Podcast appearances and mentions of nadia odunayo

Send us a textIn Episode 184 of Book Talk, Etc., Tina and Hannah are joined by Nadia Odunayo, Founder, CEO and sole developer for The StoryGraph. We chat a little bit about Nadia's personal background and share all kinds of fun information about our favorite reading tracker. We can't wait for you to listen and share in the excitement!If you enjoy our commercial-free podcast, please consider supporting us on Patreon! Your membership will give you access to our exclusive bonus episodes, including Niche Novels, Books We DNFed, and What's in the Mailbag! Plus, you'll receive invites to monthly events like Mood Reader Happy Hour and Bookstore Browsing, and a private Facebook group and Discord server where you can interact with other fans of the show... all for just $5 a month!Loving LatelyBeis Bag - The Weekender (T)The Millions - Year in Reading Series (H)Traitors UK (N)Book Talk Books MentionedThe GunnersProject Hail MaryThe FlatshareBad BloodSay NothingEmpire of PainRoguesHatching TwitterRob's Videos - @the.storygraphBooks MentionedMad  Honey | Jodi Picoult, Jennifer Finney Boylan (T)Children of Red Peak | Craig DiLouie (H)What if We Get it Right | Ayana Elizabeth Johnson (N)Traci Thomas - @thestackspod on IGWhite Smoke | Tiffany D. Jackson (T)Lofi | Liz Riggs (H)Magpie Murders | Anthony Harrowitz (N)Shelf AdditionsMinistry of Time | Kaliane Bradley (N)Blood in the Water | Tiffany D. Jackson (T)Only In Your Dreams | Ellie K. Wilde (H)Support the showLet's Connect... Email us at booktalketc@gmailTina's TikTok , IG @tbretcHannah's TikTok , IG @hanpickedbooksJonathan IG @infiltrate_jayPodcast IG @booktalketcRenee's Substack Newsletter , IG@Itsbooktalk

This week on The Changelog we're talking with Nadia Odunayo, founder of StoryGraph. Nadia started out as a one woman dev and product team — she's had to adjust and maneuver along way to becoming the Amazon-free alternative to Goodreads. We talk about the importance of customer research, the iterative nature of customer research and what it takes to synthesize and analyze the findings to guide product development, the technical challenges and learnings she faced while building StoryGraph, for example at several points they've faced challenges in handling an influx of users and had to re-architect the system. We also talk about the business model of StoryGraph and how they generate revenue through Plus subscriptions, and partnerships with publishers for book giveaways.

This week on The Changelog we're talking with Nadia Odunayo, founder of StoryGraph. Nadia started out as a one woman dev and product team — she's had to adjust and maneuver along way to becoming the Amazon-free alternative to Goodreads. We talk about the importance of customer research, the iterative nature of customer research and what it takes to synthesize and analyze the findings to guide product development, the technical challenges and learnings she faced while building StoryGraph, for example at several points they've faced challenges in handling an influx of users and had to re-architect the system. We also talk about the business model of StoryGraph and how they generate revenue through Plus subscriptions, and partnerships with publishers for book giveaways.

Get ready for an electrifying episode that will leave you in awe of the incredible Nadia Odunayo!

On today's episode, we chat with Nadia Odunayo, Founder and CEO of The StoryGraph, an indie alternative to Amazon-owned Goodreads. We discuss how The StoryGraph was founded, how it grew, and where it's going next, as well as the importance of indie companies in an ever-monopolized industry. READ FULL EPISODE TRANSCRIPT Use promo code: LIBROPODCAST when signing up for a Libro.fm membership to get an extra free credit to use on any audiobook. About Nadia Odunayo: Nadia is the founder and CEO at The StoryGraph. She studied Philosophy, Politics, and Economics at University College, Oxford. She is a fan of fiction & storytelling, and how these can be used as tools for education, the process and execution around building products, particularly from scratch, and singing & dance. Books we discussed on today's episode: The Fifth Season by N. K. Jemisin American Kingpin by Nick Bilton Thank You For Listening by Julia Whelan Come and Get It by Kiley Reid American Queen by Sierra Simone The Art Thief by Michael Finkel The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store by James McBride How to Resist Amazon and Why by Danny Caine

Robby has a chat with Nadia Odunayo (she/her/hers), the Founder and CEO at The StoryGraph. Nadia starts off by highlighting solid test coverage, up-to-date GeM language platform versions, all security patches, and proper documentation as some of the few common characteristics of maintainable software. She talks about when it makes sense to document debugging processes for your future self, the tradeoffs made when you're the solo developer and founder of a software project, how she approaches product management, how working within Pivotal Labs influenced her approach, and the differences one experiences going from an environment of constant pairing to being a solo developer.They also dive into why every engineer should be comfortable clearing out their product's icebox, the realities of being a solo developer and thinking about vacations, the fine line between premature and proactive optimization, and everything that The StoryGraph app has to offer. Nadia's engineering wisdom will be super insightful so don't miss out!Book Recommendations:Nonviolent Communication by Marshall B. RosenbergThe Eighth Life (for Brilka) by Nino HaratischwiliHelpful Links:Nadia's Websitehttps://www.thestorygraph.com/Nadia on TwitterThe StoryGraph on TwitterSubscribe to Maintainable on:Apple PodcastsOvercastSpotifyOr search "Maintainable" wherever you stream your podcasts.Keep up to date with the Maintainable Podcast by joining the newsletter.

Aaron and Andrew talk about recent experiments in video production including Aaron's upcoming MySQL for Developers course and Andrew's YouTube videos from The Rails SaaS Conference. Aaron's "confidence monitor" "Launching a SaaS in Nine Hours using Rails and Bullet Train" Screenflow Recut The complete collection of Aaron's short form Twitter videos seasoned with dank but unrelated memes An actual example of Aaron's short form videos An example of Andrew's feature release videos "Getting to One Million Users as a One-Woman Dev" by Nadia Odunayo at Rails SaaS

