A Geek Leader Podcast - inspiring technical and creative leaders around the world

As CISO for Webroot , Gary Hayslip advises executive leadership on protecting critical information resources and oversees enterprise cyber-security strategy. His mission includes creating a “risk aware” culture that places a high value on securing and protecting customer information entrusted to Webroot. Hayslip’s career in the fields of enterprise information security and network security spans m...

Today on the show I have Marin Wolfe (Marty). Marty is a systems engineer, creator of new solutions and innovations, a leader and motivator of the best and brightest, and focused on delivering solutions to the most complex challenges and supporting key goals. Marty is an IBM Distinguished Engineer and CTO, a technical executive of which there are only 600 across IBM’s entire global enterprise. Mar...

Today on the show we have Heather Wilde.  She was the eighth employee of Evernote, where she oversaw the company’s growth from thousands to 100 million customers. She’s published popular video games, trained Fortune 500 brands, advised hundreds of startups, and managed some major nonprofit programs. Now, as a fractional CTO through her own company ROCeteer , her award-winning work keep...

I heard a story on the Accidental Creative Podcast once about pruning grapes in a vineyard.  Todd said that many times healthy vines that are bearing good fruit need to be pruned off.  The reason is that the vine cannot grow new, more productive branches until some of the other branches are pruned.  So cutting out good and fruit-bearing branches may be necessary in order for the vine to increase i...

About Francesca Francesca Gino is an award-winning researcher and the Tandon Family Professor of Business Administration in the  Negotiation, Organizations & Markets Unit  at Harvard Business School. She is also affiliated with the  Program on Negotiation  at Harvard Law School, the  Mind, Brain, Behavior Initiative  at Harvard, and the Behavioral Insight Group at Harvard Kennedy School. Her c...

About Patty Patty Hatter is a multiple award-winning technology, business and operations leader who drives digital transformation and growth for global companies. Patty currently advises early stage technology companies, focused on key technologies such as cybersecurity, cloud infrastructure, and blockchain-enabled enterprise applications. She also serves on the Board of Directors for Barrick Gold...

No matter how good you are, at some point in time, you will fail.  It’s inevitable. Failure is not a problem, its promise.  How we respond to failure is crucial to how we is the most important part of failing.  It’s not the failure that stops us, it’s the inability to learn and move forward that stops us. I’ve failed at many projects, on tests in school, at sports and about...

Today on the show I’m honored to have Michelle Dennedy, VP and Chief Privacy Officer at Cisco Systems.   About Michelle Dennedy Michelle Finneran Dennedy is Vice President and Chief Privacy Officer at Cisco, where she works to raise awareness and create tools that promote privacy, quality, respect, trust, and asset-level possibilities for data. She is a unique visionary in the field of...

Last week I was honored to have Tom Rath on the show to talk about some of his books and how they impact leaders. Today I want talk about some of the take aways that I had from Tom’s books and how they have impacted my life. Eat Move Sleep Walking Meetings 10,000 steps Standing no sugar in coffee cut out fruit juices cut down on bread SLEEP!!!! Are You Fully Charged? Work in bursts Pomadora...

Today on the show we have Kevin Griffin, owner, trainer and consultant at Swift Kick.  Kevin was gracious enough to have me on his show, the Swift Kick Show a few months back.  Here’s a link to that episode . As a software professional with over ten years of experience, Kevin Griffin has had the fantastic opportunity to work with a variety of industries ranging from Military to Health Care t...

I’m honored to have multiple time #1 New York Times best selling author Tom Rath on the show today.  At one point, prior to writing best selling non-fiction books, Tom was a technical project manager.  He offers great insight into his life and work during this interview.  We talk about ways to increase health, well-being and happiness in general. We discuss focusing on your strengths and Tom...

Today on the show we’ve got Kahlia Braswell, executive director of INTech Camps for girls.  We talked mostly about INTech Camps and diversity in the technology fields.  Kahlia mentioned the NC WIT as a resource for writing job descriptions  and more. About Khalia Khalia Braswell received her first computer in the 4th grade and was instantly hooked. As a result of her early interest in tech,...

