The Kyle Rowland Podcast

The role of engineering manager is often quite enigmatic. It often finds itself in emergency mode - with little time to fix the broader structural issues that are hindering the team or teams being led. Much more of this dilemma falls under the control of the engineering manager himself - much more than is immediately apparent. Listen to this month's episode for a framework that will help to think about influencing and leading in the areas available, and understanding what progress actually looks like.

Looking into the future with our guest Erik Erichsen. AI is already making a huge impact on our craft, changing the way we solve problems and even how we conceive them. As Engineering Leaders it falls on us to prepare our people, and to keep our perspective broad enough so that the ongoing evolution of our industry is something that we can leverage and not something that crushes us.

This means understanding the timeless principles that make for great software development - for great value add to our customers. It simultaneously means not ignoring the new context or how those principles are expressed in the new environment.

Join us as we explore this and more in this month's episode...

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Our guest Erik Erichsen:

Erik has over 25 years of experience in the technology industry ranging from startups to the enterprise organizations in both the public and private sector. During this time, he's served in a variety of roles including software engineer, architect, technology leader, product manager, and Divisional CIO for a Fortune 500 organization. His passion is leveraging technology to transform Mission-Led organizations and empowering individuals to have transformative impact. While he has been in various management roles for more than a decade, he stays closely connected with emerging technologies and trends.

Working up from first principles, it becomes clear that code reviews (as typically conceived) do far more damage than good. If we want to move past this legacy approach into the faster, better, more valuable world of continuous delivery, we do need to really understand these baseline principles.

This episode works through this - and will help you understand how you can apply these principles in your context.

The important thing, ultimately, is to be delivering the highest value to our customers. To get there we do need to get past this all-to-common stumbling block. All it takes is a little bit of courage and a readiness to do the work.

Are you with us in this?

I know you are.

(Book mentioned in the episode: Powerful, Profitable Software Products: The Executive Guidebook)

Join us as seasoned engineering leader Chuck Goss pops the hood on his eminently practical but quite refined engineering practice. Currently leading the engineering organization at the innovative Kizen Technologies, Chuck will share some key tactical tools that he's used to create a powerful and productive engineering machine - even in a highly distributed context.

Dr. Kyle Smith joins us today on this extra special episode. This neuro-ophthalmologist turned technology executive explains the lessons he learned as he made the transition from customer to creator! I know you'll appreciate his perspective as much as I do - and that you'll take some great wisdom away from his unique perspective. So grab some coffee and settle in as we take in what Dr. Smith has to say.

2025 is all set to be an epic year.

As 2024 is coming to a close the question is - what can I be doing to make sure my organization and I are nice and early to the party. How can we be setting ourselves up to maximize the impact and growth that will be coming to us from this bright future.

As John Maxwell says, everything rises and falls on leadership. That's even more true in technology, where we regularly define and redefine the nature of our business.

How can we be Executive Craftsmen that build and lead great organizations.

Join us this episode as we dig into this.

(Powerful, Profitable Software Products, The Executive Guidbook - https://a.co/d/gyRwMWj )

There aren't a lot of metrics out there that actually work. At least toward building up a great software engineering practice.

There is one that does carry a bit of signal with regard to health, and that's TBD. Your maturity with TBD implies maturity with a number of the core practices involved in building software well. Further, it implies that you are actually pretty good at those things (as a team).

As long as you avoid the pitfall of "cowboy coding" - there aren't a lot of dangers in measuring and even holding yourself accountable to your TBD maturity.

Even if it turns out that your maturity is low - probing even a little at that will yield massive concrete, actionable improvement opportunities.

So join us this month as we dive into this unique and powerful idea.

Ask 5 people this question and you'll likely get 5 different definitions - "what is software architecture?"

It's a challenge because it originates from an very interesting metaphor; one that explains a lot, but that simultaneously opens a number of questions.

In this episode with guest Erik Erichsen, we dive into what software architecture is, how it provides value for an organization, and some thoughts about how our practical approach has to be deeply considered in the face of theory.

Our guest Erik has over 25 years of experience in the technology industry ranging from startups to the enterprise organizations in both the public and private sector. During this time, he's served in a variety of roles including software engineer, architect, technology leader, product manager, and Divisional CIO for a Fortune 500 organization. His passion is leveraging technology to transform Mission-Led organizations and empowering individuals to have transformative impact. While he has been in various management roles for more than a decade, he stays closely connected with emerging technologies and trends.

Large swaths of our technology brethren have concerned themselves with "keeping the lights on". That is, we want to apply technology, but only in proven, predictable ways that don't rock the boat. Like the King's sycophantic advisor, we like our cushy life and we don't want to make waves.

Unforunately trying to ensure we safely and securely profit from our easy life is the best way to ensure we won't.

In Christensen's "Innovator's Dilemma" he shows that this pattern regularly repeats in business. Business is markedly less successful when it rests on its laurels and attempts to milk previous success indefinitely. So are businessmen.

Success requires invention, and invention today is done with software.

While many legacy businesses don't consider themselves "software shops" - successful businesses do.

This month we dive into the tricky topic of dealing with jerks.

Eric Williamson teaches us some tricks for dealing with difficult people. More importantly, of course, he sheds some light on how to not be difficult people ourselves.

I hope you enjoy listening in on this conversation as much as Eric and I did having it.

Just for some background, Eric is a professional development consultant, business coach and keynote speaker. He is the author of the book, How to Work with Jerks: Getting Stuff Done with People you Can't Stand, and co-author of the best-selling book, When Work Works: Cutting Edge Solutions for the Contemporary Workplace. He has over two decades of professional development experience, speaking, and most importantly, real-life, hands on in-the trenches business experience in both the private and public sectors. He works with organizations to build more collaborative and harmonious workplace environments by building stronger customer and workplace relationships.

(Brené Brown book mentioned in the podcast: Dare To Lead)