10 tips for technical interviews

There's lots of advice out there about how to interviews, but after going through about 100 resumes and conducting dozens of interviews over the past 6 months I'd thought I'd share my thoughts.

1. Make sure you resume prints on one page, include all the positions you've had but "built an ecommerce app in a .NET/SQL stack that supported 100,000 users" is enough.
2. Do include links to your social profile on your resume: linkedin, github, etc.
3. Do be knowledgable about the company and if you're not passionate about the business don't bother showing up.
4. When you're asked about how you work through conflicts don't answer "I've never had a conflict with another co-worker", because then it's obvious you're either lying or delusional.
5. Do not be afraid to answer any question "I don't know", nothing is worse than listening to someone stumble through a domain that they don't know.
6. Do ask questions throughout the interview.
7. Remember the WAIT acronym, "Why Am I Talking", brevity is the key to answering questions effectively.
8. Be on time, and if you can't, let the company know ASAP, there is grace for people who communicate effectively.
9. Remember the non-verbal skills: eye contact, dressed appropriately, etc, it's obvious but you'd be surprised.
10. Lastly, for the hiring managers, hire for passion, train for skills.

What makes a good software engineer

A good engineer cares about all the aspects of coding as well as the complete SDLC, they should be extremely passionate about and proficient in at least one area.  Writing good code is important but is only a small part of what makes a good engineer.  A good engineer will be knowledgable and care about the following:

• Testing
• Coding
• Analytics
• Monitoring
• Deployment
• Operations
• Performance
• Scale
• Patterns and Best Practices

In addition to caring about all aspects of coding and the SDLC, a good engineer stays up to date on the latest trends in the industry.  You can tell a lot about what a developer cares about by who they follow on twitter, their RSS feeds, and the podcasts that they listen to. Also, a good engineer should care and be knowledgeable about the products and business that their efforts are serving.

Lastly a good engineer takes pride in everything that they do, remembering that whoever can be trusted with little can also be trusted with much.

Spring ski season is upon us

The warming weather and lengthening days can mean only one thing, spring season is now upon us.  When this time of year descends upon us many reach for their clubs or bikes, not me, I reach for my Salomon Pocket Rockets with my Fritschi Freerides, slap on my G3 skis and head for the Colorado high country.

Over the past 15 years I've been out and about summiting the high peaks and skiing down during the prime ski mountaineering months of April and May.  I've been tracking the list of 14ers, here and on 14ers.com http://www.14ers.com/php14ers/usrpeaksv.php?usernum=7926.  I've ventured in and around the Indian Peaks and Fall River range as well, skiing many of those high peaks as well.

There is simply no better way to enjoy the mountains of Colorado, nothing beats a long snow climb to an airy summit, clicking in and holding on for dear life as you descend 4000 vertical feet of every imaginable snow condition.  Back to the camp in the afternoon, you can kick back, enjoy a beer and relish in the satisfaction of a thrilling climb and descent.

Going from the list of 58 14ers, I have 15 left to do, whether or not I finish them all doesn't matter all that much (although it'd be nice).  What does matter is getting out, climbing and skiing on velvet corn and enjoying the warm weather with great friends immersed in the incompressible beauty of the Colorado Rockies.

Tips for moving from dev to management

Management isn't for everyone, but without it we'd probably be unable to get anything done in a corporate structure.   It's planning, organizing and leading, delegating tasks and letting other people succeed.  These skills aren't completely diametrically opposed to strictly technical positions, but it's pretty close.  It's probably why everyone is familiar with some of the most talented engineers struggling to succeed in a management role.

With that being said, it can be done, and if you' have the right temperament and frame of mind, you can not only succeed at it but you might even enjoy management.  Here's a couple of points stick out that are good to keep in mind.

