Tech Done Right

Table XI

The Tech Done Right podcast is a show by and for people who care about what they build. We don't just build software, we build teams, companies, careers, and communities.

  • 49 minutes 52 seconds
    Episode 72: Teaching Testing and Design

    Teaching Testing and Design

    Guests

    Summary

    After the discussions on testing and design in episodes 68 and 69, I had so much I still wanted to talk about in testing, design, and teaching testing and design. So I convened a panel with previous Tech Done Right Guests Avdi Grimm, Betsy Haibel, and Penelope Phippen to help me think through all these topics. I was very happy to have all of them on the show, and I think it's a great conversation. Stay tuned until the very end for an update about the show.

    Related Episodes with These Guests

    Notes

    00:50 - Previously On: Re: Testing

    02:53 - Testing and Design

    09:36 - Testing, But Not Developer Testing + Sliming The Test

    13:41 - Why + How Did You Learn TDD?

    20:24 - TDD: Not a Robust Process

    24:19 - Rails + Unit Testing

    27:41 - Is TDD really dead?

    35:06 - Keeping Code In Your Head

    37:32 - Approaching the Testing and Design of Code

    38:59 - What would convince you to stop doing TDD?

    Special Guests: Avdi Grimm, Betsy Haibel, and Penelope Phippen.

    9 October 2019, 3:00 pm
  • 36 minutes 29 seconds
    Episode 71: Supporting Innovation With Mike Todasco

    Supporting Innovation With Mike Todasco

    Guest

    Mike Todasco: Senior Director of Innovation at PayPal

    Summary

    Today on the show we have Mike Todasco, the Senior Director of Innovation at PayPal. We talk about what innovation means at a company, and how to encourage innovation both if you are a PayPal sized company and if you aren’t. Mike also shares some information about PayPal’s internal innovation tournament and how they offer incentives for innovation.

    Notes

    01:38 - What does the Senior Director of Innovation at PayPal do?

    02:32 - Why should companies innovate?

    04:29 - Who should be innovating?

    08:26 - Assisting and Guiding in Innovation

    11:15 - Introducing Innovation to Companies and Teams: Vulnerability

    16:06 - Encouraging Innovation

    18:44 - The Concept of Global Innovation Tournaments

    24:34 - Giving People Opportunity and Exposure

    28:40 - Innovation Tokens

    30:59 - Innovation For Small Companies

    32:39 - Interesting Innovations

    Special Guest: Mike Todasco.

    25 September 2019, 3:00 pm
  • 33 minutes 6 seconds
    Episode 70: How To Buy Software With Ashley Quinto Powell

    How To Buy Software With Ashley Quinto Powell

    Guest

    Ashley Quinto Powell: Director of Business Development at Table XI.

    Summary

    Today on the show, we have Ashley Quinto Powell. Ashley and I have run a workshop together called How to Buy Software aimed at people who want to buy custom software but aren't sure what the process will be like. In this episode, we try to compress a four-hour workshop into a 45-minute podcast. Ashley will talk about what to expect from the sales process and then Ashley will interview me about what it's like to work with a development team. I hope you like it.

    Notes

    01:40 - How do you buy software?

    02:47 - Common Misconceptions When Starting the Process

    04:20 - Preparing for a Conversation About Buying Software

    06:42 - Terminology To Know

    Offshore / Nearshore

    • Agile / Waterfall
    • Time and Materials Contract / Fixed Contract

    16:08 - Interacting with a Development Team

    18:28 - Estimation

    28:16 - Signs Things Are Going Well / Red Flags

    Special Guest: Ashley Quinto Powell.

    11 September 2019, 3:00 pm
  • 50 minutes 29 seconds
    Episode 69: Teaching and Learning with Sandi Metz

    Teaching and Learning with Sandi Metz

    Guest

    Sandi Metz:: Author of Practical Object-Oriented Development in Ruby and 99 Bottles of OOP. sandimetz.com

    Summary

    Today on the show we have Sandi Metz, author of Practical Object Oriented Design in Ruby and co-author of 99 bottles of OOP. I’ve literally been trying to get Sandi as a guest since we started recording the show and I’m thrilled that we’ve finally been able to connect. We talk about OOP and TDD, maybe going down a test-driven rabbit hole for a while, and also talk about what it’s like to teach and coach about OOP and TDD. I enjoyed this talk very much and I think you will, too.

    Notes

    02:46 - Keeping Up With Tech

    04:58 - Object-Oriented Design

    09:53 - Why do we write tests?

