0:00

Josh: And I carried it last time, Bob: you know, you know what I don't know about carrying it,

0:12

but I felt like the last episode you probably had the most space.

0:17

Yeah. Yeah. And it felt good to be did it, but then you just burst it right

0:22

then just that it felt good.

0:24

It felt right until you just opened your mouth and just blew it

1:06

Bob. Josh, do you know what I wish I knew what

1:12

Josh: I wish I knew how to pick a podcast partner 12 years ago.

1:16

Oh Bob: yeah. Is that, is this the, is this the reflection episode,

1:23

Josh, where we reflect back? Yeah, I guess, so maybe, maybe sort of get a little bit misty-eyed

1:31

about mistakes that we've made. What do you think?

1:35

Yeah. All right. So tell me, tell me more about that.

1:40

Josh: Oh, you more about that? Well, number one, we should have done a couple of trial

1:44

episodes and understood the word. Count the word.

1:48

That was there. Um, I probably would have practiced more in learning how to interject myself

1:53

into a soliloquy that was happening.

1:56

Yeah, big word. And I think if I knew those, if I was able to tackle that, I think we wouldn't

2:02

have landed where we are, where it's a surprise when people hear Josh's name,

2:06

they're like, oh, it's a metal cast with Bob: Bob. And Josh.

2:11

Exactly. And Josh, you know, I'm just kidding.

2:14

I just want, I've always reflected on though. What gets the value of the discourse?

2:18

I think it's sort of the value of the IVs without a doubt.

2:22

You know what I Josh: mean? I know, but we have this running joke we have

2:25

Bob: to make, it's just jabbing at you. Don't accept.

2:29

That was a jab. Fine, fine.

2:32

Get feisty. Alright, great.

2:34

You're laying back in your, in your banana shirt.

2:37

That Josh: was way louder. Sorry, everybody.

2:41

I just slapped the arm of my chair was wait,

2:45

Bob: sorry. You know, I don't regret.

2:50

No, I don't either. I, I don't re what do I get?

2:53

Here's things that I wanted.

2:56

Let's bounce the ball back and forth. So what do you have so many casters?

3:01

This, the theme of this episode is I wish we knew.

3:04

I wish I, I wish I knew this back then, whatever this is.

3:09

So Josh: go ahead. When I first started hiring, I was a computer science only person.

3:16

I had zero. Creativity or outside of the box thinking and who would be a good

3:22

developer if your resume didn't have computer science on it discard.

3:29

And over the years, some of the more higher performing successful just teams I

3:37

liked or made up of a majority of people.

3:41

That either didn't go to school or had a degree in something wildly

3:44

different than computer science.

3:46

So over the years I've learned that through just like stepping

3:51

in things and moving roles.

3:53

And now there's a team of people that I didn't hire and

3:56

I didn't look at their resumes. I just like, wow, you're really good.

3:59

And then it comes up later like, oh, holy crap.

4:01

So you've wow. That's amazing. So there were so many people that I.

4:07

Could have added to the products we built to improving my career throughout the

4:15

way that I just shut out like a dumb, Bob: well in diversity.

4:19

Right? And I'm not, there's, there's academic diversity, but there's

4:23

all kinds of aspects to diversity.

4:26

And I was doing the same. I mean, it wasn't intentional.

4:30

It was sort of naive or it was, you know, sometimes you, you just, that's all, you

4:34

know, but, I used to be like, not just university, but specific universities.

4:40

I remember when I moved down here, we identified a shortlist for our recruiters.

4:45

Like Clemson was an engineering university, Georgia tech, Virginia tech.

4:49

So we were, we, it wasn't just.

4:54

It was computer science from these universities.

4:57

And I did some of that up north too when I was in Connecticut.

5:00

when did I change? Probably at Bellin.

5:02

How after a few years down here now in my defense, we were doing hard and bad.

5:10

So embedded systems development. So, so having an engineering background probably harder to pick up, it's hard.

5:17

You don't pick that up, you know, in a bootcamp at a community college

5:21

or something, but still I just left.

5:24

I left all kinds of great people. Oh on the, just, I, I let the, I pass them by and, and I got it.

5:31

It's not even just that it's the results that I got.

5:34

We were very predictable in our results in those teams.

5:38

Right. I mean, they weren't bad teams, but just not a lot of variation,

5:43

not, not a lot of ideation, not a lot of creativity outside of the.

5:48

In those teams. So yeah, I reflect that as well.

5:53

I'm trying to think of, I wish I'd known how hard agile is to get.

