Underserved

BONUS Episode - A Monster Bonus Jun 24, 2022

Episode #075’s guest Jeff Taylor was generous with his time, spending over two hours with me in the studio. We captured so much good material that we needed a bonus episode to squeeze it all in. In this bonus episode we talk about life after Monster, why you should run the meetings you attend, and setting the world record for water skiing behind a blimp.

Links:

Blimp record: https://www.tampabay.com/archive/2000/03/23/executive-sets-blimp-skiing-record/

RoverTrophy: https://www.rovertrophy.com/

Burning Man: https://burningman.org/

Root Society at Burning Man https://www.instagram.com/rootsociety2019/?utm_source=ig_embed&hl=en

Ep. 075, A Monster Idea Jun 24, 2022

Our guest for Episode #075 is Jeff Taylor, founder of Monster.com and 14 other companies including most recently RoverTrophy.com. Jeff has always been ahead of his time, with boundless amounts of energy. This led him to create the world’s first job board in Monster, a revolutionary idea that spawned an entire industry. We discuss the resolve needed to champion your ideas, being the first URL on the radio, and when you know it is the right time to sell.

Links:

Jeff on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jeff-taylor-5212115a

A snapshot of the Monster Board in 1996 https://web.archive.org/web/19961111103115/http://www.monster.com/

When I Grow Up commercial: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fY1WoHkNGy4

Ep. 074, Make Your Luck Jun 20, 2022

Neal Cao started out feeling the pressure common in many families - “You need to become a doctor or an engineer!” After his internship, he knew the medical field was not for him, and saw his brother killing it in software development. After many burst bubbles and industry changes, Neal found himself a principal in a financial services firm. We discuss putting med students in the party dorm, sports car perk programs, and sitting on both sides of the table for an audit.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marcus_Camby

https://www.blackrock.com/us/individual

https://www.engage2excel.com/

https://www.zensar.com/

https://rsmus.com/services/business-strategy-operations/mergers-acquisitions-advisory.html

Ep. 073, You're damned right I did it Jun 13, 2022

Our first former sheriff’s deputy, Shadd Schutte brings a unique perspective to Underserved #073. Being a police officer in Wyoming turned out to be good training for managing projects and customers in IT. Shadd talks about his memorable experiences, transitioning between industries, and becoming Agile, as well as motorcycle cruises and spoiling dogs.

Shadd on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/shaddschutte/

Wyoming Department of Education: Home - Wyoming Department of Education

Laramie County Sheriff’s Department: Laramie County (laramiecountywy.gov)

Laramie County Animal Shelter: Cheyenne Animal Shelter | Dogs, Cats, Critters & Care

Ep. 072, Metaphysical Kitchen Jun 06, 2022

Episode 072 of Underserved features Brian Durkin, Sr. Group Manager & Head of User Experience, Data & Analytics at BNY Mellon. Brian leveraged his art degree into some web design work but found his true passion was in information architecture. He came to this realization in the middle of an interview, which he politely asked to terminate. Instead, he was offered a new IA job the next day! Also covered: World IA Day, getting fintech to understand IA, and the fun parts of working for Nickelodeon.

Charles Zicari, Brian's first real IA mentor: https://www.linkedin.com/in/charles-zicari-90798/

IxDA: https://ixda.org/

UXPA Boston: http://uxpaboston.org/

World IA Day, Brian started the one for Boston: https://worldiaday.org/

Some of the past speakers of World IA Day Boston:

Peter Morville - https://www.linkedin.com/in/morville
Steve Portigal - https://www.linkedin.com/in/steveportigal/
Josh Seiden - https://www.linkedin.com/in/jseiden/
Abby Covert - https://www.linkedin.com/in/abbytheia/
Aaron Irizarry - https://www.linkedin.com/in/aaroni/
Todd Zaki-Warfel - https://www.linkedin.com/in/zakiwarfel/
Dana Chisnell - https://www.linkedin.com/in/dana-chisnell/
Christina Wodtke - https://www.linkedin.com/in/christinawodtke/

Ep. 071, Shoot for the Stars May 30, 2022

Dr. Colleen Tartow was convinced investigating the heavens was her calling, studying astronomy all the way to a PhD. Once she realized the job market there was tiny and slow to advance, she moved to consulting in data and analytics. Colleen quickly found that data and software suited her and made a career of it. We talk about finding mentors, calligraphy, and the relative merits of a billionaire space race.

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/colleen-tartow-phd/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/CTartow

Starburst: https://www.starburst.io/careers

The Sequel: https://thesequel.substack.com/

Ep. 070, People First May 23, 2022

Why does John Blythe, our guest for Episode #070, believe in people first at technology companies? It could be his experience building teams, or influencing surgeons to help lower their delivery costs one hip at a time. We discuss making passion learning a business, what it means to be the Director of GIFs and comedic timing, and getting 10x throughput at 10% of the cost. metallica history with dave mustaine and kirk hammet 140db.com - built john mayer's website that inspired John curvolabs.com kyruus.com bit.cloud - for versioned component development thinking in bets others who hate dotnetnuke looool combinedcuriosity.com

Ep. 069, Last Mile Healthcare May 16, 2022

Eli Goldberg received a life-changing diagnosis from a sweat test - he found out he had cystic fibrosis. Rather than shy away from it, Eli leaned into sharpening his focus, leaving consulting, and starting a company to help people with similar afflictions drive better medical outcomes. Listen to Episode #069 to hear how that drove Eli to help define the “last mile” of healthcare delivery by a tech giant. https://www.centralwisconsinstatefair.com/p/other/worlds-largest-round-barn https://www.uwalumni.com/news/the-onion/ https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/BF02445136 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soyo

Ep. 068, Façade Pattern May 09, 2022

Kevin Jarnot, CIO of Uptime Institute, is our guest for episode #068. Kevin proves there is no set path to becoming a CIO. He was interrogated by the Secret Service in college, his band opened for Run DMC, and he ran a financial services company off the cable modem in his basement. Nowadays Kevin is a thought leader for some of the largest data centers in existence. Hear Kevin's story and transformation in our latest Underserved episode! The incredible Franklin Ace 1000 computer - http://oldcomputers.net/ace1000.html Buffalo BBS scene - https://www.reddit.com/r/Buffalo/comments/gwas9/who_remembers_the_wny_bbs_scene/ WWIV BBS software: https://www.wwivbbs.org/ Some band photos: http://www.jarnot.com/facade/musicawards_1_lg.jpg http://www.jarnot.com/facade/musicawards_2_lg.jpg http://www.jarnot.com/facade/group-photo1.jpg http://www.jarnot.com/facade/musicawards_4_lg.jpg Mentions of Nest Egg: https://www.tampabay.com/archive/1995/07/31/financially-plugged-in/ https://news.microsoft.com/1997/11/05/make-the-world-wide-web-your-oyster/

Ep. 067. Leaving the comfort zone May 02, 2022

Our guest from Episode #067, Parag Shah, foresaw the death of penmanship - something he happily announced at age 8. That didn’t save him from having to write a page of QBasic code each day before he could go out to play! Topics discussed include how serious you get about studying when you are paying your own tuition, decoupling storage and compute, and handling turnover at the top. https://learn.dvorak.nl/ https://www.umass.edu/living/residence/northeast https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Necco https://www.forcepoint.com/cyber-edu/shadow-it

Ep. 066, Across The Pond IT Apr 25, 2022

Episode #066’s guest is Matthew Wood, Deputy CTO, Commonwealth of Massachusetts Department of Transportation. Before ruling the IT end of Massachusetts roadways, Matthew grew up with technology in the United Kingdom. Some things were the same (the quest to build and play games), others very different (PC makers like the Alan Michael Sugar Trading company, aka Amstrad). We discuss differences managing when your workforce is unionized and in the public sector, and searching for the balance between being a team player and calling out bad ideas. Broomstones (curling location) - http://www.broomstones.com/ - you can rent them out for fun corporate events Coventry (where Matt grew up) - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coventry Sinclair ZX81 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ZX81 Amstrad 6128 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amstrad_CPC Acorn Electron - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acorn_Electron

Ep. 065, Whitebox Hunting Apr 18, 2022

Episode #065 features Pete Langois. Pete’s first buffer overflow exploit in 8th grade earned him a trip to the vice principal's office, but starting his own BBS out of his bedroom earned him a job. We talk about trade shows including MacWorld, Star Wars including action figures, and the ROI of investing in yourself. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commodore_64 https://www.apple.com/leadership/phil-schiller/ https://www.derrynh.org/ https://www.skillshare.com/blog/a-brief-history-of-digital-photography/ https://www.londonderrynhpd.gov/189/Police-Explorers

