A Geek Leader Podcast - inspiring technical and creative leaders around the world

About Jeff

Jeff Ton is a sought-after Information Technology speaker, author and thought leader, having led powerful teams and built successful IT departments for thepast 30+ years. For over a decade, Jeff has served as Chief Information Officer with Goodwill Industries of Central Indiana and Lauth Property Group, as well as 14 years in various technology roles with Thomson Multimedia (RCA). In his current role as Senior Vice President of Product and Strategic Alliances at InterVision, Jeff thrives on developing people while driving the company’s product strategy, service vision and strategic approach. Speaking to audiences from 5 to 1,000, Jeff has mastered the art of simplifying complex IT issues and is always looking for opportunities to drive value in organizations now and in the future. Jeff is the author of Amplify Your Value (2018) and is a frequent keynote speaker on topics related to the evolving IT landscape and the changing role of the CIO. See his frequent keynotes below. Meet Jeff and learn more at www.JeffreySTon.com.

We Talked About

How he got into Tech

Being a Rock Star

Commodore 64

The Path to CIO - get a Commodore 64

Loving writing code

Tranis

Challenges of a CIO/CTO

Stop talking about Technology and start talking about the Business

Get involved in the business

Ride Alongs (field trips)

Must have a well ran department

Guiding Principals

Grading your projects

Minimize technology issues

Lewis and Clark

Mentorship and Executive Coaching

Connect with Jeff

Facebook

Twitter

LinkedIn

Website

Book

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About Jay

Jay Karen has been the CEO of National Golf Course Owners Association since 2015, where he leads the golf industry's trade association and initiatives to support the success of the golf course business, a critical element of an $84B industry in the United States. Prior to his appointment at NGCOA, Jay was CEO of Select Registry, a portfolio of over 300 premier boutique hotels, inns and B&Bs. For seven years before that, Jay was President and CEO of the trade association representing owners of small, independent lodging businesses.

Jay was also with the NGCOA for ten years early in his career, having served the association in several roles. Jay holds a Bachelor of Arts degree from Winthrop University, a Master of Arts degree in American History from the College of Charleston and is a Certified Association Executive (CAE) by the American Society of Association Executives. Jay serves as Chairman of the industry-wide advocacy coalition, We Are Golf, and as a member of the World Golf Hall of Fame advisory board and the Golf USA Tee Time Coalition, a joint initiative with the PGA of America.  He has also served on the boards of directors of the United States Travel Association and the College of Charleston's Hospitality and Tourism Management degree program. The Wall Street Journal, Bloomberg, CBS Radio, NBC News, the Golf Channel, Golf Digest and many others call upon Jay for his insights on the golf industry.

Within the association community, Jay has become well known as a thought leader and progressive practitioner.  He has been asked by ASAE to author articles and make presentations on effective leadership and membership growth at many ASAE Annual Meetings.  Recently, he contributed to the books Membership Essentials and the ASAE Handbook of Professional Practices in Association Management.  Jay serves on ASAE's Executive Management section council, Public Policy Committee and board of directors for ASAE Business Solutions Inc (for-profit subsidiary of ASAE).  In addition, Jay serves on the Advisory Board to McKinley Advisors, one of the association industry's most respected consulting companies, and is an advisor to the board of the Charleston Wine + Food Festival.

On a personal note, Jay has been married for 18 years to an amazing woman, who is an independent college counselor, and they have two children: a 13-year old daughter and 10-year old son. His primary interests include spending as much time with his family as possible (priorities), playing golf (since the age of 10), amateur photography (who isn't these days?), social media (he keeps Facebook in business), contemplating the meaning of life (doesn't everyone?), swinging a kettlebell or running trails as often as he can (you should too), and eating foods that are really bad for him (one foot on the gas, one foot on the brake).

