Podcasts about technical program manager

In this week's episode of the Talent Hub Talk podcast, we're joined by Alice Jessop, a Technical Program Manager and the author of Salesforce Security, An Admins Guide. In the conversation we cover Alice's early career, how she found her way into Salesforce, career pivots she made to move out of Salesforce, what brought her back and how she came to be a Salesforce security specialist. We then look at some practical tips for existing and new Salesforce Orgs, explore the Principle of Least Privilege, discuss how AI changes things and also cover Alice's book.   Make sure you're following Alice here: https://www.linkedin.com/in/alicehoulihan   You can find Alice's book, Salesforce Security: An Admin's Guide, here: https://a.co/d/04ZCYkp   You can find more content from us at Talent Hub, here: LinkedIn@ https://www.linkedin.com/company/talent-hub-global/ YouTube@ https://www.youtube.com/@talenthub1140 Facebook@ https://www.facebook.com/TalentHubGlobal/ Instagram @ https://www.instagram.com/talenthubglobal/ Twitter X @ https://twitter.com/TalentHubGlobal We hope you enjoy the episode!

Artie Intel and Micheline Learning report on Artificial Intelligence and Robotics for The AI Report. Shipping giant UPS is in talks with Figure AI to deploy humanoid robots in its logistics operations. Figure’s robots, standing at 5’6”, are designed to sort packages and mimic human movements.  Trump administration has dismissed more than 200 AI experts hired under President Biden. Chinese tech giant Huawei is making waves with its new Ascend 910D AI chip. Electric vehicle powerhouse BYD is pushing the boundaries of automation. OpenAI’s latest model, GPT-4o, is under fire for being overly agreeable. Meta is on the hunt for an experienced Technical Program Manager to lead the setup and operations of a new robotics lab. The role involves managing research initiatives and collaborating with engineering teams to advance embodied AI. If you’re passionate about robotics and program management, check out it out: metacareers.com/jobs/. Meet “Archie,” the new AI agent from P-1 AI. Archie will help build things humanity can only dream of today Higgsfield AI has launched “Iconic Scenes,” a feature that lets users re-create legendary movie scenes with just a selfie. higgsfield.ai/scene Mode Mobile’s EarnPhone is turning smartphones into money-makers. Duolingo is accelerating its shift to AI, replacing more human tutors with advanced chatbots and voice models. This message comes from Sponsor, The AI and Big Data Expo! June 2025 in Santa Clara, California. showcasing Generative AI, Enterprise AI, Machine Learning, Security, Ethical AI, Deep Learning, Data Ecosystems, and more. Register for your free or gold pass to attend. Visit https://www.ai-expo.net/northamerica/ for more information. The AI Report

Today, I brought on Elvi Caperonis, Founder of Reinvent Yourself. Elvi is a distinguished Certified Project Management Professional and Scrum Master with over 15 years of related experience across more than five industries. As a former Technical Program Manager at Amazon and Analyst at Harvard University, Elvi has a wealth of knowledge to share with her audience.Recognized as a LinkedIn Top Voice with over 200,000 followers, Elvi is dedicated to helping job seekers build clarity, gain confidence, and build their personal brand. ...and let's launch right into it with the Career Warrior Podcast! Resources:Get more help on your applications from Let's Eat, GrandmaSubscribe to Reinvent YourselfConnect with Elvi on LinkedInFollow us:Follow Let's Eat, Grandma on LinkedInUse Chris' LinkedIn for the newsletterCheck us out on Instagram Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

BIO: Elvi Caperonis is a former Harvard University Analyst and Technical Program Manager at Amazon and LinkedIn's top Voice and a career strategist who has mastered the art of storytelling to create a six-figure personal brand on LinkedIn.STORY: Elvi decided to be her own boss and started an e-commerce business for which she had no knowledge or passion. It turned out to be a nightmare that cost her $30,000.LEARNING: If you don't have passion for something, don't do it. Happiness and delivering value should be the ultimate goal, not just making money. “Yes, you want to start a business. But first, sit back and ask yourself, “Will I enjoy this? Is this going to tell the story that I want to live in the world?”Elvi Caperonis Guest profileElvi Caperonis is a former Harvard University Analyst and Technical Program Manager at Amazon and LinkedIn's top Voice and a career strategist who has mastered the art of storytelling to create a six-figure personal brand on LinkedIn.With a track record of helping job seekers land their dream jobs and supporting millions across the globe through her content on Linkedin, Elvi Caperonis has become the go-to expert for those looking to build a personal brand and land their dream job.The ability to connect with her audience through storytelling and content strategies has made an impact and helped build her brand. Elvi is passionate about helping and inspiring others to achieve results similar to hers.Land Your Dream Job and Succeed 10X Faster!: Access the same strategies that transformed my career Growth by landing jobs at top companies like Harvard University and Amazon—all for a fraction of the price.Worst investment everA few years ago, Elvi decided she wanted to be an entrepreneur and her own boss. She discussed it with her husband, who was very supportive. Elvi chose to launch an E-commerce business. She had heard many people say it was a fun and profitable business and believed she could do it.Elvi took an online course and started learning about E-commerce and how to do it step by step. She did her due diligence. Unfortunately, Elvi didn't have a passion for E-commerce. It was a lot of work, and it was a nightmare at the end because she was putting in a lot of hours and didn't turn a profit. She lost about $30,000 in that business.Lessons learnedIf you don't have passion for something, question yourself 1,000 times before starting that business. Passion allows you to tell a story that resonates with your customers.Learn from people who have done it before and get a mentor.If you don't have experience in the kind of business you want to start, don't go all in; be agile and try to sell a few units of your product, then double down as you continue to grow and adapt.Happiness and delivering value should be the ultimate goal, not just making money.Andrew's takeawaysWhatever job or business you start, ensure it's built around the core thing you do naturally today.No.1 goal for the next 12 monthsElvi's number one goal for the next 12 months is to spend more time with her kids, husband, mom, sisters, aunts, and whole family.Parting words “Even if you cannot see it now, whatever you are going through will be okay. Just keep reminding yourself of this.”Elvi...

Utah Avalanche Center report, Public comment shows strong opposition to Deer Valley public financing request, Sara Sargent founder of Alpine Distilling on winning the 2024 Innovation Award, Western Regional Coordinator and Technical Program Manager for USA Luge Jon Owen has details on the upcoming season and some impressive recent results, Park City Chamber Bureau's Senior Director of Partner Services Scott House and Director of Communications Dan Howard have an update on the mountain kind card, Park City maintains statewide ranking in 2024 Municipal Equality

Anthony Woodruff, Technical Program Manager at Microsoft, discusses his role working with customers in the Microsoft 365 Customer and Partner Ecosystem Team, Copilot in Microsoft Teams and the wider challenges and impact of AI adoption.AI-powered tools can significantly improve productivity and efficiencyCopilot use cases: summarizing conversations, onboarding new employees and streamlining workflowsThe potential of AI to revolutionise educationThanks to AVI-SPL, this episode's sponsor, for their continued support.

In episode #115 of the 2B Bolder podcast, we featured Krista Palmer, a well-respected Technical Program Manager at Google Play. Krista has an impressive career journey, from front-end development to product management to now leading impactful initiatives at one of the largest tech companies in the world. With a degree in Computer Science and a passion for design and technology, she has mastered the art of blending creativity with technical execution to create seamless digital experiences.As the founder of CX with Kris, Krista is committed to empowering professionals, especially women, to break into technical program management roles. Her dedication to mentoring others and helping professionals in career transitions has made her a go-to expert in the industry. Krista opens up about her career evolution, from coding to leading high-level technical programs, and the pivotal moments that shaped her professional path.Krista also shares invaluable insights into her day-to-day role at Google Play, highlighting the importance of collaboration, problem-solving, and vision in tech. For those curious about the intersection of design and technology, Krista provides a fresh perspective on how the two worlds combine to enhance our digital lives.Krista reflects on her journey, discussing how she tackles challenges like self-doubt and her strategies for staying resilient. She offers practical advice on personal branding, goal setting, and the importance of mentorship—especially in a male-dominated industry like tech.Whether you're a seasoned professional looking for career inspiration or considering a shift into technical program management, Krista's story is a must-listen. She embodies what it means to be "2B Bolder," constantly pushing boundaries, advocating for women in tech, and continuously evolving her career.Tune in for an inspiring episode filled with actionable insights, and discover how Krista is shaping the future of tech—one program at a time.Support the showWhen you subscribe to the podcast, you are supporting our work's mission, allowing us to continue highlighting successful women in a variety of careers to inspire others helping pay our wonderful editor, Chris, and helping me in paying our hosting expenses.

In this episode of UMBC Mic'd Up, host Dennise Cardona sits down with Karanveer Anand, a Technical Program Manager at Google, to explore the dynamic fields of project and program management. Karanveer shares his journey from engineering to management, offering insights into the key differences between project, program, and product management. They discuss the challenges and rewards of managing cross-functional teams, the impact of AI on the industry, and essential skills for those looking to break into the field. Whether you're a seasoned professional or just starting out, this episode is packed with valuable advice and actionable takeaways.Interested in Project Management? Let's Go Further: https://professionalprograms.umbc.edu/project-management/

In this episode of the Microsoft Threat Intelligence Podcast host Sherrod DeGrippo is joined by Technical Program Manager at Microsoft Lynn Miyashita and Principal Research Manager, Andrew Paverd. They discuss the evolution of bug bounty programs into the realm of artificial intelligence, specifically focusing on Microsoft's initiative launched in October 2023. Lynn explains that the AI Bug Bounty incentivizes external security researchers to discover and report vulnerabilities in Microsoft's AI systems, such as Copilot, across various platforms including web browsers and mobile applications. Andrew elaborates on the concept of a "bug bar," which sets the criteria for vulnerabilities eligible for the program. They emphasize the importance of identifying security issues that could arise uniquely from AI systems, such as prompt injection vulnerabilities. The discussion highlights Microsoft's structured approach to handling reported vulnerabilities through their Security Response Center, emphasizing quick mitigation and coordination with researchers to ensure timely fixes and public disclosure.     In this episode you'll learn:          How AI Bug Bounty programs are reshaping traditional security practices  Dangers of prompt injection attacks, and their capacity to exfiltrate sensitive data  Why you should engage in AI bug hunting and contribute to the evolving security landscape    Some questions we ask:         Which products are currently included in the Bug Bounty program?  Should traditional bug bounty hunters start doing AI bug bounty hunting?  How can someone get started with AI bug hunting and submitting to your program?      Resources:   View Lynn Miyashita on LinkedIn   View Andrew Paverd on LinkedIn   View Sherrod DeGrippo on LinkedIn     Microsoft AI Bug Bounty Program      Related Microsoft Podcasts:                    Afternoon Cyber Tea with Ann Johnson  The BlueHat Podcast  Uncovering Hidden Risks          Discover and follow other Microsoft podcasts at microsoft.com/podcasts     Get the latest threat intelligence insights and guidance at Microsoft Security Insider      The Microsoft Threat Intelligence Podcast is produced by Microsoft and distributed as part of N2K media network.  