Ep. 064, Killing the Monolith Apr 11, 2022

Episode #064 features Ahmer Khan of athenahealth. After watching four friends fail their first Computer Science course, Ahmer figured he had to try it. Following a stint in rain-soaked Seattle, he came back to put down roots at Raytheon. He opened people's eyes there to new technologies, embracing other cultures, and appreciating diversity. The one constant theme in his career has been seeking out and destroying monoliths - a unique calling that he carries on today! Ahmer's LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/ahmer1781/ Patriot Missiles https://www.raytheonmissilesanddefense.com/what-we-do/counter-uas/sensors/global-patriot-solutions The most famous monolith https://2001.fandom.com/wiki/Monolith athenahealth https://www.athenahealth.com/

Ep. 063, Mentor Me to IT Apr 04, 2022

Season 6 of Underserved kicks off with Daniel Goldenberg. While many kids in high school were biding their time, Daniel was finishing a CCNA curriculum and working for a local MSP. User empathy and customer focus he learned there served him well later in his career as a Director of IT and Security. We also talk about the best brisket in Texas and the sports scene at Syracuse. Dan's LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/dsgoldenberg/ Lockpicking https://toool.us/ Dan's Texas BBQ Favorites:

Brisket- https://franklinbbq.com/
Beef Rib- https://www.labarbecue.com/
Turkey/Sausage- https://www.blacksbbq.com/
Sunday BBQ- https://www.valentinastexmexbbq.com/

Ep. 062, Hop On The Startup Train Dec 27, 2021

We finish off Season 5 with Doug Morgan, Senior Director of Development at Alteryx. Doug took his CS chops from high school and Georgia Tech out to the west coast. After learning on the company dime, he took his own company through an acquisition and has run several engineering organizations since. We discuss the upside of a Division I sports school, the pain of the pivot, and rising early for rare beer.

hopOn Acquisition https://medium.com/@lola.com/blade-travel-acquires-hopon-a2036c502655
Zipcar New Product Doug mentioned https://www.flexcar.com/
Alteryx Product Area Doug owns https://www.alteryx.com/input/blog/introducing-alteryx-machine-learning
https://www.russianriverbrewing.com/pliny-the-younger/
https://www.linkedin.com/in/douglasmorgan/
https://www.gatech.edu/

Ep. 061, One Hand Up, One Hand Down Dec 20, 2021

Lifelong Texan Lance Sleeper joins us for Episode #061. Lance studied journalism in school but always tinkered with computers growing up. After a motorsports PR gig evaporated, Lance found himself the most tech-savvy person at a mortgage company. His career focused on security from that point forward, exposing him to several different industries. We talk about airline IT, the importance of diversity and inclusiveness in security, Texas BBQ, and what it's like to wear the zebra stripes in football games. Links:

Ep. 060, Online Whiskey Blinds Dec 13, 2021

Episode #060 of Underserved features Conrad Morgan. Conrad started out building PCs when they were still a luxury item. His first foray into the technology industry was working with process control hardware, but a decision to work in an Amazon warehouse around the holidays led him to a career in large-scale e-commerce. We talk about labor management systems, automating your way out of a job, and live streaming whiskey blinds.

Ep. 059, Step Down to Step Up Dec 06, 2021

In Episode #059 we talk with Chris Sullivan. A former Navy submariner, Chris leveraged the GI bill and his curiosity about software development into a career tying together power and programming. We talk about what it's like being on a nuclear sub, doing Homer Simpson's job and then trying to improve it, and the business of sanctions compliance.

Ep. 058, VP of Electricity Nov 29, 2021

John Arsneault started full-time in the IT industry while still in high school. Wellington Management was rapidly becoming more dependent on computers and John defaulted into desktop support for hundreds of people. After seeing the potential of software companies at a VC firm, John dreamed of equity and opportunity at a startup. It took a couple of tries to get that right and to balance the demands of work and life, but now John is both a law firm CIO and a successful venture investor himself. Hear about John's journey in episode #058 of Underserved, out now!

Ep. 057, An Engineer's Engineering Manager Nov 22, 2021

Erik Dasque is our guest on Episode #057. We talk about the winding road from "the West Virginia of France" to becoming a software VP in the United States. By always staying hands-on-keyboard and coding a bit in his free time, Erik has earned himself the moniker of "an engineer's engineering manager." We cover the role of a "Repair CTO", what to do when layoffs are in the investment thesis, and having to play code cop as an open-source project manager.

Ep. 056, A Solid Foundation Nov 15, 2021

Episode #056 features Josh West, founder of Foundation.io. Josh is passionate about the foundation of software development - how do we make it easy and productive and FUN to be a software developer at a given company? How do we get developers writing code quickly instead of burning weeks on ramp-up and development environment setup tasks? (hint: Kubernetes!) A company where it is hard to "get up to speed" is at a disadvantage in a hot job market for developers. Also discussed - developer conferences ranging from HOPE to Bose to KuCon, and Scotch/bourbon budget picks (are there any left?)

Ep. 055, Classroom Relationship Management Nov 08, 2021

Chris Hull is the Co-Founder and Chief Product Officer of Otus, a Chicago-based edtech company. After 13 years as an educator, Chris wanted to minimize the chaos of disconnected edtech tools for K-12 administrators, educators, students, and their families. We talk about his humble beginnings gaming, how hating education until college made him want to teach, and how his new company helps educators bridge the gap between subjects and years at schools (think SalesForce Accounts, Contact, and Activities for the classroom).

Otus: www.otus.com
NSSD112 (where I taught) https://www.nssd112.org/
Obsidian (note taking application I use): https://obsidian.md/
Happiness Advantage (book I am reading) https://www.amazon.com/Happiness-Advantage-Principles-Psychology-Performance/dp/0307591549
Tavour (go to site for ordering beer) https://www.tavour.com/gifts?gclid=Cj0KCQjwqp-LBhDQARIsAO0a6aL0rERr51uB48ajPm3fS7nfGGMMo4_kXv--vsnVCTJXgJ1XIg0kYAIaAo9cEALw_wcB

Ep 054, Expect Success Nov 01, 2021

Episode #054 features Steve Picciano, VP of Engineering at FineTune. What if you interviewed for a job, didn't love it, but the interviewer says, "One of the reasons you don't want to come here is one of the reasons we want you here." Do you take the job and the challenge? Steve did. Hear that unusual tale, as well as taking the Smalltalk language to the big time, witnessing post-acquisition speeches that eviscerated engineering org charts, and Steve's secret to managing distributed teams (hint: it is not more Zoom meetings). Finetune product page https://www.finetunelearning.com/ When Teradata closed the Boston Office, they also jettisoned the Presto product. However we had a few customers paying for support and they no longer had engineers to support these customers. So they transitioned the Support money to a spin off that became known as Starburst. This was founded by some of the Hadapt founders and several of the Teradata engineers who were working on Presto. Today the distribution is named "Trino". https://trino.io/ Some great articles on changing a culture https://hbr.org/2017/06/changing-company-culture-requires-a-movement-not-a-mandate https://www.shrm.org/resourcesandtools/hr-topics/employee-relations/pages/10-tips-for-changing-your-companys-culture%E2%80%94and-making-it-stick.aspx Some history about Smalltalk https://www.codeproject.com/Articles/1241904/Introduction-to-the-Smalltalk-Programming-Language Atari 800 Game System https://www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/3750/a_history_of_gaming_platforms_.php?print=1 Great Sports article about adapting, modernizing and expecting success https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/sports/nfl/daily/jan00/27/coaches27.htm

Ep. 053, Send Michael Right Over Oct 25, 2021

Episode #053 features Mike Sheldon, CTO of RedRover. Mike has made some unconventional moves, starting full-time work before graduating college, missing graduation to get married, and choosing to support an older product line instead of the hot, new greenfield project. It has all worked out for him though, still happily married, still working with friends he met at that first job, and heading up engineering at a new company that leverages his years of domain experience. Also covered: a most unusual bachelor party invitation, and the best cheesesteak in Philly (a moving target).

Red Rover https://www.redroverk12.com/
Analog – the simplest productivity system by Ugmonk https://ugmonk.com/pages/analog
Agile Manifesto https://agilemanifesto.org/
Book recommendations https://a.co/5RF0dS3

Ep 052, Minimize the Entropy Oct 18, 2021

Morgan Creighton grew up watching Carl Sagan explain the wonders of our universe on PBS, inspiring Morgan to study physics. During his first job after college, a Nobel Physics Laureate famously opined that Computer Science would someday be declared a sub-discipline of physics. Morgan feels this is exactly the opposite of the truth - physics may eventually be declared a sub-discipline of CS! We cover the management of entropy in software, the Technicolor Dreamcoat that is functional programming, how your soft skills let you exercise your tech skills, and Morgan's Law for problem isolation.