5:58

Right, right.

6:01

I don't think it had changed anything. Well, no, I don't, I don't know what it would have changed something, but

6:06

I just wish I had known early on.

6:08

I think in the early days of my agile career, I looked at it as like a

6:12

method and it was the history, like a unified process and things like

6:16

that, like wrap the rational unified process and other SDLC came along

6:21

and they were processed definitions. And I wish I would have known how culturally.

6:26

Key and how organizationally key agile success was like,

6:30

like right from the get-go. I did not get it.

6:33

I probably wasted. I'm not wasted, but I probably spent, you know, the first four or five,

6:41

maybe even up to eight years thinking agile was a process thing mostly.

6:46

Right. I do. I disrupted some roles, for example, like project management roles or testers in,

6:52

in development teams and things like that.

6:55

But I didn't, I didn't get it. I wish I would've gotten it sooner.

6:58

I think it was. I think it would have increased the success of some of those early adoptions.

7:04

And I was a part of, yeah, I, I,

7:08

Josh: I've been down a similar path where I spun my wheels a lot

7:14

and I was very stubborn about, and it's like, this is going to work.

7:19

And I just tried to make it work by the process, not the culture.

7:25

And I learned through mistakes. Yeah. I needed to get better at addressing the culture from the top down and

7:31

get all of the leaders on board and helping lead it before it was actually

7:37

going to work because it was just like, oh yeah, Josh and the devs are

7:40

doing this agile thing, but the rest of the company, it was very waterfall.

7:44

And so that put a really low ceiling on the success that we can have.

7:48

And I, you know, and I. Terra data is perfect example, like you saw how that was going to end.

7:56

You had more experience, you were like, yes, this is not going to work I'm out.

8:01

And I hung around for a couple of years, at least just banging my head

8:05

against that wall, trying to turn into something that it just wasn't going to be.

8:10

Bob: That's the other thing I wish I wish I would have been more courageous.

8:15

I mean, again, I had kids growing up, so, so there was real world.

8:20

Reasons, but like with the great resignation now

8:24

people are boldly going out.

8:27

You hear about more courage now, right.

8:29

I'm not doing what I want to do. I'm going to pivot.

8:32

Right. You talk about that sometimes like startups and things like that.

8:35

I've got limited time. I wish I would have had more courage early on to take, to take more risks.

8:43

Maybe it's confidence or courage or something to do that.

8:47

I Josh: agree completely. And I think part of that is the culture that we were brought up.

8:53

And like, I, I realized the drivers that led to me choosing my career path

9:03

and it was very tied to the area that I grew up in the norms around that.

9:09

And so as I've learned that, and as I moved into Raleigh, like I started

9:14

working with the city and you know, here in Raleigh, success is usually

9:21

defined as you go to one of the big three schools, you get a job and, you know,

9:26

you know, you bounce around a little bit and that's fine, but like you do that.

9:32

There's not enough support for failure.

9:35

We're encouraging people to try different things.

9:38

You know, that's not the norm here, whereas in some other parts

9:41

of the country that's encouraged. Yeah.

9:43

So that's a thing that I've always tried to work on here is encouraging that more

9:47

often because there were societal norms that I allowed to hold me back, but I

9:56

wish I would have like shed those sooner. Bob: You mentioned something earlier, you didn't say it this

10:02

way, but like sudden costs thinking. So I've been watching this, rich Chariton has a video.

10:07

He's the Menlo innovations CEO.

10:10

And he talks about one of the major factors in slowing you down or

10:14

fear or whatever is you get stuck on what, you know, like trying new

10:18

things, because you're stuck with what you, what you've sunk into it.

10:22

And I I'm very some costs.

10:26

influenced, right. I've always been, it goes back to my background.

10:30

I'm very conservative, you know, farm conservative, you know, you're

10:34

going to, you're going to beat it. You're going to beat it into submission rather than right.

10:39

Rather than just move and not get stuck in things.

10:43

So I wish I would have let go.

10:45

There's not a specific sunk cost example.

10:48

I could mind for them, but it's being.

10:52

Being less sensitive to that.

10:55

Right. Being, yeah, it's a factor, but being very lightweight with some costs,

10:59

I think that would have changed the trajectory of my trajectory of some of

11:04

the, the companies that I was a part of, if not getting stuck in that thing.

11:09

Yeah. Okay. So I won't hit the Josh: pause button for all the listeners out there.

11:14

If you haven't been thinking about the things we've been

11:17

talking about and evaluating.