In this Better Satellite World podcast series, we ask the question: “What would you do if you had the power to make the world a better place during your career?” Joining SSPI's Lou Zacharilla to answer that question in the sixth episode are 3 members of the “20 Under 35” cohort of 2023: Christian Keil, Chief of Staff at Astranis, Sapna Rao, Senior Systems Engineer at Lockheed Martin and Glory Sikka, Technical Program Manager at Maxar. Christian Keil is the Chief of Staff at Astranis, a manufacturer and operator of MicroGEO communications satellites. He leads both the marketing team and the regulatory team, roles in which he is the primary interface between Astranis and the outside world — whether heads of international regulatory agencies or fans on Twitter. After joining Astranis as its third businessperson, Christian played a pivotal role in scaling the company to over 300 employees and a $1.6 billion valuation. Over nearly five years, he has helped by establishing the company's back-end business systems (finance, recruiting, HR, etc.), designing the company's first website, writing the company's first onboarding guide and securing the company's first MOUs from the Department of Defense. Sapna Rao is a Senior Systems Engineer at Lockheed Martin. She joined the company in 2018 after graduating from the Virginia Tech College of Engineering with a degree in Aerospace Engineering and completing an Aerospace Engineering internship with Lockheed Martin. Sapna quickly became integral to many Lockheed Martin initiatives, playing an active role as a Software Systems Engineer, Systems Engineer and Mission Operations Developer on significant programs including Artemis I, Artemis II, the Human Landing System, and the Cryogenic Demonstration Mission. She currently serves as the lead for developing customers and partners from industry and academia to participate in Lockheed Martin's Lunar Mobile Vehicle project. Sapna is also the technical lead for Project Agni, a machine learning and artificial intelligence tool that can detect wildfires using lightning and weather data. She is also leading the generation of mission operations sequences for the Cryogenic Demonstration Mission. This mission is proving out the technology for transferring liquid hydrogen in orbit demonstrating refueling in space. This capability will enable future deep space exploration to Mars and beyond. Glory Sikka is the Deputy Technical Program Manager for NASA's Space Infrastructure Dexterous Robot (SPIDER) project at Maxar. She joined the company in 2018 as a Lead Systems Engineer for the project. SPIDER is an ambitious and complex mission demonstrating a brand-new robotic arm system for in-space assembly of spacecraft. Glory's team is responsible for the end-to-end system, which includes end-over-end walking capability, robot control avionics, situational awareness software, operations console, a precision in-space assembled Ka-band antenna and an in-space manufactured composite antenna boom. She was promoted to her current position in 2021 and is one of the youngest employees to ever reach that level of seniority at the company. Before joining Maxar, Glory spent two years as a Systems Engineer performing robotic maintenance activities on nuclear reactors for the MDA Corporation. She made many training and tool upgrades and improvements while at the company, resulting in greater up-time and reduced risk during maintenance operations. Glory began her career at Solar Ship, where she conducted design, modelling, experimental testing and data analysis for a next-generation airship.

Send us a Text Message.Imagine balancing a high-stakes career at Sony PlayStation with managing the rising stars of tomorrow. That's exactly what David Fallah does, and he joins us to share his remarkable journey. As a Technical Program Manager by day and a Talent Manager by night, David provides a fascinating look into both worlds. From delivering top-notch gaming experiences to nurturing talents like Araloyin Oshunremi from Netflix's "Top Boy," David's story is a testament to creativity, emotional intelligence, and the relentless pursuit of passion.David takes us back to his early life in Sierra Leone, painting a vivid picture of the cultural values and discipline that shaped him. We hear about the harrowing experiences of the civil war, his family's brave escape to England, and the strong community spirit that welcomed them in Hackney. His reflections on his father's long career with P&O Ferries and the enduring virtues of hard work, respect, and honesty offer a profound perspective on resilience and determination.We also dive into David's personal influences and treasured memories, from the legacy of Jamal Mason Blair to the inspiration drawn from his resilient immigrant mother. Whether it's lively debates at London's Speaker's Corner, scoring a goal in the FA Cup, or the joy of mentoring and teaching, David's storytelling immerses us in the significant landmarks and emotional events of his life. This episode celebrates the importance of cherishing every moment and the power of community, making it a must-listen for anyone navigating multiple passions and careers.Tune in next week for more stories of 'Distinction & Genius' from The Good Listening To Show 'Clearing'. If you would like to be my Guest too then you can find out HOW via the different 'series strands' at 'The Good Listening To Show' website. Show Website: https://www.thegoodlisteningtoshow.com You can email me about the Show: chris@secondcurve.uk Twitter thatchrisgrimes LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/chris-grimes-actor-broadcaster-facilitator-coach/ FaceBook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/842056403204860 Don't forget to SUBSCRIBE & REVIEW wherever you get your Podcasts :) Thanks for listening!

Guest: Crystal Lister, Technical Program Manager, Google Cloud Security Topics: Your background can be sheepishly called “public sector”, what's your experience been transitioning from public to private? How did you end up here doing what you are doing? We imagine you learned a lot from what you just described – how's that impacted your work at Google? How have you seen risk management practices and outcomes differ? You now lead Google Threat Horizons reports, do you have a vision for this? How does your past work inform it? Given the prevalence of ransomware attacks, many organizations are focused on external threats. In your experience, does the risk of insider threats still hold significant weight? What type of company needs a dedicated and separate insider threat program? Resources: Video on YouTube Google Cybersecurity Action Team Threat Horizons Report #9 Is Out! Google Cybersecurity Action Team site for previous Threat Horizons Reports EP112 Threat Horizons - How Google Does Threat Intelligence Psychology of Intelligence Analysis by Richards J. Heuer The Coming Wave by Mustafa Suleyman  Visualizing Google Cloud: 101 Illustrated References for Cloud Engineers and Architects  

Guest: Angelika Rohrer, Sr. Technical Program Manager , Cyber Security Response at Alphabet Topics: Incident response (IR) is by definition “reactive”, but ultimately incident prep determines your IR success. What are the broad areas where one needs to prepare? You have created a new framework for measuring how ready you are for an incident, what is the approach you took to create it? Can you elaborate on the core principles behind the Continuous Improvement (CI) Framework for incident response? Why is continuous improvement crucial for effective incident response, especially in cloud environments? Can't you just make a playbook and use it? How to overcome the desire to focus on the easy metrics and go to more valuable ones? What do you think Google does best in this area? Can you share examples of how the CI Framework could have helped prevent or mitigate a real-world cloud security incident? How can other organizations practically implement the CI Framework to enhance their incident response capabilities after they read the paper? Resources: “How do you know you are "Ready  to Respond"? paper EP75 How We Scale Detection and Response at Google: Automation, Metrics, Toil EP103 Security Incident Response and Public Cloud - Exploring with Mandiant EP158 Ghostbusters for the Cloud: Who You Gonna Call for Cloud Forensics EP98 How to Cloud IR or Why Attackers Become Cloud Native Faster?  

Aggie Branczyk interviews Jay Lowell, who did his PhD in AMO Physics and is now the Chief Scientist for Boeing Disruptive Computing & Networks. Jay shares with us his winding journey, that started with him wanting to be a fighter pilot, then led him to teaching at the airforce academy, then to managing programs at DARPA, and eventually to an interesting and varied career at Boeing. Jay reflects on the choices he made and what mattered to him as he was pursuing the career that he wanted. He talks about how he structures his work at Boeing. He also shares useful advice and insights, including how to broaden your opportunities for getting into a PhD program and the differences between the academic, government, and industry sectors. Aggie Branczyk on LinkedInJay Lowell on LinkedInPodcast video on YouTubeJay works at Boeing as a Principal Senior Technical Fellow, and the opinions shared in this podcast are his own and are not in any way endorsed by Boeing.Opening music by Alexey Ivanov from Pixabay.---Aggie works at IBM as a Technical Program Manager for the Quantum Working Groups, and the opinions shared in this podcast are her own and are not in any way endorsed by IBM.

"Well, these tools are able to do a lot of the work that comes after when someone signs up for something, whether it's a form where they sign up for a product and they're able to like, do personalization better than we've been able to do through humans." - Kieran Flanagan, CMO at Zapier and co-host of the successful podcast 'Marketing Against the Grain' with Kipp Bodnar, HupSpot's CMO. Listen to our new episode where you'll hear from Kieran Flanagan and Ryan Howard, Technical Program Manager at Google. They share insights on leveraging AI to transform audience engagement from mundane to mesmerizing. They'll have your audience double-tapping, sharing, and subscribing before you know it!   Check it out!

Aggie Branczyk interviews Amir Feizpour, who did his PhD in experimental quantum optics and is now the founder & CEO of a company whose goal is to accelerate knowledge discovery for sales teams. Amir reflects on the changes, challenges, and the structured chaos of startup life, emphasizing the newfound importance of organization and health to his personal and professional development. He also offers invaluable insights into navigating the job market, the power of personal projects, and the role of community as a bedrock for personal and professional growth. Aggie Branczyk on LinkedIn.Amir Feizpour on LinkedIn.More on Aggregate Intellect:Book a meeting on calendly SubstackYouTubePodcast video on YouTube.Opening music by Alexey Ivanov from Pixabay.---Aggie works at IBM as a Technical Program Manager for the Quantum Working Groups, and the opinions shared in this podcast are her own and are not in any way endorsed by IBM.

З Олександром Черевком поговорили як з представником журі хакатону. Спробували передати йому дух київського стартап-двіжу за океан. «Радісно бачити таку велику кількість команд, які працюють над технічним розвитком та зростанням економіки України у цей складний час. Саме тому одним з найголовніших для нас критеріїв у оцінюванні є українськість ідеї та комітмент для України». Прямі етери мандрівної студії Radio SKOVORODA з хакатону «Інновації у сфері глибоких технологій», який пройшов у Києві 1-3 березня 2024 року в форматі Techstars Startup Weekend за підтримки Програми USAID «Конкурентоспроможна економіка України». Живе спілкування з організаторами, менторами, учасниками. 3 березня, Unit City, за мікрофоном: Олег Гергіль. Ми приходимо на ваші заходи зі своєю мандрівною студією, аби вони не пройшли повз вашу аудиторію. Продовжуємо момент, перетворюючи його у контент. Робите подію? Запрошуйте нас!

Aggie Branczyk interviews Cristina Escoda, who did her PhD in string theory, and is now the co-founder & managing partner of an early-stage biotech venture capital firm, an angel investor, and a writer. Cristina's remarkable career takes her from physics & philosophy, to film school, to an MBA, to working on the trading floor in New York, to a hedge fund, and a stint doing data science at a life sciences startup, before joining the world of VC. In this episode, she shares how she's interwoven her love for science and creative endeavours, and gives some words of wisdom to current physics PhD students. Aggie Branczyk on LinkedInCristina Escoda on LinkedInPodcast video on YouTubeOpening music by Alexey Ivanov from Pixabay.---Aggie works at IBM as a Technical Program Manager for the Quantum Working Groups, and the opinions shared in this podcast are her own and are not in any way endorsed by IBM.

In this Better Satellite World podcast series, we ask the question: “What would you do if you had the power to make the world a better place during your career?” Joining SSPI's Lou Zacharilla to answer that question in the second episode are 3 members of the “20 Under 35” cohort of 2023: Julie Newman, Program Chief Engineer at Boeing; Dr. Zhe Liu, Senior Materials & Process Engineer at Maxar; and Alix Rousselière, Strategy Consultant for Satcom at Euroconsult. Julie Newman is Program Chief Engineer for Satelit Nusantara Lima N5 (SNL), a major geostationary communications satellite program, at Boeing. In this role, she has been instrumental in overseeing risk management and problem resolution for the satellite, particularly in the midst of a challenging shift to a different payload. Julie regularly directs and approves the work of senior engineering staff and provides recommendations to the program management office and the customer. She has also represented her executive manager in various critical functions, ranging from safety to quality assurance across Boeing's El Segundo site and has spearheaded multiple process improvement initiatives, including major efforts to improve Boeing's engineering training and metrics tracking systems. Before taking on her current position, Julie was the Technical Program Manager, a role in which she led a team of 15 engineers to develop the engine controller assembly for the Space Launch System (SLS) first stage rocket. The team consistently exceeded expectations under her leadership while executing a late re-design of the unit to resolve a leakage issue associated with a sneak path discovered during testing of the engineering model. She received a Promise Award from SSPI in 2023. Dr. Zhe Liu is Senior Materials & Process Engineer at Maxar as well as an accomplished scientist with a broad range of expertise in material science, biopolymers and computer science. Originally from China, Dr. Liu began her academic journey with an undergraduate degree in her home country. She then spent several years engaged in research and development in biopolymers before moving to the U.S. for further studies. She earned a Master's degree in Material Science with a concentration in composite materials from the University of Dayton before pursuing a PhD at Florida State University, where her research focused on nano composite materials for thermal ablative applications. During her PhD, Dr. Liu joined a California-based start-up company that specialized in the novel 3D printing of continuous fiber carbon composites. As team leader, she characterized the materials and developed the process for printing structural components. This crucial work paved the way for the successful commercialization of a carbon fiber/thermoplastic composite bicycle. Dr. Liu is currently working on a second Master's degree in Computer Science at Georgia Tech while working full-time for Maxar. Alix Rousselière is Strategy Consultant for Satcom at Euroconsult, which she joined in April 2022. Her role responsibilities include advising satellite operators and space agencies, conducting commercial and financial assessments and developing market intelligence reports on a variety of topics, including milsatcom and NGSO constellations. Although not an engineer herself, Alix has completed exemplary work on highly technical technology harmonization dossiers for the European Space Agency (ESA), demonstrating her ability to learn and adapt quickly. She participated in more than 12 international consulting missions within her first year at Euroconsult. Before joining Euroconsult, Alix spent two years at Thales in Abu Dhabi where she worked on Strategy and Commercial Development for Defense & Space Key Accounts. In particular, Alix formulated and helped implement a new, transversal, coordinated 5-year Strategic Plan for the company's UAE Defense accounts by analyzing trends and providing recommendations to C-level executive management on priority subjects and associated investments.

