Making Tech Better - Made Tech

Latest Episodes:

Refactoring, with Emily Bache Nov 09, 2021

Show notes

What is refactoring, why is it important and how can you get really good at it? Clare Sudbery talks to Emily Bache about enhancing the skills and culture of your teams, to make your code easier to understand and cheaper to modify.

Emily Bache is a Technical Agile Coach who supports developers and aspiring technical coaches with effective methods for teaching and learning practices like Test-Driven Development and Refactoring. Emily has authored several books and training courses, most recently Technical Agile Coaching with the Samman method.

Join our “Connect” mailing list.

Our theme tune is “For The Miles” by Richard Murray.

Episode links: Kent Beck, Jez Humble, Dave Farley, Martin Fowler, Geepaw Hill, Llewellyn Falco, Martin Fowler’s book, Technical Agile Coaching with the Samman method, by Emily Bache, The Mikado Method, Emily’s GitHub, Clare’s refactoring article.

Visit https://tinyurl.com/podcast-making-tech-better for links and info.

When is a test not a test? with Daniel Terhorst-North Oct 26, 2021

Show notes

When is a test not a test? Clare Sudbery talks to Daniel Terhorst-North about all things testing – including why unit tests are not tests, and why “Test Driven Development” would be better named “Example Guided Design.”

Daniel Terhorst-North is a technology and organisational change specialist who has been coaching, coding and consulting for over 25 years. He applies systems thinking, lean and agile principles to solving complex business and technical problems.

Join our “Connect” mailing list.

Our theme tune is “For The Miles” by Richard Murray.

Episode links: The Fearless Organisation, by Prof Amy Edmondson, Google’s Project Aristotle, Dr Nicole Forsgren, Virginia Satir, The Pragmatic Programmer, by Andy Hunt and Dave Thomas, The Goal by Eli Goldratt, We need to talk about testing – article by Daniel , Kent Beck on Stack Overflow about writing as few tests as possible, Paul Zenon, Liz Keogh on Randy Silver’s podcast re estimation, Daniel’s website, Daniel at Goto 2021, Daniel (Tastapod) on Twitter

Visit https://tinyurl.com/podcast-making-tech-better for links and info.

Black history month: Diversity and training, with Charlene Hunter Oct 12, 2021

Show notes

October is black history month, so in this themed episode Clare Sudbery talks to Charlene Hunter, about providing professional training opportunities that create positive experiences for Black women in the face of discrimination and under-representation.

Charlene Hunter is the CEO and Founder of Coding Black Females, a nonprofit organisation to inspire, provide opportunities, and showcase the talents of Black women in tech. She is also the co-founder of Meet Up and Code.

Join our “Connect” mailing list.

Our theme tune is “For The Miles” by Richard Murray.

Episode links: Coding Black Females, Charlene on Twitter.

Visit https://tinyurl.com/podcast-making-tech-better for links and info.

Team Topologies, with Matthew Skelton Sep 28, 2021

Show notes

How should teams be organised for maximum effectiveness? How big should they be, where should the boundaries lie and how independent should they be? Clare Sudbery talks to Matthew Skelton about how to get the best from your teams.

Matthew Skelton is co-author of the Team Topologies book. Head of Consulting at Conflux, he specialises in Continuous Delivery, operability and organisation dynamics for software in manufacturing, ecommerce, and online services.

Join our “Connect” mailing list.

Our theme tune is “For The Miles” by Richard Murray.

Episode links: Ruth Malan, Clare Sutcliffe MBE, Daniel Terhorst-North, Gene Kim, Original DevOps team structure blog post, Manuel Pais, Mel Conway’s paper – How Do Committees Invent?, Matthew on Twitter, “Platform as a Product” video course.

Visit https://tinyurl.com/podcast-making-tech-better for links and info.

Test Driven Development, with Geepaw Hill Sep 14, 2021

Show notes

What is Test Driven Development (TDD) and how can it speed up your software development? Clare Sudbery talks to Geepaw Hill about why he loves TDD so much and how he spreads that love to software teams all over the world.

Geepaw Hill became a professional computer programmer in 1980. Around twenty years ago he became an avid early-adopter of Extreme Programming (XP), and has been teaching XP techniques to software organisations all over the world ever since.

Join our “Connect” mailing list.

Our theme tune is “For The Miles” by Richard Murray.