Nadia Odunayo is the Founder and CEO of The StoryGraph, a new website and app for avid book readers because life's too short for a book you're not in the mood for. The StoryGraph helps you track your reading and choose your next book based on your mood, favorite topics, and themes. Victoria talks to Nadia about coming up with a product based on the concept of mood, what you're in the mood for to read, i.e., this book made me feel this way. How do I find a book that makes me feel similar? They also talk about keeping yourself open to feedback, the ability to flow and change direction, and developing a reviewing system that keeps biases in check. StoryGraph (https://thestorygraph.com/) Follow StoryGraph on LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/company/the-storygraph-limited/), Instagram (https://www.instagram.com/the.storygraph/), or Twitter (https://twitter.com/thestorygraph). Follow Nadia Odunayo on LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/in/nodunayo/) or Twitter (https://twitter.com/nodunayo). Follow thoughtbot on Twitter (https://twitter.com/thoughtbot) or LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/company/150727/). Become a Sponsor (https://thoughtbot.com/sponsorship) of Giant Robots! Transcript: VICTORIA: This is The Giant Robots Smashing Into Other Giant Robots Podcast, where we explore the design, development, and business of great products. I'm your host, Victoria Guido. And with me today is Nadia Odunayo, Founder and CEO of StoryGraph, a new website and app for avid book readers because life's too short for a book you're not in the mood for. StoryGraph helps you track your reading and choose your next book based on your mood and your favorite topics and themes. Nadia, thank you for joining me. NADIA: Thank you for having me. VICTORIA: And you are a repeat guest at Giant Robots. But for those who missed that episode, tell me a little bit about your journey. And how did this all get started? NADIA: Okay. Yeah, so that first time was in 2015, and that was not too long after I had just got into tech. I did a bootcamp in London in 2014, Makers Academy, and that's where I learned to code. My degree was in philosophy, politics, and economics, so rather different. I worked at Pivotal for about a year and a half after I graduated from Makers Academy. And during my time at Pivotal, I got into conference speaking, and my first talk was around game theory. So I took my favorite topic in economics, game theory, and I combined that with distributed systems because that's what I was working on at the time in Pivotal on their Cloud Foundry PaaS. I think I gave it at RailsConf, and I think someone there recommended me to Giant Robots. And so Ben Orenstein interviewed me, and it was all about different types of conference talks and that kind of thing. So after Pivotal, I left and started a hybrid kind of consultancy/product company with a colleague, did that for about a year, left that, worked for about a year with my friend, Saron Yitbarek, on her company CodeNewbie. And then, when that partnership ended, I essentially had five years of runway from money that I got from the company that I started after Pivotal because we did some consulting with a bank. I'd always been entrepreneurial. I'd been doing various entrepreneurial things since secondary school, actually, high school. It was time for me to just have time on my side projects. And so I started hacking away on one of my side projects at the beginning of 2019 in January, and I haven't stopped since. That's what the StoryGraph has developed into. VICTORIA: Wonderful. And yes, I saw that the very early stages of StoryGraph started as a creative writing e-publication. Is that right? NADIA: So what happened was when I was at university, I started a creative writing e-publication, came up with the name The StoryGraph. Because we had won or we were going for some grant funding or something like that, I set up a corporate entity. And when I stopped working on that e-publication, I remember my mom saying to me, "Don't shut down the entity. I really like the name. I feel like you'll use it for something," that was in 2012. And so fast forward to 2019, and the side project that I was working on was called Read Lists. And it was very specifically focused on tracking and sharing progress through reading lists on a dashboard. But when I was doing customer research, and the scope of the project grew, Read Lists didn't fit anymore. And that's when I realized, oh, I can use The StoryGraph thing again. And so it's basically had two different lives or two different forms, the StoryGraph company. VICTORIA: That's wonderful. And I'm reading about StoryGraph and how it's an Amazon-free alternative to Goodreads. Can you talk a little bit more about the product and why people would want to use it? NADIA: So, as I said, it started life as a very specific focused side project. And I just had so much fun working on it and working in the book space. I'd always been a reader since I was a kid such that I said to myself, I need to find a way to make me building a books product a full-time thing. And so that's when customer research came in because the only way that you're going to make sure that you don't build something that people don't want is by talking to people. As I was doing customer research and figuring out, are there pain points amongst readers, people who track their reading? What would happen was the pain points that came up drove me towards building a more fully fledged reading, tracking, and recommendations product. It actually started as a very focused recommendations product. And then, we got to the point where we needed to build more around it for it to be a compelling product. And as it was growing, we never advertised ourselves as a Goodreads alternative or as an Amazon-free alternative to what was out there. But that was clearly a pain point in the market. There were tweets about us saying, "Finally a Goodreads alternative. It's small; it's independent; it's Amazon-free. And so thousands and thousands, hundreds of thousands of people have come to us because of that. VICTORIA: Wow. NADIA: And so it got to the point...mainly when we launched our payment plan, and we were trying to figure out the reasons why people were pre-ordering the plan, it was at that point where we decided to lean into the Amazon-free Goodreads alternative because that was what the market wanted. VICTORIA: Was that surprising for you? Or were there other things that came out of your research on your marketplace that kind of were different than what you thought it would be going in? NADIA: I think the most interesting thing about the product development journey was that I at least originally felt like I was building a product that wasn't for me. So what I mean by that is in my earliest rounds of research, what I was finding was that people still didn't think that they had one place to get consistently good book recommendations. And so then I started to explore, well, how do you even give somebody consistently good book recommendations? And one of the factors that kept on coming up was this concept of mood, what you're in the mood for. This book made me feel this way. How do I find a book that makes me feel similar? And so it got to the point where I said to myself, oh wow, I'm building a product for mood readers right now; that seems to be the gap, that seems to be the thing that nothing out there yet had properly attacked. And I had never considered myself a mood reader. I just thought I'm a planner. I'm an organized person. I typically decide what book I want to read, and then I read it. And so there was a point where I was concerned, and I thought, wait, am I now building something that is not for me? But then, as I started to work and do more research and talk to more and more people and thinking about my reading experiences, I developed the hypothesis or the viewpoint rather that I think everybody's a mood reader; it's just the scale. Because there are probably some books that I may have rated lowly in the past that if I had read it in a different frame of mind, or at a different time in my life, different circumstance, it probably would have resonated with me a lot more. Now, that's not to say that's true for every single book. There are some books that are just not going to work for you, no matter what. But I do think we're all on the scale of mood reading. And sometimes we say a book is a bad book, but we just read it at not the right time. And so I think the most surprising thing for me is going on that journey of realizing that, oh, I am a mood reader too. VICTORIA: [laughs] NADIA: And I ended up building an app that's a lot less focused on just the pure ratings. I was someone who, on Goodreads, if it had less than four stars, I'm not interested. And the ethos of the product is more about, well, hang on; these ratings are very subjective. And someone else's two, three-star could be your next five-star. What are the factors that really matter? Do you want something dark, adventurous? Are you looking for something funny, light? And then what kind of topics do you want to discover? And then it doesn't matter if the five people before you thought it was average; you might think it's excellent. VICTORIA: Yeah, it reminds me thinking about how bias can come in with authors and writing as well. So a simple five-star system might be more susceptible to bias against different genders or different types of names. Whereas if you have more complex numbers or complex rating systems, it might be easier to have different types of authors stand out in a different way. NADIA: That actually relates to what was going through my mind when I was developing the reviewing system on StoryGraph. You can just, if you want, leave your star rating and say no more, but the star rating is lower down on the page. And up front, we say this book would be great for someone who's in the mood for something...and then you've got checkboxes. And how would you rate the pace of the book? And if it's a fiction book, we ask you, "Are the characters lovable?" Is there a flawed narrator? Is it plot-driven or character-driven?" Questions like that because the thinking is it doesn't matter whether you are going to give the book two stars in your own personal star rating. You can still help someone else find a book that's good for them because they will be looking at the summary on the StoryGraph book page, and they'll go, "Oh wow, 80% of people said it's lovable. There's a diverse range of characters, and it's funny. So the topics fit things I'm interested in, so I care less about the average rating being like 3.5 because everything else seems perfect. Let me see for myself." And actually, we've also had a lot of feedback from people saying that "Oh, normally, I never know how to review a book or what to say. And this system has really helped me, almost give me prompts to get started about explaining the book, reviewing it for other people to help them decide if it's for them. So that's great." VICTORIA: That makes sense to me because I read a lot of books, maybe not as much as I would like to recently. But not all books that I love I can easily recommend to friends, but it's hard for me to say why. [laughs] You know, like, "This is a very complicated book." So I love it. I'll have to check it out later. It's been four years since you've been full-time or since 2019, almost five then. NADIA: Yes. VICTORIA: If you could travel back in time to when you first started to make this a full-time role, what advice would you give yourself now, having all of this foresight? NADIA: Have patience, trust the process because I can sometimes be impatient with, ah, I want this to happen now. I want this to pick up now. I want these features done now. I'm a solo dev on the project. I started it solo. I have a co-founder now, but I'm still the solo dev. And there were so many things, especially now that we've got a much larger user base, that people complained about or say is not quite right. And that can be really tough to just have to keep hearing when you're like, I know, but I don't have the resource to fix it right now or to improve it. But I think one of the things is, yeah, having faith in the process. Keep going through the cycles of listening to the customers, prioritizing the work, getting the work done, getting the feedback, and just keep going through that loop. And the product will keep getting better. Because sometimes it can feel, particularly in the first year when I was so low, you sometimes have moments of doubt. Or if a customer research round doesn't go super well, you start to wonder, is this only a nice-to-have? And is this going to go anywhere? And so that's one piece of advice. And I think the other one is knowing that there are several right paths because I think sometimes I would agonize over I want to do the right thing. I want to make sure I make the right choice right now. And, I mean, there are some things that are not good to do. You want to make sure that you're setting up your customer interviews in a non-leading way. You want to make sure that there are certain standards in the product in terms of the technical side and all that kind of stuff, so there's that. But I think it's understanding that you kind of just have to make a decision. And if you set yourself up to be able to be adaptive and responsive to change, then you'll be fine. Because you can always change course if the response you're getting back or the data you're getting back is going in the wrong direction. VICTORIA: I love that. And I want to pull on that thread about being open to changing your mind. I think that many founders start the company because they're so excited about this idea and this problem that they found. But how do you keep yourself open to feedback and keeping that ability to flow and to change direction? NADIA: I mean, I didn't set out to build a Goodreads alternative, and here I am. VICTORIA: [laughs] NADIA: I just wanted to build this specific side project or this specific...it was a companion app, in fact. Like, the first version of the thing I built, the first thing you had to do was sign in and connect your Goodreads account so that we could pull in your shelves and start creating the dashboards. So as a solo bootstrapping founder, building a Goodreads alternative was not something that I thought was going to lead to success. But through years of experience, and just hearing other people's stories, and research, I just learned that it's such a hard space just running a startup in general, and 90% of startups fail. And I just said to myself that, okay, the only way I can kind of survive for longer is if I am open to feedback, I'm open to change course, I'm patient, and I trust the process. These are the things I can do to just increase my chances of success. And so that's why I kind of feel it's imperative if you want to go down this route and you want to be successful, it's vital that you're open to completely changing the product, completely changing your direction, completely going back on a decision. You'll either lose customers or you'll run out of money, whatever it is. And so yeah, you've got to just basically be quite ruthless in the things that are just going to minimize your chances of failing. VICTORIA: That makes sense. And now, I have a two-part question for you. What's the wind in your sails? Like, the thing that keeps you going and keeps you motivated to keep working on this? And then, conversely, what's kind of holding you back? What are the obstacles and challenges that you're facing? NADIA: I think this kind of role...so I'm like founder, CEO, and developer. In general, I think I thrive under pressure and pushing myself, and trying to always be better and improve. So I'm always trying to be like, how can I improve my productivity? Or how can I run the company better? All these kinds of things. So I feel like I'm getting to explore maximizing my full potential as someone in the world of work through doing this. So that just intrinsically is motivating to me. I love books, and I love reading. I think it's such an amazing hobby. And the fact that I get to make other readers happy is awesome. So even just as the product has grown, the messages that we get about if someone got a perfect recommendation from StoryGraph, or they hadn't read for years, and now an easy form of, you know, what are you in the mood for? Check a few boxes, and we'll show you some books that fit, whatever it is. That's just so...it's so awesome just to be able to enhance readers' lives that way in terms of the things they're reading and getting them excited about reading again or keeping them excited. So those are the things that keep me going, both the personal nature of enjoying my work and enjoying trying to be the best founder and CEO that I can and building a great product. It's always great when you build something, and people just enjoy using it and like using it. So I'm always incentivized to keep making the product better, the experience better. I'm currently mid a redesign. And I'm just so excited to get it out because it's going to touch on a lot of repeated pain points that we've been having for years. And I just can't wait for everyone to see it and see that we've listened to them. And we're making progress still like three and a bit years on since we launched out of beta. What's tough? Previously, what's been tough is navigating, remaining independent, and bootstrapped with just personally trying to make money to just live my life. So I had five years of runway. And it was this tricky situation about when I had a couple of years left, I'm thinking, wow, I really like doing this, but I'm going to need to start earning money soon. But I also don't want to get investment. I don't want to stop doing this. I can't stop doing this. We've got hundreds of thousands of customers. And so kind of trying to balance my personal needs and life situations with the work I've been doing because I've been working so hard on it for so long that in the last couple of years, it's gotten to a point where it's like, how do I craft the life I want out of a product that is very not set up to be an indie bootstrapped product? [laughs] Typically, you want to do a B2B. You want to start earning money from your product as early as possible. And I feel like I've landed in a product that's typically funded, VC-backed, that kind of thing. So kind of navigating that has been a fun challenge. There's not been anything that's kind of demoralized me or held me back, or made me think I shouldn't do it. And it's just kind of been a fun challenge trying to...yeah, just navigate that. And we've been doing things like we're currently in the process of transitioning our...we have a Plus Plan. And when we launched it, it was essentially a grab bag of features. We're completely changing the feature set. And we right now have six and a half thousand people who are on that plan. But we don't have product market fit on that plan, and I can tell from when I do certain surveys the responses I get back. And so we're completely transitioning that to focus in on our most popular feature, which is the stats that we offer. And so that's kind of scary, but it's part of making that Plus Plan more sticky and easier to sell because it's going to be for your power users who love data. So they want all the data when they are reading. And then the other thing is, okay, what kind of business avenue can we start which fits in with the ethos of the product but brings in more revenue for StoryGraph? And so, we launched a giveaway segment in our app where publishers and authors can pay to list competitions for users to win copies of their books. And it's essentially a win-win-win because publishers and authors get another channel to market their books. Users get to win free books, and readers love winning free books. And StoryGraph has another revenue source that helps us stay independent and profitable, and sustainable in the long run. VICTORIA: That's wonderful. And there are two tracks I want to follow up on there; one is your decision not to seek funding; if you could just tell me a little more about the reasoning and your thought process behind that. And you've already touched on a little bit of the other ways you're looking at monetizing the app. NADIA: Since I was a teenager, I've always been interested in business, economics, entrepreneurship. I've always felt very entrepreneurial. I've read so many founder stories and startup stories over the years. And you hear about venture capitalists who come in, and even if it's fine for the first year or two, ultimately, they want a return. And at some point, that could come at odds with your mission or your goals for your company. And when I think about two things, the kind of life I want and also the nature of the product I'm building as well, VC just doesn't fit. And I know there are so many different funding programs and styles right now, a lot more friendlier [laughs] than VC. But I'm just focusing on VC because when I was younger, I used to think that was a marker of success. VC funding that was the track I thought I was going to go down, and that was what I kind of idolized as, oh my gosh, yes, getting a funding round of millions and millions and then building this huge company. That was how I used to be, so it's so interesting how I've completely gone to the other side. That idea that you could have mismatched goals and how it's ruined companies, once you take the first round of funding and you grow and expand, then you've got to keep taking more to just stay alive until some liquidation event. That just doesn't appeal to me. And I just think there's something ultimately very powerful and valuable about building a product without giving up any ownership to anybody else and being able to make it into something that people love, and that's profitable, and can give the people who run it great lifestyles. I just think that's a mark of an excellent product, and I just want to build one of those. And then I think also the nature of the product itself being a book tracking app. I think the product has done well because it is run and built so closely by myself and Rob. And so it's like, people talk about how, oh, you can tell it's built for readers by readers by people who care. And I run the company's Instagram, and it's not just me talking about the product. I'm talking with a bunch of our users about books and what we're reading. And it really feels like it's just got such a great community feel. And I worry that that can get lost with certain types of investment that I've previously thought that I wanted in my life. And so, yeah, that's the reason why I've kind of strayed away from the investment world. And then it's gotten to the point, like, now we're at the point where we don't need funding because we've been able to get to profitability by ourselves. So we don't need any type of funding. And we're just going to try and keep doing things to keep making the product better, to convert more people to the Plus Plan. And, hopefully, our giveaways platform grows in the way we want such that our goal is to just stay profitable and independent forever for as long as possible. And we think that way, we're going to have the most fun running the company, and the product is going to be the best it can be because there's not going to be competing incentives or goals for the product. VICTORIA: That makes sense. And it sounds like, in reality, in the real case, you had a team, and you had the skills yourself to be able to move the product forward without having to take on funding or take on additional support, which is awesome. And I actually really like your background. I also have a degree in economics. So I'm curious if the economics and philosophy, all of that, really lends itself to your skills as a founder. Is that accurate? NADIA: I don't think so. VICTORIA: [laughs] NADIA: I love my degree. I get sad when I meet econ grads or econ majors, and they're like, "Oh, I hated it. Oh, it was so boring," or whatever. I'm like, "No, it was so great." I'm a big microeconomics fan, so I was all about...I didn't like macro that much. I was all about the game theory and the microeconomic theory, that kind of stuff. I don't think there's anything that really ties into my skills as a founder. I feel like that's more to do with my upbringing and personality than what I studied. But, I mean, one of the reasons I did love my degree is because there are elements that do crop up. It's such a widely applicable...the subjects I did are so widely applicable, philosophy, different ways of seeing the world and thinking and approaching different people. And then, obviously, economics that's essentially behavior, and how markets work, and incentives, and all that kind of stuff. And when you get to pricing and all those sorts of things, and business, and then politics as well, I mean, everything is politics, right? People interacting. So there are definitely things and conversations I had at university, which I see things crop up day to day that I can tie back to it. But yeah, I think it doesn't really...my specific degree, I don't think it's made me a better founder than I would have been if I'd studied, I don't know, English or Math or something. VICTORIA: Right, yeah. I think economics is one of those where it's kind of so broadly applicable. You're kind of using it, but you don't even realize it sometimes. [laughs] NADIA: Yeah. MID-ROLL AD: thoughtbot is thrilled to announce our own incubator launching this year. If you are a non-technical founding team with a business idea that involves a web or mobile app, we encourage you to apply for our eight-week program. We'll help you move forward with confidence in your team, your product vision, and a roadmap for getting you there. Learn more and apply at tbot.io/incubator. VICTORIA: So what made you decide to go to a bootcamp right after finishing school? NADIA: So I'd always been entrepreneurial. I remember...I don't know where exactly it started from, whether I got it from my mom. I know she's always been very entrepreneurial and into business. The earliest memory I have of doing something that was very specifically business-oriented was in what we call sixth form in the UK, which is essentially the last two years of high school before you go to university or college; we had this scheme called Young Enterprise. And essentially, you got into teams of people, small teams, or they could be quite big, actually. It could be up to 20 people. And you started a business, and there were trade shows, and pitch meetings, and all that kind of stuff, so I remember getting involved in all that sort of stuff at school. But I'd always been on the investment banking track because when I was young...so my parents...we come from a poor background. And so my parents were very much like, you know, try and find high-paying careers to go into so that you can pay for whatever you want and you have a much better lifestyle. So I had gotten onto the investment banking track from the age of 14 when I went with a friend...at the school, I went to, there was a Take Your Daughter to Work Day. My dad said, "Oh, you want to go to try and find someone whose parent works in an investment bank or something like that. That's like a great career to go into." And so I went with a friend's dad to UBS. And I remember being blown away, like, wow, this is so fascinating. Because I think everything seems so impressive when you're 14, and you're walking into a space like that, and everything seems very lively. And everyone's walking around dressed sharp. They've got their BlackBerries. So from the age of 14 until 20, it would have been, I was very much I am going to work in an investment bank. And I did all the things that you would do, like all the schemes, the spring programs. And it got to my final internship. And I just remember at the internship being rather disillusioned and disappointed by the experience. I remember thinking, is this it? I was studying at Oxford, and I put so much into my studies. And I remember thinking; I'm working so hard. And this is what I come to? Is this it? And so around the time as well, I was also meeting a lot of people in the entrepreneurship space, social enterprises, people doing their own ventures. And I just remember thinking, oh, I feel like I've got to go down that track. And I ended up winning a place on a coding course. It was set up specifically to help more women get into tech. And it was called Code First Girls. I won a place that started...it was just part-time. What I did was I actually...I got the banking job from Deutsche Bank, it was, but I decided to turn it down. It was a very risky decision. I turned it down, and I stayed in Oxford after graduating and worked in the academic office for a while. And then, twice a week, I would go to London and do this coding course. And during it, on Twitter, I remember seeing a competition for a full-paid place at this bootcamp called Makers Academy. And I just thought to myself, having tech skills, I'd heard the feedback that it's a very powerful thing to have. And I remember thinking I should go for this competition. And I went for the competition, and I won a free place at the bootcamp. If I didn't win a free place at the bootcamp, I'm not sure what would have happened because I'm not sure whether at that point I would have thought, oh, paying £8,000 to go to a software bootcamp is what I should do. I'm not sure I would have got there. So that's how I got there, essentially. I won a competition for a bootcamp after having a taste of what coding was like and seeing how freeing it was to just be able to have a computer and an internet connection and build something. VICTORIA: Oh, that's wonderful. I love that story. And I've spent a lot of time with Women Who Code and trying to get women excited about coding. And that's exactly the story is that once you have it, it's a tool in your toolset. And if you want to build something, you can make it happen. And that's why it's important to continue the education and get access for people who might not normally have it. And you continue to do some of that work as well, right? You're involved in organizations like this? NADIA: Like Code First Girls? No. I did some years ago. I would go and attend Rails Girls workshops and be a mentor at them, at those. And while I was at Pivotal, I helped with events like codebar, which were essentially evenings where people who were learning to code or more junior could come and pair with someone more senior on whatever project they wanted to. So I did a bunch of that stuff in the years after leaving Makers Academy. And I was even a TA for a short time for a couple of weeks at Makers Academy as well after I graduated. But in more recent years, I haven't done much in that space, but I would love to do more at some point. I don't have the bandwidth to right now. [laughs] VICTORIA: And you're still a major speaker going and keynoting events all around the world. Have you done any recently, or have any coming up that you're excited about? NADIA: So before the pandemic, my last talk, I keynoted RubyWorld in Japan. That was in November 2019. And then the pandemic hit, and 2020 June, July was when StoryGraph had some viral tweets, and so we kicked off. And amongst all of that, I was being invited to speak at remote events, but it just didn't make sense for me. Not only was I so busy with work, but I put a lot of hours into my talks. And part of the fun is being there, hallway track, meeting people, being on stage. And so it just didn't appeal to me to spend so much time developing the talk to just deliver it at home. And so, I just spent all the time on StoryGraph. And I remember when events started happening again; I wondered whether I would even be invited to speak because I felt more detached from the Ruby community. Most of the conferences that I did were in the Ruby community. StoryGraph is built on Rails. Yeah, I just thought maybe I'll get back to that later. But all of a sudden, I had a series of amazing invitations. Andrew Culver started up The Rails SaaS Conference in LA in October, and I was invited to speak at that. And then, I was invited to keynote RubyConf, that was recently held in Houston, Texas, and also invited to keynote the satellite conference, RubyConf Mini in Providence, that happened a couple of weeks earlier. And so I had a very busy October and November, a lot of travel. I developed two new talks, a Ruby talk and a StoryGraph talk. It was my first ever time giving a talk on StoryGraph. It was a lot of work and amongst a lot of StoryGraph work that I needed to do. All of the talks went well, and it was so much fun to be back on the circuit again. And I'm looking forward to whatever speaking things crop up this year. VICTORIA: That's wonderful. I'm excited. I'll have to see if I can find a recording and get caught up myself. Going back to an earlier question, you mentioned quite a few times about market research and talking to the customers. And I'm just curious if you have a method or a set of tools that you use to run those experiments and collect that feedback and information. NADIA: Yes. So I remember one of the first things I did years ago was I read "The Mom Test" by Rob Fitzpatrick. And that's great for just getting the foundation of when you talk to customers; you don't want to lead them on in any shape or form. You just want to get the raw truth and go from there. So that's the underpinning of everything I do. And then, I learned from friends I made through Pivotal about how you put together a script for a customer research. You can't just have bullet points or whatever. You should have a script. And the foundation of that script is a hypothesis about what you're trying to find out in that round of research. And once you figure out your hypothesis, then you can put together the questions you want to ask and understand how you're going to measure the output. So the first ever thing I was trying to find out when I first started interviewing people was just very general. It was just like, are there any pain points? I was just trying to figure out are there any pain points among the avid reader group of people? And then I remember the results from that were, "No place for consistent, high-quality recommendations." And so then I said, okay, how are people finding recommendations now, or what are the factors that lead to people thinking a book was great for them? And that's how I ended up getting to the moods and pace. But when I do my interviews, I record them all. I watch them back. And I condense everything on sticky notes. And I use a virtual tool. And I try to take word for word. When I summarize, I still just try and use their specific words as much as possible. So I'm not adding my own editing over what they say. Every single interviewee has a different color. And I essentially group them into themes, and that's how I unlock whatever the answers are for that round. And then I use that...I might have been trying to find out what to build next or whether we should go down a certain product direction or not. And so, depending on the outcome, that helps me make up my mind about what to do. So that's the high-level process that I follow. VICTORIA: Well, that sounds very methodical, and interesting for me to hear your perspective on that. And you mentioned that you do have a redesign coming out soon for StoryGraph. Are there any other particular products or features that you're really excited to talk about coming up soon? NADIA: Yeah, I'm so excited about the redesign because we're bringing out...it's not just a UI improvement; it's a user experience improvement as well. So there are a lot of little features that have been asked for over the years. And actually, it was trying to deliver one of them that sparked the whole redesign. So people really want a marked as finished button. There's no way to mark as finished. You just toggle a book back to read. And some people find this quite counterintuitive, or it doesn't quite explain what they're doing. And so when I came to deliver the mark as finished button, this was months and months ago now, I realized that the book pane was just becoming so cluttered, and I was trying to fight with it to squeeze in this link. And I remember thinking; this is not the only thing people want to see on the book pane. They also want to see when they read the book without having to go into the book page. They also want to be able to add it to their next queue. And I just said, you know what? I need to redesign this whole thing. And so I was able to luckily work with Saron Yitbarek, who is married to my co-founder, Rob. There's a funny story about all of that. And she helped me do this redesign based on all my customer research. And so I'm just so excited to get it out because the other thing that we're bringing with it is dark mode, which is our most requested feature in history. And it's funny because I've always felt like, ah, that's a nice-to-have. But obviously, for some people, it's not a nice-to-have; it's an accessibility issue. And even me, I'm quite strict with my bedtime. I try and be offline an hour before bed. In bed by 11, up at 6, and even me if I want to track my pages, I'm like, ooh, this is a bit bright. And my phone itself is set on adaptive, so it's light mode during the day and dark mode during the night. And even me, I can see why people really want this and why it would just improve their experience, especially if everything else on your phone is dark. So I'm really excited to get that out, mainly for the UX improvements. And the other thing I'm really excited to do is transition the Plus Plan to being the advanced stats package rather than the random selection of features right now. Because not only will the people who pay us get more complex stats functionalities such that they feel like, wow, the subscription fee that I pay not only does it still make me feel like I'm supporting an alternative to Goodreads, an independent alternative to Goodreads I also get such value from these extra features. But the other thing is what I found from my customer research is that if you're a Plus customer, there's often one or two of the Plus features that you love and that you don't really use the others. But they're all really great features. And so what I'm really excited about is that we're going to make all the non-stats features free for everybody. And so I'm so excited for, like, we have a feature where if you put in a group of usernames, we look at all of your to-read lists and suggest great books for you to buddy-read together. Now, there's a bunch of Plus users who aren't social and don't care about it. But there's going to be a bunch of our free users who are so excited about that feature, probably will use it with their book clubs, things like that. We have up-next suggestions where we suggest what you should pick up next from your to-read pile based on a range of factors. It could be, oh, you're behind on your reading goal; here's a fast-paced book. Or this book is very similar to the one that you just finished, so if you want something the same, pick up this one. And, again, that's behind a paywall right now, and I'm just so excited for everybody to be able to use that. When I remember starting out with StoryGraph, I remember thinking, wow, the way this is going, wouldn't it be so cool if we could just suggest books that would be the next perfect read for you? Because a lot of people have a pile of books by their bedside table or on their shelves, and they're just like, well, which one should I start with? And this tool literally helps you to do that. And so I can't wait for everyone to be able to try it. And so that's why I'm excited about that transition because the Plus Plan will be better, and the free product will be better. VICTORIA: That sounds amazing. And I'm thinking in my head like, oh, I should start a book club with thoughtbot. Because there are some engineering management and other types of books we want to read, so maybe we could use StoryGraph to manage that and keep ourselves motivated to actually finish them. [laughs] NADIA: Cool. VICTORIA: No, this is wonderful. And what books are on your reading list coming up? NADIA: Yes. I am excited to read...I'm not sure...I'm blanking on the series' name. But the first book is called "The Poppy War." I don't know whether it's called "The Burning God" or if that's the third book in the series. But it's this very popular trilogy, and I'm excited to read that soon. I'm doing a slow chronological read of Toni Morrison's fiction. I recently read "Song of Solomon," which was great, really, really good. And so I'm excited to read more of her novels this year. I'm also on a kind of narrative nonfiction kick right now. I love narrative nonfiction. So I just finished reading "American Kingpin," which is about Silk Road. And I've picked up "Black Edge," which is about SAC Capital and Steve Cohen and that whole hedge fund insider trading situation. So I'm probably going to look for more of the same afterwards. VICTORIA: Well, that's very exciting. And it's inspiring that as a founder, you also still have time to read [laughs] and probably because StoryGraph makes it easy and motivating for you to do so. NADIA: Yeah, everyone thought that my reading would tank once I started the company, but, in fact, it's multiplied severalfold. And a couple of reasons; one is it's very important in general for me to make time for me because I'm in a situation that could easily become very stressful and could lead to burnout. So I make sure that I make time for me to read and to go to dance class regularly, which is my other main hobby. But then, secondly, I feel like I can justify it as work. Because I say, wow, me being a reader and being able to communicate with people on Instagram and on Twitter about books, not just the product, adds legitimacy to me as the founder and developer of this product. And so it's important that I keep reading. And it also helps the product be better because I understand what features are needed. So, for example, I never used to listen to audiobooks. I'm a big podcast person; I love music. So between those two, when does audio fit in? And also, I didn't like the idea that I could just be absent-minded sometimes with some podcasts, but with a book, you don't want spoilers. It could get confusing. But I started listening to audiobooks because we had a large audiobook user base. And they would ask for certain features, and it was really hard for me to relate and to understand their needs. And now that I have started listening to audiobooks as well, we made some great audiobook listeners-focused additions to the app last year, including you can track your minutes. So you can literally get you read this many pages in a day, but you also listened to this many minutes. You can set an hours goal for the year, so not just a reading goal or a pages goal. You can set an hours goal. Or maybe you're someone like me, where audiobooks are the smaller proportion of your reading, and you just want it all calculated as pages. And so I've got it on the setting where it's like, even when I track an audiobook in StoryGraph, convert it to pages for me, and I just have my nice, all-round page number at the end of the year. VICTORIA: That's so cool. Really interesting. And I've had such a nice time chatting with you today. Is there anything else that you'd like to share as a final takeaway for our listeners? NADIA: If you are someone who wants to start a company, maybe you want to bootstrap, you've got a product idea, I think it's honestly just trust the process. It will take time. But if you trust the process, you listen to customers and really listen to them...research ways to talk to customers, and don't cut corners with the process. There have been so many times when I've done a whole round of research, and then I say, oh, do I have to go through all these now and actually do a synthesis? I think anecdotally; I can figure out what the gist was; no, do the research. You don't know what insights you're going to find. And I think if you just trust that process...and I think the other thing is before you get to that stage, start building up a runway. Having a runway is so powerful. And so whether it's saving a bit more or diverting funds from something else if you have a runway and you can give yourself a couple of years, a few years without worrying about your next paycheck, that is incredibly valuable to getting started on your bootstrapping journey. VICTORIA: Thank you. That's so wonderful. And I appreciate you coming on today to be with us. You can subscribe to the show and find notes along with a complete transcript for this episode at giantrobots.fm. If you have questions or comments, email us at hosts@giantrobots.fm. And you can find me on Mastodon at Victoria Guido. This podcast is brought to by thoughtbot and produced and edited by Mandy Moore. Thank you for listening. See you next time. ANNOUNCER: This podcast is brought to you by thoughtbot, your expert strategy, design, development, and product management partner. We bring digital products from idea to success and teach you how because we care. Learn more at thoughtbot.com. Special Guest: Nadia Odunayo.