    17:53 - Teaching Yourself TDD

    22:11 - Procedures and Patterns

    34:07 - CI

    39:23 - Approaching TDD

    44:49 - What should we be doing as a community to share knowledge?

    Special Guest: Sandi Metz.

    28 August 2019, 3:00 pm
  • 52 minutes 27 seconds
    Episode 68: Pragmatic Programmer at 20 with Dave Thomas and Andy Hunt

    Pragmatic Programmer at 20 with Dave Thomas and Andy Hunt

    Guests

    Dave Thomas and Andy Hunt: Authors of The Pragmatic Programmer and publishers of The Pragmatic Bookshelf.

    Summary

    I’m very excited to have Dave Thomas and Andy Hunt on the show today. Dave and Andy are the authors of the Pragmatic Programmer, which has a 20th anniversary edition that is out now, and they are the publishers of the Pragmatic Bookshelf, where they have (full disclosure) published my books a time or two. We talk about what’s changed in the new version, what being a Pragmatic Programmer means, whether there’s still a role for tech books, and how to make automated testing pragmatic. Somehow I avoid telling the slightly embarrassing story about the bad impression I made the first time I met Dave. Enjoy.

    Notes

    02:52 - Revisiting the Book 20 Years Later and What Has Changed/Hasn’t Changed

    06:41 - What it Means to be a Pragmatic Programmer

    08:39 - Software Development as a Team Sport

    12:56 - Extreme Programming Explained and The Pragmatic Programmer; Similarities and Differences

    22:09 - Finding The Pragmatic Programmer Voice/Tone

    24:55 - Roles for Dead-Tree Technical Books

    30:36 - How To Make Automatic Testing Pragmatic

    Special Guests: Andy Hunt and Dave Thomas.

    14 August 2019, 3:00 pm
  • 21 minutes 16 seconds
    Episode 67: Civic Software with Alex Pedersen and Abhi Nemani

    Civic Software with Alex Pedersen and Abhi Nemani

    Guests

    Summary

    This week, we have Alex Pedersen of Polco and Abhi Nemani of EthosLabs. They're both involved in various uses of technology to increase civic engagement. We'll talk about how technology can improve the public sector and why technologists should be interested in public sector work.

    Notes

    02:09 - Technology and Civic + Political Engagement

    06:14 - Risks of Making the Government More Technological

    10:01 - Balancing Conversations Amongst Citizens

    12:18 - Building and Designing Software for Government vs Commercial Use

    14:39 - Getting Involved in Government, Civic Engagement, and the Public Sector

    Special Guests: Abhi Nemani and Alex Pederson.

    31 July 2019, 3:00 pm
  • 38 minutes 26 seconds
    Episode 66: Stories and Community with Ariel Caplan

    Stories and Community with Ariel Caplan

    Guest

    Ariel Caplan: Co-Host of Dev Empathy Book Club, Backend Developer at Cloudinary, and Flatiron School Alum. Personal Site

    Summary

    Our guest this week is Ariel Caplan. Ariel is a developer at Cloudinary and the Founder of the Dev Empathy Book Club. At RailsConf this year, Ariel gave a keynote about culture and stories using examples from Israeli and American children's literature. In our conversation, we focus on the stories that developers tell ourselves about who is successful, what it takes to be successful, and what people and skills are left out of those stories, and how we might be able to change them.

    Notes

    02:18 - Stories We Tell New Members of the Community

    04:17 - The Myth of the Lone Genius

    06:28 - How Stories Affect Day-to-Day Expectations on Teams

    12:36 - Stories That Benefit Our Employers

    16:11 - How We Treat New Developers

    21:11 - “Real Programmers”

    26:30 - Computer Science Education

    31:07 - People Skills and Community

    Special Guest: Ariel Caplan.

    17 July 2019, 3:00 pm
  • 35 minutes 45 seconds
    Episode 65: Managing Pain and Suffering at Work with Amy Newell

    Managing Pain and Suffering at Work with Amy Newell

    Guest

    Amy Newell:: Director of Engineering at Wistia. Previous Director of Engineering at PatientsLikeMe. RailsConf 2019 - Failure, Risk, and Shame: Approaching Suffering at Work by Amy Newell

    Summary

    Our guest this week is Amy Newell. Amy is the Director of Engineering at Wistia, and she gave a talk at RailsConf this year entitled “Failure, Risk, and Shame: Approaching pain and suffering at work”. We have what I hope is an uplifting conversation about failure and pain, how to recognize it, and how to skillfully manage those feelings to be more resilient, prevent additional pain, and ultimately be more satisfied with your job.