Episode links: Ron Jeffries, Nyari Samushonga, We Think Code, Liz Keogh, Emily Bache, Joe Rainsberger, James Grenning, Jim Shore, Alice Goldfuss on DevJourney, Geepaw on Twitter, Geepaw’s website.

Visit https://tinyurl.com/podcast-making-tech-better for links and info.

Crowdsourcing, with Dr Mia Ridge Aug 31, 2021

Show notes

What is crowdsourcing, and how is it used to improve the British Library’s online cultural heritage collections? Clare Sudbery talks to crowdsourcing expert Dr Mia Ridge about the power of volunteer digital engagement.

Dr Mia Ridge is the British Library’s Digital Curator for Western Heritage Collections, where she provides support, training and guidance on applying computational research methods to historical collections.

Join our “Connect” mailing list.

Our theme tune is “For The Miles” by Richard Murray.

Episode links: Meghan Ferriter, Sam Blickhan from Zooniverse, Living with Machines project, The old weather project, National Library of Australia’s Trove project, Flickr Commons, https://twitter.com/ukglo, The Collective Wisdom Handbook, Mia on Twitter, Mia’s blog, Mia’s website, British Library crowdsourcing, Zooniverse, From the Page (old handwriting).

Visit https://tinyurl.com/podcast-making-tech-better for links and info.

Digital accessibility, with Jonathan Hassell Aug 17, 2021

Show notes

How do you maximise digital accessibility, and how might your software be inaccessible? Clare Sudbery talks to Jonathan Hassell about considering and balancing the diverse needs of all digital users.

Jonathan Hassell provides strategic accessibility transformation services to organisations worldwide. He has just delivered the new international accessibility standard ISO 30071-1.

Join our “Connect” mailing list.

Our theme tune is “For The Miles” by Richard Murray.

Episode links: Mark Webb, Shift MS, Disability at the Table podcast, Hassell Inclusion, Accessibility Myths, Hi Hub, MadeByDyslexia.org, Hemingway app, free Hassell Inclusion book on digital products, Delusions of Gender by Cordelia Fine.

Visit https://tinyurl.com/podcast-making-tech-better for links and info.

Communities of Practice, with Emily Webber Aug 03, 2021

Show notes

What does a good community of practice look like? Kyle Chapman talks to Emily Webber about how we can use communities to facilitate good collaboration between our teams.

Emily Webber is an independent agile and delivery consultant, conference speaker, and the author of Building Successful Communities of Practice.

Join our “Connect” mailing list.

Our theme tune is “For The Miles” by Richard Murray.

Episode links: Margaret Heffernan, Wilful Blindness, Robin Dunbar, Paper on CoP by Emily and Robin Dunbar, Assisted Serendipity blog post, Steve Jobs / Pixar book, Agile in the Ether, Emily on Twitter.

Visit https://tinyurl.com/podcast-making-tech-better for links and info.

Service Design, with Fritz von Runte Jul 20, 2021

Show notes

How do you design public-facing services so that users get the best experiences? Clare Sudbery talks to Fritz von Runte about the difference between art and design, and how to make the most of service design with a collaborative, multi-disciplinary approach.

Fritz von Runte is a Mancunian Service Designer obsessed with the North, improving public sector services and multi-disciplinary product development.

Join our “Connect” mailing list.

Our theme tune is “For The Miles” by Richard Murray.

Episode links: Abby Covert, Leisa Reichelt, Jeff Gothelf, Dan Ariely, Lisa Jeffery, Kit Collingwood, Clare Moriarty, Lou Downe – 15 principles of Good Services.

Visit https://tinyurl.com/podcast-making-tech-better for links and info.

Changing legacy systems, with Meri Williams Jul 06, 2021

Show notes

What can you learn from working with legacy code? Meri Williams talks to Clare Sudbery about respecting your predecessors, the impact of failure, the value delivered by the code that’s running right now, and the benefit of frequent software releases.

Meri Williams is an experienced CTO, a published author, an international speaker, chair of The Lead Developer conference, tech advisor for Kindred Capital and a trustee at Stonewall, the UK’s leading LGBTQ+ rights charity.

Join our “Connect” mailing list.

Our theme tune is “For The Miles” by Richard Murray.

Episode links: Camille Fournier, Lara Hogan, Maria Gutierrez, Gina Trapani, Jessie Link, The blue and white marbles post, Lou Downe – Good Services, Becky Stafford – Adapting testing for engineers, Meri on Twitter, Lead Dev Together.

Visit https://tinyurl.com/podcast-making-tech-better for links and info.