stock markets trading shares in big companies, with their stock-tickers showing the ups and downs of an organization's perceived value. Imagine if you could invest in, let's say, a sports stars career or the local shop down the road. Well, this is the platform that tZERO's CTO, Amit Goyal, is working on. He joins us to share his trials and tribulations, not forgetting the successes in creating this novel trading system. The key takeaways from the podcast are: - How a more democratic trading system will create investment and growth opportunities in some weird and wonderful places - Slicing big projects into manageable small value deliverables enhances the Agile space - The importance of reducing the delay of developed code getting into the production space. Ultimately to ensure developers don't get disconnected from their work and technical debt doesn't sit around out of sight. Our Guest: Amit Goyal LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/amit-goyal-302a0852/ Website: https://www.tzero.com/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/tZERO Intro and background music: Craig MacArthur - Power Shutoff (www.youtube.com/watch?v=x74iB_jtauw)

Many enlightened businesses work hard to make their brands and relationships with their customers stronger and more human, and that's exactly what Wistia does. For those who think that's obvious, well, there are many businesses out there that do the exact opposite. Either intentionally or unintentionally). The CTO and co-founder of this interesting startup joins us to share his leadership learning and the importance of building that human face of the business one video at a time. With the bonus of making the process super easy and effective. The key takeaways from the podcast are: • Creating the right funding model for your startup can have a positive impact on the way you run and do business • Learning from Brendan's reflections of leading through tough decisions (tapping into the wisdom of the organization) • Leading with remote teams and making sure they become autonomous and effective development machines ◦ Especially getting the decision making and set of power closer to the cross-functional teams doing the work Our Guest: Brendan Schwartz LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendanschwartz/ Website: http://wistia.com/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/wistia Intro and background music: Craig MacArthur - Power Shutoff (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x74iB_jtauw)

In this episode, we talk to a tech leader who has turned a technical ship around. Her leadership resides in a cancer intelligence organization that uses data science to help oncology care teams better personalize treatment and improve drug toxicity management for their patients. Denali Lumma, the VP of engineering at Project Ronin, shares her story and her leadership. Particularly on how she, her peers, and team pivoted a troubling technical situation and created a state of technical flow in the organization. The best part is the improvements in care for patients. Feedback loops of care went from a month to days. Allowing carers to be agile in improving the conditions of patients and enhancing their quality of life. Maybe even saving lives. Key takeaways from the podcast with Denali are: • The concept of technical-debt-event-horizon (the point of no return) • How Agile can absolutely work. It can be a success if you keep going, learn from mistakes, and don't see it as some magic formula out of the box. You have to be agile about Agile. Let it guide you, rather than dictate • The huge power of healthy feedback loops. Find the important ones and enhance them • How systems and industries create incentives that really aren't helpful. Even damaging Our Guest: Denali Lumma LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/denali-lumma-1330061/ Website: https://www.projectronin.com/ Intro and background music: Craig MacArthur - Power Shutoff (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x74iB_jtauw)

With technology permeating and threading through all industries, it's surprising when you come across an industry that has further growth in the digital space, giving the tech leaders in that arena the opportunity to spearhead an industry evolution. This is exactly what our guest Rajiv Peter, the Director of Digital Technology at Notting Hill Genesis, is doing. Under his leadership and tech team, the company creates opportunities for more growth, efficient operations, and insights from the data they collect. Like the host, Rajiv has Dyslexia. He is not bestowed with the luxury of moving super quickly through tasks that others would glide through. But like many challenges, he has adapted and created his own mechanisms and leadership style to thrive. Key takeaways from the podcast are: • Using the gift of Dyslexia to lead in a better way (Visual vision) • The power of trusting your teams • Preparing a business to be able to collect the right data for the next evolution so they can sense and adapt aspects of the businesses direction Our Guest: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/rajivpeter/ Website: https://www.nhg.org.uk/ Intro and background music: Craig MacArthur - Power Shutoff (www.youtube.com/watch?v=x74iB_jtauw)