The Sapir-Whorf hypothesis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linguistic_relativity
St. John's High School https://www.stjohnshigh.org/
The X-ray telescope from Harvard https://www.thecrimson.com/article/1988/5/9/up-up-and-away-palthough-harvard/
Boston Area Scala Enthusiasts (BASE): https://www.meetup.com/boston-scala/
Morgan's Monad talk: https://vimeo.com/103647102

Ep 051, Hampshire Andrologist's Road to IT Oct 11, 2021

We kick off Season 5 speaking to Bob Hammond, CTO of Choreograph. Bob has survived the dotcom boom and bust, several acquisitions and divestitures, and scaling several companies to provide ad delivery to large audiences. When you make things big enough and fast enough, the LAN speed often becomes your throttle, and expansion efforts are like changing the tires on a speeding car. We talk about backbone bottlenecks, boats Bob wishes he had been on, and building a rig to fly virtual planes when there is no time to fly real ones.

Ep 050, End Zone Militiaman Jul 12, 2021

Episode 050 of Underserved features Gene Grella, a renaissance IT executive who also teaches, flies RC planes/drones, and fires a musket after every Patriots home game touchdown. We discuss the merits of a big, boring, process-driven company for your first job out of college. We also talk about CEOs who put their personality stamp on their companies, FPV flight, and how the best professors correlate the classroom lessons to the real world.

Wang 2200: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wang_2200
PDP 11 - https://www.olddec.nl/Thanks-41-Years/PDP11.htm
Electric Boat: https://westfaironline.com/102139/electric-boat-commits-to-investing-over-800m-in-state/
Avery Dennison: https://timkellygroup.com/projects/finesse-longford/
Tom Siebel: https://philanthropicpeople.com/profiles/thomas-m-siebel/
Oracle HQ in Redwood City: https://www.businessinsider.com/oracle-employees-enjoy-pool-yacht-2015-1#since-1989-oracles-headquarters-has-dominated-the-town-of-redwood-city-california-about-25-miles-south-of-san-francisco-1
Tinyhawk Drone: https://www.gearbest.com/brushless-fpv-racer/pp_009296354194.html
Rick Reilly joins the End Zone Militia: https://www.espnfrontrow.com/2015/11/rick-reilly-joins-the-patriots-end-zone-militia/
Pictures of Gene in action, and a real, live ABEND: https://photos.app.goo.gl/RbjF3rgrZGhjCT3H9

Ep 049, Ace of Bass Jul 05, 2021

Our guest Sean Mack spent many sunny surf days at UCSC in the basement computer lab, but it paid off. Sean was at the dawn of the streaming age, helping bring online everything from submarine trips to game shows. Later in his career, he moved to education technology as the mission was more in line with his interests. We talk about enterprise DevOps, balancing security and capability delivery, and playing the upright bass for rent.

Wiley: https://www.wiley.com/
UC Santa Cruz: https://slugstore.ucsc.edu/
Muay Thai: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muay_Thai
LinkedIn: SeanDMackNYC
Twitter: @SeanDMackNYC
Facebook: SeanDMackNYC
Instagram: SeanDMackNYC
Sean's latest article: Accelerating Change Through Crisis

Ep 048, From Cowboys to Courses Jun 28, 2021

Noah Pryor realized early on that building GUIs in C was a losing battle, as was fielding support calls at 3 a.m. from drunken phone battery kiosk users. Noah pivoted into Ed Tech and we talk about how he enjoys the journey and the mission. Also discussed: Modern-day web scraping tools, dealing with DMCA requests, and what happens when you Rickroll yourself.

Age of empires: https://www.ageofempires.com/
Teachable: https://teachable.com/
Udemy: https://www.udemy.com/
Seat Geek: www.seatgeek.com/

Ep 047, Build Your Own Role Jun 21, 2021

Our guest Jen McComas started out intercepting calls for help from customers and building herself a tech support position. This "build your own" theme continued in her career as Jen invented roles in subsequent technology companies, culminating with becoming a division CTO at IBM. We talk about the changing definition of work and productivity, the importance of curiosity, and how staying in your swim lane may shrink your pool.

Jobs of the future https://www.voanews.com/usa/all-about-america/most-2030s-jobs-havent-been-invented-yet
Unpaid work and GDP https://theconversation.com/womens-unpaid-work-must-be-included-in-gdp-calculations-lessons-from-history-98110
Clan Aran Sweater Market https://www.aransweatermarket.com/clan-aran-sweaters?gclid=EAIaIQobChMIg63uzPzv8AIVlLWzCh08oALMEAAYASAAEgJgR_D_BwE

Ep. 046, Butchering Bytes Brilliantly Jun 14, 2021

Out of the mosh pits of Worcester, Jeff Gnatek found his way to a graphic design internship and coding by creating tattoo artist websites. Custom Made (think Etsy on-demand) led him to become the Head of Engineering at Butcher Box, the monthly meat-by-mail company. We talk about ribeyes as a perk, hardcore history, and empathy for fellow managers when you become one.

Ep. 045, Our Passive House Jun 07, 2021

This week's guest Matt Hillery started his career translating between business users and the engineering ivory tower. This skill would come in handy again and again throughout his career as he honed in on content management as a vocation and basis for a company he later sold. We cover lessons learned from start to exit, energy-efficient housing as a hobby, and what to do when a job leaves you.

Ep. 044, Metadata Maven May 31, 2021

This week's guest Doug Poirier started out programming on a VIC 20 but found during his career that he liked putting tools in users' hands and driving adoption better than slinging code. What good is technology anyway if you can't get people to embrace it? We talk about the ILOVEYOU virus's siren song, the virtualization of databases, and the hidden value of SharePoint in Office 365.

ILOVEYOU virus: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ILOVEYOU
Conventional wisdom and database virtualization: https://searchservervirtualization.techtarget.com/feature/Running-databases-on-VMs-The-time-is-now
Benefits of Office 365: https://www.core.co.uk/blog/blog/the-7-undeniable-benefits-of-using-office-365-for-business
Single System of Record – SharePoint for records management: https://www.jackfrostdesign.com/blog/2018/8/2/sharepoint-records-management-system
Term Store – SharePoint Managed Metadata: https://blog.mydock365.com/a-basic-guide-to-term-store-management-in-sharepoint-online

Ep. 043, Owning your Career May 24, 2021

This week's guest Nausheen Moulana grew up fascinated by the potential of the humble electron. Her parents were wary to send her to the US after hearing some scary stories, but Nausheen made it here in time for grad school. As a MATLAB power-user, Nausheen was thrilled to work at The Mathworks for decades. We talk about when it's time to move on, the importance of financial literacy for software professionals, and the delicate balance of "finding your voice" as a female in engineering.

How I got started in Tech
About Hyderabad
- Biryani + Charminar + Hyderabadi Pearls
Experience coming to the US
- https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dotbusters
Career in High tech
- CASE
Career Advice
- First Break All The Rules
- StrengthsFinder

Ep. 042, Realtor Genius May 17, 2021

Our guest Lisa Maxwell was encouraged to "go into computers" but initially resisted this advice. She enjoyed playing music so much she ended up with a degree in it, but found that it's hard to make a living that way. Lisa's aptitude for math led her to program for a living, as well as qualifying for MENSA. We talk about instrument petting zoos, the tryout similarities between orchestras and sports teams, and what goes on at those MENSA meetings.

Agile Manifesto: https://agilemanifesto.org/
Agile Alliance: https://www.agilealliance.org/
American Mensa: https://www.us.mensa.org/
BSO Volunteers (BSAV): https://www.bso.org/brands/bso/contribute/volunteer-opportunities.aspx
Concord Community Music School: https://www.ccmusicschool.org/

Ep. 041, In careers, timing is everything May 10, 2021

JP Beaudry grew up in rural Quebec hacking together cars and studying engineering. After an eye-opening internship in Japan, he came to the US as the DotCom bubble was booming, discovering in the process that timing is everything in careers. We discuss his love/hate relationship with automobiles, changing development velocity, and his experience bringing online learning to the masses at edX.

Ep. 040, Finnish Strong May 03, 2021

This week's guest Vesa Tormanen grew up in Finland, first amazed by the computers running at the government pension fund where his parents worked. He hit university at the perfect time, as fellow Finn Linus Torvalds was creating Linux, a classmate was inventing ssh, and the web browser came of age. We talk about Nokia's history and Apple's future, as well as how his current company Neurala is using AI to accelerate and improve product and materials inspection.