11:20

How you're doing with those rewind and start over, make sure you're,

11:25

you're listening to these are, these are stories of mistakes that we made,

11:29

but we are going to do with them. Can you look at, oh, I do that same thing.

11:32

I like Bob. I do the exact same thing. And then how do you start to drive change?

11:37

So don't passively listen, actively, listen here.

11:39

The next thing for me is I wish I had.

11:46

More training with firing people than I did with hiring people.

11:51

The amount of effort that I put in personally and other people put into

11:57

helping me hire the right people, just absolutely dwarfed the training.

12:03

I basically got no training for how to let someone go.

12:07

And the first few I fumbled. A complete doofus and I look back and I feel terrible because I

12:15

just mishandled it with someone's life and all of those things.

12:19

And I did it poorly. So I've really invested in myself in trying to get better at that because

12:26

you're not going to get everything right. You're not going to get every hire.

12:29

Perfect. Bob: I agree.

12:32

I mean, I remember going, what was the name?

12:35

Wavetec Wando and Goldman was a telecommunications instrument

12:39

company here in the triangle.

12:41

There was a big tea. There's a lot of peripheral telecom companies and they were

12:46

one of them like test instruments. And I worked there for awhile and the HR, I w I went to HR to try to put someone

12:53

on a performance improvement plan. And, and the director of HR, didn't have a thing like that.

13:00

So literally like the HR team didn't know how to fire somebody.

13:04

And, and so I had to help. So I had some experience, but it's like indicative.

13:09

It's not just you it's, it's like, that's not, I would call a skill or a competency

13:17

that that's lacking in most organizations.

13:19

And. Right. Like doing it with humanity, doing it with equity, doing it with patience, doing

13:27

it with clear clarity of communication.

13:30

Right. You know, just doggedly doing it, putting in the effort to do that.

13:33

Just like you would in recruiting. Right. That's another missing a missing thing.

13:38

What for me. do you have I'm thinking, do you have another one?

13:41

Could you throw another one out? Josh: I've clearly made a lot more mistakes than Bob.

13:45

It's not mistakes. Bob: I wish I would

13:47

Josh: know in the yard time. One of the things where I have stubbed my toe the most in my career has

13:55

been, I would interview for a roles.

13:58

I would get accepted. About the leaders, they were selling exactly what I was buying

14:04

and I was fired up and no one knows this better than my wife.

14:07

Right. Cause she's been along all those rides and the number of times that I was

14:14

disappointed as time progressed and that person wasn't really what I thought they

14:19

were coming out of the hiring process.

14:22

And that led me to leave. So I've worked really hard and the past five or six years.

14:27

To learn how to interview the leaders at accompany, to understand who they

14:31

really are and be more confident about the choices that I make.

14:34

Okay. Bob: I hear that I do a lot of coaching now.

14:38

You know that I do the leadership workshops and things, but I

14:41

try to help the community. It's probably not probably it's the number one thing I hear is people making

14:49

mistakes and they're making repeated mistakes going into the wrong company.

14:53

And it's, it's a pervasive problem because it's really hard.

14:56

It's actually, I think, quite challenging for anyone to interview for the culture,

15:01

to cut through the bullshit, to cut through the facade and get to the real

15:04

essence of a company like the glass store of a company or something like that.

15:08

Then I think the one regret I have, and I still have it.

15:12

I'm still working on it. I'm working on a blog post about.

15:15

Is my humility and I think I'm too, and don't don't please don't

15:20

harass me about it, but I I'm too.

15:24

I'm too humble. And part of it is, imposter syndrome and it's been, it's been a problem for me from

15:31

my youth, like growing up, I've never.

15:34

I've never been ultra confident or ultra cocky or anything like that.

15:40

And I wish I would have, I wish I would've seen my value even to this day.

15:46

You know, when I, you know, you've talked to me about you

15:48

don't, you don't charge enough. A guy was talking to me the other day, you know, I have this pattern

15:53

sometimes of excusing my experience right on webinars and things like that.

16:00

And, and he was like, he shook me and is like, you know, you don't

16:03

undermine what you have to offer. Right.

16:06

It devalues your experience. You have a lot of experience.

16:10

And so I wish I would have stopped that shit earlier.

16:12

I really, and I'm still.

16:16

Going into that. But I, I think that's that undermine the trajectory of my career.

16:23

I think you broke professionally as an employee, but also, outside as

16:31

a consultant and things like that. And I'm not saying I should be cocky, but I think a lot of people are too humble.

16:39

They're too. They're letting their imposter syndrome.