    Notes

    01:56 - Why Use Words Like “Pain” and “Shame” When Talking About Work Experience

    04:21 - Specific Kinds of Pain and Suffering at Work

    07:31 - Mistakes People Make When They’re Dealing with Failure, Anxiety, and Shame

    10:28 - Skillful Responses

    17:37 - Mitigating Pain

    21:57 - Skillful Responses (Cont’d)

    25:04 - Mindfulness

    30:34 - Feedback and Identity

    Special Guest: Amy Newell.

    3 July 2019, 3:00 pm
  • 34 minutes 16 seconds
    Episode 64: AI and Privacy with Bärí A. Williams

    AI and Privacy with Bärí A. Williams

    Guest

    Bärí A. Williams: VP of Legal, Business, and Policy Affairs at All Turtles, a startup advisor in the tech industry, and a published author in the New York Times, WIRED, Fortune, and Fast Company. Bärí writes at bariawilliams.com.

    Summary

    Our guest this week is Bärí A. Williams, the VP of Legal, Business, and Policy Affairs at All Turtles. She provides legal guidance to startups working with Artificial Intelligence. Bärí was a keynote speaker at RailsConf this year, you can see the video at https://youtu.be/HBAra5J5c90. She and I talk about writing ethical terms of service, and how to collect and use data properly. We talk about facial recognition and other data mining and machine learning topics in the news, and how having a diverse user and testing base can prevent damaging mistakes.

    Notes

    01:48 - The Intersection of Law and Tech

    03:16 - Writing Ethical and Clear Terms of Service

    05:48 - Legal and Ethical Collection of Data

    09:01 - Principles That Should Be in Ethical Codes of Conduct

    10:38 - Combatting Algorithmic Bias in AI

    14:15 - Facial Recognition Technology and The Importance of Diverse Testing

    18:07 - Facial Recognition Technology and Preventing the Selling of Information

    26:39 - Facial Recognition Technology, DNA and the Government

    31:18 - Opting In and Out of Things Due to Privacy Concerns

    Special Guest: Bärí A. Williams.

    19 June 2019, 3:00 pm
  • 41 minutes 40 seconds
    Episode 63: Software Consulting With Chad Pytel

    Software Consulting With Chad Pytel

    Guest

    Chad Pytel: CEO, Co-Founder, and Developer of thoughtbot.

    Summary

    Our guest this week is Chad Pytel. Chad is the CEO of thoughtbot, which is a design and development firm known in the world for its support of open source projects like paperclip and shoulda. Chad and I talk about how to make short consulting projects work, the importance of hiring, why thoughtbot makes their internal guides public, and how they continue to be able to support open source. It's a great conversation about how thoughtbot approaches the world.

    Notes

    02:09 - How thoughtbot Works as an Integrated Design and Development Team

    06:50 - Handling Discovery Phases and Product Design Sprints

    11:40 - When Clients Aren’t a Good Fit and Setting Expectations

    14:12 - Hiring for Values

    21:05 - The thoughtbot Playbook

    26:43 - Client Communication During Projects

    30:48 - Investment Days and Supporting Open Source Projects

    36:49 - Using Rails and Not Using Rails

    Special Guest: Chad Pytel.

    5 June 2019, 3:00 pm
  • 37 minutes 6 seconds
    Episode 62: Food and Design Thinking

    Food and Design Thinking

    TableXI is now offering training for developers and products teams! For more info, email [email protected].

    Guests

    Summary

    In this episode, we have a slightly different topic for Tech Done Right - food. Table XI has been working to adapt our design sprint process out of the realm of custom software and into more general product design. In particular, we've worked with Tyson Foods Innovation Lab on a few different projects including the creation of their Yappah brand which is designed to prevent food waste. In this episode, you'll hear from Chemia Davis and Santi Proano from Tyson, Rex Chekal from Table XI and Jessie Shternshus from the Improv Effect and we'll show you how we adapted design thinking and Agile process from software to food products.

    Notes

    02:58 - The Scope of Work Between Table XI and Tyson Foods Innovation Lab

    04:08 - The Goal of the Innovation Lab

    06:51 - Bringing Design Thinking to Product Development and CPGs

    11:13 - Design Steps

    17:14 - Facilitating Communication

    22:05 - The Sprint Week Experience

    26:40 - Next Steps After Sprint Week

    29:32 - Learning From the Design and Coaching Process

    Special Guests: Chemia Davis, Jesse Shternshus, Rex Chekal, and Santi Proano.

    22 May 2019, 3:00 pm
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