Twitter: @vesatormanen
Neurala https://www.neurala.com/
Sinclair Spectrum: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ZX_Spectrum
Rare Games on ZX Spectrum: https://www.denofgeek.com/games/the-15-greatest-zx-spectrum-games-ever-made/
SSH (Secure Shell): https://www.ssh.com/academy/ssh
Nokia: https://www.nokia.com/

Ep. 039, You want chili powder with that? Apr 26, 2021

Matt Phair did not expect to be a data scientist when he was a butcher in his younger days. But after some school and getting some experience he found technology to be a great vehicle for social mobility. Matt talks to us about Peapod Digital Labs using data science to make the shopping experience better. He also shares some suggestions for folks who aspire to become great data scientists or developers. Matt's show notes:

LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/matt-phair
Peapod Digital Labs: https://www.peapoddigitallabs.com
Heroku: https://www.heroku.com/I’m a huge fan of Heroku! It’s really fast and easy to host a small web app and database for free but it’s also scales really well! I’ve used this for my own personal projects as well as for production apps. In my opinion it’s much easier than AWS or Azure.
Coursera: https://www.coursera.org
The best education program I’ve done was a data science certificate program through John’s Hopkins. It took about 11 months to complete cost roughly $1,200. This program contributed more to my career than everything I studied at university. This was 8 years ago. The program appears to have been revamped and broken into multiple sub-specializations on Coursera. Here are the three related specializations:
Recently I completed a few courses in Coursera’s “Mathematics for Machine Learning” specialization. These courses connect the dots between math and ML/DL. I really liked them and would also highly recommend: https://www.coursera.org/specializations/mathematics-machine-learning

Ep. 038, I can't defend what I don't know exists Apr 19, 2021

This week's guest Brian Haugli is a "recovering CISO" - a veteran manager of big-company Information Security who is re-packaging that skillset for the SMB market. Brian is also the host of CISOlife, a YouTube channel about struggles, tools, and solutions for CISOs. We talk about Brian's early days as a physical security tester, realistic vendor assessment, and the origin of his company SideChannel.

RealCISO.io - https://www.realciso.io).
SideChannel - https://www.sidechannel.com
YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/c/sidechannel
Twitter - @sidechannelsec or @brianhaugli

Ep. 037, Zooming in the nineties Apr 12, 2021

Season Four kicks off with our guest Jeff Krampf. Jeff started on an Apple II back in the day and worked on CU-SeeMe, the Internet's first video conference software - the great grandfather of Zoom. We talk about commercializing open-source, overcoming acquisition indigestion, and how Bose is adding real-time services to their famous speakers.

CU-SeeMe: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CU-SeeMe
IntelliVid: https://www.securitymagazine.com/blogs/14-security-blog/post/79355-tyco-acquisition-of-intellivid-1
Credorax: https://www.credorax.com/
Vaultive: https://www.cyberark.com/press/cyberark-acquires-vaultive-advance-privileged-account-security-cloud/
Bose: https://www.bose.com/en_us/index.html

Season 3 Bonus Episode: ANIME! Part 2 - The Collector Jan 04, 2021

In our second Bonus Episode of Season 3, we cover toy collecting with Mason Fitch. Mason's collection features over 450 toys, mostly rare die-cast Shogun warriors, and other Japanese classics. We talk about how a single action figure purchase led to trips to both the West Coast and Japan in pursuit of these childhood mementoes. We also talk about how to truly appreciate the Citizen Kane of anime, Akira.

toyboxdx.com http://toyboxdx.com/datafiles/
ToyboxDX FB group https://www.facebook.com/groups/toyboxdx
The Maine Toy Museum https://maineantiquetoymuseum.com/

Season 3 Bonus Episode: ANIME! Part 1 Dec 28, 2020

I was among many folks in Massachusetts who grew up watching Force 5, Star Blazers, and other animated shows from Japan (aka anime). In this bonus episode of Underserved, I talk with Art Sousa, a lifelong friend with a shared nostalgia for these giant fighting robot serials. I then speak with Robert "Swifty" Swift aka Nixon, who takes us much further down the anime rabbit hole to show us how the genre is "as big as all outdoors" and is rapidly going mainstream on Netflix and Hulu.

Why is Anime like that? (BIG EYES, WEIRD HAIR, NOSE BLEEDS, etc) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eYWM1CmbAd0&list=PLnQjuGx1VLWhl7972EtFTL5uY8scmOoqt
List of Anime (sub)Genre's - https://reelrundown.com/animation/Anime-Genre-List
MIT Anime Club https://anime.mit.edu/ and Crunchyroll https://www.crunchyroll.com/
"Yes, and..." can be the key to improv as well as improved business https://medium.com/improv4/saying-yes-and-a-principle-for-improv-business-life-fd050bccf7e3
The best pizza IMNSHO: https://zmenu.com/family-pizza-and-grinder-westfield-online-menu/

Ep. 036, Know thy user for he is not thee Dec 21, 2020

Our guest for the Season Three finale is a legend in the User Experience community. Dave Platt started developing because of a love of mainframe games. He graduated to becoming an author of books on various Microsoft programming tools before concentrating his efforts on UX. We talk UX process, evangelism, and Dave's mission to help senior citizens better leverage technology to stay connected.

Ep. 035, Don't drink the Java Dec 14, 2020

Bill Scott toured the trades and the military before discovering software consulting as a career. Rather than being yet another Commodore 64 disciple, Bill's introduction to programming is a unique story, one you'll have to hear to believe. We also talk about iOT development/hardware hacking, Extreme Programming, and the push for digital transformation.

Dover Corporation https://www.dovercorporation.com/
Computer Learning Centers https://www.referenceforbusiness.com/history2/5/Computer-Learning-Centers-Inc.html
Rama meditation society https://www.nytimes.com/1993/06/20/nyregion/mentor-to-some-cult-leader-to-others.html
Extreme Programming https://www.agilealliance.org/glossary/xp
Lean Business
https://hbr.org/2013/05/why-the-lean-start-up-changes-everything
Digital Transformation https://www.cio.com/article/3211428/what-is-digital-transformation-a-necessary-disruption.html

Ep. 034, From Mixology to Management Dec 07, 2020

Jeremy Halperin chased a dream of being in a band, bartending to make ends meet. The progression of life led him to computer science. During his ascension from individual contributor to manager to CTO, he realized that his helpdesk and bartending experience were unexpectedly useful. We talk about the drama formula, watching people hose production servers, and the coolest thing Jeremy has ever done in a job.

Jeremy on LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/jeremyhalperin/
Rarebreed Veterinary Partners https://rarebreedvet.com/
Using KPI's to drive business https://insightsoftware.com/blog/using-kpis-to-drive-profitable-business-performance-management/
Google: https://www.forbes.com/sites/zackfriedman/2019/01/28/google-says-the-best-teams-have-these-5-things/?sh=bc4d4415a302
Radical Candor: https://www.radicalcandor.com/
Inspired: https://medium.com/@damonallison/inspired-how-to-create-tech-products-customers-love-a-book-review-513603a8a533
Thanks for the Feedback: https://thepowermoves.com/thanks-for-the-feedback/

Ep. 033, A journey is time suspended Nov 30, 2020

Our guest Brian King is a veteran of many travels, trials, and tribulations. He has seen the technology industry progress through decades, often seeing the same situations reappear repeatedly. We talk about the difficulty of traveling and job hunting during a pandemic, some underrated European travel spots, and how the Hamilton musical is infecting the minds of parents and kids alike.

Brian on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/brianpking/
Ron Chernow book on Alexander Hamilton: https://www.amazon.com/Alexander-Hamilton-Ron-Chernow/dp/0143034758
Blue Highways: https://www.amazon.com/Blue-Highways-Journey-into-America/dp/0316353299
Heart of Dryness: https://www.amazon.com/Heart-Dryness-Bushmen-Permanent-Drought/dp/B003P2VDZQ

Ep. 032, Don't shoot your insurance agent Nov 23, 2020

Unlike most PoliSci majors, Jesse McSweeney started out his professional career chasing down rogue insurance agents who were ripping off clients. We talk about how to avoid being scammed, being a Scrum master without previously being a developer, and why it just might be worth it to fly halfway around the world to Bora Bora.

Jesse's company https://www.iqvia.com/
Jesse on LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/jessemcsweeney/
The Elements of Scrum https://www.amazon.com/Elements-Scrum-Chris-Sims/dp/0982866917/ref=nodl_
Coaching an inexperienced team https://winninghoops.com/article/preparing-to-coach-an-inexperienced-bad-team/
https://www.westfield.ma.edu/
https://www.townofnorwell.net/advisory-board
https://www.mass.gov/orgs/division-of-insurance
https://www.rockland-ma.gov/finance-committee

Ep. 031, Death of the sticky note Nov 16, 2020

Damien Scott is a recovering hardware guy living in a software world. Similar to previous Underserved guest Ben Szekely, Damien was recruited out of college to work for IBM. We talk about consulting company truths and myths, how to get a bank to sign off on using open source, and how to spot optimization opportunities at your company.