1. You don't get to manage 10 of you. You were put into this role because you probably outperformed your peers, so don't think that you'll get to manage ten top performers.  However, hopefully you'll get complimentary set of skills that you can leverage to 
2. Build a team, a team is a group of individuals working towards a common goal.  Be a constant reminder of what your team is working towards.
3. Realize your words carry more weight than they did before, so choose them carefully.  Have select people to confide in "off the record" is important, but it's also important to not vent everything to your team.
4. Think small at first.  It's amazing how a series of small, incremental improvements can affect employee morale, you won't be able to complete restructure the organization, but you can make your team more customer service focused and as a result, end up with happier customers, either internal or external.
5. Get to know who is working for you, weekly or bi-weekly informal one on one sessions are great.  Ask lots of questions, find out how they tick, every single person has a unique viewpoint and way of thinking and working.  By learning how your team members think and learn you will be better suited to managing them and assigning them the work most likely to keep them happy.

writing

Recently, I reminded myself that I used to write, volumes and volumes of nonsense.  Although some of it made sense, most was just stream of consciousness  that really didn't make any sense.   When I wrote with pen I seldomly used the back space and didn't worry too much about misspellings.  In this blog I can see already that it doesn't like the word seldomly so I should check if I am spelling it correctly.   Interesting that seldom is an adverb and seldomly isn't really a word, I'm not going to correct it now or else the context would be lost.

So, I found some old pictures today while cleaning out the garage and that got me thinking.  When I look back on pictures from ten or twenty years ago, there's usually a consistent progress of thought.  Initial thoughts usually are around how much fun I had in those days, second thoughts are around how much better I looked 15 years ago, finally a sense of contentment comes over me where I'm grateful to have those memories but even more grateful to be where I am in my life today.

Today, right now, is the best possible moment in the world.  Every single breath is a gift from God not be taken lightly, the breath is a gift from God, what we do with that breath is our gift to Him.  I find myself crying all the time these days at the simplest things, simple movies will bring me to tears, just today I cried at the end of "Sandlot", remembering those days with me and my friends playing baseball, but also crying for my children who don't know such simple unstructured pleasures in today's strictly regimented extra curricular society.  Now, I don't feel sorry that for my kids per se, because this is the world that they know and all they need to know is that they are loved.  It's only my knowledge of my past that shapes that emotion.

Writing like this reminds me of why I could never be a writer, because I could never get to or make anything to could be remotely construed as a point.  In conversation as in writing, I enjoy the journey more than the destination.  Kerouac would never allow his rambling to be edited, always saying the words came straight from God to his pen and were not to be altered.   Of course he was actually a gifted writer and story teller, if he rambled to this extent with no point, he would have never had much success as a writer.

There was something else, and it was about love.  I was sitting outside in the backyard looking at our house, and thinking how cool it is that me and my baby have had so many magical moments and have created so many incredible memories in this house.  With so many more to come, it's unfathomable to think what is to come, but I have no fear, zero fear of the future. Why?  Because I wear a coat of love,  a coat of love and gore-tex.  The love protects me and comforts me, the gore-tex keeps the water out while still breathing.  Both are important, but the love never wears out, and if you care for it correctly it actually gets better over time.

Now I remember why I used to write so much, the act of writing in and of itself is cathartic.  I do it for no one else other than me.  It is a cleansing experience; putting a stake in the sand of time, capturing where my head was at that singular moment.

sneffles

The San Juans, simply put, are Colorado's finest mountain range and no mountaineer can consider their San Juan experience complete without a visit to the summit of Mount Sneffles, the monarch of the range.  The memorial day weekend Mike and I had a chance to do just that. 

Read more below

http://14ers.com/php14ers/tripreport.php?trip=14886

tips for moving from dev to arch

After 7 years and dev and now in an arch role for 2 years at a high level there are a few things that jump out to me as being some of the bigger differences with going from dev and into the arch.

• You need to consider and prioritize equally all stakeholders, product, qa, dev, external customers, you can't be biased towards dev just because that's the world that you know.
• Lead through influence not edicts, teams don't usually want to be told what to do but are almost always open to hear ideas about how to do certain things, nudge, lead and guide gently
• Stay close to the code, never stop coding, continue to contribute regularly to the project(s) that you are overseeing
• Trust the people you work with until they prove to you that they are not to be trusted
• Be fearless and speak up, one of the best things about being in arch outside of the dev organization is that you should feel free to speak your mind, don't be afraid to disagree with dev if you think they are going about something the wrong way, but also realize that it might be you who is in the wrong.