16:41

affect them. Yeah. And, and seeing yourself, giving yourself a fair break, really sort of seeing

16:48

yourself the way you are looking in the mirror effectively in a balanced way.

16:53

You're Josh: Bob Bob: effin, Galen. And I don't feel like that.

16:56

I know. Right. I Josh: honestly, everyone else does.

17:00

Bob: And everyone else does, and I don't feel that way.

17:03

And, and, actually being vulnerable now, that's, I've, that's hurting me.

17:07

It's hurting me in many ways.

17:10

And, and I just, and I'll never, I'll never be cocky.

17:14

Right. Who's a cocky guy in, Craig Lara. The less guy is relatively cocky.

17:20

Yeah. So I will never be a Craig alarm and or someone like that,

17:24

but I, you need to step it up.

17:26

You, you really need to like, look yourself in the mirror and

17:30

accept yourself for like your strengths and things like that.

17:33

The other weird thing about it, Josh is I'm good at I'm good at, I think

17:38

I'm good at, giving, giving you. Yeah.

17:42

See, I, I just can't, but I, I do that with you, right?

17:46

Like I give you a mirror and I'll, if I'm talking to you, I will coach up your

17:50

strengths, but I won't do it to myself.

17:53

So I'll get, I'll show a mirror to other people, but I won't.

17:56

So that's something I wish I not only knew it was self aware of it and I think I've

18:02

been self-aware, but it's it's is really working hard to, to rebalance myself.

18:08

Josh: You know, given last episode, I, as a friend would

18:13

say, give therapy a try, right?

18:16

Like if you think it was shaped by upbringing, like most things like

18:20

this are, it might be helpful for you to work through that with an expert.

18:25

And that might uncover the thing that then helps you.

18:28

Push forward, you know? Cause I, you know, I can tell you I've I've been investing a lot there.

18:32

Yeah. And it helps.

18:35

So Bob: that's actually coaching has helped me in that I've I've because I'm in

18:39

these coaching programs, I've connected to one-on-one coaches and the coaching

18:44

has helped actually the coaching has, but therapy would equally probably.

18:50

It's the same thing. It's that reflection. Right.

18:53

And the other thing is doing something about it, right?

18:56

Most people, you know, it's not just reflecting on it.

18:58

Surfacing at board is your action plan. Like what are the small little things you can do to start

19:02

shifting your frame for that? What else do I wish?

19:05

I wish I would've known that management.

19:08

I wish I had known that I was good at management.

19:11

So it's going to be like a twofer, but I wish I would've known how hard it was.

19:15

Like how challenged it's, it's almost, I wish I would've known

19:18

the dichotomy of leadership, which is it's freaking hard to walk.

19:23

We talk in the medic cast all about walking your talk.

19:27

I don't think people under. Walking, your talk is fricking challenging right under, under, and

19:34

you're not perfect, but you're, you're doing it under all circumstances.

19:37

You walk your talk. I walk my talk.

19:40

That's fricking hard. It's just challenging.

19:43

It requires courage. It's it's whatever.

19:46

But then it's worthwhile. I wish I had known how worthwhile it was, but how tough it was.

19:50

I don't know. I might've changed the trajectory of my leadership career if I didn't know.

19:55

Yeah. It's, it's almost like the humility thing.

19:59

I don't know what I would have become, but, I may have gone into consulting

20:03

earlier or something and skipped I, so, you know, we talk, you think.

20:09

You know, like a Teradata, I cut out early, but there, there was a

20:14

company where I was like, shrugging my forehead against the wall for 10 years.

20:18

Do you know what I'm saying? Right. I could have cut that coulda got had until like three or four and saved

20:25

myself a lot of like, you know, brain damage or something along the way.

20:29

What do you got? Similar Josh: along the way and like almost the opposite of.

20:36

Of where you're coming from in that I was overly confident that

20:41

management was going to be easy and I jumped way too early into it.

20:45

I jumped away too early into it for a couple of reasons.

20:49

One, I was just not ready to give up coding.

20:52

I still loved it. And I didn't realize that to do leadership.

20:56

Well, you had to stop the other thing and I didn't want to, so that already was.

21:02

Not only was I not like experienced at it yet.

21:05

I didn't want to do that. Part of the job was I wanted to keep writing code.

21:09

So there were a ton of mistakes I made early in the game where I,

21:15

you know, I just fumbled things. I

21:17

Bob: think when I, if I remember you talking about your story, you had a good

21:21

mentor, but I think you went early, right?

21:24

You went into leadership management early.