What is Reactive Programming? https://developers.redhat.com/blog/2017/06/30/5-things-to-know-about-reactive-programming/#:~:text=Reactive%20programming%20is%20simply%20to,in%20a%20sequence%20over%20time.
Example of why Damien has always leaned towards more remote work: https://www.visualcapitalist.com/five-business-priorities-for-the-future-of-work/?_lrsc=5b896a85-a766-4b71-9678-d50815a4ef13&utm_source=Linkedin%20Elevate&utm_medium=Content&utm_campaign=Linkedin%20Elevate
RP.com Leadership Page: https://www.rightpoint.com/company/leadership/damien-scott
NY Announcement: https://www.rightpoint.com/news/2020/08/20/riding-a-wave-of-growth-rightpoint-expands-its-capabilities-in-new-york?_ga=2.61208300.1992843015.1604671745-1930859806.1604671745
Low Code/No-Code: https://www.forbes.com/sites/adrianbridgwater/2019/03/18/what-no-code-software-really-looks-like/?sh=1790a36f96ce

Ep. 030, What's next for US? Nov 09, 2020

Our guest Paul Krasinski mentored some kids while attending Brown University, and their experience changed his perspective. We talk about playing professional basketball in Europe, the science of tracking audience engagement, and the struggle for companies to engage consumers without being creepy. Paul also discusses his plans to move online relationships into the real world, developing a collaboration and connection space in Plymouth, MA.

Newton South High School - https://www.newton.k12.ma.us/nshs
Hope High School - https://www.providenceschools.org/hope
The Second Mountain - https://www.amazon.com/Second-Mountain-David-Brooks/dp/0812993268
Epicenter Experience Founder Video - https://www.thepeopleplatform.com/story
The People Platform Consumer Journey - https://www.epicenterexp.com/the-consumer-journey
The People Platform - 2020 Top 20 Most Promising Customer Experience Management Solution - https://static1.squarespace.com/static/593e9b6b1b10e33a7a3ed578/t/5e878dfdc8cf637f75d23aef/1585942019815/Epicenter+Experience%28H%29.pdf

Ep. 029, Domo arigato, Mr. Roboto Nov 02, 2020

Brandon Kindred's dad redirected his excess energy and curiosity to learning programming with a teach yourself in 24 hours book. The same thing happened in school, where a chance encounter (getting caught programming) led to a spot on the robotics team. We talk about lessons learned from robotics competitions, using AI and ML to improve software testing, and where the soft powder is in Colorado.

The FIRST robotics organization https://www.firstinspires.org/robotics/frc
Brandon's company https://www.look-see.com/
Autodesk's 3DS Max - https://www.autodesk.com/products/3ds-max/overview?support=ADVANCED&plc=3DSMAX&term=1-YEAR&quantity=1
The conference that recognized Qanairy for Best in class for Transfer learning - https://aidevworld.com/
The company where Brandon's Dad is CTO - https://sqad.com/
The insurance group run by Brandon's old sales mentor Adam Schwartz - http://afoxassoc.com/our-family/

Ep. 028, Paint me a picture of tech Oct 26, 2020

Our guest Jed Maczuba grew up reading 2600 - The Hacker Quarterly (as did your humble narrator). His curiosity about phone systems and computer systems led him to become a Mac user and an IBM employee. We talk about the most underrated skill in management, steering management to best leverage technology, the struggle to exceed the industry average for successful projects (as low as 10%!), and how oil painting is a surprisingly technical hobby.

Link to Jed's article on Agile : https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/why-does-agile-work-jed-maczuba/
Most Underrated Skill in Management: https://sloanreview.mit.edu/article/the-most-underrated-skill-in-management/
Examples of System Dynamics:
- https://mitsloan.mit.edu/shared/ods/documents/Repenning_JN_2001_TippingPoint.pdf&PubID=14333
- http://web.mit.edu/nelsonr/www/Repenning%3DSterman_CMR_su01_.pdf
Oil painting master Yayoi Kusama: http://yayoi-kusama.jp/e/information/

Ep. 027, People are not good at search Oct 19, 2020

Adria Kyne was in Seattle pursuing a Ph.D. in Chinese Archaeology when the Dot Com boom pulled her into the software industry. Search engines were at war and Microsoft was determined to win the battle with a combination of human curation and machine classification. This led to a 20-year career bringing rigor and truth to search technology and search marketing - an industry often rife with snake oil salesmen and pseudoscience. We also talk about larping and how that hobby led to Adria appearing on a reality TV show.

History of Google Updates with explanations
Duche de Bicolline (EN version)
"How to Learn SEO" - Adria wrote this at ASICS Digital
"Lies, Damned Lies, and Search Marketing Statistics"
"Future-Proofing Your SEO"
"The Quest Revived as Disney Plus Brings Back ABC Fantasy Reality"

Ep. 026, Insurance as a career Oct 12, 2020

Meredith Barnes-Cook started running agile development teams before agile was even "a thing". Her no-nonsense, results-oriented approach to insurance software development led to a successful career at Liberty Mutual and other insurers. We talk about moving from career management to career ownership, getting work done through people not in spite of them, and folding in teams from formerly hostile competitors.

Needham High School – Home of the oldest Thanksgiving football rivalry https://needhamhistory.org/features/articles/needham-wellesley/
From agility to Agile https://www.prosci.com/resources/articles/stop-confusing-agile-with-agile
A career jungle gym https://www.gsb.stanford.edu/insights/sheryl-sandberg-careers-arent-ladders-theyre-jungle-gyms
The power – and joy – of networking https://www.linkedin.com/posts/meredithbarnes-cook_networking-5-circles-of-influence-smith-activity-6702377150449807360-Rcb8
Roblox – My son’s journey to becoming a software engineer https://www.techradar.com/news/teaching-children-to-code-and-program-with-roblox
Elon Musk - Tesla is just a small part of his story https://www.cbinsights.com/research/report/elon-musk-companies-disruption/?utm_source=CB+Insights+Newsletter&utm_campaign=aeb0ccf0a5-newsletter_general_Sat_20200926&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_9dc0513989-aeb0ccf0a5-94473706

Ep. 025, Architecture Discussion Oct 05, 2020

Season Three kicks off with our guest Jim Martin, CTO of Shepley Bulfinch. Famed architect H.H. Richardson gave birth to the company way back in the 1800s with the design of Trinity Church in Boston, and they have remained in practice ever since. Jim's job is to make sure technology is an enabler for architects, helping them better design, draw, and deliver solutions to their clients. We talk about growing up with LOGO, the intricacies of CAD software and its IT care and feeding, and Jim's involvement as the president of SIM Boston (the Society for Information Management).

Knowledge Management - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knowledge_management
Positive Deviance - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Positive_deviance
Starchitect - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Starchitect
Shepley Bulfinch - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shepley_Bulfinch
Autodesk Revit - https://www.autodesk.com/products/revit/overview
SIMBoston - https://www.simboston.org/home
Zoom break out rooms - https://support.zoom.us/hc/en-us/articles/206476093-Enabling-breakout-rooms

Underserved 2020 BBQ Special Episode Part 2 Just the BBQ Tips Jul 02, 2020

We are back with Part 2 of our BBQ Bonus edition of Underserved! This episode features the tips and tricks that our pitmasters have learned during years of time spent over the smoker. Learn secrets including brining, rub and sauce selection, resting, wrapping, and more.

Featured are: Dave White - Director of Software Engineering at Iron Mountain, weekend BBQ warrior https://www.linkedin.com/in/dsw999/ Carlo Crocetti - Owner of Crocetti's and South Shore Meats, the thrill of the grill https://www.linkedin.com/in/carlocrocetti/ https://www.instagram.com/the_boston_butcher/ Bill Gillespie - Distribution Designer for National Grid and pitmaster of world-champion team Smokin Hoggz BBQ https://www.linkedin.com/in/bill-gillespie-7aaa6410/ https://www.smokinhoggzbbq.com/

Underserved 2020 BBQ Special Episode Part 1 Jun 18, 2020

Just in time for summer - A special 2-part BBQ bonus edition of Underserved! Years back I decided to get good at cooking barbecue and formed a competitive team called Tasty Bytes BBQ. Along the way, we won some contests, cooked some good food, met some great people, and learned a ton. This episode features three friends I have made in the BBQ world. We talk about how they got into BBQ and what they enjoy most about it. Next episode we will feature tips and tricks from all three of them. Featured are: Dave White - Director of Software Engineering at Iron Mountain, weekend BBQ warrior https://www.linkedin.com/in/dsw999/ Carlo Crocetti - Owner of Crocetti's and South Shore Meats, the thrill of the grill https://www.linkedin.com/in/carlocrocetti/ https://www.instagram.com/the_boston_butcher/ Bill Gillespie - Distribution Designer for National Grid and pitmaster of world-champion team Smokin Hoggz BBQ https://www.linkedin.com/in/bill-gillespie-7aaa6410/ https://www.smokinhoggzbbq.com/

Ep. 024, The best WiFi is in the jungle May 28, 2020

Capping off Season Two, Bharathi Balasubramanyam (B, for short) tells us about finding computer science when biology class went awry, serverless frameworks, imposter syndrome, and becoming the queen of working remotely. You won't want to miss B's around-the-world experience with Remote Year, where she traveled to 23 different countries in one year all while keeping the same job!