Welcome to Remote Ruby and thanks for joining us! It's a full house this week as Jason, Chris, and Andrew are back together! They also have a great guest joining them, Nadia Odunayo, who's the Founder, CEO, and Software Developer of The StoryGraph, a book tracking, and recommendations app. Nadia spoke at the Rails SaaS Conference and her talk was titled, “Getting to one million users as a one-woman dev team.” After listening to this episode, you'll understand why she's such an engaging speaker.  Today, Nadia shares her journey of how she got into programming and building software apps, to being the Founder of The StoryGraph.  She shares some interesting things about scaling and Elasticsearch, we'll hear about her project Speakerline, and we'll find out how she got into public speaking and how her approach to conference speaking is like product building. Download this episode now to learn more! [00:04:07] Nadia tells us her background, what she does, and why she created The StoryGraph app.[00:07:24] We hear a great story on how Nadia got into programming. [00:11:31] Nadia explains how she first experienced Ruby at the Code First Girls program, and at the boot camp that was Ruby and Rails focused.[00:12:19] We learn about Nadia's journey from working at Pivotal Labs to where she is today with The StoryGraph. [00:15:38] In Nadia's talk she mentioned “financial independence” and Andrew wonders what kind of journey she takes when she builds these kinds of software apps.[00:19:59] The StoryGraph is written in Ruby and Jason wants to know if Nadia is still happy with her decision to use Ruby all these years later. [00:22:55] Nadia shares some interesting things about scaling.[00:29:13] Find out about Nadia's journey with Elasticsearch. [00:36:00] Dark Mode is brought up which is the most requested feature on the app and Nadia tells us that she has been working on it. Andrew of course loves it, and he tells us about using Radix colors. [00:38:18] We hear how Nadia got into public speaking, a story about meeting Sarah Mei, her project Speakerline, and she shares advice to people who think public speaking is not for them.[00:47:42] Nadia tells us her approach to conference speaking is like product building, Jason tells us his talks got better when he started bringing other people in, and Andrew highly recommends Speakerline. [00:54:00] Find out where you can follow Nadia onlinePanelists:Jason CharnesChris OliverAndrew MasonGuest:Nadia OdunayoSponsor:HoneybadgerLinks:Jason Charnes TwitterChris Oliver TwitterAndrew Mason TwitterNadia Odunayo WebsiteNadia Odunayo TwitterNadia Odunayo InstagramThe StoryGraphThe StoryGraph TwitterThe StoryGraph InstagramThe StoryGraph TikTokThe StoryGraph MastodonCode First GirlsRadix colorsSpeakerlineSarah Mei-What Your Conference Proposal is MissingRuby Radar TwitterRuby for All Podcast