21:26

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And like my third job.

21:29

Yeah. Yeah, there's no magic time, but it's, it's, it's not for the, so

21:35

it's not for the faint of heart. It's one of the reasons why I'm getting pissed off lately

21:39

about people slamming managers. Right.

21:42

And I know there's tons and tons of bad leaders, bad managers in the

21:46

planet earth, but dammit, you got to tip your hat to these people who are

21:50

on the field of battle trying, right.

21:52

Trying to make a difference. And folks, folks marginalized them in slam in the agile community.

21:57

A lot of people just, just always are anti manager, right.

22:02

It's just get rid of them and fire them. And I, they, it annoys me.

22:06

I wish I would have known earlier how important.

22:13

Like your, your languages your words matter how you show up matters.

22:20

It's sort of like I thought, like in management it was, you know,

22:26

the technical stuff or something. Like, I, I grew up as a developer or detecting to leading teams that way, but

22:34

in soft skills, does it a disservice, but.

22:38

I wish I had known, you know, to be careful in how you articulate

22:42

things to be careful You know, in how people interpret it and D diverse

22:47

communities and things like that. Our language is becoming now, nowadays it's incredibly important to be caught,

22:54

not overly cautious, but careful, thoughtful intentional with your language.

22:59

And I, I wasn't, I mean, it's not that I was bad, but I, I

23:04

wasn't, I wasn't considerate of the crowd the way I should have.

23:08

I became much more considerate of it, but there were probably probably 15

23:14

years of leadership where I, I was, I was not really, I was hurting people.

23:19

I was insulting people and not intending to do.

23:22

But, but language, language matters.

23:25

How you show up matters your body language, you know, like

23:29

the nuance of leadership, the nuance of how you communicate.

23:33

I think, I don't think I got that so much. She was like, here's a PowerPoint slide.

23:37

Here's a goals. And you know, who's, here's an OKR, blah, blah, blah.

23:41

Get it done. Go right. Like Newt Rockne kind of thing or something.

23:46

That was my vision. That probably went back to the army.

23:51

Oh yeah. Yeah. There's, I'm sure there was some military sort of influence there of

23:55

how leaders like showed up there.

23:58

but what are you guys? Josh: Yeah, I, I, I think it was spoiled in that aspect with

24:04

the coaches I had in college. That was a key to who they were and who we were, and it was really

24:11

kind of drilled into us, but. Along the way where I've struggled, where I did struggle.

24:18

I don't do any more. Cause I've, I've learned my lesson was as we acquired or worked

24:26

with, teams that were global.

24:30

I, I didn't understand early enough that their culture is their culture

24:36

and you cannot ask them to operate.

24:40

Like we do on our culture. And so there were teams I had in Malaysia and China that I was trying

24:48

to force them into working in the way we worked here in the U S and

24:52

that's not, that's not fair to them.

24:54

And then teams in Eastern Europe, same thing.

24:58

Yeah. I tried to ask to work them the way that we do, and that's just not respectful.

25:03

It's not realistic. So I, I fumbled a few things and had to learn and just.

25:09

I accept and respect the cultures that were in place and understand that I

25:15

needed to do a better job of tweaking, how we work with them and how we

25:20

support them and what we ask of them, because that really was the problem.

25:24

And everybody I worked with was doing their darndest, but it was asking them to

25:30

jump over a mountain and it just wasn't.

25:33

Bob: I think as you were talking, I was thinking the

25:36

same thing in a different way. The same thing for me was, was change.

25:40

I wish I would've known earlier that you can't change people.

25:46

Right. You just can't right. And I thought I could write and I, and I worked hard to change it.

25:52

I'm trying to think of when did I, when did that get through my hard head?

25:56

Within the last five years, So I have, you know, 40 years of working

26:01

or over 40 years twenty-five years of leadership 20 years of agile and

26:07

only in the last five years probably have I, I mean, I S I might've said.

26:13

But, but in my heart, like as a coach, I would go in and like, I'm Bob Galen.

26:17

Right. I can change you. Right. so in my head, I was like, I can change it.

26:22

Right. I just need to push the right buttons and figure out the

26:24

right magic words or whatever.

26:26

And I can, I can, I can make you do scrum or I can make you, right.

26:31

If you're in Eastern Europe, I can make you love collaboration and kumbaya

26:36

meetings with other developers and stuff. And, and it, it doesn't, it doesn't work.

26:40

Yeah. Not directly, not in a direct way.

26:44

And that's boy, I'll tell you the amount of like fire and brimstone and chaos.