Today we Talked About

Getting Started with Associations

Leadership

Best skill a CEO can have is Communication

Curiosity of understanding the layers

Binary decisions in a scale of gray world

The answer is always maybe

Managing Time

Don't listen to the squeaky wheel, get to know your members

Supply and Demand

Building your team

Moving for Good to Great

Hire Slow and Fire Fast

Find ways to say yes

How to Connect with Jay

NGCOA

LinkedIn

Twitter

Podcast

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About Sergey

Sergey Sundukovskiy, Ph. D. – Co-Founder, Chief Technology Officer and Chief Product Officer, Raken

Before Co-Founding Raken, Dr. Sergey Sundukovskiy served in capacities of Chief Technology Officer, Chief Information Officer, and Chief Product Officer. Sergey is a serial entrepreneur co-founding multiple successful Startups focused on Small Business Marketing and eCommerce. The last Startup co-founded by Sergey was acquired by Capital One in 2014.

 

Sergey specializes in implementation of subscription-based high volume SaaS platforms, with a strong emphasis on early stage product development, product marketing, and customer acquisition. Specific areas of expertise include User Testing, A/B Testing, Marketing, Big Data, Video Management, eCommerce, RTB platforms and Cloud Computing.

 

Sergey has B.A. in Computer Science from the University of California, San Diego, M.S. in Information Technology from the University of Liverpool, and Ph.D. in Information Technology Management from the School of Business and Technology, Capella University.

We talked about:

How he got into tech

Starting a company

The importance of business knowledge

Pre-sales

Minimal testable products

Net promoter score

Approach problems the way investors do

Is it a pain killer or a vitamin?

clarify and simplify

10 shades of gray will work either way

Testing mentality

Build an idea into a product, build a product in a company

Culture is huge

Find your passion and see if you can make a business out of it

Connect with Sergey

Rakenapp.com

Twitter

LinkedIn

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About Heather

Heather is a passionate coder and entrepreneur. She has experience working with Fortune 500 companies building enterprise-level voice, mobile and C#/.Net applications. She focuses on external thought leadership, encouraging fellow programmers to present on topics outside of the office and in the community. She is an international technical speaker and co-host of the YouTube channel "The Hello World Show" -- a weekly video series that interviews software masters and teaches the audience something valuable in less than 10 minutes. ​

Heather encourages those with nontraditional backgrounds to enter the world of software development, as she changed careers at 27 and does not have a degree - yet has built a reputation as an early adapter of new tech. She is an advocate of women in tech, and part of Kansas City Women in Technology. When not coding, Heather spends her time as a competitive equestrian and learning the art of mounted archery.

Today we talked about:

Technology Beginnings

Imposter Syndrome

Overcoming fear

Speaking internationally

Surrounding yourself with people you respect

Networking

Developer PTSD

Getting broad experience

Perspective

Introverts and networking

Passion and Inspiration

How tied are you to what you do for a living?

Tain people how to treat you

The value you provide is your output

Connect with Heather:

LinkedIn

Twitter

Website

Imposter Syndrome Talk

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About Khalid

Khalid Machchate is a Moroccan serial techpreneur, international consultant and speaker.

As a Mobile and Embedded Systems engineer, consulting and capacity building for several EMEA multinational corporations and Governments in disruptive technologies integration, especially Smart Cities, AI and IoT solutions. He developed proprietary algorithms and designed hardware for his accident detection and automated medical assistance solution SOS Santé, and AI powered software for his blended learning platform Skillearn, winning 20+ international innovation awards. All under his privately owned technology group: K&W Technologies.

In 2018, he was invited to speak in 4 continents, and 15 countries, in various summits, forums and seminars, earning him several global titles including Ashoka Changemaker, World Summit Awards expert, G20 special guest policy advisor...

As a thought leader he works with multilaterals and development agencies such as G20, World Economic Forum, GIZ, World Bank, UN amongst others to promote equality in opportunity, advocate for Health, Education and Economic Wellfare SDGs, empower youth, and co-create policies around entrepreneurship, self-employment, technology adoption and future of work.

Today We Talked About:

Khalid's Tech Story

AI

AI regulations

Data Privacy

Smart Cities

Quantum Computing

Fighting Global Crisis

Music

And much more!