Technical Program Manager in the Azure Commerce team, Obinna Nwokolo explains exactly what the new Azure Savings Plan is all about and how you can easily take advantage of it via the Portal experience. He digs into the various options for cutting costs in Azure and when the Savings Plan makes sense for you. Media file: https://azpodcast.blob.core.windows.net/episodes/Episode486.mp3 YouTube: https://youtu.be/Qwt728PUz0U Resources: SP product page - Azure Savings Plan for Compute | Microsoft Azure SP Recommendations 101 - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4HV9GT9kX6A&list=PLlrxD0HtieHjd-zn7u09YoGJY18ZrN1Hq&index=2&t=15s&pp=iAQB SP Benefit application 101 - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AZOyh1rl3kU&list=PLlrxD0HtieHjd-zn7u09YoGJY18ZrN1Hq&index=3&t=2s&pp=iAQB   Other updates: https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/updates/generalavailabilityofazuremonitormetricsdataplaneapi/

Aileah Olds is a Technical Program Manager, 3x Career Pivoter and Career Transition Coach, passionate about mental health and career development. After spending 9+ years in humans resources and experiencing burnout and learning about her neurodiversity, she decided to make a career pivot to the tech industry, to increase her quality of life, and she teaches others how to do the same! Follow Aileah at https://www.linkedin.com/in/aileaholds-tpm Say hi to me on IG www.instagram.com/careerintechnicolor If you enjoyed this episode, share it with someone you know who could benefit from this story and leave a review and rating! Thank you so much for your time, say hi to me and Aileah, and let us know what resonated most with you! Sending you love, Baiba

If you have been wondering how to successfully launch your new program or service, join me for an exciting interview with Elisa Boogaerts, and experienced systems specialist and launch manager. She helps coaches launch their programs and events while working with them to set up systems to keep their business organized and running smoothly. She will reveal: 1. How to set up your biz for less stress and more success 2. The Essential Steps to Crafting a Repeatable Launch System 3. Metrics that Matter: Tracking Your Launch for Ongoing Success Before becoming a coach, she had a 23-year corporate career working in international Fortune 100 & 500 companies as a Technical Program Manager. Therefore, it was her job to keep herself and everyone she worked with organized when launching new products or software. Join Us for Key Strategies for Organizing a Winning Launch and please help get the word out and share with those who may need a business boost. Each #IBWS provides "a Goldmine of Entrepreneurial Tips, Strategies and Advice to grow your business to new Heights of Success from Inspirational Business Women in the Know.” Hear the inspired stories and personal struggles of these amazing women and learn how they rose to the top of their field while making a big impact on the lives of others. As your host, it is my deepest desire to uplift and inspire our "sister entrepreneurs" to pursue their dreams and share their passions with the world. Together we can "make a real difference" across the globe.

On this episode, we are joined by an amazing guest that is a US Army Veteran, IT Adjunct Professor at South University and Technical Program Manager at Google. We discuss his time in Iraq, his 18 years of experience in the "Game of Thrones" world of telecommunications and what it is like to work at Google.As he is our first guest of Black History Month, Demarkus also shares his experience as an African-American in telecommunications and what can be done to provide more opportunities for African-Americans in tech.Recommended Links:Demarkus Pruitt LinkedIn

In this Making Leaders podcast, we hear from Julie Newman, Program Chief Engineer at Boeing and one of three Promise Award Recipients in 2023. Julie is Program Chief Engineer for Satelit Nusantara Lima N5 (SNL), a major geostationary communications satellite program. In this role, she has been instrumental in overseeing risk management and problem resolution for the satellite, particularly in the midst of a challenging shift to a different payload. Julie regularly directs and approves the work of senior engineering staff and provides recommendations to the program management office and the customer. She has also represented her executive manager in various critical functions, ranging from safety to quality assurance across Boeing's El Segundo site and has spearheaded multiple process improvement initiatives, including major efforts to improve Boeing's engineering training and metrics tracking systems. Before taking on her current position, Julie was the Technical Program Manager, a role in which she led a team of 15 engineers to develop the engine controller assembly for the Space Launch System (SLS) first stage rocket. The team consistently exceeded expectations under her leadership while executing a late re-design of the unit to resolve a leakage issue associated with a sneak path discovered during testing of the engineering model. Julie is a graduate of Caltech with a Bachelor of Science in Electrical Engineering.

Today I am speaking with Pedro Diogo, Senior Technical Program Manager at The Graph Foundation. Pedro has played a pivotal role within The Graph Foundation, collaborating closely with core developers and contributors to bring forth groundbreaking initiatives, including the MIPs program and the recent announcement of the new Chain Integration Process.During our conversation, Pedro offers insights into his background, including an interesting discussion about his home country, Portugal, known for its reputation as one of the friendliest crypto and web3 nations. We then discuss Pedro's journey into the world of crypto, his early engagement with The Graph (as a user!), and his eventual transition into full-time web3 work at The Graph Foundation. At the end, Pedro shares details about recent ecosystem programs he's been involved in and outlines his visionary perspective on the future of The Graph.Show Notes and TranscriptsThe GRTiQ Podcast takes listeners inside web3 and The Graph (GRT) by interviewing members of the ecosystem.  Please help support this project and build the community by subscribing and leaving a review.Twitter: GRT_iQwww.GRTiQ.com

In this ever-evolving world of technology, roles and responsibilities are subject to constant change. The Technical Program Manager (TPM) position has been a crucial part of product and software development for many years. However, more recently, there have been many questions about the role's relevance and future due to various factors, primary of which is the tech layoffs.In this episode, I answer the question "Is the TPM role dead?" and look into factors leading to this point and what the future holds. Join me as I share my views on the TPM role - value of the TPM role to organizations,  the impact of layoffs on the TPM function,  the current state of the TPM role and the evolution of the TPM role and expectations around it. Learn more about TPM with these resourcesTPM InsightsCracking the TPM Interview CourseWant to unleash your leadership? Work with meFollow MeLinkedInFacebookInstagramYoutubeSupportBuy me a coffee

In this episode, Ajay Khaladkar, former Technical Program Manager, Golisano Institute for Sustainability, Rochester Institute of Technology, discusses how the institute is helping companies transition to Industry 4.0. Humanity is in relentless pursuit of enhancing living standards and creating a more comfortable existence. Every major effort to advance society using human intellect and technology has not only induced socioeconomic ripples but also transformed the world — starting from the first industrial revolution in the 1700s, also known as Industry 1.0, to the digital transformation we are witnessing today: Industry 4.0.  As technology is rapidly evolving and new frameworks are being introduced, experts point out that the periods between industrial revolutions are decreasing. A good transition strategy can help traditional businesses to successfully adapt to the latest transformation metrics.  Ajay Khaladkar, former Technical Program Manager of Advanced Manufacturing and Industry 4.0 Solutions at Golisano Institute for Sustainability, Rochester Institute of Technology, discusses how the institute is supporting organizations' transition to Industry 4.0, the challenges and what to expect after the transition. Key takeaways: It is noted that the periods between industrial revolutions are getting smaller and we may enter Industry 5.0 quicker, with the emergence of new technologies and the fast, widespread integration of information. Industry 4.0 is considered as a catalyst for better, sustainable goals and may bring societal shifts, such as in job profiles and social equity. Industry 4.0 is more complex than its previous counterparts for calculating returns on investment, because some Industry 4.0 tools will not replace workforce, but help empower leaders to make agile, reliable decisions.

One World in a New World with Sunitha Sandeep - TEDx Speaker & Transformative Coach* An Apocalyptic Chat with host, Zen Benefiel, MA, MBA, Transformational Coach (https://BeTheDream.com) Sunita Sandeep, a Technical Program Manager at Amazon Web Services and a certified Inner Transformational and Integrative Wellness Coach, talks about her childhood experiences of spending time alone, looking at the ceiling or sky, and doing nothing. She explains how these moments of being quiet and still allowed her to feel connected to herself and everything around her, and gave her a sense of trust and confidence in a deeper part of herself. As she grew up and entered the corporate world, she lost touch with this inner awareness, but has since reconnected with it and integrated it into her life. The journey of transformation is about being open, vulnerable, and willing to change. The process involves moving through different levels, starting with the surface level of mental thoughts, progressing to emotional intelligence, and finally to the gut level. It is important to allow oneself to feel all emotions on a spectrum and not judge them. Letting go of personal will leads to a natural state that carries data that has not been unpacked due to lack of quietness. The journey is simple but not easy, and different perspectives operate in the moment. Sunitha discusses the importance of deep listening and the power it has in connecting with others, promoting creativity and facilitating change. Zen suggests that as leaders, it is essential to lead with empathy and emotional intelligence, which starts with being an active listener. Zen also shares their experience as the executive director of a Global Peace movement, which involves removing aggression and nurturing growth to create a vibrant collective. Fear is discussed as a major barrier to change and the author recommends inquiry-based practices and transmutation processes to overcome fear. One of the suggested practices is to sit with fear and ask oneself what is feared the most. This is seen as a form of self-care that promotes inside-out transformation. Dive in and listen to what Sunitha and Zen have to offer for finding happiness and success. Please subscribe and share when you find value here or elsewhere on YouTube. Together, we can all make a difference in changing ourselves and the world for the better. Connect with Sunitha: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sunithasandeep/ Sunitha's Website: https://www.sunithasandeep.com/ Sunitha's TEDx Talk: https://youtu.be/aAS_deL8Ebw _______ Connect with Zen: https://linkedin.com/zenbenefiel Zen's Coaching: https://BeTheDream.com Zen's CV et al: https://zenbenefiel.com Live and Let Live Global Peace Movement: https://liveandletlive.org

AI is the hottest topic in L&D since Learning2.0. It's even hotter than Virtual Reality. Why? Because it's something everyone can use and doesn't require additional hardware expenses.  And more importantly, when used creatively, AI apps can supercharge your individual productivity. But if you're a manager/director of an L&D or Training department, you need to build your knowledge of these tools as well. They are changing how your team will work and support stakeholders.Myra Roldan, AWS Sr. Technical Program Manager, joins us to talk about the many solutions and productivity hacks she's discovered while experimenting with AI apps. She'll talk about building AI generated content, but also how she's generated more complex solutions like knowledge bases. She's even used AI to generate her own app that generates instructional objectives. The future of AI is here now.If you follow Myra on social media you may have already seen these demos, but if you're like me, her videos sparked even more questions. Bring your own questions and curiosity to this episode and join the always active chat room. And bring your manager, and your manager's manager. This technology, more than any other, is changing rapidly the way we work and improve performance.Become virtual friends with the IDIODC gang on Twitter. Remember you can always stay in the loop by searching through the #IDIODC tag:Brent: @BSchlenkerChris: @Chris_V_WIDIODC: @TeamIDIODC Brent Schlenker is dominKnow's Community Manager. Chris Van Wingerden is dominKnow's Sr. VP Learning Solutions. Want to join us live? Follow us on Crowdcast: https://www.crowdcast.io/@dominknow

Salaam #muslimprofessionals! In this episode, Zohaib speaks with Ali Khan, a Sr. Technical Program Manager at Microsoft on how he made a rebound after being laid off from his first gig after 8 months of starting. Ali and Zohaib also discuss different techniques and strategies to maximize finding that next rebound gig and ensuring to maximize as much time as possible. --- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/muslimprofessionals/message