26:50

I created in my wake right along the way.

26:54

And I mean, I did get, and I did affect people change.

26:59

The problem is it wasn't sticky change?

27:01

They, it was, they were changing. They were mirroring what was expected.

27:05

I wasn't changing people. And you know, I think a lot of people still have that.

27:09

I just did a calc class last week and it's one of those things that

27:13

I talked to people about and from a leadership point of view, and

27:17

almost everyone to a person is.

27:20

Is asking questions, like, how do I, how do I get people to adopt scrum?

27:24

Or how do I get people to do this? Or how do I get people to they're looking for this magical change elixir

27:30

and I burst her bubble and I'm like, you can't, and you can see this like

27:33

overarching sadness and all the, you know, and all the faces in zoom.

27:37

Yeah. It's like, but what do I do?

27:39

I'm like you don't.

27:41

Yeah. Right. And so I think, I think that's an epiphany or a transition.

27:47

But a lot of people should have not enough. People have

27:50

Josh: it. This can sound very flippant.

27:54

So know that I don't intend it this way, but I was talking with a group, you

28:00

know, a couple of weeks ago and they were working through a team that was struggling

28:06

and trying to figure out what to do.

28:10

And just as we talk through. I kind of blurted out.

28:15

So what we really need to do is figure out who we need to fire, right?

28:18

Because like, there's, there's something that's not working.

28:22

Right. And which, which piece of the puzzle is it.

28:26

And let's identify that and that's clearly the issue.

28:30

And then we need to replace that piece cause something's wrong with it.

28:33

And so, you know, throwing around words like that, that's.

28:40

Kind of heavyweight and to just say like, who do we need to fire?

28:42

You know, like that sounds pretty jerky, but in reality, you have a

28:46

bunch of unchangeable pieces and maybe the final piece for your puzzle

28:51

belongs with a different puzzle. It doesn't mean it's a bad puzzle piece.

28:55

It's just the wrong puzzle piece. And so then you have to switch it for both

29:00

Bob: parties to be happy. Absolutely. Well, the realization that you can't change people.

29:05

Right. They can change themselves. You can inspire them to change themselves, but I can't make someone do something.

29:12

and I'm still working. I still have to remind myself of that.

29:15

I've gotten so much better about that, but I wish I, I wish I would have

29:20

maybe just, just, even for myself, the other thing with me is, you know,

29:25

you get frustrated with yourself. It's like, I should have changed that either the other side or.

29:32

Realizing you're not, you can't change. People is giving you the freedom to not being accountable for

29:37

everything around you, right? Oh, I, I didn't change the culture the way it is.

29:42

Well, no one could have changed. So culture, so it's a little freeing a little bit, right?

29:49

It's a, it's a little, it's a little sort of treating yourself with some care.

29:53

You have something else. Josh: Welcome to our diversity and inclusion minute where Josh is embarrassed

29:59

because Bob is lapping him here.

30:02

So I'm just going to zip my lip and allow

30:04

Bob: Bob to have. So not really lapping, but a couple things, just did a calc class last week.

30:11

And I was really, I do, like I studied the people I asked them to do pre-work

30:16

and of 13 attendees and a captain at 12.

30:19

So I keep it small. so it was 13 attendees and eight of them were women and I was.

30:25

Yeah, that's exactly what I'm looking for.

30:27

Um, and that's not totally intentional.

30:30

I was lucky, but it's, I'm working at it and we also market absolutely

30:35

why I provide discounts and stuff. Yeah. But, you know, sometimes I look up and it's a very sort of diverse from a racial

30:42

point of view and I get very pleased. This one was, I was really any of that.

30:47

You said it was a freaking awesome class.

30:50

So this, you can see the diversity of leaders and, and these

30:53

are what eight women leaders.

30:56

So that was cool. what else?

30:58

I picked up another mentee. So agile Alliance, I've been really pushing on the agile

31:02

Alliance for people to join it. And, have you joined her?

31:06

I have, I don't have a mentor. So, and then they have a program called Agilent color

31:12

where you can go and volunteer. I have one minute.

31:15

And he's, he's wonderful. He's in Peru.

31:17

So just, I just like working with him, I like working with serious people.

31:22

Right. Who you could just tell in the dialogue there, they're just yearning.

31:26

I love to help people like that.

31:28

Right. And then I have, I have another one signed up, that we're going to work together.

31:32

So I've added a mentee. And then the third thing is one of the, attendees of the calc class

31:38

is active in the Seattle women in.