[00:04:11] Jason and Andrew have a chat about seeing Drew Bragg at the Rails SaaS Conference and things they enjoyed about it.[00:07:50] We hear about all the talks at the conference from Nadia Odunayo, Joe Masilotti, Michael Buckbee, Don Pottinger, Adam Pallozzi, and Saron Yitbarek.[00:15:27] We learn why the guys had to leave the intergalactic cantina early, and they tell us about more of the talks from Todd Dickerson, Colleen Schnettler, Evan Phoenix, and Mike Coutermarsh.[00:21:26] Jason's explains his fun talk on the Rails Renaissance, find out why Andrew sat up front for it, and the last talk from Andrew Culver, who went through a lot of Bullet Train things.  [00:24:12] Jason gives a shout-out to Paula, the makeup artist, and we hear what she did to Jason's mustache.[00:26:19] Andrew gives a big shout-out to Andrew Culver who organized the conference and making it so much fun. [00:26:56] Jason announces he's finally working on his Active Record Course stuff now, and Andrew tells us about how he's been working on Kredis.[00:28:23] We end with a story about how Jason slipped out of the shower and now has a bruise the size of an IHOP pancake on his leg.Panelists:Jason CharnesAndrew MasonSponsor:  HoneybadgerLinks:Jason Charnes TwitterAndrew Mason TwitterRails SaaS Conference TwitterAndrew Culver TwitterRemote Ruby Podcast-Episode 185: Aaron & Colleen from HammerstoneHi-ChewRuby Radar NewsletterRuby Radar TwitterRuby for All Podcast

