Google Tech Talks
May 6, 2008
ABSTRACT
When you look around, there are a lot of leaders recommended for software development. We have the functional manager and the project manager, the scrum master and the black belt, the product owner and the customer-on-site, the technical leader and the architect, the product manager and the chief engineer.
Clearly that’s too many leaders. So how many leaders should there be, what should they do, what shouldn’t they do, and what skills do they need?
This will be a presentation and discussion of leadership roles in software development — what works, what doesn’t and why.
Speaker: Mary Poppendieck
Mary Poppendieck started her career as a process control programmer, moved on to manage the IT department of a manufacturing plant, and then ended up in product development, where she was both a product champion and department manager.
Mary considered retirement 1998, but instead found herself managing a government software project where she first encountered the word “waterfall.” When Mary compared her experience in successful software and product development to the prevailing opinions about how to manage software projects, she decided the time had come for a new paradigm. She wrote the award-winning book Lean Software Development: An Agile Toolkit in 2003 to explain how the lean principles from manufacturing offer a better approach to software development.
Over the past six years, Mary has found retirement elusive as she lectures and teaches classes with her husband Tom. Based on their on-going learning, they wrote a second book, Implementing Lean Software Development: From Concept to Cash in 2006. A popular writer and speaker, Mary continues to bring fresh perspectives to the world of software development.
Speaker: Tom Poppendieck
Tom Poppendieck has 25 years of experience in computing including eight years of work with object technology. His modeling and mentoring skills are rooted in his experience as a physics professor. His early work was in IT infrastructure, product development, and manufacturing support, and evolved to consulting project assignments in healthcare, logistics, mortgage banking, and travel services.
Tom led the development of a world-class product data management practice for a major commercial avionics manufacturer that reduced design to production transition efforts from 6 months to 6 weeks. He also led the technical architecture team for very large national and international Baan and SAP implementations.
Tom Poppendieck is an enterprise analyst and architect, and an agile process mentor. He focuses on identifying real business value and enabling product teams to realize that value. Tom specializes in understanding customer processes and in effective collaboration of customer, development and support specialists to maximize development efficiency, system flexibility, and business value.
Tom is co-author of the book Lean Software Development: An Agile Toolkit, published in 2003, and its sequel, Implementing Lean Software Development: From Concept to Cash, published in 2006.
Duration : 1:32:4
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Google Tech Talks
January, 30 2008
ABSTRACT
Greg Gillis and Lesly Higgins, experienced corporate coaches, will discuss and demonstrate various methods to effectively communicate; whether it is delivering a yearly review to a fellow Googler, developing your group’s strategic vision, or influencing others towards an idea. By learning about Advocacy and Inquiry, Appreciate Inquiry, and Effective Feedback/Feedforward, you will come away from this workshop with concrete examples and experiences to help you get your message across with impact.
Speaker: Lesly Higgins
I’ve been coaching since 1999. After my first career in software development, with roles that included VP Software Engineering at Commerce One and VP Information Technology at Charles Schwab, I returned to school to complete an MS in Organizational Behavior and Development and also a comprehensive coaching program. I’ve coached at all levels in organizations, most functions, and with both early stage and Fortune 500 companies. Most of my clients are in the tech space, and they include: Agile Software, America Online, Apple Computer, Autodesk, Charles Schwab, Coremetrics, CNET, Google, Hewlett-Packard, Peoplesoft, Pixar, SAP, Shutterfly, Taleo, TiVo, and Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati.
I believe everyone wants to be more effective and more fulfilled in life. Usually we don’t know HOW to achieve that. And often we don’t know what skills are important to develop to increase our overall effectiveness and satisfaction in work, and to position ourselves for greater responsibility. I help clients to understand WHAT they need to work on, and then HOW to achieve their developmental goals. I partner with clients as a guide, a mirror, a challenger, a support system, a sounding board—to name a few roles. I help them to develop new awarenesses, master new skills, assimilate new ways of seeing the world and shift their way of being in a way that not only meets their developmental goals but also creates the ability to continue growing—as a person and as a leader. I’ve been coaching at Google since 2003.