31:41

Group and she invited and I was talking about my daughter teaching the class.

31:44

So she avoided, she invited Rhiannon and I to do like a father daughter,

31:50

ask us anything about leadership. And I think that's kinda cool, but different perspectives.

31:54

and we're going to do that. I think in January or something like that.

31:58

So I, I keep trying to keep trying to do things.

32:02

Just keep the ball, moving down.

32:04

The what's the, give me the metaphor, Josh.

32:07

I mean the court, the field, the field, the field, keep moving, keep

32:11

matriculating the ball, the field.

32:14

Okay. So Josh: remember right now in your diversity inclusion, thoughts, be more like.

32:22

Josh was playing a little catch Bob: up, move, move the ball down the field.

32:26

Josh: If you listen to last episode, you might understand

32:30

why I've slowed down a bit, but that's going to get back on track.

32:34

Bob: It's it's all good. But you know what, though? We have this diversity actually.

32:38

Another person, the other woman I'm coaching.

32:41

She, and she was apologizing. I don't listen to the Medicare as much, but I listened to one and you guys

32:46

talk about diversity and it inspired me from a woman perspective cause I have

32:50

imposter syndrome and it was really thankfully you guys talked about that.

32:54

And so. Yeah, that's wonderful.

32:56

The fact that we're doing this right.

32:59

I agree. So you get credit for that too, right?

33:02

Where we don't know, like we're throwing a rock, everyone, medic casters, just

33:08

throw a rock in the pond and see what the ripples do back to the episode with that.

33:19

It's what I do. Josh: You know, the, the funny thing that keeps bouncing around in my head

33:36

is I feel like I should have learned. In high school with all my girlfriends that I tried to change.

33:43

And like, it just didn't work. Like how did I walk out of high school with the relationships that I had

33:47

thinking that I could change anybody

33:50

Bob: that's true. Even marriages and stuff.

33:52

Right? Yeah. People get. I mean, my w you know, if we have tongue-in-cheek Diane still, I'm

34:00

like, honey, you ain't going to jail.

34:02

Yeah. I'm pretty, I'm pretty solid where I'm at right now.

34:06

but we, we try, I was gonna S I was gonna say something about, like, I wish

34:14

I would've known how the frameworks, how bad the frameworks can be.

34:23

I mean, I've discovered that over time, but it would have

34:26

changed how I did things. If I, if I would've went scrum, when I first got exposed it, I

34:33

mean, I've been doing scrum for a long time, you know, 20 plus years.

34:37

So I've influenced people. It's not just I've been doing it.

34:40

I've done it in companies. I've done it with my teams.

34:42

I've done it as a co you know, I've done it to lots of organizations.

34:46

I wish I would've known how unimportant.

34:50

Some aspects of it are. And, and, and, you know, don't get caught up on it.

34:55

And it's the same thing with Kanban.

34:58

And it's the same thing with all of the scaling frameworks, just every

35:02

framework, dev ops, all of the fricking frameworks and, and mindset things.

35:08

I wish I would've known how little they mattered, how much

35:13

mindset mattered, still matters.

35:16

Right. Principal. Mindset getting to the essence of something.

35:21

And, and I w I wish that could have changed how I was operating externally.

35:26

I don't know if it would have changed how my writing is or something.

35:29

I mean, the people were still there's brick walls out there, and I still

35:34

throw stuff in brick walls all the time. Right.

35:36

So I don't know if it would have changed the world or change.

35:39

My writing or anything like that. But certainly for me personally, I think it would've, it would've

35:46

gotten me on, on essence. You know what I hope I'm making sense.

35:49

Like, like it's walk, getting to the essence of something is important.

35:54

And I, you know, I F and I fought, I fought for things too much fought, but

35:59

argued things that just don't matter. Right?

36:02

Yep. It's just, don't, I've done the same. I've done.

36:04

Does it matter? I'm trying to think of what else.

36:08

I want to squeeze. I want to squeeze as much juice for.

36:11

Okay. Well, I will Josh: reiterate while you work

36:14

Bob: on that juice. Yes. Jeez.

36:18

What's wrong with us? Medic casters, weird to such a team.

36:21

Aren't we, we just play off of each other.

36:24

So, so Josh: elegantly, yeah. Elegantly that's us elegantly for a member.

36:29

Don't just passively. Listen to what we're talking about.

36:33

Find the one thing in here that you.

36:35

I didn't know, you wish you knew and evaluate where you're at and maybe, maybe

36:43

there's still time, you know, and you can, you can save it and you can make

36:47

a difference sooner rather than later. And that will set you off in whatever direction you want to go.