 

Connect with Khalid:

LinkedIn

Twitter

Website

TedX Talk

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Today on the show we've got one of my favorite authors, A.J. Jacobs.  I first learned about A.J. when reading an article he wrote that was reprinted in Tim Ferriss's 4 Hour Work Week about outsourcing.  The humor and information contained in that article made me want to find and read more by A.J. We talked mostly about gratitude in this episode, and I'm grateful to have had A.J. on the show.  I hope you guys enjoy the conversation as much as I did, and be sure to tell A.J. thank you!

About A.J.:

A.J. Jacobs is an author, journalist, lecturer and human guinea pig. He has written four New York Times bestsellers that combine memoir, science, humor and a dash of self-help. He is also editor at large at Esquire magazine, a commentator on NPR and a columnist for Mental Floss magazine.

A.J. Jacobs is author of The Know-It-All, which documents the year he spent reading the Encyclopedia Britannica from A to Z, uncovering both funny and surprising factoids but also poignant insight into history and human nature. In 2007 he released The Year of Living Biblically, in which he attempted to follow every single rule in the Bible as literally as possible for an entire year. His book The Guinea Pig Diaries: My Life as an Experiment is a collection of numerous personal experiments, including living according to George Washington's rules of conduct, outsourcing every single task to India and posing as a woman on an online dating site. Jacobs recently released a new book, Thanks A Thousand: A Gratitude Journey, which relates his life-altering journey to thank every single person involved in producing his morning cup of coffee.

We Talked About:

Gratitude

Handwritten notes

Face to Face Thank Yous

Take aways from the gratitude project

Family Tree

A-Z gratitude hack

Gratitude of Leaders

Manager need to appreciate their employees

 

Connect with A.J. Jacobs:

LinkedIn Article by A.J. Jacobs

Books

Website

Twitter

Facebook

LinkedIn

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About Bas Rutten

Bas Rutten is the Former Heavy Weight Champion of the UFC and the three time King of Pancrase who has also made a name for himself outside the ring as an actor, host, inventor and television personality.

Bas has been seen co-starring in the Kevin James feature film Here Comes the Boom (2012) for Columbia Pictures. He also appeared in Paul Blart: Mall Cop (2009) and Zookeeper (2011).

In this interview we go over his early years and how Bas became a fighter and how he had to overcome medical conditions and bullying from a young age.  We also talk about what Bas is doing now and how he successfully maintains the mind of a champion even after fighting.

We talked about

His early days before MMA

How he became a fighter

Overcoming adversity

What it takes to be a champion

Pushing through failure

Building good habits

O2 Trainer

Connect with Bas Rutten

Facebook

Twitter

Instagram

Website

O2 Trainer

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About Andy

Dr. Andy Young has been a Professor of Psychology and Counseling at Lubbock Christian University since 1996 and a negotiator and Psychological Consultant with the Lubbock Police Department's SWAT team since 2000. He also heads LPD's Victim Services Unit and is the director of the department's Critical Incident Stress Management Team.  He has been on the negotiating team at the Lubbock County Sheriff's Office since 2008, is on the team at the Texas Department of Public Safety (Texas Rangers, region 5), and has recently been asked to serve as the Psychological Consultant on the Amarillo Police Department's negotiating team.  He has written a book, mostly stories about his work as a crisis counselor and hostage negotiator at LPD called Fight or Flight: Negotiating Crisis on the Frontline (see www.DrAndyYoung.com) and has published research on the callout experience, personality and decision-making styles of negotiators and SWAT operators, one of which was recently published in the National Tactical Officer Associations magazine The Tactical Edge, and in the International Association of Chiefs of Police online publication.  Since 2014 he has spoken nationally at numerous hostage negotiator conferences, as well as other professional and academic conferences on crisis intervention and hostage negotiating.

