@brwngrldev - March, 2019
Hey! šWelcome to my first newsletter of the year. I can hardly believe itās been an entire year since Iāve moved to Amsterdam. So many things have happened. It feels more like an entire decade than just 12 months! Iāve had the chance to explore a few other countries in Europe, watch my girls continue to transform into young ladies, take walks with my husband, and much more.
I am unbelievably proud of us all for taking a chance and being willing to move half-way across the world. I have many thoughts about this whole experience so far, too many for this newsletterā¦a blog post is in the works ;-) In the meantime, here are a few pictures that highlight this rollercoaster of a year...
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Upcoming Engagements
Droidcon Italy, 2019Ā -Ā https://it.droidcon.com/2019/it/talks/606-talk-to-me-right
Droidcon Italy is Italyās most important Android event. The 2019 edition of Droidcon will bring together #android4everyone to celebrate the very best projects and learn from the very best specialists. I will be presenting my new talk for the year: āTalk to Me Right!ā. Itās an exploration of how we can evolve our communication skills while working in the technology space. Canāt wait to visit Italy for the first time!
And if youāre interested in becoming a more effective technical communicator, I encourage you to check out my latest course!
Books Iām Reading
The Checklist Manifesto -Ā https://amzn.to/2XMgz5u
Finally got to another book on my wishlist, The Checklist Manifesto. In it, surgeon and author, Atul Gawande, shares stories of how checklists are used in various industries to make a real difference. I was expecting to see examples of lots of checklists. Maybe instructions on how to craft the perfect checklist. This book is not that. Itās inspirational, itās emotional, itās telling!
I love the way he used very emotional stories to show the benefits of using checklists. It made me think of how I could incorporate more checklists into my own life. I now have a Weekly Action List that keeps me focused on my big goals for the week. I also keep a ToDo List as my backlog. Every Sunday, I go through the ToDo List and move items to the Weekly Action List as needed. This helps me not to feel overwhelmed. Do you have a similar strategy? Please share.Ā
Letās Talk Podcasts
I.T. Career Energizer - Learn to Evangelize Your Excellence...
Jen Bunk, a career coach for technical managers was interviewed in this episode. I really enjoyed her energy and practical advice. Self-promotion can feel icky and you probably wish everyone would just recognize your expertise without you having to say anything. It doesnāt work that way in the real world. You have to let people know what you do and why you deserve a promotion, raise, opportunity, etc. Jenās story about gaining tenure really touched me; never assume your colleagues know what youāre doing. Give this one a listen!
Voxgig Newsletter -Ā Tips for delivering an amazing technical presentation
Ok, so this one isnāt a podcast, but I really enjoyed watching this interview. It was less than 20 minutes, but several points resonated with me.Ā David Chappell talked about the Three āIās of giving a technical talk: Information, Insight, and Inspiration. Itās something that I try to do in all of my talks and having it encapsulated this way made it more concrete for me as to why it works. My favorite quote of this interview was, "Speaking is theater!ā I šÆagree with this. I tell people this every time they ask me for speaking tips. Make it fun, put on a show, but still share information. I hope you enjoy this chat as much as I did.
Talking KotlinĀ - Adopting Kotlin and Functional Programming
In this episode, Hadi talks with Shelby Cohen from Intuit about the adoption of Kotlin on the server-side and functional programming. The idea of having a group of folks meet across the company to learn Kotlin together is really appealing to me. Thatās one potentially nice thing about larger companies, the ability to find people across the org who are eager to experiment and learn something new.
Somewhat related, Iāve started āFlutter Fridaysā at my current company. I live-code on a Flutter task for two hours over Zoom. Itās really nice, well, at least for me ;-) I hope that eventually, more folks will drop in as I think itās fun to just hang out and code without a real agenda. Will keep you posted on the results in an upcoming newsletter.
Until next time, thanks for reading!
"My mission in life is not merely to survive, but to thrive; and to do so with some passion, some compassion, some humor, and some style.ā
Ā - Maya Angelou
Blog:Ā http://www.adavis.info
Twitter:Ā https://twitter.com/brwngrldev
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