Up next in 10
Rockin’ The Code World with dotNetDave ft. Robert Bogue - Ep. 86
14K views
Oct 30, 2023
Join us on August 5 with David McCarter & Robert Bogue for the next episode of Rockin' The Code World with dotNetDave - a weekly show to learn & live Q&A focused on .NET and other programming technologies. AGENDA • Introduction • Imposter Syndrome • Wrap up GUEST SPEAKER Robert Bogue has led change projects for three decades. As a recovering technologist, he's changed the way people work as he changed technology. He's the author of 28 books and has been a Microsoft MVP for 19 years. His work has transformed corporations, government, and quasi-government organizations. It's not about the technology, but he leverages his strength in technology and human systems to create change that is sustainable and transformative for organizations of all sizes and shapes. C# Corner - Community of Software and Data Developers https://www.c-sharpcorner.com #CSharpCorner #rockinthecodeworld #live #dotnet
View Video Transcript
0:30
Thank you
0:59
Thank you
1:29
We'll be right back
1:59
Welcome, geeks, to another exciting episode of Rock of the Cold World with Donet Dave
2:08
I'm David McCarter. I'm glad you're all here. How's your week been
2:15
Mine's been okay. I guess I'm not feeling all that awesome today
2:19
but this is a really important show that I arranged with my guest, Robert Bogue
2:25
just to tell you a little bit about why I asked Robert to come back on the show
2:31
This is the second time he's been on the show. And, you know, since I'm looking for a job
2:39
I'm really feeling imposter syndrome a lot this time. I experience bouts of imposter syndrome just like a lot of other people do
2:50
especially software engineers. But this time it's kind of hitting me really hard
2:55
And it's been difficult to deal with. And so I thought, who can I invite on the show to talk about this
3:02
I thought of Robert and here he is. So I hope you join
3:07
I hope you ask questions. Please start submitting your questions now. If you do, please also let us know what country you're coming from
3:20
Looks like my screen share is frozen. So let's see if it works. I'm having some weird screen share issues with StreamYard today
3:30
But anyway, please ask your questions now so we can get them answered with Robert because he's the expert in this subject
3:38
And I'm going to be asking him questions. But, you know, this is really your show
3:42
So you need to ask questions. So start submitting them now. I'll get them answered as fast as I can
3:49
And also, before I start the show, I want to give a shout out to everybody in Hawaii right now dealing with their biggest natural disaster ever
4:03
That happened a couple of days ago where a fire ripped through one of the islands there and wiped out an entire town
4:12
This morning, the death toll is over 80, I think. and one town is completely gone, which is just really sad
4:22
So if you can help out in some way, either by being there physically
4:29
or sending money to the Red Cross or anything, please do because our fellow Americans
4:36
and fellow humans need your help and this is the way you can help
4:39
So I hope you do that. All right, let's get started with the show
4:46
I want to announce this is my last show of this month because I will be going to Denmark at the end of the month
4:53
I'm really super, super excited about going to Denmark. This is my very first time in Denmark
4:59
Actually, my very first time speaking in Europe. Actually, being in Europe
5:04
I mean, besides airports, it really don't count. I've never really been to Europe, and I've been trying to get there for a really long time
5:11
And so finally, the brand new Copenhagen Developers Festival picked me up and I'll be speaking on August 30th
5:20
And I'll be doing my code performance talk. I've just been doing my last benchmarking last night
5:27
So in this talk, if you're in the area, you're going to come to the conference
5:32
This talk, I'm going to be showing for the very first time in public performance metrics from .NET 8
5:38
and I'm going to compare them to the last long-term support done at six
5:43
And so you definitely want to come to this session. And if they put it up afterwards, I hope you watch it
5:52
because I'm going to be showing some really important information about .NET 8
5:56
You know, most things in .NET 8 has sped up. Some things haven't, and I'll be sharing those also in this session
6:04
Some things have actually slowed down a little bit. I'm not super worried about that right now because this is still a preview version, but I just did final benchmarks because they released the latest version of the SDK this week
6:18
And so I've been rerunning all my benchmarks, which takes a very, very long time
6:23
So anyway, if you're in the area, I hope you come see me
6:27
Come if you if you are there, please stop by and say hi, shake my hand
6:33
And I want to get to know people from that area. I'm going to be doing touristy things
6:38
And so if you have any suggestions what I should be doing in Copenhagen the couple of days before the conference starts, please let me know
6:46
Email me or tweet at me and I'll try to put in my list
6:52