Today's guest is Alex Siegman, Machine Learning Technical Program Manager at Google AI. Google are excited about the transformational power of AI and the helpful new ways it can be applied. From research that expands what's possible, to product integrations designed to make everyday things easier, and applying AI to make a difference in the lives of those who need it most, Google are committed to responsible innovation and technologies that benefit all of humanity. Alex is an experienced leader in the AI/ML space, specializing in designing and leading AI-centric programs. He joined Goggle in April 2021 and currently partners with scientists, applied researchers, and engineering & product teams, alongside compliance, ethics and fairness orgs to develop and deploy human-centric, generative foundation models and other incubatory programs. He is also responsible to manage strategic planning, budgeting, communications, compute, and resource allocation for a 110+ person organization within Research. In the episode, Alex will talk about: An overview of the work he does with Google Research, What a typical working day for him looks like, The most rewarding aspects of his role, What the interview process was like joining Google, His advice for people who want to work at Google, Skills and qualifications needed to succeed in his team, New tech trends that excite him and What ‘s changed for him since his last episode

She wasn't sure what she wanted to do after high school. But one thing Heaven Hamilton was sure of was that she didn't want the huge debt she'd be left with. She took the community college route since the researched she did showed her that she'd save a ton by taking that route. As she entered the workforce, she observed that her college-degree holding coworkers didn't make much more than her. She wanted a change from the job she had but wasn't sure what that would be. That's when she discovered YearUp. Listen in as she talks about how it transformed her career and her life.Here are a few things she discussed with Jonaed:(00:57) What is a technical project manager(2:49) Heaven Hamilton has no degree but worked at big companies like Ebay(3:15) Technical project manager salary(4:54) Heaven's path from program manager to Technical Program Manager(8:02) How not playing it safe and asking questions lead to her working at T-Mobile(10:03) Unsure of what to do in high school since struggled with grief at the time(12:05) Community College, a cheaper college alternative(17:38) Pivoting from working as a care giver to working in an office(24:17) She needed a change in her career but wasn't sure what until she learned about this(27:38) Why YearUp's mentorship was transformative(34:39) She realized her coworkers, with college degrees, didn't make that much more than her(36:39) How networking helped her to move on from a technical analyst role(41:47) Learning on the job(45:02) How her contract got extended at T-mobile(51:25) Working at Twitter was a dream(58:03) Getting fired from Twitter(1:08:39) Wrestling(1:13:07) Sports helped with her work ethicSupport/Contact Heaven:Twitter: https://twitter.com/HeavensTakeLinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/heaven-hamilton/ Books and resources mentioned in this podcast:YearUp: https://www.yearup.org/students/become-a-studentNeed career or resume advice? Follow and/or connect with Jonaed Iqbal on LinkedIn.LinkedIn: https://bit.ly/JonaedIqbalNDConnect with us on social media!LinkedIn: https://bit.ly/NoDegreeLinkedInFacebook: https://bit.ly/NoDegreeFBInstagram: https://bit.ly/NoDegreeIGTwitter: https://bit.ly/NoDegreeTWTikTok: https://bit.ly/3qfUD2VJoin our discord server: https://bit.ly/NoDegreeDiscordThank you for sponsoring our show. If you'd like to support our mission to end the stigma and economic disparity that comes along with not having a college degree, please share with a friend, drop us a review on Apple Podcast and/or subscribe to our Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/nodegree.Remember, no degree? No problem! Whether you're contemplating college or you're a college dropout, get started with your no-degree job search at nodegree.com.

MLOps Coffee Sessions #154 with Melissa Barr & Michael Mui, Machine Learning Education at Uber co-hosted by Lina Weichbrodt. // Abstract Melissa and Michael discuss the education program they developed for Uber's machine learning platform service, Michelangelo, during a guest appearance on a podcast. The program teaches employees how to use machine learning both in general and specifically for Uber. The platform team can obtain valuable feedback from users and use it to enhance the platform. The course was designed using engineering principles, making it applicable to other products as well. // Bio Melissa Barr Melissa is a Technical Program Manager for ML & AI at Uber. She is based in New York City. She drives projects across Uber's ML platform, delivery, and personalization teams. She also built out the first version of the ML Education Program in 2021. Michael Mui Melissa is a Staff Technical Lead Manager on Uber AI's Machine Learning Platform team. He leads the Distributed ML Training team which focuses on building elastic, scalable, and fault-tolerant distributed machine learning libraries and systems used to power machine learning development productivity across Uber. He also co-leads Uber's internal ML Education initiatives. Outside of Uber, Michael also teaches ML at the Parsons School of Design in NYC as an Adjunct Faculty (mostly for the museum passes!) and guest lectures at the University of California, Berkeley. // MLOps Jobs board https://mlops.pallet.xyz/jobs // MLOps Swag/Merch https://mlops-community.myshopify.com/ // Related Links https://www.uber.com/blog/ml-education-at-uber-program-design-and-outcomes/https://www.uber.com/blog/ml-education-at-uber/https://www.uber.com/en-PH/blog/ml-education-at-uber/ --------------- ✌️Connect With Us ✌️ ------------- Join our slack community: https://go.mlops.community/slack Follow us on Twitter: @mlopscommunity Sign up for the next meetup: https://go.mlops.community/register Catch all episodes, blogs, newsletters, and more: https://mlops.community/ Connect with Demetrios on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/dpbrinkm/ Connect with Melissa on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/melissabarr1/ Connect with Michael on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/michael-c-mui/Connect with Lina on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lina-weichbrodt-344a066a/ Timestamps: [00:00] Melissa and Michael's preferred coffee [01:51] Takeaways [05:40] Please subscribe to our newsletters and leave reviews on our podcasts! [06:18] Machine learning at Uber education program [07:45] The Uber courses [10:03] Tailoring the Uber education system [12:27] Growing out of the ML-Ed platform efforts [14:14] Expanding the ML Market Size [15:23] Relationship evolution [17:36] Reproducibility best practices [21:46] Learning development timeline [26:29] Courses effectiveness evaluation [29:57] Tracking Progress Challenge [31:25] ML platforms for internal tools [35:07] Impact of ML Education at Uber [39:30] Recommendations to companies who want to start an ML-Ed platform [41:12] Early ML Adoption Program [42:11] Homegrown or home-built platform [42:54] Feature creation to a course [45:24] ML Education at Uber: Frameworks Inspired by Engineering Principles [49:42] The Future of ML Education at Uber [52:28] Unclear ways to spread ML knowledge [54:20] Module for Generative AI and ChatGPT [55:05] Measurement of success [56:39] Wrap up

In this episode of RCA Radio, host Brandon Miller is joined by Eric Januszewski, Senior Director of Client Relations for US and Europe, at Regulatory Compliance Associates® (RCA) to talk about outsourced technical program management and the increased demand caused by the shortage of qualified subject matter experts.Listen in as Eric goes over what outsourced program management is, the benefits clients receive when having a technical program manager, and the heuristic approach RCA takes with their program managers to transfer knowledge to the clients internal team. About RCARegulatory Compliance Associates®  (RCA) provides worldwide services to the following industries for resolution of compliance and regulatory challenges:PharmaceuticalBiologic & BiotechnologySterile compoundingMedical deviceLab TestingWe understand the complexities of running a life science business and possess areas of expertise that include every facet of R&D, operations, regulatory affairs, quality, and manufacturing. We are used to working on the front lines and thriving in the scrutiny of FDA-and globally-regulated companies.As your partners, we can negotiate the potential minefield of regulatory compliance and regulatory due diligence with insight, hindsight, and the clear advantage of our unique expertise and experience.

For many people, the internet is the source of news and communication on a daily basis.  In rural areas of Wisconsin, however, broadband internet is not taken for granted.  Stephanie Hoff talks to Jason Wied from Bug Tussel Wireless about grant monies they've received to work on providing internet access to all of rural Wisconsin. Wyffels Hybrids wraps up the growing season with a conversation featuring Dr. Brent Tharp, Technical Program Manager at Wyffels.  He explains what will be happening all winter for the seed corn company. It's time for crop consultants and growers to fine tune their agronomy skills.  This year, University Extension staff are combining efforts to bring their updates to growers next week.  Dr. Damon Smith, UW-Extension Plant Pathologist, explains the goal and program content.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Daniel Charpentier is the founder of Kreechures, creator and lead developer of Venatrix. Prior to entering the world of web3 full-time, Daniel was a Technical Program Manager, with a focus on software development & IT infrastructure for over a decade. Further back Daniel served in the US Army. He is based out of Cary, North Carolina, with his wife and children.In this conversation, Daniel and I talk about the evolution of NFTs on Solana over the past 2 years, the culture of NFT flipping and his new NFT Marketplace called Venatrix that's set to solve a unique set of problems for customers. We talk about his decision to pivot away from the Kreechures game, the controversial topic of NFT royalties and also get his thoughts on using AI to create art.Relevant Links:https://www.venatrix.xyz/https://www.kreechures.com/https://twitter.com/kreechuresSponsors:The Kin Show Store - https://store.thekinshow.com/ 

So much has been changing in how we work over the past few years that it can be tough to keep track of everything. There has been an increased focus on product management as companies move from a project-based approach to a product-based approach. Some organizations are still trying to get their feet with agile, while others have decided that their teams no longer need a Scrum Master (very bad idea - IMHO). And more recently, there has been an increased focus on the role of Technical Program Manager. When you check out the job postings for these gigs, you'll see a bit of variety, but some things they often have in common are that this person should have experience managing projects, programs, and portfolios in a traditional approach; experience working, leading, and coaching Agile teams; experience working as a software developer; and sometimes also experience working in product management. If project managers were superheroes, this would be all of the Avengers in one person. It's a big ask. In this episode of the podcast, my friend Jeff Howey joins me to talk about what he's been seeing in market as companies are listing jobs for a Technical Program Manager. We dig into why this has become a thing, whether it is even possible to find all this in one person, how it might impact organizations, and how you can get started filling whatever gaps you may have so that you can maintain the ability to be competitive in the job market. If you'd like to contact Jeff Howey. LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jeffhowey/

This week on the pod, Natalie speaks with Alex Berry and Dyllan Elizabeth Cabiles. They work at CMD LLC, an organization that empowers underserved and untapped communities to tell powerful career narratives. Listen as we talk through the role of code-switching in the narratives that are told, and what it means to tell truth to power. Alex is a Technical Program Manager within Intel's Global Supply Chain. A technologist by day and a social entrepreneur by night, he incorporated CMD LLC. Alex graduated from Georgia Tech with a B.S. in Industrial Engineering and dual minors in Business/Mandarin. Dyllan Elizabeth is a multi-disciplinary creative who is passionate about individual and community empowerment. Dyllan Elizabeth has honed her skills through branding, marketing, graphic design, and website creation; with these skills, she creates inclusive stories that bring people together. https://chocolatemilkdiplomacy.com/ You can email us at podcast@womeninsciencepdx.org and follow us @women_in_science_pdx on Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook.

Guest: Jack Gouge - Air Force special operations Veteran, Technical Program Manager at AmazonEpisode Description: Welcome back for another episode of Lead On: Lessons from Military Leaders! Today we are joined by Air Force Veteran and Technical Program Manager at Amazon, Jack Gouge. Join us as he speaks about hard lessons he has had to learn that have led to great humility in his leadership style. If you enjoyed this episode, please be sure to like, comment, subscribe, and check out our previous episodes! To find out more information about the Enlisted Leadership Foundation, please visit us at  https://www.enlistedleadershipfoundation.org/. 