Whether you're soaking up Nutcrackers on Rockaway beach like Kate's book-reviewing heroine Molly Young, throwing down a picnic rug in your garden or the local park, fighting your way through airport chaos with the promise of a trip abroad or cosying up with a warm blanket in the Southern Hemisphere, we've got the Summer Reading show for you. It's packed full of recommendations including our own favourite beach reads and tips from booksellers, authors and other friends of the pod. So if you're curious what show-regular Phil Chaffee is diving into this summer, what Emily Rhodes of Emily's Walking Book Club is planning on reading, what Nadia Odunayo of book recommendations app The Storygraph thinks you should try, what onetime journalist now bookseller Tom Rowley is planning on reading when he gets a second off setting up his new bookshop, Backstory, and finally what one of our favourite authors, Ed Caesar, thinks might be the perfect page-turner for you, keep listening. So whether you're inclined towards the hottest new releases or the tried and tested classics (including several our guests love so much they return to them again and again), grab a notepad and listen in. If you enjoyed the show head over to our website to comment and let us know your favourite summer reads, we love to hear from you. Or follow us on Instagram @thebookclubreviewpodcast, on Twitter @bookclubrvwpod or email us at thebookclubreview@gmail.com – want to help us out? Subscribe, drop us a review and tell your book-loving friends about the show. Book recommendations Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin The Field by Robert Seethaler Sea of Tranquility by Emily St. John Mandel Hot Milk by Deborah Levy Early Morning Riser by Katherine Heiny Lessons in Chamistry by Bonnie Garmus You Made a Fool of Death with your Beauty by Akwake Emezi A Lady's Guide to Fortune Hunting by Sophie Irwin A Month in the Country by J.L. Carr Brother of the More Famous Jack by Barbara Trapido The Whalebone Theatre by Joanna Quinn News of the Dead by James Robertson Free by Lea Ypi Serious Money by Caroline Knowles The Lymond Chronicles by Dorothy Dunnett The House of Niccolo sequence by Dorothy Dunnet We Don't Know Ourselves by Fintan O'Toole Gallant by V.E. Schwab Clockers by Richard Price Virtue by Hermione Hobie Neon in Daylight by Hermione Hobie Essex Dogs by Dan Jones (published 15 September 2022)

Who better to lead us on using The StoryGraph app than Nadia Odunayo- the CEO and Founder of The StoryGraph app. Nadia shares how the design's simple tracking and insightful stats tool can enrich your reading life.  These personalized recommendations are based on your mood and can curate the perfect read for any mood occasion.   Today we discussed who were the users for The StoryGraph's features. We also discuss the critical differences between GoodReads and The StoryGraph, like buddy reads, book club challenges, and content warnings. Learn why I'm making the switch away from GoodReads after our discussion. I can't wait to discover books this year through these curated lists and reading challenges. Today's episode includes a readable guide on How to Use the StoryGraph (linked in show notes) as we take you on a screen-by-screen capture of described features in our interview.  Mentioned in this episode:The StoryGraphThe StoryGraph RoadmapThe Flatshare by Beth O'LearyGet A Life, Chloe Brown by Talia HibbertTake A Hint, Dani Brown by Talia HibbertAct Your Age, Eve Brown by Talia HibbertNever Split the Difference by Chris VossWhat It Means When A Man Falls From the Sky by Lesley Nneka ArimahA Little Hope by Ethan JoellaNadia Odunayo on InstagramNadia Odunayo on TwitterThe StoryGraph on InstagramThe StoryGraph on TwitterConnect With Me:Amy is @momadvice on InstagramJoin the Patreon Community For the Bonus Content

Whenever I work on a side project, I can't help but daydream of it taking off in a big way. For today's guests, something like that did happen.    When Nadia started building her side project, she didn't know that it would end up spreading virally. She didn't know that it would end up competing with an Amazon product. She didn't know that keeping it up would be something that would drive her close to tears. Episode Page Support The Show Subscribe To The Podcast Join The Newsletter

Colleen interviews Nadia Odunayo, the founder of The StoryGraph. Now with over 500,000 users, The StoryGraph is an app that helps you track your reading and choose your next book based on your mood and your favorite topics and themes.

Goodreads competitor The StoryGraph is quickly gaining a cult following — largely thanks to its founder, Nadia Odunayo.

Nadia Odunayo is the founder and CEO of The StoryGraph, the new website that helps you to track your reading and choose which book to read next. She previously worked at Pivotal Labs as a software engineer and originally learned to code at Makers Academy in London. In her spare time she loves to take dance class and, naturally, read!Follow The StoryGraph on Twitter @thestorygraph and Instagram @the.storygraph.Visit Nadia’s website: https://www.nadiaodunayo.com/Connect with Charnaie online in the following places:Blog: http://hereweeread.comPersonal Website: charnaiegordon.comPodcast Email Address: hereweereadpodcast@gmail.comFind Charnaie on the following social media platforms under the username @hereweeread: Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, PinterestFeel free to share this podcast on your social media platforms to help spread the word to others.  Thanks for listening!

Life Is Work - Ep 52 - Effective QuestionsCo-hosts, Producers:Danielle Stenger Cameron Navarro, LMSW  Mel’s Mindful Minute: 30:15Melanie Wilmoth Navarro, LMSW, RYT, TSTSY-FOwner, Lead Facilitator - Whole Moon Wellnesswholemoonwellness@gmail.com Contact Info:WebsiteEmailTwitter Instagram Music:Intro - King Must Die, by Picnic LightningMMM Transitions - Sur, by Picnic LightningOutro - Pa’lante, by Hurray for the Riff Raff Effective QuestionsRESULT: To explore how questions are frequently asked in meetings, some common problems with how questions are asked, and some ways to ask questions more effectively to move work forward.CamnecdoteVery bad at it - creating questions on the fly when planned ones aren’t appropriateProtein - Main Event - Topic d’jourEffective QuestionsHow they often show up in meetingsThe person with the most authority asks what they need to know In hierarchies, this often looks like, “who is doing this? When will it be finished? Do you need anything from me?”Other people will then ask questions as it pertains to /their/ workExamples: “have you thought about this though? Why isn’t so and so here? What do you need from me?”Random questions Often happen because the result of the meeting is not clearWhatever the topic is reminds someone of something else, sp a question is asked about /that/ that then gets the group off topicYes or No questionsOften posed from people with most power in the room. Examples:Are you available to do xyz?Do you like this?Do you understand this?Common Issues with these things:Person with the most power gets what they need, but others may notQuestions may not have a clear result as it pertains to the group, so whomever is asking the question generally is the only one who benefitsQuestion are vague, so the information that is needed may never be exploredQuestion may be confusing/too specific, can get the group off trackAlso very common if the result of the meeting is not clearYes or no questions, questions that are not pre-developed can limit the capacity of a conversationEffective QuestionsOpen ended (not answered with a yes or no)Inquisitive (ask what or how)“You” oriented (what do you think about..? How do you feel about..?)Appreciative (trust that the person has the answer) Types of questions that resonated with different MBTI’s:MBTI TypePreferred ContextPreferred EQSFPractical informationPersonal statementSpecifically, what would this look like?What is the impact on you?NFFeelings StatementsPossibilitiesWhat is that like?How is this unique?STFactual, Sequential, Logical, Impersonal StatementsWhat are the facts?How has this worked?NTGoalsOptionsWhy?What if?Try this, Not That:Instead of: ‘Does this sound good to you?” Try, “How does this look/feel sound to you?” Instead of: “What about xyz?” Try, “I remember xyz piece of information from another project, would it be helpful here or is it best to bike rack it for now?”For people with power in particular,: Instead of: “Do you know how to do this?” Try, “Who has the expertise in this? Do one or more of you have capacity? How can we help you be successful?”Do A GoogleElevating Rachel Cargle’s work instagram.com/rachel.cargleWe’ve done a pre-google to use our privilege to pass along infoBlack Wall Street - also known as the Greenwood district, Black Wall Street was an affluent Black community in Tulsa Oklahoma that was thriving after World War I. The district was destroyed in the Tulsa race massacre, which many saw depicted on the recent HBO tv series, Watchmen.Mel’s Mindful Minute: 30:15Breath AwarenessWe Are Always StudentsResults Based Facilitation Book One by Jolie Bain PillsburyLetters to a Young Poet by Rainer Maria Rilke:I want to beg you, as much as I can, dear sir, to be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and to try to love the questions themselves like locked rooms and like books that are written in a very foreign tongue. Do not now seek the answers, which cannot be given you because you would not be able to live them. And the point is, to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps you will then gradually, without noticing it, live along some distant day into the answer.BHM: Storygraph app -app.thestorygraph.com (@the.storygraph)Nadia Odunayo (@nodunayo)Sharing is Self-CaringSelf-careWhat question do you wish was asked in meetings? How might you introduce it using the effective question model?Community-careWhat questions might benefit your team members?Systems-careHow can systems better encourage and promote meeting frameworks that center effective questions that move work forward?Reach Out!lifeisworkpod.comFind questions submission linkInstagram @ lifeisworkpodKo-Fi Coffee info@palanteconsulting.comBlack Businesses of the weekGoogle Black owned businesses in your community!