36:52

So please take the time

36:54

Bob: to do that. My final wish I think is I wish I would've known Josh Anderson earlier.

37:05

I agree. Josh: I should've moved here sooner. Bob: Yeah.

37:07

Or, or in general, it's it's, you know, I was joking a little bit.

37:12

That was pretty apparent. Was it? Yeah, I know it's shocking.

37:15

but in general, the community, I wish, I wish I would have, like, there's, there's

37:19

wonderful people in this community. And so if I had a wish and we've talked about this, ask for help more frequently,

37:25

or I say, you don't know, reach out to us, reach out to other people.

37:30

I wish I would have reached out sooner because I would have accelerated

37:35

in some areas I think quicker.

37:37

Because generally, I mean, someone might say no every once in a while, but in

37:40

general, kind of, I can't I mean, I had a guy in Atlanta send me, out of the blue.

37:44

I know. He sent me something today.

37:47

And, he had like a question he's running a workshop or something.

37:50

I sent him back a reply and I think it like helped him a lot.

37:53

That's that's I do that because it's important to me to give back.

37:57

Right. He'll do that. You'll you do that?

38:01

There was a girl. I, there was, there was a lady, a girl lady in, in Eastern Europe.

38:07

That I comment on, I forget her name, but think, I think what's Lina.

38:13

Yeah. I just love her posts.

38:15

Yeah. And I try to, I try to give her some encouragement in my

38:19

comments to her post sometimes. And I, I think you have talked to her or something, she

38:24

reached out to you for coaching. And I just, I just think doing more of that earlier.

38:30

would have made me better.

38:33

It would've made the universe better.

38:35

Yup. Yeah. I've I, I mean, I've started that in the early days of the Medicus.

38:40

We didn't do a lot. We didn't do a lot of that.

38:43

I mean, w what we asked for was feedback, give you, give

38:45

us topics and things like that. When, when have we done the pivot, like we've done a community

38:51

diversity give back pivot. It's only been in the last five or less years or something like that.

38:57

Probably less than three years or something.

38:59

Yeah. I don't know what's happened. We've we've changed.

39:02

We've gotten older. We've seen exactly it.

39:05

We've reflected what we're saying and we've gotten feedback.

39:08

The other thing is, I think we've gotten some encouragement

39:10

by people like there's folks.

39:12

What is that darn tool that people discord, discord.

39:17

Yes. That people have. Well, you were doing the discourse, things, getting feedback and

39:21

stuff from people for awhile. There's some,

39:23

Josh: there's some good dialogues in there. The exciting thing that's happening in there right now.

39:28

Linked below is that there are like role specific channels

39:33

that people are talking about. It's like a scrum master discussion and product owner discussion.

39:39

Bob: I have to get on there sometimes I have just been, so I just not, it's

39:44

just another technology kicks my butt.

39:46

It just does. It just absolutely does.

39:50

And the name, you know what, by probably Josh: I've heard that if I sent it to you before.

39:56

Bob: Yeah. If it was called, like Charlie brown, I'd probably, you know, or cotton candy.

40:02

Oh, if it was cotton candy, I'd be all over it.

40:04

I would pay, I w you know, all right.

40:08

I did. I did. We, I think we squeezed enough juice and the casters it's reflection go

40:14

back and reflect, listen to what we've said, reflect on your own journeys

40:19

and start making some earlier pivots. Like I don't, don't get into that sunk cost crap.

40:26

Oh, I can't make a change. Right. Or I'll call or I'll put it off till next year or next speaking as me,

40:33

that turns into the next decade. Right.

40:35

And then you're, you know, it's a little, it's not late, but it's,

40:39

it's much later than the harder. It makes it much harder.

40:42

Right. So, really reflect and I wish I would have known.

40:47

The other thing is in your team. And your teams, you know, run your retro.

40:52

How about I wish I would've known what retrospective or I

40:56

wish I would have discovered. And what would we give a ton?

40:59

So it's, that's, that's start having a tsunami.

41:04

Whoa of reflection that is, out there.

41:07

Sounds powerful. All right. So from beautiful downtown, we're in few, quite a few quake.

41:13

Hyphen Rena I'm Bob Galen, Bob F and Galen,

41:17

Josh: Bob effin gala. And I'm Bob: Josh Anderson and Josh F and Anderson.

41:21

Yeah, baby shake. Josh: Oh, we gotta reach.

41:25

Oh, take care of y'all.