Speaker: Greg Gillis
I combine real-world wisdom, gathered through years of high technology corporate experience, with solid coaching expertise and training — to help successful people become even more successful. I help my client’s transition from manager to leader, enhance their leadership skills, better work within political infrastructures, delegate effectively, and collaborate wisely. I often increase their awareness of power in the organization, how it is acquired, manifested, held and diminished. I enhance their influence skills–critical to a leader’s growth in managing cross-functionally. I increase their awareness about emotional intelligence and interpersonal effectiveness while helping them shift to a more encompassing outlook resulting in more successful performance.
Duration : 0:55:40
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Google Tech Talks
September 4, 2008
ABSTRACT
High performance depends on the self-organizing capability of teams. Understanding how this works and how to avoid destroying self-organization is a challenge. Until you understand complex adaptive systems and how Toyota works it is difficult to improve team velocity. Jeff will discuss three core topics:
1. Shock therapy as a strategy for booting up teams.
2. The Cosmic Stopping Problem, otherwise known as the choice uncertainty principle.
3. Punctuated equilibrium – how software systems evolve
Take advantage of these concepts and you may find a way to achieve the ultimate potential of a team. This session will be a “Deep Agile” presentation keying off topics presented to engineers at MIT.
Speaker: Jeff Sutherland
Dr. Jeff Sutherland is one of the co-creators of the Scrum software development process. He and Ken Schwaber invented Scrum in 1993. Since then he has worked with many software companies and IT organizations to extend and enhance this process.
For more info please Google Jeff or visit his web site.
Duration : 1:33:20
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Google Tech Talk
December 4, 2009
ABSTRACT
Presented by Manuel Pérez-Quiñones.
Personal Information Management (PIM) practices are the behaviors that we follow when we organize our information. This often includes emails, documents, bookmarks, pictures, etc. Research in PIM has identified a common set of activities that require support: encountering information, organizing information, filing/archiving, and reusing information. Different tools must provide different kinds of support for each one of these activities.
PIM practices become easier if the organization provides some infrastructure to alleviate the difficulty of these activities. But a larger value is that the organization can leverage these personal practices to improve the effectiveness of others and to capture that elusive corporate knowledge in an easy way.
In this talk, I will describe previous work in PIM and highlight how some of the PIM practices can be supported and leveraged from the organization point of view.
Manuel A. Pérez-Quiñones is Associate Dean and Director of the Office for Graduate Recruiting and Diversity Initiatives at the Graduate School, Associate Professor in the Department of Computer Science, and a member of the Center for Human-Computer Interaction at Virginia Tech. Pérez-Quiñones holds a DSc in Computer Science from The George Washington University. His research interests include human-computer interaction, personal information management, user interface software, digital government, and educational uses of computers. He is a member of the Coalition to Diversify Computing, where he co-directs the national program Collaborative Research Experience for Undergraduates in Computer Science and Engineering. He serves on the editorial board for ACM’s Transactions on Computing Education journal. For 2008-2010 has been included in the IEEE Computer Society Distinguished Visitor program.
Duration : 0:56:31
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Google Tech Talk
September 11, 2009
ABSTRACT
Presented by Jerry Porras.
Jerry Porrass research interests are the characteristics of visionary companies in both the United States and Europe; the dynamics of planned organizational change process; organizational vision and its influence on the long-term behavior organizations; and leadership.
Jerry I. Porras is the Lane Professor of Organizational Behavior, Emeritus. He received his BSEE from Texas Western College, his MBA from Cornell University, and his PhD from the University of California, Los Angeles. Among the honors he has received are the Brilliante Award from the National Society of Hispanic MBAs, the Silver Apple Award from the Stanford Business School Alumni Association, and the Kanter Medal from the Pacific Graduate School of Psychology. He joined the Stanford faculty in 1972.
Professor Porras is author of Stream Analysis: A Powerful Way to Diagnose and Manage Organizational Change (Addison-Wesley, 1987); co-developer of the Stream Analysis Software Package (1999); and coauthor of Built to Last: Successful Habits of Visionary Companies (Harper Business, 1994) and Building Your Companys Vision, Harvard Business Review (1996). He has served on several editorial boards including the Journal of Organizational Change Management, Journal of Applied Behavioral Science, Academy of Management Journal, and Academy of Management Review.
About Perspectivas Speaker Series: Perspectivas is a speaker series aimed to empower and inspire individuals by providing ‘mentoring at scale’. Latino scientists and professionals share their perspectives on careers, work-life balance, and how they’ve achieved personal success.
Duration : 1:0:28
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