As recently stated in a tweet by Chris Dixon, General Partner at a16z, “We are now at the beginning of the web3 era, which combines the decentralized, community-governed ethos of web1 with the advanced, modern functionality of web2.”Join Chjango Unchained, Host of Interchain.FM, Osmosis Labs Advisor, Cosmos Head of Ecosystem and Alani Kuye, Technical Program Manager at Overclock Labs as they discuss the deeper meaning behind web3. Why does the world need a new technological system for financial security, cloud technologies and maybe most importantly, privacy? What are the teams behind Osmosis and Akash Network doing to help bridge the old world and the new? How does web3 solve the issues of legacy technologies?We'll cover all this and much more in a very special fireside chat!--------------------Official Osmosis LinkEnter the Lab and Earn:https://osmosis.zone  Frontier site:https://frontier.osmosis.zone  Docs:http://docs.osmosis.zone Read about the OSMO token distribution:https://medium.com/osmosis/osmo-token...  Learn more about what it means to be a Liquidity Provider:https://medium.com/osmosis/osmosis-li...  Join the CommunityFacebook Page:https://www.facebook.com/Osmosiszone Facebook Group:https://www.facebook.com/groups/osmos...  Twitter:https://twitter.com/osmosiszone  Reddit:https://www.reddit.com/r/OsmosisLab Discord:https://discord.gg/osmosis  Telegram:https://t.me/osmosis_chat  Instagram:https://www.instagram.com/osmosis.zone Medium:https://medium.com/osmosis  Youtubehttps://www.youtube.com/c/Osmosiszone...Governance:https://gov.osmosis.zone Podcast:https://podcast.labupdates.zone  GitHub:https://github.com/osmosis-labs  Community updates:https://medium.com/osmosis-community-...    Interchain Wallet Keplr:https://www.keplr.app Keplr Support:   https://help.keplr.app  ⚠️Keplr does not have a Telegram channel, existing ones are scams⚠️

In this interview, I'm chatting with the amazing Pujitha Desiraju, Technical Program Manager at Microsoft Azure Core. We'll be chatting about breaking down hustle culture, passion projects, and Pujitha will be sharing her advice for getting established in the IT field. Pujitha is a Technical Program Manager in Microsoft Azure Core focused on the quality and resiliency of the Azure Host and platform. Her day-to-day is devoted to empowering Azure customers to monitor and troubleshoot Virtual Machine Availability disruptions to run their workloads seamlessly on Azure. Her obsession with problem-solving and penchant for leveraging strategy and leadership to influence attracted her to the responsibilities of a Program Manager. She often looks for creative solutions to complex problems. She enjoys design and storytelling which comes in handy as she routinely engages with customers to retain and attract their attention to Azure services. ✉️ Connect with Pujitha https://www.linkedin.com/in/pujithadesiraju/

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Show Notes(01:53) Alessya shared her formative experiences growing up in Kazakhstan, coming to Washington during high school, and discovering a passion and extreme aptitude for mathematics.(04:20) Alessya described her undergraduate experience studying Applied Mathematics at the University of Washington.(08:00) Alessya talked about impactful projects she contributed to while working as a software developer at Amazon's quality assurance and DevOps organizations.(12:29) Alessya went over critical responsibilities during her time as Amazon's Technical Program Manager.(17:06) Alessya talked about the process of building and getting adoption for an internal Machine Learning platform at Amazon.(20:42) Alessya shared her biggest takeaways from Amazon's culture of customer obsession and operational excellence.(23:26) Alessya revisited her period enrolling in UW's Master of Science in Entrepreneurship Program and highlighted two core entrepreneurial muscles developed: networking and negotiation.(28:58) Alessya provided insights on the startup ecosystem and ML community in Seattle.(34:47) Alessya walked through her period serving as the CTO in Residence at Allen Institute for AI and evaluating a range of AI technologies for viability and product readiness.(37:12) Alessya shared the backstory behind the founding of WhyLabs, an AI observability platform built to enable every enterprise to run AI with certainty (read her blog post about early misadventures with AI at Amazon that inspired the incubation of WhyLabs at AI2).(42:23) Alessya examined what makes an AI solution robust and responsible.(46:09) Alessya dissected the anatomy of an enterprise AI Observability platform.(49:58) Alessya explained why data logging is a critical missing component in the production ML stack and described whylogs, an open-source ML data logging library from WhyLabs.(54:12) Alessya shared valuable hiring lessons to attract the right people who are excited about WhyLabs' mission.(57:03) Alessya shared tactics to find and engage contributors to whylogs.(58:10) Alessya shared the hurdles to find the early design partners and lighthouse customers of WhyLabs.(01:02:28) Alessya shared upcoming go-to-market initiatives that she is most excited about for WhyLabs.(01:03:54) Alessya explained what it felt to be recognized as the CEO of the year for the Pacific Northwest startup community last year and shared her perspective on work-life balance.(01:07:43) Closing segment.Alessya's Contact InfoLinkedInTwitterWhyLabs's ResourcesWebsitewhylogsSlack CommunityBlogLinkedIn | Twitter | Facebook | YouTube | GitHubWhat is AI Observability?Mentioned ContentArticles + Talks“Introducing WhyLabs, a Leap Forward in AI Reliability” (Sep 2020)“WhyLabs: The AI Observability Platform” (Sep 2020)“whylogs: Embrace Data Logging Across Your ML Systems” (Sep 2020)“Who Said Moms Can't CEO?” (May 2021)“The Critical Missing Component in the Production ML Stack” (May 2021)PeopleCassie Kozyrkov (Chief Decision Scientist at Google)Dan Jeffries (Chief Evangelist at Pachyderm and Founder of AI Infrastructure Alliance)Michael Petrochuk (Founder and CTO of WellSaid Labs)Book“The Hard Things About Hard Things” (by Ben Horowitz)NotesMy conversation with Alessya was recorded back in August 2021. Since then, many things have happened at WhyLabs.I'd recommend looking at:The self-service release of AI ObservatorySeries A fundingExploring their new integrations with Teachable Hub, UbiOps, Valohai, and Superb AILaunch of their listing on AWS MarketplaceTheir article on How Observability Uncovers the Effects of ML Technical DebtTheir achievement of SOC 2 Type 2 certificationwhylogs is evolving to a new iteration that will be even more usable and more useful than it was before. With the launch of whylogs v1 in May, users will be able to create data profiles in a fraction of the time and with a much simpler API. Additionally, WhyLabs built-in handy features such as the profile visualizer (which allows users to visualize one or multiple profiles for exploration and comparison) and constraints (which allow users to validate the quality of their data as it flows through their data pipelines).About the showDatacast features long-form, in-depth conversations with practitioners and researchers in the data community to walk through their professional journeys and unpack the lessons learned along the way. I invite guests coming from a wide range of career paths — from scientists and analysts to founders and investors — to analyze the case for using data in the real world and extract their mental models (“the WHY and the HOW”) behind their pursuits. Hopefully, these conversations can serve as valuable tools for early-stage data professionals as they navigate their own careers in the exciting data universe.Datacast is produced and edited by James Le. Get in touch with feedback or guest suggestions by emailing khanhle.1013@gmail.com.Subscribe by searching for Datacast wherever you get podcasts or click one of the links below:Listen on SpotifyListen on Apple PodcastsListen on Google PodcastsIf you're new, see the podcast homepage for the most recent episodes to listen to, or browse the full guest list.