Lifescore Labs - https://www.lifescorelabs.com/
AWS Lambda - https://aws.amazon.com/lambda/
Remote year - http://boston.cbslocal.com/video/3839298-highly-skilled-workers-travel-the-world-while-keeping-their-jobs/
The Ikikai tribe - https://remoteyear.com/itineraries/ikigai

Ep. 023, Scratching the itch to code May 12, 2020

Our guest PK Shiu was building remote development teams long before it was fashionable (or the only way!) to do so. We cover the organizational and people challenges of making remote work, talk a bit about audio production, and about getting kids interested in coding using the Scratch programming language from MIT.

Ep. 022, Catching the coding bug May 04, 2020

Our guest Sara Morgan explains how a sick day led to a love of coding and how questions like, "Would you rather plan a party or take a doorknob apart?" can help point you towards a career. Sara also talks about how your network enables more industry portability than your expertise can, and how important attitude and perspective can be in shaping your future. We also talk about applying technology toward kids' sports and fishing.

The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People https://www.franklincovey.com/the-7-habits.html (book is available on Amazon)
The Speed of Trust https://www.speedoftrust.com/ (book is available on Amazon)
Wisdom Quotes https://wisdomquotes.com/
The Cadillac of Fish Finders for ice fishing https://www.vexilar.com/
Youtube bass fishing videos: https://www.google.com/search?q=youtube+bass+fishing+videos&rlz=1C1CHBF_enUS703US703&oq=youtube+bass+fishing&aqs=chrome.1.69i57j0l7.6841j0j4&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8
Lacrosse shooting w/Paul Rabil on Youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ujqm0sdy93M

Ep. 021, Ed Tech REACTions Apr 22, 2020

Matt Hodges (fellow member of the Commodore Army) applied lots of grit and determination to graduate with a CS degree at a time when 93% were quitting the major. Like our previous guest John Newman, Matt got to view development from a lot of different angles before becoming part of the organization (QA, DBA, Ops, etc). We talk about how being thankful and humble can be a really important part of your career, and how being the Excel stat geek can endear you to your softball team.

Stonehill College: https://www.stonehill.edu/
Staples (Contract Space): https://www.staplesadvantage.com/
Curriculum Associates: https://www.curriculumassociates.com/
React Redux: https://react-redux.js.org/
React Sagas: https://redux-saga.js.org/
CreateJS: https://createjs.com/
LinkedIn Learning: https://www.linkedin.com/learning/
VueJS: https://vuejs.org/
i18n: https://www.npmjs.com/package/i18n
Thanks A Thousand: https://www.amazon.com/Thanks-Thousand-Gratitude-Journey-Books/dp/1501119923
SIM Boston: https://www.simboston.org/home

Ep. 020, Social-emotional learning Apr 13, 2020

Khan Klatt has been involved in education technology for the last 7 years, on both the for-profit and non-profit sides of the industry. Khan talks about how some things change and some stay the same between those two worlds, how he got his start in software, the front-end focus in ed tech, and how he applies "otaku" to his hobby of building light displays.

CFC’s Mission: https://www.cfchildren.org/blog/2016/04/safe-children-thriving-in-a-peaceful-world/
UIUC https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NCSA_HTTPd
CFC https://www.cfchildren.org/
Open Educational Resources (OER) - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_educational_resources
Bob Martin / Clean Code - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_C._Martin
NoOps/ZeroOps - https://www.cio.com/article/3407714/what-is-noops-the-quest-for-fully-automated-it-operations.html
Otaku - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Otaku
Falcon PixelController - https://www.pixelcontroller.com/store/index.php
xLights Software - https://xlights.org/

Ep. 019, Better Business Travel Apr 02, 2020

Chris Stasonis, VP of Engineering at Lola.com talks about the trajectory of an engineering career, and how to decide at critical junctures - "Stay or leave a company? Stay technical or consider management? How do I become a good (not average) manager?" Chris also (drum roll) keeps chickens and has automated some of the coop life. We talk a bit about the prosumer-ization of flying private airplanes as well.

"Being Geek" - the software developer's career handbook https://www.amazon.com/Being-Geek-Software-Developers-Handbook/dp/0596155409
Author page https://randsinrepose.com/
Reid Hoffman's "The Alliance" https://www.amazon.com/Alliance-Managing-Talent-Networked-Age-ebook/dp/B00JTJ84EW/ref=tmm_kin_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=1585582216&sr=1-1
The GitHub repo Chris forked for the chicken door robotics https://github.com/ericescobar/Chicken_Door
Guide for aspiring software managers https://www.amazon.com/Managers-Path-Leaders-Navigating-Growth/dp/1491973897
"Infinity pools" book https://www.amazon.com/Make-Time-Focus-Matters-Every/dp/B07DHT9BZV/ref=sr_1_1?crid=FP15NXKU2RCQ&keywords=make+time&qid=1585588299&s=books&sprefix=make+time%2Cstripbooks%2C159&sr=1-1
For hardcore airplane geeks https://foreflight.com/

Ep. 018, Get in the ring Mar 22, 2020

If your team grows 4x in a year it can be hard to keep up! Ken Pickering talks about bracing for the influx, living with a Scala architecture, and working in consumer-facing companies. Hear how boxing competitively provides the necessary stress relief for the software industry (link below to sponsor Ken in this year's Haymakers for Hope charity tournament!)

Hopper: https://www.hopper.com/ (and download the App!)
Haymakers for Hope: https://haymakersforhope.org/event/boston/2020/rock-n-rumble-x/ken-pickering
Harry Potter Programmable Wand: https://kano.me/us/store/products/coding-wand

Ep. 017, Go fly a kiteboard Mar 12, 2020

Our guest Ben Szekely talks about pioneering semantic technologies at CSI for over a decade. As an SVP and Head of Field Operations, Ben has been applying graph technology to the human data model and other tough problems. In his spare time, he is also an avid skier (think jumping out of a perfectly good helicopter onto a mountain in Alaska) and kiteboarder. Hear about how the highest kiteboard jump in the world happened in Massachusetts Bay!

Cambridge Semantics, https://www.cambridgesemantics.com/
Video and whitepaper on Data Fabric https://www.cambridgesemantics.com/robust-agile-and-comprehensive-the-story-of-the-data-fabric/.
Jobs @ Cambridge Semantics https://www.cambridgesemantics.com/about-us/careers/
Heliskiing video from Alaska https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=COKHFZd0ZNE
WooSports kiteboard jump measurement https://woosports.com/

Ep. 016, The Continuous Compliance Conundrum Mar 02, 2020

Vikas Singhvi went from the ultimate for-profit industry (financial services software) to a running IT for a non-profit. Hear his lessons learned, along with how to level up using online resources, and what DevSecOps is. We talk about continuous compliance and how to reconcile Agile methodologies with regulated industries. We also cover trying to retain culture and traditions from the old country when living in a new country.

Vikas on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/vikassinghvi/
Software Composition Analysis https://resources.whitesourcesoftware.com/blog-whitesource/software-composition-security-analysis
Continuous Compliance https://www.pulsant.com/knowledge-hub/blog/what-is-continuous-compliance/
DevSecOps https://www.redhat.com/en/topics/devops/what-is-devsecops
SonarQube https://www.sonarqube.org/
Snyk https://snyk.io/

Ep. 015, The siren song of the modem Feb 20, 2020

Our guest in Episode 015 is John Newman, Senior Software Engineer (Java/Spring/Oracle). After growing up on a steady diet of BBSes, John went from the physical therapy program to the programming program. After his start in Ops he moved to Dev and has been coding ever since. John talks about developing for the fun of it, his early days on the dial-up bulletin board systems in Boston, and how coaching youth sports helps him with his job.

What is a BBS - https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bulletin_board_system
Commodore 64 - https://www.google.com/amp/s/gizmodo.com/a-commodore-64-clone-with-a-working-retro-keyboard-will-1835836875/amp
Umass Lowell CS Dept. - https://www.uml.edu/sciences/computer-science/
BU Met CS - https://bumetprograms.bu.edu/computerscience/
Spring Boot - https://spring.io/projects/spring-boot

Ep. 014, Competing against free is really hard Feb 10, 2020

In Episode 014 I talk to Tim Callaghan, VP of Technology at Crunchtime. Tim has some great stories from a previous job where they embraced open source, extended it, and competed with it on occasion. His story about attending a presentation that (surprise!) ended up being about his benchmarking code at a worldwide MongoDB conference is a must-listen! We also talk about inspiring the next generation of coders and cloud provider merits.

