181: Normalcy Theater with Aaron Aldrich

02:04 - Aaron’s Superpower: Relating to people on any level because he has so many hobbies!

• Useful in DevRel
• Ending Up in Unexpected Places
• Trying New Things and Nerding Out

06:42 - Everything Has a Technical Aspect

• Music vs Computer Programming
• Computer Systems as Sociotechnical Systems

10:37 - Connecting High-Performing Resilient Teams

• Common Ground Within Teams
• Recovering From Failure
• Failover Conf by Gremlin

14:14 - Implementing Purposeful/Intentional Communication

• Team vs Individual Work
• Ken Mugrage - Keynote Speaker | Everything I need to know about DevOps I learned in The Marines
• Turn the Ship Around!: A True Story of Turning Followers into Leaders by L. David Marquet

17:55 - Highlights from Failover Conf - (Videos not available)

• Heidi Waterhouse
• Honeycomb

19:45 - How did an actual virtual conference go since COVID-19?

• Slack Implementation
  • Bots
  • #Hallway-track channel
  • Each Talk Had Its’ Own Q&A Channel
• Challenges
  • People Interaction
  • Breaktime
  • Technical Difficulties
• Zoom Chat After the Conference
• Deserted Island DevOps

26:27 - The Impact of Having ADHD

• Advanced Forms of Coping Mechanisms
• Quality Time
• Struggling with ADHD During COVID-19
• Working From Home and Being Thrown Into Remote Work
• Juggling Meetings
• Maintaining Comradery

39:43 - Normalcy Theater: Maintaining a Sense That Everything is Fine (When It’s NOT.)

• Grief and Loss is Happening on a Global Level
• J. Paul Reed
  • Shed Load
  • Sacrificing Thoroughness: we are ALL overloaded
  • Recruiting Resources
  • Shifting Work and Time
• Showing Others Grace and Empathy

Reflections:

John: The idea of a software team plays at software just like a music group plays at instruments. (Twitter thread)

Carina: Everything has technical and human skills aspects.

Aaron: It’s okay to not be getting things done right now and to be taking the time that we need to take care of ourselves.

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Special Guest: Aaron Aldrich.

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