Interesting content Friday — 2019/06/07

[52min Video] Don’t Walk Away from Complexity, Run — Venkat Subramaniam

Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4MEKu2TcEHM

This entertaining talk from Venkat Subramaniam is mostly about accidental complexity and simplicity. I agree with his ideas and recommendations about software development, but sometimes I fail to follow them; the video was a great reminder to keep myself in check.

I see this talk as a more general version of Rich Hickey’s Simplicity Matters talk, which you should also watch! By the way, Venkat’s book Practices of an Agile Developer is worth a read.

[1h44min Podcast] Eric Schmidt — Lessons from a Trillion-Dollar Coach (#367)

Link: https://tim.blog/2019/04/09/eric-schmidt/

I could listen to Eric Schmidt, former CEO of Google, for many more hours. This interview is about his new book, Trillion Dollar Coach. I hadn’t heard about Bill Campbell, the subject of the book, before this interview and I’m impressed with his abilities as a coach and his work ethic. The interview highlights many of the traits of a good coach and can help you get better as a leader.

I’m still thinking about this interview, mostly the part they discuss the role of technology in the future of society, such as the possibility to create better systems (judicial, political, prison, traffic, etc.) due to the massive amounts of data we can gather.

[10min Video] Drive: The surprising truth about what motivates us

Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u6XAPnuFjJc

This animation is an adaptation of Daniel Pink’s talk at RSA about motivation in the workplace. The research says that you need to “Pay people enough to take the issue of money off the table,” then give them purpose and autonomy so they can perform at their best — at YipitData we have ownership, mastery, and purpose as core company values.

Daniel Pink is a prolific writer and I always learn something from his research. The full talk is available at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_mG-hhWL_ug.