Diverse Software Engineers Podcast

Ever dreamed of having superpowers? In all my 15+ years experience as a software engineer, I have witnessed such powers. They are called event modeling / event sourcing! How do you acquire such powers and profit from it? In the season 1 finale, let the creator of event modeling, Adam Dymitruk, tell you how!

This concludes season 1, and it was a blast. Season 2 will begin in the fall (stay tuned for exact dates) with new and exciting guests!

Live far away from the office? Have an accent? These are some examples of how you can be unfairly rejected from a position. Have you been rejected because of these things? I suspect I had, and I can imagine that is true for many of you. Bias are pervasive and sometimes even well meaning managers, such as myself, who have worked as a software engineer manager for years, have committed in the past. 

In this episode I confess to some of these biases and expose how some questions fester biases. Then Fatima and I will show you ways to overcome them, so you can obtain fulfilling positions and careers.

Are you where you are meant to be right now? How can you tell if you are not? If you ever wonder about that, you are in good company. Fatima is asking these questions, and I had made major academic and career changes in university as a result of these questions. Listen in as we discuss, and inadvertently reveal an intimate personal story I had buried for over 15 years.

How many days in the past 30 days do you feel lethargic? You wake up with a list of things to complete, and end up doing none of it? Or you dread waking up, and wish the day is magically over? Perhaps yesterday at times you feel great, but it lasts only a few hours at most, and soon you have that sinking or nagging feeling that something is just … off. It has happened to many of us, me included, in my 15+ years as software engineer, manager, and architect. 

This episode’s guest, Karthik Viswanathan, is taking an extended break from work. He is living through this right now, so he is perfectly positioned to identify burnout, look for ways to reduce likelihood of burnout happening to you, and what to do when you feel burnt out.

Listener feedback and support has been incredible thus far, and really took off since the last episode. All you guys are amazing! One listener asked "How do You Uncover a Company's Real Culture?" 

This episode directly answers the question. If you want to know what it’s like to work for a company, you can’t exactly go up to an interviewer or HR and ask “What’s your company culture like?” Summing it up in one answer isn’t totally possible, and often yields a polished, marketing-approved answer than a candid discussion. 

So how do you do it? Find out by subscribing and listening, like so many of you have already thus far.

University, Code Camp, or Technical Program? This episode, thanks to guest Matt Catallier, who has mentored at Lighthouse Code Camp, we will explore:

1. What are code camps, and what students can accomplishment from them
2. Code camps vs technical programs vs university degree
3. Why  Amazon, Microsoft isn't always the best thing 
4. Ideal first / second job
5. Job position red flags
6. How having a bad manager really sucks

What does it take to be hired by Microsoft as a software engineer? My guest and Simon Fraser University alumni Issac Qiao has started an exciting chapter of his career there, and he dishes out all the time and effort he went through to get it, as well as how you can get there.

As Fatima's mentor, Eric is going to inquire about Fatima's career path, schooling challenges, and dishes out solicited advice on career path (not knowing is OK), ways to get more information about a career, and doing the best you can at your current path matters even if the course material or subjects are not immediately applicable.

Eric and Fatima sit down with Eric's long time friend and Ping Identity QA Manager Ken Wong to talk about the quality assurance mindset, what it means, and how software engineers / developers can benefit from it.

While Ken is not holding his breath that Hollywood will feature a QA person as a glamorous profession in a feature film, he believes QA is a worthwhile profession that many in software engineering programs want to be aware of.

https://www.linkedin.com/in/kenwong80/

Building the right things can be as important as building things right. Our guest this episode, Hussein Waljee, is a champion of this statement. An accomplished Solutions Architect with degrees from MIT, MBA credentials from University of British Columbia's Sauder Business school. With stellar education and work experiences in his pocket, Hussein talks about how he got here, what the architect role means, and career advice on how you can become one yourself.

https://www.linkedin.com/in/hussein-waljee/

Media, traditional or social, is flooded with advice. We pledge to never tell you what you should or should not do. Yet even among computer science / engineering students, there seems to be no shortage of "know it alls" dishing out advice! We discuss what unsolicited advice really is, what it does, and why there's already too much of it.

This short episode was brought on due to some feedback that the first episode didn't cover what Fatima's struggles were. See if you can relate, because whether you do or you do not, eventually in your career you will struggle. It happens to all of us. Share your thoughts with us! dsepodcast.com

What does it means to dare to suck? How does it apply to my software career? It means more than you may think.