About JohnnyJohnny was born in Cleveland, OH and graduated from the University of Toledo with a Bachelor's in Computer Science Engineering. He began his career as a software engineer focused on embedded device protocols and systems engineering. Eventually he realized that Program Management worked better with the grain of his brain, so he took his career in that direction.In 2019, he was hired by Google Cloud to serve as a Communications Lead on their incident management teams. Most recently, he joined Waymo in November 2021 as a Technical Program Manager, acting as an anti-entropy agent for the self-driving car company's offboard infrastructure teams.Outside his day job, Johnny enjoys mountain biking, playing piano and trumpet, personal finance, coaching, and studying complex systems. He currently lives in Sunnyvale, CA with his wife Emily, and is expecting their first child in April 2022! Links: Original Twitter thread: https://twitter.com/QuinnyPig/status/1436129343399346184 Personal website: https://jmpod.com LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jmpod Twitter: https://twitter.com/gratitudeisfree/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/gratitudeisfree/ TranscriptAnnouncer: Hello, and welcome to Screaming in the Cloud with your host, Chief Cloud Economist at The Duckbill Group, Corey Quinn. This weekly show features conversations with people doing interesting work in the world of cloud, thoughtful commentary on the state of the technical world, and ridiculous titles for which Corey refuses to apologize. This is Screaming in the Cloud.Corey: Couchbase Capella Database-as-a-Service is flexible, full-featured and fully managed with built in access via key-value, SQL, and full-text search. Flexible JSON documents aligned to your applications and workloads. Build faster with blazing fast in-memory performance and automated replication and scaling while reducing cost. Capella has the best price performance of any fully managed document database. Visit couchbase.com/screaminginthecloud to try Capella today for free and be up and running in three minutes with no credit card required. Couchbase Capella: make your data sing.Corey: This episode is sponsored in part by LaunchDarkly. Take a look at what it takes to get your code into production. I'm going to just guess that it's awful because it's always awful. No one loves their deployment process. What if launching new features didn't require you to do a full-on code and possibly infrastructure deploy? What if you could test on a small subset of users and then roll it back immediately if results aren't what you expect? LaunchDarkly does exactly this. To learn more, visit launchdarkly.com and tell them Corey sent you, and watch for the wince.Corey: Welcome to Screaming in the Cloud. I'm Corey Quinn. Every once in a while I get feedback from people who I've encountered who are impacted in various ways. Most of it is feedback delivered of the kind you might expect, like, “Unsubscribe me from this newsletter,” or, “Block,” or sometimes bricks thrown through my window. But occasionally, I get some truly horrifying feedback, and far and away one of the most horrifying things I can ever be told is, “So, I was reading one of your tweet threads and it changed the course of my career.”It's like, “Oh, dear,” because nothing good is going to happen after something like that. It's, “Yeah, they were going to name something terrible here at AWS, so I ran over my boss in the parking lot,” is sort of what I'm expecting to hear. But I got that exact feedback about life-changing tweet threads from today's guest. We'll get into what that tweet thread was a little bit, but let's first let the other person talk for a minute. Johnny Podhradsky is a technical program manager at Waymo. Specifically, of Offboard Infrastructure. Johnny, thanks for suffering through a long, painful introduction, as well as, more or less, the slings and arrows that invariably come with being on the show.Johnny: Thanks, Corey. I'm grateful to be here.Corey: So, first things first. I always like to find out what people actually do for a living that is usually a source of entertainment, if nothing else. You are a technical program manager—or TPM as they say in tech companies—of Offboard Infrastructure. I'm assuming because Waymo, is at least theoretically, a self-driving car company, ‘offboard' means things that are not on the vehicle themselves.Johnny: That's exactly right. Yeah.Corey: Fantastic. Now, ask the dumb question because I'm still not sure I have an answer after however many years in this industry. What does a technical program manager do?Johnny: [laugh]. I get that question a lot. Often people try to distinguish between what's a technical program manager do versus what does a product manager do.Corey: Or a project manager, too, because there's a lot of different ways it can express itself, and I'm a PM, and it's, “Oh, wonderful. That's like four different acronyms I can disambiguate into and I'm probably going to get it wrong.”Johnny: And to make it even more confusing, it varies company by company. So, just focus in on specifically what I do as a technical program manager, I'm an anti-entropy agent, right? I make sure things stay on track, specifically embedded into technical teams. So, I have a degree in engineering; I'm able to speak fluently about technology. And the entire idea, the entire purpose of my existence is to make sure that things don't fall apart. So, I'm keeping track of people and resources; I'm keeping track of overall timelines; risks and mitigations for programs that are ongoing, whether they're small with just a few people or cross-org, cross-functional teams; serving as an unblocker and making sure that all the dependencies that exist between the various tasks in the teams are addressed ahead of time so that we know what needs to be done when.Corey: It's one of those useful almost glue functions, it feels like that is, “Well, what have you actually built? Point at the thing you've constructed yourself from your hands on your keyboard?” And it's hard to do and it's very nebulous, when you're not directly able to point to a website, for example. “Yeah, you see that button in the corner? I made that button.” Great.Like, that's the visceral thing that people can wrap their heads around. Project and program management feels to me like one of those areas that, in theory, you don't need those people to be a part of building anything, but in practice you very much do. Another example of this—from my own history, of course—is operations because in theory, you just have developers write code correctly the first time and then they leave it where it is and it never needs to be updated again, and there's no reason to have operations folks. Yeah. As they say, the difference between theory and practice is that in theory, there is none.Johnny: I'll buy that. Yeah, when it comes to actual, I mean, digital, but physical deliverables and things that you can show that you've done, there are standards that you can have with documentation, like Gantt charts and risk registers and all that sort of thing, but it is very much a glue role. It is very much a gentle nudge to get things done. And it really revolves around the transparency and making sure that the people who are invested in the success of whatever it is that you're doing program-wise are aware of what's going on as far ahead of time as possible. That's why I like to consider it sort of an anti-entropy role because things will just naturally go off the rails if no one is there to help guide them.I mean, that doesn't happen in every situation, of course, but having someone dedicated to the role of making sure that things are moving according to a good rhythm is a critical role. And it just so happens that that is sort of the way the grain of my brain works and I discovered that throughout the course of my career.Corey: So, let's get back to the reason you originally reached out to me. I think that is always an interesting topic to explore because whenever someone says, “Wow, your tweet really helped me with my career,” I get worried. Because as I said before, I am one of the absolute best in the world at getting myself fired from jobs, so when it comes to being a good employee, mostly my value is as a counter-example of advice I'll give [unintelligible 00:05:49] job interviews. For example, when they say something condescending and rude, insult them right back because A, it's funny, and that plays well on Twitter. And B, interviews are always two-way streets, and if they're going to treat you like crap, you don't want to work there anyway, so you may as well have some fun with it. But a lot of what I say doesn't really lend itself to the kind of outcomes that lead to happy employment scenarios. So, I've got to ask, what the hell did I say?Johnny: Yeah, it was kind of serendipitous. I'm in a number of Slack communities, one of them being the Cleveland Tech Slack—if you're in Cleveland or around Cleveland, I highly recommend it—and someone just randomly posted this thread right in the middle of me interviewing at Waymo. So, previously before Waymo, I was at Google, and I loved my job. I loved the team that I was on, I loved the—I mean, I was still very much in the honeymoon phase of Silicon Valley. I had moved to Silicon Valley from Cleveland in 2019 with my then fiance.And so I was just, you know, bright-eyed and bushy-tailed, and everything was just incredible to me; why would I ever consider leaving this? So, I had an interview at Waymo and I ended up getting an offer and I just didn't know whether I should take it. Because I loved where I was at and I really enjoyed the opportunities, so it was just, you know, ten out of ten. One of the things that I was thinking about then was, you know, I kept thinking back to our first team dinner where our teammates were sharing their stories of their careers. And my mentor, Ted, had mentioned how he had worked on the iPhone at Apple and was in the same room with Steve Jobs.And me being a Cleveland boy, just it sounded like, “Whoa.” My eyes got really big like dinner plates. And it's just like, “I'm sitting at a table with people who have done these things with these people.” And I was wondering, like, what did that mean for my career? And so where did I want to take my career and have those kinds of stories? So fast-forwarding, you know, I was interviewing at Waymo; I ended up getting the offer. And I was just on the fence; I couldn't decide if that was the way I wanted to go, if I really wanted to leave my amazing job at Google.Corey: What was holding you back on that? Was it a sense of well you want to be disloyal to the existing team? You were thriving in the role you're in? Was it the risk of well, I don't know how I'll do in a different company solving different problems? What was it that was holding you back?Johnny: It was all of those. When you do an apples-to-apples comparison, you don't really know what you're getting into when you're going to a new company, and that's part of why your thread was so critical in making my decision. Just to say exactly what you said in the tweet, “So, an anonymous Twitter person DM'ed me this morning with a scenario. Quote, ‘I work at a large cloud company that makes inscrutable naming decisions, and I have an offer elsewhere for 35% more. Should I take it?'” to which you said, “Oh, good heavens, yes. A thread.”What followed is a number of questions that you asked exactly like you just asked now and your short answers to them. And they were just so on point and so quick, and it was so serendipitous for me to see that because this ended up being the tipping point that made me decide that, yes, this is the direction that I want to go. And you know, I'm—let's see, I started in November, so five months into the role. It was more than I ever expected; it's harder than I ever expected, but I'm growing so much, I'm getting a ton of eustress, if you're familiar with that concept of the positive stress that makes your muscles grow. And just wanted to give back to you and in thanks and gratitude for being that tipping point. And that thread definitely led me down this path, so thank you for that.Corey: It's interesting because so far as of this recording, there are no two podcast episodes that came out of that thread because, to be clear, this was the thread-summary of a half-hour conversation I had with the person who messaged me about whether or not she should take the role. Because her manager had gone to bat for her to give her a raise and… yeah, she wanted to be loyal and show thanks for that. Which I get, but the counterpoint to that is okay, you turn down the offer out of loyalty. Great. A month goes by.Now, your manager tells you that he or she is leaving to go work at a different company. Well, that opportunity is gone. Now, what? When it comes to career management, you can't love a company because the company can't ever love you back. And I got some pushback on that from Brian Hall, the VP of Product Marketing at Google Cloud—something about Google seems to be inspiring feedback on this one—because he spent something like 20 years at Microsoft and learned how to work within an organization, and then transfer jobs a couple of times to Amazon, they tried to non-compete lawsuit him on the way out—because, I don't know, his PowerPoints were just that amazing or something, or they're never going to replace his ability to name services badly—who knows why.But he took the other position on this. And I'm not saying that my way is always right, it is provably not, as a self-described terrible employee, but it really is interesting that that's the thing that resonated the most. I take a very mercenary approach to my career and I'm not convinced that's at all the best way, but when someone dangles a significant opportunity in front of you, I always take the view that it's better to explore and learn something about yourself if it appeals and the rest of the stars tend to align. And there's a certain reluctance to go out and try new things, but it's not like you're leaving your family. It's not like you're selling out people who've come to depend on you.Employment is fundamentally a business transaction and the company is never going to be able to have any sort of feeling for you, so you shouldn't necessarily have this sense of loyalty, and oh, it'd be it would leave the team in the lurch if I left. That is the company's problem to deal with. No one is irreplaceable.Johnny: Yeah, and a lot of times when you were talking there, you talked about ‘the company, the company,' but really, it's the people that you're working with that—and that was really what was weighing on me the most. I found myself in the same position. I had just recently gotten promoted. You know, my manager, and my team had gone to bat for me a lot, and so it's hard for me to walk away. But it was ultimately the strong relationships that I had built with the team and my managers over time that allowed me to make this step because as a program manager, I'm always thinking that anything I work on needs to survive multiple generations of stakeholders.So, everything that I do on a day-to-day basis has a breadcrumb trail, so that, hey, if I were to get hit by a bus tomorrow, someone with minimal amount of effort, can pick that up and move forward. And I've actually built that mindset into my entire career. Walking away from a role, you know, it'll always leave a gap, it'll always be challenging for the people and the teams around you, especially if you, you know, have a great affection for them, but by setting myself up to exit and still being there, since you know, Waymo is within the Alphabet companies and I can still talk with my old team, it wasn't like I was completely leaving; I was kind of still there if I needed to be, if they needed help or needed to find something. But I can definitely see what how that would be challenging moving to a totally different company. But yeah, it's really important that if you're thinking about exiting, you have a good exit plan. And I'm all about planning as a program manager, and that just helped kind of grease the wheels a little bit.Corey: I want to call it my own bias. You're right, I use the term team and company interchangeably because that's been my entire career. I, right now, have 12 employees here at The Duckbill Group and it is indistinguishable for me to make any meaningful distinction between team and company. Personally, I'm also not allowed to leave the company, given that I own it, and it looks really bad to the rest of the team if I decide, yeah, I'm going to go do something else now. People don't like playing games with their future.You're on the exact opposite end of a very wide spectrum. It's not that Google slash Alphabet is a big company, but you went from working on cloud computing to self-driving cars and you didn't leave the company, you're still at the same place as far as the benefits, the tenure, the organization, the name on the paycheck in all likelihood, and a bunch of other niceties as well. It almost presents is looking a little bit more like a transfer than it does leaving for a brand new job slash company.Johnny: It definitely was a soft landing to go from Google to Waymo. There were a lot of risks—again, talking about risks and mitigations—that I was concerned about that we're just kind of alleviated by the fact that okay, you can keep your same health care plan and various other things. So, that made it a soft landing for me. But yeah, it really was just making sure that the thing that I was working on at Google was able to be carried forward by the team and the people that I really enjoyed working with. So.Corey: As you went through all of this, you said that you were in Ohio before you wound up taking the job at Google—Johnny: Yeah, Cleveland [crosstalk 00:14:22].Corey: —and one of the best parts about Ohio [unintelligible 00:14:22] family and spending time there is you get to leave at some point. And—Johnny: [laugh].Corey: There was a large part of that of, great. I felt the same way growing up in Maine, let's be very clear here, where when I came to California, it was going to this storied place out of legend. And that was wild. And once your worldview expands, it feels very hard to go back again. At least for me.It took me years to really internalize that if this particular job or this particular path didn't work out, my failure mode—if you want to call it that—was not and then I return to Maine with my tail between my legs and go back to the relatively dead end retail fast food job that I was working before, comparatively. No. It's like, you go in a different direction; you apply the skill set; you have the stamp of validation on you. I mean, you have something working for you that I never did, which is the legitimacy of a household name on your resume. Whereas you look at mine, it's just basically a collection of, “Who are they again?” And, “You make that company up?”Which, fine, whatever. There's a bias in tech—particularly—towards big company names because that's a stamp of approval. You've already got that. The world is very much your oyster when it comes to solving the type of problem that you've been aimed at. I'm used to thinking about this from a almost purely technical point of view.It's like I'm here to write some javascript—badly—and I can write bad JavaScript for you or I can write bad JavaScript for that company across the street, and everyone knows what it is that they're going to get from you: Technical debt. Whereas when you're a technical program manager, that is something that you said varies from between company to company. And you hear founders talking about, “Oh yeah, our first engineering hire, we're going to bring in a VP of engineering; we're going to bring in a whole bunch of engineers; it's going to be great.” You very rarely hear people talk about how excited they are like, “Oh yeah, employee number three is going to be a technical program manager, and we're going to just blow the doors off of folks.” Which haven't been through the growth process myself, yeah, we really should have had a technical program manager analog far sooner; it would have helped us blow the doors off of competition. And great, the things we learn, but only in hindsight.Articulating the value of what a software engineer does is relatively straightforward, even for folks who aren't great salespeople for their own work. Being a TPM inherently requires, on some level, a verification that your understanding and the person that you're talking to are communicating about the same thing. Like, if you wind up having to solve code on a whiteboard, maybe that is part of your conception of it—I mean, you work at Google, probably—but for most companies, it's yeah, my ability to write shitty JavaScript is not the determining factor of success in a TPM role. How do you go about even broaching that conversation?Johnny: So, part of the way that program managers can be successful is through anticipating what's coming next and understanding not only the patterns that were implanted over time, but also thinking ahead. And this actually kind of takes me back to why I learned program management in the first place. Pretty early in my life, I started feeling a great deal of anxiety, especially thinking towards future situations, or, you know, even in the present moment. I mean, we've all been through it right? Right before the big test, you're feeling anxious; maybe talking to your crush—or before you talk to your crush—you're feeling this anticipatory anxiety; in hindsight replaying that interview that you just went through.For me, I was kind of like, constantly stuck in this future-state mode about being anxious about what's coming next, and that combined with ADHD—which is something that I also have—is kind of a wicked combination. And we can talk about that separately, but once I started understanding what program management did and how program management allowed businesses to keep things on track, I realized that there was a parallel into my own life there. The skill of program management actually became my defense against the crippling anxiety that I felt anticipating future events. And it's really become kind of the primary lens by which I understand and synthesize the world around me. And I know that sounds kind of weird, but with ADHD, I have a tendency to either being total diffuse mode and just working on nothing in particular, and letting my attention take me, or being in hyperfocus mode. And when you're hyper-focused and anxious, it can be a deadly combination, right?So, what I learned was taking that hyperfocus and taking that idea of program management and figuring out what it takes to get from here to there. I'm a strong believer in go as far as you can see, and when you get there, you'll see further. And this skill of program management kind of becomes the stepwise function by which I get to that later point, very much like you were saying with coming to Waymo: You never know what you're going to get until you get there. Well, now I see further and in hindsight, it was the right decision. So, the concept of program management is bringing structure, is bringing order, is bringing hierarchy to the chaos and uncertainty that we all naturally navigate in whatever we're doing and trying to transmute that into some kind of transparent order and rhythm, not only for my own benefit to reduce my overall anxiety, but also for the benefit of everyone else who's interested in what's going on. Does that answer your question?Corey: No, it absolutely does. Dealing with ADHD has been sort of what I've been struggling with my entire life. I was lucky and got diagnosed very early, but I always thought it was an aspect of business, but in many respects, it's not just about owning a business; it's about any aspect of your career, where the hardest thing you're ever going to have to do, on some level, is learn to understand and handle your own psychology where there are so many aspects of how things happening can impact us internally. I can't control what event happens next, of people yelling at me on Twitter, or I get a cease and desist from Amazon after they finally realized five years in, “You're not nearly as funny as we thought you were. Stop it.”Great. I can deal with those things, but the question is how I'm going to handle what happens in that type of eventuality? It's, am I going to spiral into a bitter depression? Am I going to laugh it off and keep going on things that are clearly working? Am I going to do something else? And so much of it comes from—at least in my experience—the ability to think through what's going on in a somewhat dispassionate way, and not internalize all of it to a point where you freeze. It's way easier said than done, I want to be very clear on this.Johnny: That's absolutely right. Stepping back, seeing the forest for the trees. I've recently become fascinated with systems thinking. You know, I'm in Silicon Valley, so I might as well start looking into a complex adaptive systems—Corey: Oh, no.Johnny: —[crosstalk 00:21:09] buzzword. We don't have to go down that thread because I'm very much an amateur when it comes to it, but what it does is it forces you to look at the connections between the components rather than the reductionism approach of let's look at this component, let's look at this component… instead, it forces you to step back and see the system as a whole. And so when you're responding to you just got a cease and desist, you know, of course you're going to feel depression, of course you're going to feel anxiety, and understanding all those as part of the system of experiencing that situation, it lets you kind of step back and say, okay, it's normal to be feeling this, it's normal to be feeling that. How can I harness these and structure my approach so that I can get to some further point where I not only know what I can do, and what options are available to me, but I have a clear path forward and strategy for how I want to approach this.Corey: How long have you been in your career at this point?Johnny: So, I graduated college in 2009. And I worked at my first company for about ten years from 2005, so I guess you could say 17 years, plus or minus, if you don't count internships.Corey: Looking back, it's easy to look at where we are at any given point in our career and feel that, oh, well, here's where I started, and here's where I am now, and here are the steps I took along the way where there's a sense of plodding inevitability to it. But there never is because when you're in the moment, in the eternal now that we live in, it's there are millions of things you could do next. If you were to be able to go back to your to talk to yourself at the beginning of your career, what would you do differently? What advice would you give yourself that would have really helped out early on?Johnny: You know, I think the thing that gave me the most leverage in my career was—as I move forward—is seeking out communities of like-minded, positive people. On the surface, that sounds a little shallow; of course, you would want to seek out communities, but what I've observed is that the self-organizing communities that pop up around technologies, or ideas, or roles, their communities of people who want to help you succeed. And I think, you know, one of the ways I reached out to you and was able to contact you was through one of these communities, right? So, you know, I talked a little bit the Cleveland Tech Slack earlier; most people aren't familiar with what mediums are even available. There's Discord, there's forums, there's Slack, there's probably other areas that I'm not aware of, where you can find people who will help you find that next step in your career.Actually [laugh] I got my first taste of community in online video games, so—Corey: Oh no.Johnny: —playing World of Warcraft back in 2003, you know you would have a guild—I was, gosh, how old was I in 2003, basically, early-20s and, you know, you'd have a guild of 40 people trying to coordinate all over one single voice chat server. And there was various groups and subdivisions, and so that was almost a project management exercise in itself. That's where I first learned project management. By the way, I have a sneaking suspicion that the roles that we play and that we are have an affinity for in video games mirror the roles that were best suited to play in life. So, I find myself playing a support class in League of Legends or a priest in World of Warcraft or Lord of the Rings Online. I'm always that support person, the glue that helps keep things moving. And surprise, that's exactly what I do for my career. And it works perfectly. So.Corey: The accountant I keep playing gets eaten by goblins constantly, but, you know—Johnny: [laugh].Corey: —that's the joy that I suppose.Johnny: So, pretty early on, I developed this skill of creating friendships, and those friendships, in turn opened me up to these new communities. So, if I were to give one piece of advice to my early self, it would be to put more emphasis on finding and seeking out the communities that consists of people who are interested in the things that you're interested in, but also are willing to help you get to where you want to go. How do you succeed? Well, you find someone who is doing what you want and you talk to them. About it and you figure out how to get to where you're at from where you're at.And maybe they can't help you, maybe they can help you but, you know, we have a unique ability to crowdsource our questions, whether it's on Reddit, whether it's on Slack or Discord, and just say, “Hey, I'm thinking about this thing. Does anyone have any thoughts?” You're immediately—you know, if you ask the question correctly—given five or six different opinions, and then you can kind of meld and understand, okay, here are the options. Again, going back to what we were saying about how do you even decide what the next steps are? You can crowdsource that now, and so the one piece of advice that I would give is to seek out communities of like-minded positive people.Corey: This episode is sponsored in part by our friends at Vultr. 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My thanks to them for sponsoring this ridiculous podcast.Corey: And I think the positivity is important. There's a lot as particularly in tech, that breeds a certain cynicism that breeds a contempt almost. And Lord knows, I'm not one to judge; I revel in a lot of that when it comes to making fun of companies' ridiculous marketing and some of the nonsense we have to deal with, but it has to be tempered. You can't do what some of the communities I started out with did. IRC, learn how to configure Debian or FreeBSD, where it was generally, “Oh, great, someone else joined? Let's see what this dumbass wants.”It doesn't work that way. It's like just waiting for someone to ask a question so you can sink the knives in is not helpful. Punch up, not down. And making people feel welcomed and valued, even if they don't understand the local behavioral norms quite yet is super important. I'm increasingly discovering, as I suspect you are as well, that I'm older than I thought were when I talk to folks who are just starting their careers about here's how to manage a career, here's how to think about this, I am veering dangerously close to giving actively harmful advice, if I'm not extraordinarily careful because the path that I walked is very much closed.It is a different world; there are different paths; there's a different societal understanding of technology and its place in the world. There's a—what worked for me does absolutely not work the same way for folks who aren't wildly over-represented. And I increasingly have to back off lest I wind up giving the, I guess, career Boomer advice style of irrelevant and actively harmful stuff. How are you thinking about that?Johnny: So, I guess that kind of gets into the underpinnings of what I think it takes to be successful, right, and how do you find success in any aspect of your career? And—Corey: And what is success?Johnny: It differs for every person—yeah, what is success? And we were talking just before the show about how every person experiences not only what is success, but what does success mean and what do you believe the key is differently. For me—and this is pretty on—brand with where I am in my career and what I do—is I think the key to success is preparation. And it really ties into finding those communities and asking those questions, right?There's three key aspects to it, right? First is understanding how you learn. Everyone learns differently, and so knowing how you learn—and you know, college and school is kind of meant to kind of eke that out; it's how best do you learn? How best can you succeed with these tasks that we give you, study for this test, learn these concepts? If you can understand how you learn, that's the first step in preparing correctly, right, building your personal knowledge systems around that, taking notes, ordered hierarchy, structured thinking, that sort of thing.Knowledge management is a good field, if you ever have some time to figure out what you want to do with your external hard drive of your whiteboard like I have back behind me here. The second aspect is just mastering how to seek out information, right? So, how do you prepare? Well, you have to understand how to seek out information. You mentioned, you know, positive communities versus potentially cynical or toxic communities. Their opinions are still very valid.They might be jaded and they might provide a cynical opinion, but you still need to encompass that within the spectrum of your understanding of the world, right, because they have something that happened to them, or they have some experience that still is very valid from their perspective. So, seeking out information, understanding the people and the tools at your disposal, the communities that you can go to knowing how to discern the signal from the noise. And again, that's really where your thread that really helped me—because you nailed a bunch of the questions that I just wasn't entirely sure on in that Twitter thread, and when I went through that, it hit some of the major points that I was just uncertain on, and you just gave very clear, albeit, you know, somewhat tongue in cheek cynical advice, to say like, don't worry about the company, worry about yourself. And that really was helping me get to that next step.And then lastly, how do you prepare? And this is the one I always struggle with. It's calibrating your confidence barometer. What does that even mean? How can you calibrate your own barometer of your confidence? It's a knowingness; it's knowing what to expect.And so for example, when I was getting into Google, I had no idea what to expect in terms of the interviews. So, what's the first thing I do? I go out and I ask a bunch of people, people who know people who are at Google people who are at Google, what do I expect? What should I prepare for? What communities should I join? What books should I read? What YouTube videos should I watch?I ended up finding a book called Cracking the PM Interview by Gayle—I think her name is Laakmann McDowell. There's a Cracking the Coding Interview as well. That ended up being, like, exactly what I needed, and going through that cover-to-cover got me into Google, amongst other things, and talking with the community. So, calibrating your confidence parameter, that knowingness of, I know that I'm ready enough for this. There will always be things that catch you by surprise, but knowing that you're ready and having that preparation and that internal knowingness not only increases your confidence, but it also increases your ability to operate improvisationally when you're in the moment.And in fact, that's exactly what I went through for this podcast. I have a little document in front of me where I just jotted my notes down last night, I was thinking through, what do I want to cover? What do I want to say? How can I respond to the questions that he's going to ask me? He might ask me, you know, a curveball, but I have some thoughts that are structured, I'm prepared for this so that no matter what happens, I'll be okay. And again, that really gets down to that essence of philosophy of program management that I have. No matter what happens, I'll be okay; no matter what happens, we'll be okay. And believing in that and having a level of knowingness—[laugh].Corey: I am not a planner at all. For me, my confidence comes from the fact that I can't predict what's going to happen so I don't even try. Instead, what I do is I focus on preparing myself to be effectively dynamic enough that whatever curveball comes my way, I can twist myself in a knot and catch it, which drives people to distraction when they're trying to plan a panel that I'm going to be on. “Okay, so we're going to ask this, what's your answer going to be?” I have absolutely no idea until I find the words coming out of my mouth.And if I try and do a rehearsal, I'll make completely different points, and that really bothers folks. It's, I don't know; I'm not here to read a script. I'm here to tell stories, which is great for, you know, improv panel activity and challenging if you're trying to get a software project off the ground. So, you know, there are different strengths that call us in different ways.Johnny: Exactly. I mean, the flip side of preparation is improvisation. And you know, I spent ten years as a jazz musician playing trumpet in a swing band back in Cleveland before I moved out here. And that really helped me understand how to think improvisationally, right? They give you the chords, the underlying structure by which you can operate, and then you can kind of choose your own path through there.And sometimes it's good, sometimes it's bad, you learn over time, you come up with libraries of ideas to pull out of your head at any given time. So, there is an aspect of preparation to improvisation. And I think if you, I would encourage you to think about it more; I bet you do more planning than you think you do; maybe you just don't call it that.Corey: No, I have people for that now.Johnny: [laugh]. “I have people for that.”Corey: I am very deliberately offloading that. Honestly, that was part of the challenge I had psychologically of running my own place. If I were just a little better at following a list or planning things in advance, all these people around me wouldn't have to do all this extra work to clean up my mess. Instead, it's okay, let it go. Just let it go and instead, focus on the thing that I can do this differentiated. That was my path. I don't know how well it works for others, and again, I'm swimming in privilege when I say it.One last topic I want to get into, I think it might be part of the reason that you and I are talking so much about the future, the next generation, and the rest is we're recording this on March 9th. I don't know the date this is going to air, but there's a decent chance that will be after April 22nd, where you and your wife Emily are expecting your first child. So congratulations, even though I'm a little early. I definitely want to get that in there.Johnny: Thank you.Corey: Have you found that since you realized you were expecting a child—with an arrival date, which is generally more accurate than most Amazon order dates—that you find yourself thinking a lot more about the future and how you're going to wind up encapsulating some of the lessons you picked up along the way for, I guess, the next generation of your family?Johnny: Yeah. I mean, everyone who finds himself in this situation, finds himself somewhere between panic and bliss, right? There's some balance that I have to find there. And fortunately, my wife Emily, and I have a very strong rapport when it comes to how I think and how she thinks, and so we're able to—you know, our emotional intelligence is very high; we talk about that sort of thing a lot. And we try to plan for the future as best we can, knowing that things will go off the rails as soon as you know, what's the old saying about the best laid plans and how, you know, every plan is—Corey: Man plans and God laughs.Johnny: Yeah, or goes awry as soon as the first shot is fired, et cetera. Thinking more than five years out is still pretty challenging for me, but thinking within the first five years, we can already sketch out some plans. I already have some ideas of where we want to go and what we want to do and how we want this new child, this being, to experience the world and how we want to impart the things and the wisdom that we've learned and experiences and skills that we've developed—Emily and I—to this new child, realizing that I have no idea what's coming and I have no idea what to expect because I just really haven't had much exposure to babies or children at all in my life, so I'm just kind of rolling the dice here and trusting that it'll all work out really well. And again, going back to communities, the communities that I'm in, there are parenting channels, there are friends and family that I can talk to. So, I have everything that I need in terms of knowledge.Now, I just need to go through the experience, right? So, I'm definitely thinking a lot about the future. In fact, I've got a—I don't know if you can see it here—quarterly plan for my life up here on the wall that I [unintelligible 00:35:33]. It's just something that I can glance at every so often, and there it is, right, there: ‘Q1 2022: Kid.'Corey: How long has that ‘Q1 2022: Kid' been on the board? Like oh, since 2014? Like that is remarkably good planning.Johnny: Mid-2021.Corey: Okay, fair enough.Johnny: No joking: Mid-2021.Corey: [laugh].Johnny: Yeah, just even having that up there and writing a sticky note and slapping it on there for, like, a hey, here's what I think, some of them fall off, some of them don't fall off, but I'll tell you what, more than more often than not, it actually ends up working and happening and being realized, no matter what it is. Because just having it there and glancing at it every so often is that repetition, it keeps it on my mind. It's like, hey, I should probably think about that. The next thing you know, it's done. And then I can take it off and put it in my binder of accomplishments.Corey: I am about five years ahead of you on that particular path that you're on because five years ago, I was expecting my first child. And I don't want to spoil the surprise entirely, but I will Nostradamus this prediction here, five years from now, when you go back and listen to or watch this episode and listen to yourself talk about how you're planning to parent and your hopes and your dreams, you are going to, in a fit of rage, attempt to build a time machine to travel back to what is now the present day for us, in order to slap yourself unconscious for how naive you are being [laugh] because that is—I'm hearing my words coming out of your mouth in a bunch of different ways, and oh my God, I was—it's the common parent story you all these hopes and dreams and aspirations for kids and then they hand you a tiny little baby and suddenly it becomes viscerally real in a different way where, “It's going to be a little while until I can teach you to do a job interview, isn't it?” And other things start wind up happening to, like—Johnny: [laugh]. Right.Corey: —what do I do? I've never held a baby before. How do I not drop it and kill it? And later in time they learn to talk. They talk an awful lot, and then it's like, how do I give them a bath without drowning them in the process? Not because I'm bad at it, but just because I'm at my wit's end because I haven't slept in three days.Parenting is one of the hardest things you'll ever do and everyone has opinions on it. And it's gratifying to know that the world continues to go on even in these after-times where things have gotten fairly dark. It's nice to see that flash of optimism and remember walking down at myself. It's exciting times for you. Congratulations.Johnny: Yeah. Thank you. It's a beautiful thing. And I'm self-aware and I have a knowingness of my naivete, right? And that's part of the fun.And the whole idea of it is an explorative journey. I have no idea what to expect, but I have a good support system; my wife is incredible. She has an early childhood education degree, so that's going to be really useful. Yeah. And so kind of going back to that concept of preparation.And I don't feel a lot of anxiety about it because I am feeling like I have the knowledge, the community, the friends, the family in place so that no matter what happens, I'll be able to maneuver through it. And I can ask, and I can get help. Yeah, so that's where my head is at with that. [laugh].Corey: We'll be checking back in once you're up to your elbows and diapers and I assure you, you'll be lucky if it stops your elbows.Johnny: [laugh].Corey: I really want to thank you for taking the time to talk to me about your own journey and, I guess, a variety of different things; hard to encapsulate it all at once. If people want to learn more or chat with you, where's the best place to find you?Johnny: Yeah, thanks for asking. So, I have a website jmpod.com, JM Pod. My middle name is Michael. So, John Michael Podhradsky. jmpod.com. That links to my blog, there's links to LinkedIn, Twitter, Instagram. I'm most active on Instagram.I'm always looking to connect with and just chat with new people, people who want a new perspective, people who are interesting or want to share their stories with me. Coaching is something that I thought of doing in the long-term. It's not on the plate right now because I'm focused on my current career, but that's something that I'm very interested in doing, so you know, happy to field that questions or if anyone wants to reach out and hey, what communities can I look for or where should I be looking for communities, I'm happy to help with that as well.Corey: I will, of course, put a link to that in the [show notes 00:39:39]. Thanks again for your time. I really appreciate it.Johnny: Yeah, this was a fantastic experience. It's the first podcast I've done, I'm hoping it went well, and I really appreciate that you even asked me to do this. It was a surprise. My eyes went like dinner plates when you said, “Hey, why don't you come join me?” And I said, “Absolutely. That sounds like a fantastic idea.” So, thank you again, Corey. I really appreciate spending time with you and looking forward to doing it again sometime in the future. With a baby in the background, screaming. [laugh].Corey: Oh, yes. They do eventually sleep; you won't believe it for the first three months, but they do eventually pass out. Johnny Podhradsky, technical program manager of Offboard Infrastructure at Waymo. I'm Cloud Economist Corey Quinn and this is Screaming in the Cloud. If you've enjoyed this podcast, please leave a five-star review on your podcast platform of choice, whereas if you've hated this podcast, please leave a five-star review on your podcast platform of choice along with an angry comment telling me exactly which tweet of mine you followed for advice and it did not in fact help your career one iota.Corey: If your AWS bill keeps rising and your blood pressure is doing the same, then you need The Duckbill Group. We help companies fix their AWS bill by making it smaller and less horrifying. The Duckbill Group works for you, not AWS. We tailor recommendations to your business and we get to the point. Visit duckbillgroup.com to get started.Announcer: This has been a HumblePod production. Stay humble.

