Sharpening the Technology Saw

Wayne John Varney
Jul 30, 2017 · 5 min read

One of the reasons I love working in tech is that things never stay the same, change is constant, innovation is the name of the game and that makes stuff interesting and exciting. Reflecting back 20 years to the beginnings of my IT career, Client/Server computing was all the rage, WiFi was emerging in the Enterprise, Frame Relay was king of the WAN and building an Intranet was what all the cool kids did. Fast forward to today and all but one of these technologies ceases to exist, Cloud rules the lands, there’s an App for everything, Mobiles are the new PC, Machines can learn, everything is connected, Software ate the world and Virtual Reality is fast becoming the new reality. It’s hard to deny, the pace of innovation has accelerated exponentially in recent years and shows no signs of abating.

So how does a Technology Manager or leader keep their knowledge and skills up to date when the pace of change is so high ? IT leaders more then ever need to make informed decisions regarding technology choice and direction as the implications are far reaching for a business. In the words of one Dr Stephen Covey how do you sharpen the saw when the saw has already been super seeded by a chainsaw and will likely be replaced by a robotic blade in the next release ! This is not an easy question to answer. As a leader working in the technology industry it’s a topic I’ve spent some time considering and over the course of my career have found some techniques that have worked well. I’ve done my best to summarise these below, note these are not an exhaustive list and I’d love to hear what techniques others are using … how do you keep your technology saw sharp ?

Reading, Reading and More Reading- Like most, reading is an integral part of my learning strategy, I’ll typically be reading 2–3 books or e-books at any point in time, focused on one or more technology subjects, I try to rotate through a subject area every 3–6 months. Over the last few months I’ve been investing heavily in DevOps, Continuous Delivery, AI and Cloud. I look for book recommendations from industry leaders, recognised experts or visionaries like Elon Musk, Mr Zuckerberg etc. Audio books and services such Audible are fantastic for whiling away time on those long commutes. I have a regular set of RSS feeds I track, I subscribe to the Economist, Business Insider and local newspapers such as the Age.

Social Media and Blogs — More and more I rely on social media to keep myself up to date with news, trends, articles, discussions as well as finding the major movers and shakers in a particular technology area local and international. I’m a big user of Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and LinkedIn which I find is increasingly becoming an environment for professional contributions, blogs and articles. I’ve recently become a regular user of Medium following a number of industry thought leaders and analysts as well as contributing with my own blog.

Find a Guru — When needing to accelerate learning, there’s no substitute for experience, the next best thing is to spend time with someone who’s been there, done that and has the scars to prove it ! I’m fortunate to work in a team of highly skilled and experienced engineers so try and make time with specialists in the team to get a deeper understanding of specific technologies, delivery methods or common customer challenges. Similarly leveraging the rolodex to catch up regularly with peers and ex-colleagues to discuss trends, challenges and emerging technologies is a great way to get your finger on the technology pulse. I find it provides a broader and more balanced view of technology trends, customer challenges and solutions then what you might get within your own organisation.

Conferences & Meetups — Industry and vendor conferences can be a great source of information, there’s typically a keynote from the CEO or industry leader laying out the broader vision and strategy, followed by more focused tech updates, deep dives, labs, show cases and customer case studies. I’ve noticed in recent years vendors are placing more emphasis on having customers deliver their stories of success in keynotes, emulating the successful format used at AWS re:Invent. Conferences provide a fantastic opportunity to network with peers, customers, ecosystem partners and gain direct access to product managers and engineers designing solutions. You’ll never get a better opportunity to influence product direction. Over the last 2–3 years I’ve been leveraging local meetup communities in Melbourne as a key learning resource, I’m a member of the DevOps, Container, Pitch X and AWS meetups amongst others. There are literally hundreds of Tech Meetup’s established covering everything from Cloud, Startup Pitches, Containers, Virtual Reality, AI, coding etc etc. Meetup’s typically meet once a month and are supported by a bunch of like minded individuals, they are a fantastic way to learn as well as network and if inclined contribute knowledge back to the community. Download the App and join a meetup today !

Podcasts — I’ve come to love Podcasts relatively recently and just like Audible find them to be a perfect learning companion to the regular work day commute or a long road trip … much to the despair of my kids ! Great thing about Podcasts is they are typically short so you can easily digest an update or interview in 15–20 minutes. I use the Apple Podcasts App and have half a dozen or so Podcasts that I subscribe to and listen to regularly. Current subscriptions include The New Stack Makers, AWS Podcast, DevOps Chat, The Cloudcast and the Microsoft Cloud Show.

Technical Training — I’ve found training works best when there is a specific need or gap to fill i.e. I need to learn about a specific product or technology, I need to understand typical deployment scenarios, how do I troubleshoot this thing ? From experience training without the opportunity to leverage learnings quickly can be a wasted training. Just in time training typically offers the greatest return. Training followed by certification is also a great way to ensure focus and industry acknowledgement, great for that LinkedIn profile !

On The Tools — Back in my Engineering days, I loved the opportunity to play with the latest gadget or widget, better still when I was being paid to do it for a customer. Without a doubt the best way to learn a new technology is to roll up the sleeves and play with it. Unfortunately as I’ve moved into the realms of management the opportunity to get on the tools has declined considerably. To help address the gap, I’ve made investments in home tech including a Raspberry Pi and accessories. The Raspberry Pi is a fantastic piece of computing kit and great value at $40, I’ve used it to help teach my kids coding with Scratch, to build out a web service and am attempting to teach myself Python. For a very modest investment it’s a great way to preserve some of those diminishing tech skills. Another recommendation is to leverage free tier cloud services available at providers such as AWS and Google Cloud Platform, they provide a great introduction to commonly used services and give a feel for how services can be coupled together to support broader enterprise infrastructure needs.

I’d love to hear what you do to keep your skills up to date ? What other techniques do you use ?

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