About Dave Dave Bittner is the producer and host of the CyberWire podcast, a top-rated daily cyber security news program produced in Baltimore. He’s been tinkering with electronics practically his whole life, cobbling together a computer system to dial in to pre-internet BBS systems at the age of ten with the money he saved from his paper route. After college (University of Maryland, Radio TV and...

Today on the show we have Alan Stevens.  I heard Alan speak at a local conference on leadership many years ago and he is one of the people that first sparked my interest in leadership.  I was honored to have him on the show.   Alan is an advocate of open spaces and today we talked about how to get fired… that’s right. About Alan Stevens Alan Stevens is a passionate software developer w...

Joe Topinka, a career CIO, is a dynamic author, speaker, and coach and a three-time CIO-of-the-year award winner. He has over 35 years of success leading IT organizations and driving meaningful business results in the process. His game-changing IT Business Partner Program bridges the chasm between business stakeholders and IT organizations. Joe is a frequent keynote speaker on this subject where h...

What’s your Plan for______?   I decided to do another short solo show for those of you that might have missed the earlier format of A Geek Leader shows.  This is a quick tip that I picked up from a parenting course.  Now before you rule out using parenting techniques at work, let me confess and say that I use them all the time… and they work.  This one is is called “What&#82...

Today we have Kent C. Dodds on the show.  He and I talked about lots of things including how he got started developing software and some of his early work in automation.  We talked about some of his mistakes and why its important to share your mistakes so that others can learn from them.  We talked about giving back to the community, teaching to learn and many more topics. This is a fantastic conv...

Today on the podcast we’ve go Jay Harris.  I met jay a few years back at a conference.  I’ve heard Jay speak several times and thought he would be a good guest for the show and he did not disappoint.  He came with good topics and the ideas of celebrating our own expertise as a well to improve overall mental health and confidence in our own abilities.  This is a must listen to show for...

Scott Drake – VP of Technology Scott Drake is on a mission to help great technologists become great leaders. His 20-year career includes stops at Microsoft in Redmond, Wash., at startups in Silicon Valley, and he is currently the Vice President of Technology for a medical education company in his hometown of Louisville, Ky. He is the author of “ The Programmer Hiring Playbook: A Crash...

Derek Doepker is a 7 time bestselling author and consultant on leadership, personal development, and entrepreneurship. His team at Influencing Millions helps companies improve their sales, increase employee retention, and improve performance by teaching principles of behavior change, habit development, and influential communication. You can learn more at  http://influencingmillions.com  and  http:...

Today on the show have Andrew May with a cameo from the one and only Brad Miller .  Andrew May, originally from Phoenix, AZ, started in computing when he was twelve years old, writing windows applications to assist in quick email responses. Throughout his scholastic endeavors, he continued to focus on computing; moving from desktop applications to web applications. Andrew attended Arizona State Un...

Today on the show we’ve got Jeff Roberts.  Jeff  has more than 20 years of experience leading Information Technology for top financial services and real estate firms.  Since 2015 he has served as the first-ever Chief Information Officer of HFF (NYSE: HF), a commercial real estate capital intermediary, where he is leading a digital transformation and technology platform upgrade.  Prior to joi...

Today on the show we have Arthur Doler. Arthur (or Art, take your pick) has been a software engineer for 14 years and has worked on things as exciting as analysis software for casinos and things as boring as banking websites. He is an advocate for talking openly about mental health and psychology in the technical world, and he spends a lot of time thinking about how we program and why we program,...

Today on the show we have Tom Cooper .  I met Tom a few years ago while we were both speaking at a conference. Tom and I served on the board of advisors for the Interface Security Conference in Charlotte, NC last year.  During this chat, Tom and I discuss the 4 levels of thinking as a geek leader. Tom has put together some special resources, just for A Geek Leader listeners.  Check them out at  br...

Today on the show I have Daniel Argandona, Managing Director for Fortalice Solutions, LLC .  Fortalice is a boutique, white glove, cyber security services firm. In this episode we talk about Dan’s journey through his career and how he got started into the cyber security and eventually found himself as the managing director for a cyber security firm in Washington D.C. While talking today, we...