Tim on LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/timcallaghan/ @tmcallaghan (twitter) acmebenchmarking.com (blog)

The mongodb presentation - slide 7 was where it all started! https://www.mongodb .com/presentations/mythbusting-understanding-how-we-measure-performance-mongodb
Tim's benchmark applications @ github https://github.com/tmcallaghan/sysbench-mongodb https://github.com/tmcallaghan/iibench-mongodb
mongodb 3.0 bug hunt winners https://www.mongodb .com/blog/post/announcing-mongodb -30-and-bug-hunt-winners
mongodb 2.6 bug hunt winners https://www.mongodb .com/blog/post/bug-hunt-winners-for-mongodb -26-rc0
Tokutek’s fork of Mongodb https://www.percona.com/blog/2013/06/19/announcing-tokumx-v1-0-tokumongo-you-can-have-it-all-2/
Cloud provider usability http://www.acmebenchmarking.com/2015/12/cloud-provider-usability.html

Ep. 013, A trip you'll want to hear about Jan 30, 2020

We kick off Season Two with Steve Kaufer, CEO of TripAdvisor, Inc. Steve made the long trek across the highway in Needham to talk to me about what initially excited him about computers, what he learned at each stage in TripAdvisor's growth, and what he would go back and tell himself if he had a time machine. We also talk about fencing, the TripAdvisor Charitable Foundation, and the anti-bureaucracy challenge. How does your outlook on acquisitions change from being a $50M company to being a $4B company? You won't want to miss the lessons learned and how to use the "mirror test" to determine what price to charge when you have no clue how to value something.

TripAdvisor Refugee relief : https://www.tripadvisor.com/vpages/refugee_relief.html Sabre fencing in MA: http://zetafencing.com/ Boston fencing club: https://www.bostonfencingclub.org/ The Pan-Mass Challenge: https://www.pmc.org/ Other ways to price services (besides the Mirror Test): https://www.inc.com/guides/price-your-services.html

Underserved 2019 Holiday Bonus Episode Dec 13, 2019

It's almost time for the business world to hibernate for a couple of weeks, and Underserved is shipping some yuletide bits to enjoy during the break! We have taken some cuts we did not have room for in our regular episodes and packaged them here. This bonus episode is the end of Season One of Underserved. Season two is coming in early 2020, see you then!

Show notes:

Buoyancy - Forbes article https://www.forbes.com/sites/lizryan/2016/12/19/10-good-reasons-to-change-jobs-every-3-5-years/#4d8f9cf2777b
Why do Hackathons? https://www.thetechedvocate.org/benefits-participating-hackathon/
Benefits of GITHUB https://apiumhub.com/tech-blog-barcelona/using-github/
When to get an endorsement/reference https://www.themuse.com/advice/the-right-and-wrong-way-to-ask-someone-to-be-a-reference
Advice about counter-offers: https://thehiredguns.com/should-you-accept-a-counteroffer/

Ep. 012, Rise of the machines Nov 20, 2019

How many people started their data science career at 16 years old? Then took a sabbatical to play with famous jazz musicians? And subsequently bootstrapped the US presence for a Norwegian data science firm? I know one! His name is Russ Wilcox. On this week's Underserved Russel explains how a Tesla sees the world (and how it can be fooled), how to teach an old AI new tricks, and we discuss the ethical implications of artificial intelligence. If you ever wondered how machine learning worked, or if the rise of SKYNET is imminent, this is the podcast for you.

Russel's company, Sannsyn US Sannsyn.com/us
Gradient Descent: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gradient_descent
Convolutional neural networks: https://papers.nips.cc/paper/4824-imagenet-classification-with-deep-convolutional-neural-networks
Anders Hanssen: https://www.mn.uio.no/math/personer/vit/anderch/
Tensorflow: https://www.tensorflow.org/
Keras: https://keras.io/
Pytorch: https://pytorch.org/
Comparison of TF, Keras, PT: https://dzone.com/articles/tensorflow-vs-pytorch-vs-keras-for-nlp
Anthony Fung: https://www.anthonyfungmusic.com/
George Garzone: http://www.georgegarzone.com/
The Russ Wilcox Jazz Group : https://www.facebook.com/rwilcoxjazz/

Ep. 011, Addicted to learning Nov 11, 2019

Arvind Singh https://www.linkedin.com/in/aaroh/ is a software developer that specializes in security and identity management. He has been a proponent of open source software for over two decades, particularly BSD derivatives of Unix. We talk about how open source is the unsung hero of the Internet, the proliferation of open source licensing models, coming up from the west coast of India to the East coast of the US, and where the best Indian food in Boston is (hint: JP). We also talk restoring bicycles and bike trails in the Boston area.

A practical guide to open source license compliance https://www.softwarefreedom.org/resources/2008/compliance-guide.html
Binary GPL checker tool https://lwn.net/Articles/386280/
Code together live in VS https://code.visualstudio.com/blogs/2017/11/15/live-share
Indian food: 1st place for Arvind is Bukhara https://www.bukharabistro.com/
Indian food: Close second is Mela https://melainboston.com/
The Minuteman Bikeway http://minutemanbikeway.org/
Mass State biking advocacy https://www.massbike.org/
BONUS: Sarson Ka Saag recipe https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ZoqWWtagHY

Ep. 010, QA is a marathon, not a sprint Nov 01, 2019

Brian Adams got into QA by way of customer service, and has developed his testing skills, user empathy, and teamwork to become a top professional. We talk about best practices for performing quality assurance, QA in an agile lifecycle, and making the most out of distributed teams. Brian is also a veteran of multiple marathons (the running kind) so we talk about his rituals and routines.

The combined BA/QA role: https://www.emids.com/defining-the-baqa-role/
Microsoft OneDrive is taking over DropBox and GDrive: https://onedrive.live.com/about/en-us/
Learning from your coworkers: https://idealistcareers.org/learn-from-coworkers/
MapMyRun: https://www.mapmyrun.com/
Bowling in Tewksbury: https://wamesitlanes.com/

Ep. 009, The higher you are on the pyramid... Oct 21, 2019

I have known Mark Carbrey for over 20 years, from my first job in the software development industry. One fateful day I asked to audit a class he was teaching and our paths have been intertwined ever since. We have worked together, helped one another with projects, and both learned a lot along the way. Mark has worked leading software development teams and organizations up to the CTO/CIO level, has helped companies improve quality, figuring out how to pass audits, and facilitate acquisitions. Topics include "What is it like having hundreds of people trying to sell to you?" and "Why are security audits becoming harder and more commonplace?"

ISO 27001: Information Security Management https://www.iso.org/isoiec-27001-information-security.html
Cyber Hygiene: https://digitalguardian.com/blog/what-cyber-hygiene-definition-cyber-hygiene-benefits-best-practices-and-more
Yes, it's all about the PowerPoint: https://business.tutsplus.com/tutorials/how-to-learn-powerpoint--cms-29884
Mark on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mark-carbrey-6a7672/
Tasty Bytes BBQ: http://tastybytesbbq.com

Ep. 008 of Underserved, The geek shall inherit the earth Oct 10, 2019

Robert "Swifty" Swift (LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/robert-swift-2094774/ ) A.K.A "Nixon" has been a fixture of the Boston geek community for decades. An engineer turned recruiter by day, in his free time Robert has been to most cons, gaming gatherings, LARPs, and D&D sessions in the 617. Robert serves up his top phone, Skype, and in-person interview tips and then shares his off-the-clock experiences, providing an exclusive look into the social underbelly of the Boston tech scene.

Arisia: Boston’s Oldest Sci-fi Convention https://arisia.org/
The Ig-Nobel Prizes, Presented by real scientists who run a hobby Magazine the AoIR https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ig_Nobel_Prize
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Annals_of_Improbable_Research
The Convention Competition to Arisia.org is of course Boskone! https://www.boskone.org/
The Insanely Popular D&D Weekly Live Show “Critical Role” https://critrole.com/
The Matt Mercer effect https://www.geeknative.com/68009/what-is-the-matt-mercer-effect/
The New Popularity of D&D https://tinyurl.com/y2vl5kp9
Paizo’s game “Pathfinder” created the first Competitor to D&D ever, https://paizo.com/pathfinder
Types of LARPs https://thelarplife.wordpress.com/2015/06/10/types-of-larps/
Local US “Best” LARP manufacturer https://www.b3is.com/
and his LARP Store near Worcester MA https://larpbox.com/
The SCA https://sca.org/
Gaming Stores in Boston that Swifty goes to: http://www.pandemoniumbooks.com/ https://www.battlegroundgames.com/
And the Adventure Pub, Boardgame café in Arlington, MA https://theadventurepub.com/

EPS NEWS FLASH - Twitch Stream Poker Cheating Scandal - Mike Postle Oct 09, 2019

Special News Episode - There is a scandal in the Twitch Streaming/Poker world this week. Our guest to help us break down and analyze the news is Mike Breault. You might remember Mike from Episode 007 of Underserved. We go into deep technical detail on the live-streaming poker cheating scandal at the Stones Gambling Hall involving a man named Mike Postle. We talk about how the story broke, the Internet sleuthing that followed, and how programming and various technologies may be involved.