TEHMINA BEG is a New-York based VFX supervisor currently working at Molecule VFX. She has previously worked at Zoic Studios, The Mill, MPC. Tehmina's credits include Homeland, Quantifco, The Blacklist, And Just Like That, Modern Love and many more. She is a self-taught artist and photographer. MAGGIE OH is currently a Sr. Technical Program Manager for Machine Learning and Computer Vision on Google's Project Starline. Her previous roles include TL, Lighting TD, Lead Technical Artist, and programmer on projects such as Stadia, Mandalorian, #LiveCGX (AR Fashion Show at London Fashion Week 2018), Hololens, Halo 4, Star Wars, Pirates of the Caribbean 2, and Cars. She holds a Masters from Harvard and a BSci from MIT. ERIN RAMOS is Head of Effects Animation at Walt Disney Animation Studios. As an award-winning VFX Supervisor she's also worked for Weta, Rhythm & Hues. Her credits include Moana, Frozen II, Ralph Breaks the Internet, The Hobbit and many more. CONNIE SIU is a Virtual Production Manager at Eyeline Studio (Scanline VFX / Netflix). Her credits include How to Train Your Dragon, Kung Fu Panda, Rise of the Guardians.  She is also a Writer and Director of short film Jeffrey which was shot using virtual production in 2020 (www.allanmckay.com/277).  In this Podcast, Women Leaders and VFX Artists discuss the importance of representation, business mindset in artists, give advice on how to find mentors and provide resources to women starting out in visual effects. For more show notes, visit www.allanmckay.com/345/.