I heard they have like a mini Disneyland. I'm thinking about going to that
6:56
We'll see. I want to promote my latest book, which is Rock Your Career, Surviving the Technical Interview
7:05
It's got a lot more pages than the last version did. I spent a bunch of months updating this version
7:13
including adding information about how to utilize ChatGPT to enhance your resume and things like that
7:21
So I hope you go pick up a copy. If you looking for a new position or you just want to get some inspiration about your career you can pick up the book too So hope you do that Also at the beginning of the month
7:35
I've released brand new versions of my Spargin OSS libraries and NuGet packages
7:43
And so I hope you go check those out. Spargin is all the common code I've been writing since .NET 2
7:49
and I'm constantly working on it. Actually, as soon as I released it
7:53
I started working on the next one. And so I hope you go check it out
7:57
And if you like it, let me know. And if you want anything added to it, either let me know or just do a pull request and I'll try to get into the package as quick as I can
8:09
Also with that, I released a brand new version of my Spargen dev tool, which allows you to do two things
8:18
It cleans out all the cached and temporary files that Visual Studio, SQL Server, and other programs leave laying around on your computer, which actually can cause issues with debugging and things like that
8:31
So it does that. The feature I use the most is the backup feature, which automatically scans your entire system for source code and quickly backs it up
8:41
I use the turbo mode every single day, multiple times a day, because I've lost code because of my hard drive or source control repositories clobbering it or something
8:55
And I hate losing work I've done. And so Spargin, the dev tool really saves me
9:02
It's already saved me since I released this new version. So I hope you go check it out
9:09
All right. Things are getting close to the .NET 8 release. And so this week, .NET has released the, I think they said the final preview of .NET 8
9:22
And also a new version of Visual Studio 2022 preview, along with a lot of other things
9:29
So Visual Studio is getting a lot of new features to help you with productivity
9:35
I haven't checked them all out yet. but it seems like they're working really hard
9:39
on boosting our productivity in Visual Studio. And, you know, hopefully this preview release
9:45
will be pretty good. I'm going to look at the benchmark numbers later today
9:50
So keep on top of .NET 8. Like I said, .NET 8 overall is a lot more performant
9:57
than .NET 6 and .NET 7. So if your team is one of the older versions
10:02
I definitely would recommend getting into .NET 8 later this year, just for the speed improvements
10:08
alone. All right. I want to welcome my guest, Robert Bogue. Robert has led projects for nearly
10:15
three decades or over three decades. As a recovering technologist, he's changed the way
10:20
people work as he changed the technology. He's author of 28 books and has been a Microsoft MVP
10:28
for 20 years. His work has transformed corporations, governments, quasi-government organizations. It's not about the technology, but he leverages his strength in technology and human
10:43
systems to create change that is sustainable, transformative, I'm not pronouncing it right
10:50
for organizations of all sizes and shapes. Welcome, Robert. Thanks, Dave. Thanks for having me back
10:57
yeah that's a uh my tongue got tied doing your yeah i don't i'm not exactly sure who wrote that
11:04
but i think we try to make it hard for people hey you know i know we're supposed to talk about
11:11
imposter syndrome i know we'll do that but um you mentioned what's going on in maui yeah um and i
11:18
think it actually you know is an opportunity for us to kind of reflect on it but also uh it has a
11:23
strange tie-in to imposter syndrome. So for those, you know, you mentioned that the death toll now is
11:29
tragically over 80. And, you know, Maui was really very unprepared for this
11:37
Yes. Yeah. But in addition, so, so you have the folks who are there and who are directly impacted
11:43
and then you have the folks who are secondarily impacted. And this is my third conversation this
11:49
week with somebody who felt some sort of a connection with it, who, who, you know, either
11:55
they stayed there at one time and that's the place they went to vacation. It's a place they loved
11:59
And I think one of the things that we've got to recognize is not just for the people who live
12:04
there and are struggling through the aftermath. And I don't want to minimize that, but I think
12:09
there's a lot of people who struggle with, they feel like their memories have been taken away
12:16
wiped out right yeah that's that's always like the number one thing you hear people say i was
12:22
watching the news this morning and that's exactly what people are saying they're saying you know
12:26
my dad built this multi-generational house with his bare hands and now it's completely gone and
12:33
i've got nothing to leave to my my my children and you know yeah it's pretty devastating and
12:41
there's a tree that that i understand was brought over in 1850 a banyan tree yeah it's survived