2+2 poker forum https://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/29/news-views-gossip/mike-postle-cheating-allegations-faq-first-post-1753388/
bb/100 vs VPIP graph https://i.gyazo.com/9640d7665da6f5fbc37ad6c935334fbb.png
Hendon Mob website https://pokerdb.thehendonmob.com/player.php?a=r&n=47805
Phone leaves the rail and Postle becomes a superuser https://youtu.be/qAw9HiSpG9w?t=7249
What is a superuser http://pokerterms.com/superuser.html
Poker streams on YouTube https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCU2mtbH_7p0a4EyavEKMHTA/videos
Pokernews.com interview - Andrew Milner of PokerGFX https://cutt.ly/beiWeIP
Session History
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1MCfupw2gOZSDj_qvfL0ndIUsyE_Nx7YLNTKVoQUR_VE/edit#gid=2044248290
Telling the player his cards didn't register https://youtu.be/M6yLN32LpGQ?t=169

Ep. 007 of Underserved, Destined to be a developer Sep 30, 2019

This week's guest is my friend of nearly 20 years, Mike Breault. Mike on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/michaelkbreault/ Mike and I became fast friends back at Monster.com and have worked together, traveled together, and had a lot of fun times ever since. Mike always knew he wanted to be a software developer, starting in 1976 sending emails from his kitchen with his dad. Yes, 1976. We talk about development history, current events, and a bit about sports gambling and one-day fantasy sports.

People talking into the mouse - IRL, not just Star Trek IV: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hShY6xZWVGE
"Cracking the coding interview" - the book http://www.crackingthecodinginterview.com/
Van Eck Phreaking https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Van_Eck_phreaking
Eight Men Out - movie about The Black Sox https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0095082/
"Integrity fees" for sports gambling https://www.legalsportsreport.com/integrity-fee/
Basketball official who bet on games - Tim Donaghy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tim_Donaghy

Episode 006, What about the children? Sep 20, 2019

This week I talk to my wife Tricia and daughter Caroline to get two different perspectives on kids using social media. If you are a parent and don't know what a Finsta is, or what TikTok/VSCO are, or how monitoring SnapChat / social media works, this is the podcast for you! Social media with kids is a catch 22 - if they are not on it they miss out on a lot of their peer socialization, if they are on it there are at least as many risks and downsides as upsides. We talk about the platforms, usage, abuse, and how to try to get a handle on it as parents (including tools to do so). OurPact - the tool we use ($8/month) for controlling access to apps and screen time. There's a locator app too but Google Maps with location sharing is pretty much the same IMO. https://ourpact.com/ Bark - for monitoring social media, we have not tried it but have heard about it ($9/month). One caveat - SnapChat private messages and private stories are not monitored. The only way to get at those is with jailbreaking or rooting your kids devices, as far as I can tell. https://www.bark.us/ What is a Finsta (Fake-Instagram) https://www.dictionary.com/e/slang/finsta/ What is a VSCO girl? https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=VSCO%20GIRL What is TikTok? https://www.tiktok.com/en/ How can kids secretly screenshot SnapChat? https://www.spyzie.com/snapchat/how-to-secretly-screenshot-snapchat.html

No CS degree? No problem! Sep 10, 2019

Jarrod Taylor is a self-taught software developer. He lives in Florida and works with modern JavaScript frameworks and languages like Ruby, He started out learning programming to help move along an internal project and things catapulted from there. Hear how Jarrod came into the industry the "no CS degree" route and what he's interested in today. Jarrod spends a lot of time at Disney and shares some of his favorite spots. Jarrod on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jarrod-taylor-53900768/ Coding Current favorite editor - Panic Coda 2 https://panic.com/coda/ Spiffy new 5K displays - https://www.amazon.com/LG-Ultrafine-Monitor-5120-Resolution/ Using Sidecar as second display for Mac - https://www.macstories.net/stories/sidecar-in-ios-13-and-macos-catalina-working-seamlessly-between-an-ipad-and-mac/ Using Elixir on the Erlang vm https://elixir-lang.org/ The Nerves Framwork https://nerves-project.org/ The movie pi: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0138704/ Disney Insider tips The new Star Wars park at Disney - https://disneyworld.disney.go.com/destinations/hollywood-studios/star-wars-galaxys-edge/ Chef Art Smith's Homecomin' restaurant - http://www.homecominkitchen.com/ Trader Sam's Grog Grotto Tiki Bar at The Polynesian - https://disneyworld.disney.go.com/dining/polynesian-resort/trader-sams-grog-grotto/ One of the few appreciating cars you'll ever see - The Ford GT 40 from 2004-2005 on Ebay - https://www.ebay.com/b/Ford-Ford-GT/116478/bn_7115875849 Ford vs. Ferrari https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1950186/ The Porsche 917 https://www.roadandtrack.com/motorsports/a10209689/porsche-917-steve-mcqueen-le-mans-movie-car-for-sale/

Ep. 004 of Underserved, Drafting the varsity team Aug 29, 2019

This week's guest is Colin Reposa, VP of Resource Management from Syrinx Consulting. Colin's job is to match up technologists with the needs clients have for building teams. It sounds simple on paper but there is a lot to doing it right! Colin talks about the evolution of job boards (and why he rarely uses them nowadays), getting an employer to allow you to work remote, and how contract-to-hire has become more popular and more possible than before. Some tools and topics Colin mentions: LinkedIn Recruiter https://business.linkedin.com/talent-solutions/recruiter Changes to H1B visas in 2019 https://www.forbes.com/sites/andyjsemotiuk/2019/01/02/recent-changes-to-the-h1b-visa-program-and-what-is-coming-in-2019 What is an RFE? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Request_For_Evidence A still-relevant article on JS Framework longevity: https://www.bitovi.com/blog/longevity-or-lack-thereof-in-javascript-frameworks The brutal lifecycle of JS frameworks https://stackoverflow.blog/2018/01/11/brutal-lifecycle-javascript-frameworks/

Ep. 003 of Underserved, How Agile are you? Aug 22, 2019

In Episode 003, Glyn Morgan (Practice Director, AgileNX) talks about modern software development processes. Specifically, what's it like to implement Agile across several companies, where do many organizations stumble, and what are his tips for success? Glyn also talks about early computers in the UK, his unusual status as a Mac user with an Android phone, and immigrating to the US. Glyn on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/glynm/ Jira Kanban view https://www.atlassian.com/agile/kanban/boards AgileNX https://agilenx.io/ and https://www.facebook.com/pg/SyrinxConsulting/posts/ Making QA a part of your agile process http://www.wirfs-brock.com/PDFs/QA2AQ.pdf

Episode 002 of Underserved, You have to sell to survive Aug 13, 2019

In the first few companies where I worked there was little fraternization between the sales, product, and development groups. Monster changed that for me, and I found it very interesting to see how sales-centric organizations were run and what made salespeople tick. My guest Matt Berg is one of the top salespeople in the software consulting industry. Matt talks about how he got interested in technology, working with developers and customers, and finding common ground. Matt on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/matt-berg-0b875a20 Which one is the Sega TMNT game that Matt lost? https://www.amazon.com/s?k=tmnt+for+sega+genesis&ref=nb_sb_noss_2 The scoop on keeping a coop: https://thepoultrysite.com/articles/fundamental-rules-to-keeping-backyard-chickens If you are in the tech industry and keep chickens or other livestock, tell us about it! Email us at underserved@syrinx.com or hit me up on Twitter @AndrewGelina https://twitter.com/andrewgelina Matt's most important online sales tool, ZoomInfo: https://www.zoominfo.com/ The scariest distracted driving - People shooting videos while driving: https://www.yahoo.com/lifestyle/alarming-trend-taking-videos-driving-everybody-224451939.html

Episode 001 of Underserved, the podcast for the rest of the technology industry Jul 17, 2019

In this inaugural episode of Underserved, Andrew explains the motivation for the podcast. He also talks about how he got into programming and answers some frequently asked questions about developer preferences. This show is sponsored by Syrinx, the developer-founded, developer-run software consulting company www.syrinx.com

Episode Links

Code.org's hour of code: https://hourofcode.com/us

Learning JS: https://www.learn-js.org/

VS Code: https://code.visualstudio.com/

Android Studio: https://developer.android.com/studio

Sublime Text: https://www.sublimetext.com/

We want to engage with our listeners! Please feel free to email us at underserved@syrinx.com or tweet to @AndrewGelina with show feedback, ideas, rants, or praise.

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