For the past 17 years, Brian J. Pohl has experience being a visual effects artist, layout artist, and previs supervisor. A veteran of George Lucas' pre-vis team and Industrial Light and Magic's art department, he is credited for creating or supervising previs on over twenty-seven feature films. Pohl has also served six years within the software development industry; designing new tools that assist the digital artist's workflow. He can provide creative and managerial skills capable of directing small to large sized teams in either film or commercial production environments. Currently, he works at Epic Games as a Technical Program Manager for the Media and Entertainment industry in order to provide artists and clients the training they need to integrate the Unreal Engine into their creative pipelines. He also acts as the academic Dean for the Unreal Engine Fellowship Program. Highlights of the Episode: 00:00 - Introduction 01:23 - Introduction of the guest 02:11 - Background of the Brian Pohl 10:51 - Working at EPIC Games 13:03 - How EPIC took care of their employees through COVID 13:48 - The Fellowship: How EPIC made the company better 16:37- Creating opportunities through the fellowship 19:10 - Zero to Competent: 5 week fellowship 22:17 - Problems that the fellowship has conquered and their 2022 plans 26:57 - How Real-Time affected the Pre-visual workflow 33:42 - How animation studios get the value of Real-Time 35:25 - Why you should invest in a virtual production department 38:16 - Virtual Production in the Work-From-Home set-up 39:25 - Innovation as it happens 40:44 - The barrier to start Visual production is getting lower 44:15 - The surprising uses of Unreal Engine 48:21 - The rebirth of Virtual production with Unreal Engine 49:42 - How Virtual production departments will evolve in the future 53:55 - How green screen works in Unreal Engine 56:01 - How Unreal Engine Is affecting screen-writing 59:47 - Brian's thoughts on the Meta-Verse 1:03:26 - Ability to have a multi-user session in the Meta-Verse 1:06:20 - Brian's knowledge about audio in Unreal Engine 5 1:07:34 - Advice for those entering and re-entering virtual production 1:15:00 - Outro Quotes: “If you're reskilling, feel encouraged. I don't think the industry is leaving you behind if you are willing to take another step out. Right now, we are experiencing a drought of talent, so there's huge opportunities for you if you want to learn this technology.”“Choose an area of interest that excites you most. There's nothing wrong with specializing.”“You can make anything you want, you just have to detach yourself from your perfectionistic nature.” Connecting with the Guest: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/pohlbrian/ Connecting with CG Pro: Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/groups/becomecgpro Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/becomecgpro/ Website: https://www.becomecgpro.com/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/edgevisualCG

Happy International Women's Day! We are so excited to welcome Laura Zito Dodds. Laura Zito Dodds is a Senior Technical Program Manager. Laura holds a degree in Mechanical Engineering.

W. R. Alex Berry (call him Alex) is a Portland-based Technical Program Manager within Intel's Global Supply Chain. He combines his corporate experience from four industries (chemical, forestry, pharmaceutical, and manufacturing), his nonprofit leadership, and his global travels to build bridges between the public and private sectors. After graduating from Georgia Tech with a B.S. in Industrial & Systems Engineering and a dual Business/Mandarin minor, Alex has dedicated the last five years to creating sustainable programming at the intersection of technology, business, and societal impact. With this in mind, Alex created a social business (Chocolate Milk Diplomacy - #CMD) that empowers underserved and marginalized communities with the career development support they need. His black-owned business works with students, early career professionals, and career changers on resumes and cover letters, skill mapping, interview preparation, career navigation, and more! After work, you can find Alex leading within the community - collaborating with nonprofits that support minorities, first-gen students, and those facing homelessness. A true introvert, Alex recharges by playing soccer, watching anime, and drinking chocolate milk! Alex and #CMD would love to connect with you! Don't forget to share #CMD with your networks and friends! linkedin.com/company/chocolate-milk-diplomacy/ facebook.com/ChocolateMilkDiplomacy/ instagram.com/chocolatemilkdiplomacy/ twitter.com/CMDiplomacy ----- Join the Pipeline community: @PipelineCareerServices or https://linktr.ee/pipelinecareers New episodes every Wednesday at 6 PM EST! --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/connectingwithcareers/support