We Talked About

Fight or Flight: Negotiating Crisis on The Front Line

Andy's 1st Negotiation

Stories at Lubbock County Sheriff's Office

Negotiation strategies

Importance of Negotiation for Leaders

Listen and start from their point of view

Paraphrase to let them know you understand

Don't try to fix the problem

Ask if you can help

Non-verbal cues

Vocal Tonality

Patient

Work together for a "win-win"

Having a sense of humor

Connect with Andy

Website

LinkedIn

Facebook

Book (Fight or Flight)

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About Patrick

Patrick Barry serves as the Chief Information Officer at Rebyc Security.  In this role, he drives Rebyc Security’s strategic IT initiatives as well as help design and deliver offensive security offerings to Rebyc’s clients. Patrick has diverse experience with network security, having also served in risk assurance roles with PricewaterhouseCoppers and Computer Services Inc., and as a network security administrator for a large regional bank.  Patrick has a bachelor’s degree in management information systems from Youngstown State University, and he also holds the following certifications: CISSP, CISM, CISA, and CRISC.

Today we talked about

Patrick's journey through tech

Why Cyber Security?

What are things tech leadership should be thinking about in terms of security?

What you're using and where its hosted?

Shadow IT?

Security Awareness Training

Pen Testing

Technical vs. telling the breach story

Over coming fear of starting a new business

Connect with Patrick and Rebyc

Rebyc website

Rebyc Twitter

Patrick's LinkedIn

I hope you enjoyed this show, please head over to iTunes and subscribe and leave me a rating and review, even one sentence will help spread the word.  Thanks again!

Being that it is late January 2019 now, I'm sure most of you have already made and broken at least one new years resolution. There's nothing wrong with that... we all do it.  But let's focus on why you created that resolution in the first place.  Some common resolutions are to eat healthier, get in shape, be nicer, work harder, stop drinking so much, stop eating fast food, etc.  If you picked one of those, or something totally different, ask yourself why it is important for you to stop or start those things?   We'll dig more into the why in a minute...Ever wonder why we do resolutions and goals at the beginning of the year?  There is a good book about timing that digs into this by Dan Pink, called When.  It talks a lot about the best time of the day, week, month, or year to start or do certain things.  Its super fascinating, but basically our brains like new beginnings.  That can be a birthday, or the start of a week, or what better time, than the start of a new year.  We tend to have an easier time starting something during one of these new beginning times. But that doesn't necessarily equate to keeping it up.  Habits and motivations are important for that (check out the episodes with John Hitler on The Motivation Trap and Jeff Haden on The Motivation Myth to learn more about motivation).

For me, when I start something and begin to struggle seeing it through to completion, I begin to feel discouraged.  I've found that it is helpful to ask "why am I doing this anyway?" So let's take the get in shape scenario as an example.  Why do I want to get in shape? To be healthier... to look better at the pool... but why do I want to be healthier?  Why do I want to look better at the pool?  If I keep going down this rabbit hole of ask why using something called the five why protocol, I will likely find that the end game is to be happier. When I change my focus away from the task of working out, and point it at the correct goal of happiness, I find its easier to stay on task and accomplish my goals.

The Five Why Protocol

Wikipedia has a really good breakdown of the history and rules for the five why protocol so I'll link to that instead of boring you with all of the details. But the basics are, ask Why, from the customer point of view, at least 5 times to find the true root cause of the problem you're trying to solve.  I'll read the rules on the podcast, but you can go find them at Wikipedia.

S.M.A.R.T. Goals

I've spoken about, used, and stood by SMART goals for many years.  SMART is an acronym for Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant and Time-bound goals.  When you're setting your goals, you need to make sure you check all of the boxes for these in order to make the goal useful.

An example of one of my SMART goals for 2019 is: To increase 1st quarter podcast downloads by 10% over the 4th quarter 2018 download numbers. Let's break it down:

Specific - Increase Podcast Downloads

Measurable -By 10% over the 4th quarter 2018 download numbers

Achievable - a 10% increase is doable with more marketing and/or more episodes

Relevant - increasing downloads is a direct metric that relates to an increase in good content and more listeners to the show

Time-bound - 1st quarter downloads means that it has to be achieved by end of the 1st quarter in 2019.

I hope this information is helpful for you in 2019 and beyond.  I hope it helps you start back your failed new years resolutions or helps you keep them going.  Or maybe it helps you redefine better goals for the rest of the year. If so, please leave me a message on LinkedIn, on Twitter, through the website or in an ITunes Review. Thanks so much and have a great 2019!