How do you track your reading life? Today's guest has a whole new system of book tracking and reviewing to share. Anne is talking with Nadia Odunayo, the reader and entrepreneur behind The Storygraph, a brand new website full of tracking tools and detailed rating systems to help readers go beyond a book’s jacket copy and filter through information to find what they’re really looking for.We love hearing behind the scenes stories and it was fascinating to hear Nadia explain how this creative endeavor came to be. We also mention a bunch of books that have never made it on the podcast before and Anne recommends a couple of genres that haven't gotten much attention on the podcast. We can't wait to hear which titles end up on your TBR lists.Visit the podcast website at whatshouldireadnextpodcast.com/271 for the full list of titles Nadia and Anne discuss.Find Nadia and The Storygraph on Instagram, Twitter or The Storygraph website.Thanks to our sponsors:Brooklinen is the perfect place to find all the comforts for home, including super fluffy comforters — they offer varying styles, so you can choose the linen experience that best supports your sleep! WSIRN listeners can use promo code READNEXT for $25 off a minimum purchase of $100 at Brooklinen.com.Rothy’s shoes are seamless and fully machine washable, making them ultra comfortable and ultra convenient. They’re simple, comfy, and they go with everything. Check out all the amazing shoes and bags available right now at Rothys.com/READNEXT.Betabrand pants look good, feel comfortable, and they’re easy to wear with any outfit. Whatever your style, Betabrand has the pants to match. What Should I Read Next listeners can take 30% off your first order.

The StoryGraph is a safer, quieter place on the internet where you can find your next favorite book. Founder and CEO Nadia Odunayo joins Emily to discuss developing this cozy online experience and how input from enthusiastic readers makes everything better. Our website: hybridpubscout.com/interview-nadia-odunayo-the-storygraph Facebook: www.facebook.com/hybridpubscout/ Twitter: twitter.com/hybridpubscout Instagram: www.instagram.com/hybridpubscoutpod/ Our newsletter: eepurl.com/gfajR9

02:13 - Dan’s Superpower: Ability to Keep Calm * “We need to solve this problem.” * Dealing with Frustration * Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance (https://www.amazon.com/Zen-Art-Motorcycle-Maintenance-Paperback/dp/B00ZT1W1DO/ref=pd_lpo_14_t_0/132-3661810-3882807?_encoding=UTF8&pd_rd_i=B00ZT1W1DO&pd_rd_r=9a9d44ae-174a-45d0-9d26-209d9489e335&pd_rd_w=DdnSJ&pd_rd_wg=kqSrE&pf_rd_p=7b36d496-f366-4631-94d3-61b87b52511b&pf_rd_r=63K9K68E65P4FKNM9XZC&psc=1&refRID=63K9K68E65P4FKNM9XZC) 07:11 - Maximizing Your Potential as a New Developer and Making a Good Impression * Overindex * Asking Questions * 054: Code Hospitality with Nadia Odunayo (https://www.greaterthancode.com/code-hospitality) * Try New Things, but Enjoy Your Work 17:55 - What Makes a Senior Engineer? * When is a senior engineer not a senior engineer? (http://www.mooreds.com/wordpress/archives/2812) * Impact * Making Mistakes * Pragmaticism vs Perfectionism * The Efficiency Throne as Tradeoff * Recognition Prime Decision-Making 42:51 - Solving Big Problems vs Small Problems * Getting People to Care * Group Accountability & Presenting Deliverables 50:39 - Creating an Organization Where People Can Thrive and Grow * Fostering a Culture of Help 53:17 - Letters To A New Developer (https://letterstoanewdeveloper.com/) 57:52 - Community and How They Help Developer Growth Reflections: Dan: Build your mental muscle around tradeoffs. Jacob: Thinking about talking to junior developers. Rein: The context we’re in when we’re thinking changes how we think. This episode was brought to you by @therubyrep (https://twitter.com/therubyrep) of DevReps, LLC (http://www.devreps.com/). To pledge your support and to join our awesome Slack community, visit patreon.com/greaterthancode (https://www.patreon.com/greaterthancode) To make a one-time donation so that we can continue to bring you more content and transcripts like this, please do so at paypal.me/devreps (https://www.paypal.me/devreps). You will also get an invitation to our Slack community this way as well. Special Guest: Dan Moore.

01:32 - Joe’s Superpower: Hospitality * Greater Than Code 054: Code Hospitality with Nadia Odunayo (https://www.greaterthancode.com/code-hospitality) 06:20 - Social Media: It's time for us to stop acting like we are getting access to social media for free. * When you add up your household's cable/Internet/phone bills, you're paying bare minimum $100/mo. * This money isn't going to Facebook and Twitter, but it is the entry fee for bringing these platforms into your home, where they subsequently track everything you do, everyone you know, build a facial recognition database with the photos you post, and determine your sexual orientation before you even disclose it (https://www.nbcnews.com/feature/nbc-out/facebook-can-tell-if-you-re-gay-based-few-likes-n823416). * Nobody reads the privacy policies. * UBDI – Universal Basic Data Income (https://www.ubdi.com/) 15:36 - Owing Your Identity & Data * Email Plus: An Idea * Slack (https://slack.com/), Microsoft Teams (https://www.microsoft.com/en/microsoft-365/microsoft-teams/group-chat-software) * A Key / Distributed Data Idea 25:25 - Protecting Children’s’ Privacy & Data 32:00 - Leading The Movement; Rolling Out a Solution: Taking back control of our data * People who are willing to be hobbyists * Experimentation & Activism Reflections: Christina: The value and the power of open source and thinking beyond giving your data out willy-nilly. Jacob: Teaching our children to be thoughtful technologists. Jerome: Keeping our kids safe is a job on top of a job, and the goalpost keeps moving! Joe: A reminder that other people are thinking about this. We are all concerned about privacy. This episode was brought to you by @therubyrep (https://twitter.com/therubyrep) of DevReps, LLC (http://www.devreps.com/). To pledge your support and to join our awesome Slack community, visit patreon.com/greaterthancode (https://www.patreon.com/greaterthancode) To make a one-time donation so that we can continue to bring you more content and transcripts like this, please do so at paypal.me/devreps (https://www.paypal.me/devreps). You will also get an invitation to our Slack community this way as well. Special Guest: Joe LeBlanc.

On this week's episode, in celebration of the new year, Thom shares the 2019 blooper reel! Words are hard and here's the audio to prove it. Listen to all of the silly mishaps, goofs, and general nonsense captured in between the moments of "professional podcasting". Chris and Steph also reflect on their top themes of 2019 and discuss New Year Systems vs New Year Resolutions.Karabiner-ElementsRailsConf 2016 - The Guest: A Guide To Code Hospitality by Nadia OdunayoAtomic Habits: James Clear

On this week's episode, Steph and Chris share the news that The Bike Shed won the Best Dev Podcast on the Hackernoon Noonies awards! After a bit of celebration, they get back to their normal adventures with a discussion around onboarding covering the importance, approach, and pitfalls that they've seen in their time joining countless teams. They also touch on the relevance and increasing ease of SSL everywhere, and they answer a listener question about technical debt and rewriting applications. Bike Shed - Best Dev Podcast Noonies Simplecast Let's Encrypt Heroku Netlify Nadia Odunayo on Giant Robots A Guide To Code Hospitality - Nadia Odunayo The Headphones Rule Second System Syndrome Entity Service Antipattern Devon Zuegel on Giant Robots