12:48
but it's been damaged yeah damaged yeah you know and people and and so there's this kind of threat
12:53
to longevity there's this threat that underlies it that the things that we know aren't safe they
13:01
can be taken from us yeah at any moment you know any moment that's why i'm very diligent in scanning
13:09
things and putting them up in the cloud because it went the last time we had our really big fire
13:14
here in San Diego in 20 uh 20 uh 2007 you know again that was the number one people thing people
13:22
were upset about they lost all their pictures right and I'm going okay that's not going to
13:27
happen to me so I started this project which I'm still working I'm pretty much done now I think
13:32
uh but scanning all those pictures because yeah I don't want to lose that I anything else I'm
13:38
okay with, but yeah, losing family memories and things like that, especially with my kids
13:43
Yeah. That'd be devastating. Yeah. You know, your whole history gone. Right. And it's sort of disconnects you from your past
13:51
It does. It does. And it's, it's going to take them a long time to recover. And, you know
13:56
just, you know, some of the things I've been, you know, seeing on the news is like, you know
14:01
if I pronounce it right, Lahana, is that the main town? Yeah. Yeah. They, they only had a
14:08
a two-lane road one two-lane road in and out of that place and so right evacuating that place was
14:15
really really difficult and right so bad that some people were jumping into the ocean to
14:21
escape the flames right you know that's yeah dang yeah you know it's it's very hard yeah
14:29
so so yeah did like i said at the beginning of the show if you can help out in any way i hope
14:35
Hope you can, because, you know, it's going to take, like someone said on the news, it's
14:39
going to take them many, many years to, you know, to recover off of this, from this
14:44
So, so let me actually, so let me give you a suggestion for the, for the listeners, the
14:48
folks who are there to set a reminder on your phone or on your computer somewhere for a
14:53
month out and then reach out to people who you know who are directly impacted Yeah And i say that because what happens is right immediately right after an event everybody oh yeah busy and then
15:06
you remember and then you get you get busy and you forget so just set a reminder right now
15:10
one month out call one friend who was directly impacted and say hey i'm still thinking about you
15:15
yeah right then and that that that rebuilds some of that connection that we've lost and i i i do
15:22
want to say real quick is I'm really happy to see like some people, like I saw a report this morning
15:28
about a nurse practitioner, you know, on her own dime, you know, flew herself over there
15:38
and is trying to find burn victims to help out. Right. And that is incredible, especially because
15:45
you know, Hawaii is so far away from the mainland. It's not cheap to get there and it takes five
15:51
hours right right yeah and uh and so yeah i i have to hand it to the people who are able to go
16:00
and actually physically you know uh try to make a difference and help these people because they
16:06
really you know they really do need it right now yeah yeah and then then the further help about
16:12
getting their structures back and and all that that that'll come you know like you said in a
16:16
a month or so that'll probably start you know the insurance companies uh you know uh working on that
16:23
stuff but yeah well but even the relationships right like and i you know we're we're going to
16:28
talk about imposter syndrome uh and imposter syndrome is how we view each other how we view
16:33
ourselves in relation to others right um and even me right like so i would tell you that i feel like
16:41
I've got a pretty good handle on performance, but when you and I are talking, uh, no, yeah. Right
16:49
And, and I can look at that two ways, right? Like one way I'm going to be like, Nope, Dave is a God
16:53
he knows. Right. Or I can go, Hey, my buddy, Dave, if I call him with a question, he's going
16:59
to help me out. It's going to fill the gap in my knowledge. Right. And so, you know, do I have to
17:05
know every single thing about every little bit? No, no, no, you can't, there's no way you can
17:11
Right. Right. There's, there's nobody that can know everything. Right. But at some level, don't we like, don't we want that? Right. Sure
17:20
You want to be like, no, I know everything there is to know. This is not real
17:25
No, it's, you know, it's like, you know, I've, I had a couple of preliminary interviews this weekend and, and
17:33
and that's one of the things, you know, people say, you know
17:37
or are you more of a backend or front end or full stack
17:41
And, you know, I've already written an article saying there's no such thing as a full stack developer
17:46
But but, you know, I kind of tell them the story where, you know, over, you know, 13 years ago, I was you know, I was seeing that, you know, programming is getting to a point where you really can't know everything anymore
18:00
Right. And it's just too much. Right. Then then when I started, when you and I started and and when the dinosaurs roamed the earth
