Author

About the Author
Michaela is passionate about making the life of developers and engineers better. She hosts the SE Unlocked podcasts and also researches and helps to make software engineering processes and tools better. She writes about her work on https://www.michaelagreiler.com.

Episode 21: Inside Doist – The Bootstrapped Market Leader

June 23, 2020 michaela Company Culture, Entrepreneurship, Hiring, Productivity, Remote Work 00:50:12

In this episode, I talk to  Amir Salihefendić, CEO and Founder of Doist,  the company behind the widely successful productivity app ToDoist. Amir shares with me his entrepreneurial journey and talks with me about the company and engineering values lived at Doist.

We talk about:

  • bootstrapping from idea to market leader, 
  • how asynchronous communication helps create better products,
  • why he believes in the vitality of recharging,
  • and how to get a job at the remote-first company Doist.
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Episode 20: Fundamentally Changing How We Develop Software

June 9, 2020 michaela DevOps, Entrepreneurship, Monitoring, Open Source, Productivity, Startup 00:45:04

In this episode, I talk to Tudor Gîrba, CEO and co-founder of Feenk, a software consultancy. Over the last 10 years, Tudor researched new ways to develop software – called moldable development. In this interview, I did deep to understand what that exactly means, and how he started to work on a novel IDE that enables moldable developments. 

We talk about:

  • how reading code slows down software productivity,
  • building developer tools,
  • starting your own software company,
  • transitioning from consultancy to product company,
  • and applied research.
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Episode 19: Checking the Disability Box at Apple Changed My Life

May 26, 2020 michaela Company Culture, Hiring, Remote Work, Women in Tech 00:58:28

This episode is part 2 of my interview with Cher. In this part, we deep-dive into her interview experience at Apple and how she worked her way up to a Staff engineering position.

We talk about:

  • the hiring process at Apple
  • the tasks and responsibilities of a Staff engineer
  • mental health, and bipolar disorder
  • and how the “disability” box can be a life-changer when it comes to getting accommodations for your special needs.
 
Check-out also part 1 of this interview, in which Cher talks about how she overcame poverty and hardship. 
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Episode 18: From Hardship to a Staff Engineering Position at Apple

May 12, 2020 michaela Company Culture, Hiring, Women in Tech 00:27:17

In this special episode, I talk to Cher. Cher shares her inspirational story about she overcame hardship and poverty, and worked her way up to now be a staff engineer at Apple. 

Cher has incredible strength in her, and bravely shares her struggles dealing with mental health issues publicly. 

She also regularly reminds people that they belong in tech independent of their education or background. 

I am impressed by how she openly shares her vulnerabilities and encourages and lifts up others. 

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Episode 17 Why we hate to read code Trisha Gee

April 28, 2020 michaela Company Culture, Hiring, Remote Work, Women in Tech 00:48:41

In this episode, I talk to Trisha Gee, who is the Lead of the Java Developer Advocacy Team at JetBrain. She is an expert for Java high-performance systems, and developed software for a variety of industries, such as finance or manufacturing.

We talk about:

  • how she got started in tech, 
  • why it’s harder to read than write code,
  • how it is to work at JetBrains,
  • her hiring experiences,
  • and how she overcame imposter syndrome and started to feel confident with her competences.
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Episode 16: Running A Successful Dev Shop with Martin Gratzer

April 14, 2020 michaela Company Culture, Entrepreneurship, Remote Work, Startup 00:56:55

In this episode, I talk to Martin Gratzer, CEO, and founder of Topmind. Topmind is a successful boutique dev shop in the heart of Carinthia in Austria. Martin shares with me, how he managed to build a striving development agency far way from Silicon Valey and other tech hot spots.

We talk about:

  • why he decided to start his own company, 
  • what helped him get started on his entrepreneurial journey,
  • how he managed to be successful by focusing on a niche,
  • what he advises others that want to freelance or build up the dev shop,
  • and behind the scenes info on what it means to develop software as an agency. 
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Episode 15: How to Succeed in Building Developer Tooling with Peter Pezaris

March 31, 2020 michaela Company Culture, DevOps, Open Source, Productivity, Remote Work 00:57:47

In this episode, I talk to Peter Pezaris. Peter is the CEO and co-founder of a start-up called CodeStream. What’s interesting about Peter’s story is that CodeStream isn’t his first startup. CodeStream is one of the many companies Peter built. So, in this interview, we talk about his 25 years-long journey building tech startups and what he has learned along the way.

We talk about:

  • how he started his journey as a founder,
  • which technology changes he went through throughout the different tech start-ups,
  • the tech stack and architecture of the developer collaboration software CodeStream,
  • how he was able to build a team that stuck with him through four different startups,
  • and his advice for first-time founders. 
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Episode 14: What developers should know about security with Troy Hunt

March 17, 2020 michaela DevOps, Entrepreneurship, Startup 00:58:14

In this episode, I talk to Troy Hunt, a leading security expert. Troy is a successful Pluralsight author and runs security workshops all around the world. He also is person behind the popular web haveIbeenPwned, which allows everybody to check whether their data has been exposed in a data breach.

In this episode, we talk about:

  • how to prevent data breaches,
  • what software engineers have to know about the security and software vulnerabilities,
  • how to take your career in your own hands and
  • how he started to teach security to millions of developers worldwide.
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Episode 13: Bad Tests Are Worse Than Product Issues with Dan Abramov

March 3, 2020 michaela Company Culture, Hiring, Open Source 01:04:16

In this episode, I talk to Dan Abramov. Dan is a developer at Facebook, working on the popular JavaScript framework React. Dan is also one of the most well-known person in the whole front-end developer scene and recently started working on his new side-project JustJavaScript.

We talk about:

  • how he got a job at Facebook,
  • his interview tips for getting into Facebook
  • the development mentality and the development practices at Facebook,
  • and his new project JustJavaScript that helps intermediate developers to become JavaScript experts. 
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Episode 12: Starting a Profitable Business in Six Weeks with Courtland Allen

February 18, 2020 michaela Startup 00:48:35

In this episode, I talk to Courtland Allen, the founder, and chief-indie hacker of the Indie Hacker community. After many years of trial and error, Courtland launched the widely successful indie hacker community and the indie hacker podcast.

We talk about:

  • how he managed to build a lively community from the scratch
  • his tips for first-time founders
  • why he wanted to code as little as possible, and still coded as much as possible
  • his four-phase success plan for kick-starting a profitable community-based business.
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