Meetings and Inclusion with Katie Gore and Mark Rickmeier The inclusion card deck discussed in this episode is now live on Kickstarter. Go to https://www.tablexi.com/kickstarter to get your deck. TableXI is offering training for developers and product teams! For more info, got to http://tablexi.com/workshops or email workshops@tablexi.com. Guests: Mark Rickmeier (https://twitter.com/MarkRickmeier): CEO of Table XI (https://www.tablexi.com/). Katie Gore (https://twitter.com/speechIRL): Founder and Director of speech IRL (https://www.speechirl.com/). Summary Today we are talking about meetings. Any group software activity is going to have meetings, and we’re going to talk about making them better, where by better we mean more interactive and able to get meaningful contributions from everybody without letting the loudest or most powerful voices dominate. My guests are Mark Rickmeier, the CEO of Table XI, and Katie Gore, of the communication coaching company SpeechIRL. As this podcast comes out, Table XI is running a Kickstarter for a new meeting tool that you can use to improve your meetings. We’ll talk about how we came to develop the tool, how we use it, and why we think it’s effective. We want to hear from you — what’s the problem with your meetings and how have you solved it? Let us know at techdoneright.io/48 or on Twitter at @tech_done_right Notes 02:25 - What are the problems with meetings that we are trying to solve? - Multipliers, Revised and Updated: How the Best Leaders Make Everyone Smarter by Liz Wiseman (https://www.amazon.com/Multipliers-Revised-Updated-Leaders-Everyone/dp/0062663070/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1540240738&sr=8-1&keywords=multiplyers+book) - Accidental Diminishing - People Who Don’t Contribute Enough - Rambling and Tangents - Interrupting 08:40 - Remote Meetings and Communication Styles and Tactics 13:28 - Creating Cards and Gamifying Meetings: “Wicked Meetings” - Question Cards - Opinion Cards - The Interrupter Card - The Devil’s Advocate Card - The Angel’s Advocate Card - The Kicking a Dead Horse Card - Speak Up Card 24:00 - What kinds of meetings do these work best at? - Meeting Owl 360 Degree Video Conference Camera with Automatic Speaker Focus (https://www.amazon.com/Meeting-Owl-Conference-Automatic-Speaker/dp/B075X1VL3Y/ref=sr_1_1_sspa?ie=UTF8&qid=1540242163&sr=8-1-spons&keywords=meeting+owl+360+degree+video+conference+camera&psc=1) 27:24 - Table XI’s Inclusion Card Kickstarter! - https://www.tablexi.com/kickstarter - Are you (accidentally) diminishing colleagues in your meetings? (https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/you-accidentally-diminishing-colleagues-your-meetings-mark-rickmeier/) 29:23 - How can people and companies get started implementing something like this? Related Episodes Diverse Agile Teams with Marlena Compton, Betsy Haibel, and Jennifer Tu (https://www.techdoneright.io/38) Your First 100 Days at a New Company with Katie Gore and Elizabeth Trepkowski Hodos (https://www.techdoneright.io/36) Nonviolent Conversation with Nadia Odunayo (https://www.techdoneright.io/22) Building Trust and Building Teams with Jessie Shternshus and Mark Rickmeier (https://www.techdoneright.io/001-building-trust) Special Guests: Katie Gore and Mark Rickmeier.

Panel: Charles Max Wood Guest: Nadia Odunayo This week on My Ruby Story, Charles talks to Nadia Odunayo. Nadia was previously on Ruby Rogues Episode 264 and she used to have her own podcast called Ruby Book Club. She first got into programming because when she was in college she launched a creative writing publication and she was frustrated that she had to keep asking others for help. This was when she started researching coding and how it all worked so that she could put her ideas into action. They talk about Ruby being the first programming language she learned, the importance of learning both the frontend and the backend, her desire to run her own thing, her need to find a company that would support her learning, and more! In particular, we dive pretty deep on: Ruby Rogues Episode 264 Ruby Book Club How did you first get into programming? Hated having to ask other for help Studied Philosophy, Politics, and Economics at University Code First: Girls Have you done much with your degree? Her first talk as a junior Ruby developer Economics is about how people behave Was Ruby your first programming language? Learning HTML, CSS and the Ruby and Rails Frontend VS backend How long was the program? Learning Ruby first and the pros to that Sinatra Do you feel like the boot camp prepared you to be a full-time Ruby developer? Wanting to run her own thing Doing these courses only scratches the surface How did you find a company that supported your learning? Pivotal Labs TDD and pairing When she joined Pivotal VS now What are you doing currently? And much, much more! Links: Ruby Rogues Episode 264 Ruby Book Club Code First: Girls Ruby Rails Sinatra Pivotal Labs @nodunayo nadiaodunayo.com Nadia’s GitHub Sponsors: FreshBooks Loot Crate Picks: Charles Being willing to get some help Kiwi Crate Nadia Nonviolent Communication by Marshall B. Rosenberg The Evolution of Trust Work Life Podcast

Panel: Charles Max Wood Guest: Nadia Odunayo This week on My Ruby Story, Charles talks to Nadia Odunayo. Nadia was previously on Ruby Rogues Episode 264 and she used to have her own podcast called Ruby Book Club. She first got into programming because when she was in college she launched a creative writing publication and she was frustrated that she had to keep asking others for help. This was when she started researching coding and how it all worked so that she could put her ideas into action. They talk about Ruby being the first programming language she learned, the importance of learning both the frontend and the backend, her desire to run her own thing, her need to find a company that would support her learning, and more! In particular, we dive pretty deep on: Ruby Rogues Episode 264 Ruby Book Club How did you first get into programming? Hated having to ask other for help Studied Philosophy, Politics, and Economics at University Code First: Girls Have you done much with your degree? Her first talk as a junior Ruby developer Economics is about how people behave Was Ruby your first programming language? Learning HTML, CSS and the Ruby and Rails Frontend VS backend How long was the program? Learning Ruby first and the pros to that Sinatra Do you feel like the boot camp prepared you to be a full-time Ruby developer? Wanting to run her own thing Doing these courses only scratches the surface How did you find a company that supported your learning? Pivotal Labs TDD and pairing When she joined Pivotal VS now What are you doing currently? And much, much more! Links: Ruby Rogues Episode 264 Ruby Book Club Code First: Girls Ruby Rails Sinatra Pivotal Labs @nodunayo nadiaodunayo.com Nadia’s GitHub Sponsors: FreshBooks Loot Crate Picks: Charles Being willing to get some help Kiwi Crate Nadia Nonviolent Communication by Marshall B. Rosenberg The Evolution of Trust Work Life Podcast

Panel: Charles Max Wood Guest: Nadia Odunayo This week on My Ruby Story, Charles talks to Nadia Odunayo. Nadia was previously on Ruby Rogues Episode 264 and she used to have her own podcast called Ruby Book Club. She first got into programming because when she was in college she launched a creative writing publication and she was frustrated that she had to keep asking others for help. This was when she started researching coding and how it all worked so that she could put her ideas into action. They talk about Ruby being the first programming language she learned, the importance of learning both the frontend and the backend, her desire to run her own thing, her need to find a company that would support her learning, and more! In particular, we dive pretty deep on: Ruby Rogues Episode 264 Ruby Book Club How did you first get into programming? Hated having to ask other for help Studied Philosophy, Politics, and Economics at University Code First: Girls Have you done much with your degree? Her first talk as a junior Ruby developer Economics is about how people behave Was Ruby your first programming language? Learning HTML, CSS and the Ruby and Rails Frontend VS backend How long was the program? Learning Ruby first and the pros to that Sinatra Do you feel like the boot camp prepared you to be a full-time Ruby developer? Wanting to run her own thing Doing these courses only scratches the surface How did you find a company that supported your learning? Pivotal Labs TDD and pairing When she joined Pivotal VS now What are you doing currently? And much, much more! Links: Ruby Rogues Episode 264 Ruby Book Club Code First: Girls Ruby Rails Sinatra Pivotal Labs @nodunayo nadiaodunayo.com Nadia’s GitHub Sponsors: FreshBooks Loot Crate Picks: Charles Being willing to get some help Kiwi Crate Nadia Nonviolent Communication by Marshall B. Rosenberg The Evolution of Trust Work Life Podcast

Diverse Agile Teams with Marlena Compton, Betsy Haibel, and Jennifer Tu TableXI is now offering training for developers and products teams! For more info, email workshops@tablexi.com. Get your FREE career growth strategy information and techniques! (https://stickynote.game) Guests Marlena Compton (https://twitter.com/marlenac): Organizer of PearConf (https://pearconf.splashthat.com/). Betsy Haibel (https://twitter.com/betsythemuffin): CTO at Cohere (https://www.wecohere.com/). Jennifer Tu (https://twitter.com/jtu): Co-Founder at Cohere (https://www.wecohere.com/). Summary How do common Agile practices like pair programming and retrospectives work when you have diverse teams? How can you make sure that underrepresented team members have their voices heard, and how does doing so improve the way that your team delivers software? Besty Haibel, Jennifer Tu, and Marlena Compton discuss ways in which Agile practices can better serve your team in the real world. For more discussion, be sure to check out PearConf (https://pearconf.splashthat.com/). Notes 02:05 - Pairing and Agile Development on Diverse Teams Betsy on Twitter (https://twitter.com/betsythemuffin/status/990568867683500034) 04:31 - Implicit Agreement, Teaching Vs Exploring, and Power Differentials in Pairing Ruby DCamp (http://rubydcamp.org) Code Retreat (https://www.coderetreat.org) Allison McMillan (https://twitter.com/allie_p) 08:52 - Understanding and Improving Team Dynamics: Building a Library of Smells Pairing With Privilege (https://pearconf.splashthat.com) Ping Pong Pairing (http://wiki.c2.com/?PairProgrammingPingPongPattern) Troll Pairing Table XI Pair-A-Palooza Station (https://uploads.fireside.fm/images/e/e2f17a1d-4992-4c1c-b414-0780dcd58bc3/SAElUnop.jpg) 17:57 - Good Agile Pair Programming Techniques + Retrospective Roles Running your unconference discussions effectively: AdaCamp session role cards (https://adainitiative.org/2013/10/02/running-your-unconference-discussions-effectively-adacamp-session-role-cards/) 22:14 - Making People Comfortable When Speaking Up and Making Agile Healthier Dot-Voting (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dot-voting) 32:30 - Agile As An Institution Agile Manifesto (http://agilemanifesto.org) 38:34 - Backing Away From The Idea of Perfection 42:42 - PearConf (https://pearconf.splashthat.com/) Details 43:55 - Bonus Conversation: The Practices Not Being the Manifesto The Winter Getaway That Turned The Software World Upside down by Caroline Mimbs Nyce (https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2017/12/agile-manifesto-a-history/547715/) Related Episodes Nonviolent Conversation with Nadia Odunayo (http://www.techdoneright.io/22) How Set Design Can Inform Software Architecture With Betsy Haibel (http://www.techdoneright.io/21) Agile Teams and Escaping Velocity with Doc Norton and Claire Podulka (http://www.techdoneright.io/15) Special Guests: Betsy Haibel, Jennifer Tu, and Marlena Compton.

Ever wondered how to take that first step into open source? Nadia Odunayo joins us to talk about 24 Pull Requests, her work with open source and speakerline.io, her project to make public speaking more accessible. We'll look at what newbies need to know, as well as how open source projects friendlier and more welcoming for folks new to open source.

The Social Responsibility of Coding with Liz Abinante Follow us on Twitter @techdoneright (https://twitter.com/tech_done_right), and please leave us a review on Apple Podcasts (https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/tech-done-right/id1195695341?mt=2)! Guest Liz Abinante (https://twitter.com/feministy): Senior Software Engineer at GitHub (https://github.com/) and occasionally acts as Ruby Documentation Empress at RubyTogether (https://rubytogether.org/). Blogs at lizabinante.com (http://lizabinante.com/). Summary What responsibility do developers have for the consequences of their code? Liz Abinante joins the show to talk about overlooked consequences, big and small, and what you can do if you find your self being asked to do something you think is unethical. Along the way, we talk about user data, the cloud, making career choices you are comfortable with, and why you should always go to Canadian college engineering conferences when asked. Notes 01:39 - The Social Responsibility of Coding Talk (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EAV7RZZOspw) - Why do people keep coming to this couple's home looking for lost phones? (https://gimletmedia.com/episode/53-in-the-desert/) - Reply All 53: In The Desert (https://gimletmedia.com/episode/53-in-the-desert/) - The Not-So-Wholesome Reality Behind The Making of Your Meal Kit (https://www.buzzfeed.com/carolineodonovan/the-not-so-wholesome-reality-behind-the-making-of-your-meal?utm_term=.sy4W4JMJlp#.ntjQM2G20o) - VW Engineer Sentenced (https://www.cnbc.com/2017/08/26/vw-engineer-sentenced-to-40-month-prison-term-in-diesel-case.html) 07:35 - Being Responsible For Data 14:09 - Speaking Up for Ethical Practices 21:44 - Staying at an Unreputable Company and Guiding Your Career - Amazon Key (https://www.cnbc.com/2017/11/16/amazon-key-in-home-delivery-review.html) 28:29 - Being Aware of the Context You’re Coding In - The Impact (https://www.vox.com/2017/10/23/16387300/hospital-policy-saved-thousands-lives-central-line-infection) 34:30 - Liz’s Talk Audience - CUSEC (http://cusec.net) 37:30 - Empathy and Ethics Training Related Episodes Nonviolent Conversation with Nadia Odunayo (http://www.techdoneright.io/22) Using Software to Create Better Countries: Recovering Healthcare.gov with Andy Slavitt (http://www.techdoneright.io/006-healthcare-dot-gov) Open-Source Community Management and Safety With Coraline Ada Ehmke and Yana Carstens (http://www.techdoneright.io/8) Special Guest: Liz Abinante.

01:19 – Nadia’s Superpower 02:01 – Code Hospitality and Being a Good Host Nadia Odunayo: The Guest: A Guide To Code Hospitality @ GORUCO 2016 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GUuAp6c1ylM) Daniel Dennett’s “Intuition Pump” (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intuition_pump) 10:22 – People and Habits and Having Expertise in a Particular Realm 17:00 – Asking Questions/Waiting for Explanation Rather Than Passing Judgement 22:16 – Codebases Are Constantly Changing: Use the README to Give Context Code Hospitality Guide App (https://gist.github.com/nodunayo/c919477906aab6c1af6065ff8e868d3e) 27:27 – Making Diagrams Whilst Coding/Pairing Rapoport’s Rule (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rapoport%27s_rule) 32:27 – Thinking About the “Why” 36:44 – Giving and Receiving Feedback in a Nonviolent Way 39:09 – Host Responsibilities for Hospitality Reflections: Jamey: Breaking down the power dynamic of learning. Jacob: Unspoken rules and normalized behavior based on location and telling stories to make people feel more at home. Rein: Recognizing emotional labor. This episode was brought to you by @therubyrep (https://twitter.com/therubyrep) of DevReps, LLC (http://www.devreps.com/). To pledge your support and to join our awesome Slack community, visit patreon.com/greaterthancode (https://www.patreon.com/greaterthancode). To make a one-time donation so that we can continue to bring you more content and transcripts like this, please do so at paypal.me/devreps (https://www.paypal.me/devreps). You will also get an invitation to our Slack community this way as well. Amazon links may be affiliate links, which means you’re supporting the show when you purchase our recommendations. Thanks! Special Guests: Jacob Stoebel and Nadia Odunayo.

Nonviolent Communication With Nadia Odunayo Follow us on Twitter @techdoneright (https://twitter.com/tech_done_right), and please leave us a review on Apple Podcasts (https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/tech-done-right/id1195695341?mt=2)! Guest Nadia Odunayo (https://twitter.com/nodunayo), nadiaodunayo.com (http://www.nadiaodunayo.com/), Co-host of Ruby Book Club (http://rubybookclub.com/), director at Ignition Works (http://ignition.works/). Summary Do you have interactions with co-workers where one or both of you get angry and defensive, and everybody ends up frustrated? Today we talk to Nadia Odunayo about "Nonviolent Communication", a way to communicate that honestly addresses issues, explaining how you feel without harming the other person, and getting everybody to the point where they feel better about the situation and have a clear path to move forward. Nadia gives examples of how she uses nonviolent communication in her day-to-day life, and she tries to coach me to improve my own skills. By focusing on communication your needs and not assuming anything about others, you can make difficult discussions less difficult. Notes 01:47 - Nonviolent Communication Nadia’s Talk: This Code Sucks: A Story About Nonviolent Communication (https://brightonruby.com/2017/this-code-sucks-a-story-about-non-violent-communication-nadia-odunayo/) Nonviolent Communication: A Language of Life by Marshall B. Rosenberg (https://www.amazon.com/Nonviolent-Communication-Language-Marshall-Rosenberg/dp/1892005034) 03:16 - A Concrete Example of Violent and Nonviolent Communication: A Code Review 07:08 - How should a manager communicate nonviolently? 11:01 - Judging and Assuming People’s Character Subconsciously Fundamental Attribution Error (http://study.com/academy/lesson/fundamental-attribution-error-definition-lesson-quiz.html) 18:11 - How has nonviolent communication affected your day-to-day interactions? 24:14 - Self-Empathy: Being Non-Violent with Yourself 28:32 - Transparency and Vulnerability 32:15 - Nonviolent Communication and Being Nice/Kind 36:17 - Screaming Nonviolently Masters of Love (https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2014/06/happily-ever-after/372573/) Special Guest: Nadia Odunayo.

How actionable feedback can transform your performance, what to do if you're stagnant when learning something new and how to know when to quit.

Get your Ruby Remote Conf tickets!   02:42 - Nadia Odunayo Introduction Twitter GitHub Ignition Works Nadia Odunayo: Playing Games in the Clouds 05:00 - Ruby Book Club 11:20 - Nadia Odunayo: The Guest: A Guide To Code Hospitality @ RailsConf 2016 17:23 - Collaboration and Pairing: Guest and Host Roles; Driving and Navigating Coderetreat Ruby DCamp 24:42 - Perspectives and Mapping Sam Livingston-Gray: Cognitive Shortcuts: Models, Visualizations, Metaphors, and Other Lies @ Cascadia Ruby Conf 2014 Cortical Homunculus Peter Gardiner Motor and Sensory Homunculi 41:04 - Ruby Central's Opportunity Scholarship Program Space Babies   Picks   Case Studies in Apprenticeship (Coraline) Everything's an Argument by Andrea A. Lunsford and John J. Ruszkiewicz (Sam) RIF6 Cube 2-inch Mobile Projector (Chuck) Nonviolent Communication: A Language of Life by Marshall B. Rosenberg (Nadia) Robert Frank on Dinner Table Economics (Nadia)   See Also Ruby Rogues Episode #190: Apprenticeship with Joseph Mastey and Jill Lynch of Enova

Get your Ruby Remote Conf tickets!   02:42 - Nadia Odunayo Introduction Twitter GitHub Ignition Works Nadia Odunayo: Playing Games in the Clouds 05:00 - Ruby Book Club 11:20 - Nadia Odunayo: The Guest: A Guide To Code Hospitality @ RailsConf 2016 17:23 - Collaboration and Pairing: Guest and Host Roles; Driving and Navigating Coderetreat Ruby DCamp 24:42 - Perspectives and Mapping Sam Livingston-Gray: Cognitive Shortcuts: Models, Visualizations, Metaphors, and Other Lies @ Cascadia Ruby Conf 2014 Cortical Homunculus Peter Gardiner Motor and Sensory Homunculi 41:04 - Ruby Central's Opportunity Scholarship Program Space Babies   Picks   Case Studies in Apprenticeship (Coraline) Everything's an Argument by Andrea A. Lunsford and John J. Ruszkiewicz (Sam) RIF6 Cube 2-inch Mobile Projector (Chuck) Nonviolent Communication: A Language of Life by Marshall B. Rosenberg (Nadia) Robert Frank on Dinner Table Economics (Nadia)   See Also Ruby Rogues Episode #190: Apprenticeship with Joseph Mastey and Jill Lynch of Enova

Get your Ruby Remote Conf tickets!   02:42 - Nadia Odunayo Introduction Twitter GitHub Ignition Works Nadia Odunayo: Playing Games in the Clouds 05:00 - Ruby Book Club 11:20 - Nadia Odunayo: The Guest: A Guide To Code Hospitality @ RailsConf 2016 17:23 - Collaboration and Pairing: Guest and Host Roles; Driving and Navigating Coderetreat Ruby DCamp 24:42 - Perspectives and Mapping Sam Livingston-Gray: Cognitive Shortcuts: Models, Visualizations, Metaphors, and Other Lies @ Cascadia Ruby Conf 2014 Cortical Homunculus Peter Gardiner Motor and Sensory Homunculi 41:04 - Ruby Central's Opportunity Scholarship Program Space Babies   Picks   Case Studies in Apprenticeship (Coraline) Everything's an Argument by Andrea A. Lunsford and John J. Ruszkiewicz (Sam) RIF6 Cube 2-inch Mobile Projector (Chuck) Nonviolent Communication: A Language of Life by Marshall B. Rosenberg (Nadia) Robert Frank on Dinner Table Economics (Nadia)   See Also Ruby Rogues Episode #190: Apprenticeship with Joseph Mastey and Jill Lynch of Enova

Ben talks with Nadia Odunayo about giving non-technical conference talks and full-time pairing. Playing Games in the Clouds- Nadia's 2015 RailsConf Talk Floobits Makers Academy RubyConf Nadia On Twitter