18:11
Back when we had punch cards and, but, you know, I tell them, I go, yeah, I had to decide, you know, do I want to be an expert, you know, in one area or mediocre at all areas
18:27
Right. And I chose to be more of an expert in the back end, you know, during that time
18:33
And I'm pretty much the same way. yeah and I so I chose a different route right like I chose to be a generalist I chose to
18:42
and what I say it'd be I get very incredibly narrow focus in certain areas right and and
18:52
what I mean by that is I'd be a generalist and there'd be a problem and then you know if it was
18:59
a perf problem I'd call you or there's a couple of other guys that I called as well different
19:02
networking things and different pieces right and then i would get really super deep knowledge in
19:07
this one little tiny area right um and then and and then i would be go be a generalist again and
19:14
and it's funny because you're like well what am i right because i i like if anybody anybody that's
19:21
watching the show now would like to talk about tcpip flags and what reset does versus a normal
19:28
closed sequence happy to have that conversation you're like that is the most obscure thing yeah
19:33
it is it absolutely is and and and it's something i know but so am i a generalist am i somebody who
19:41
doesn't know the tech where the semicolons go or there are there i'm not a specialist right and so
19:48
i i end up in this space too where you know i feel like an imposter when i go in places and i'll tell
19:57
you shared some of your story let me tell you something that happened to me back in January
20:01
so I own guns um I I I like guns um I think we should all have them right like so so none of
20:11
folks who are second amendment folks don't come chasing me down because they might right and by
20:17
the same and and and in the gun control people right like all everybody I'm all everybody just
20:22
I I want us to be responsible about it so we're doing a project on safe gun storage and we're
20:27
going to try and get everybody to lock their guns up that's all i want i'm not trying to take them
20:30
just make sure they're locked um so we get to be nssf the national sports shooting federations
20:36
guests at their shot show in las vegas 60 000 people 60 000 members of the firearm community
20:44
dang that's a lot and i'm walking the floor like i don't belong here yeah no yeah yeah and all of
20:53
sudden i moved from hey i know a fair amount about guns right like it's i grew up in the country we
20:58
we knew guns right but i was like i walked around with these people i'm like i don't know anything
21:04
right why why is this spring better than this spring right right there's springs
21:12
like somebody's gonna go no you really like this one's the one and and you know and
21:19
that was a struggle for me yeah like do i even belong here
21:25
um and so i think we all we all end up there right like we all end up in that space of
21:31
do i really belong here do i have what i need do do i have the right experience do i did i do the
21:37
right research yeah yeah and yeah and then you know imposter syndrome of course you know uh
21:45
you know falls in many areas not only work right but yeah like i have crippling imposter syndrome
21:53
for uh musician being a musician right and that's why i don't i don't play in a band i just feel
22:00
i've never been worthy enough to play in a band right yeah yeah i've played with bands i've played
22:05
at a sold-out show here in san diego but that's kind of a temporary kind of thing you know that's
22:10
a little different but you know and even even other pursuits i have like artwork and and things
22:17
like that like for example last year i decided to uh write kind of my first uh fiction story you know it a it a story about technology but it it uses these you know superhero like characters you know Inspector Cody you know and Captain Cookie and and
22:38
you know, these characters. And I went through a lot of agony, just deciding if I'm going to
22:45
release it, right. It was done. And I spent months rereading it over and over again, going
22:50
people are going to think i'm an idiot because you know i this is the first time you know i've
22:57
i've tried to publish something fictional right uh well pseudo fictional because my brother is a
23:03
fiction writer he that's what he does i mean he's a software engineer too but he puts out entire
23:08
books on on fiction and so i and i just went through a lot of anguish for that right and i
23:16
finally did it you know it felt good once i did it uh but yeah it's tough you know yeah well and
23:25
it's about our it's about our identity right it's about who do we see ourselves as right and and on
23:31
the one hand it's i don't see myself as a fiction writer yet i've not or or a musician i've not done
23:37
the i've not done the things i need to do i've never played till my fingers bled well i have but here
23:46
yesterday almost my fingers bled i was practicing yesterday and i was gonna oh that finger's gonna start bleeding anytime soon
23:55
but but there's some there's like this thing and you get these
23:59
magical um and i call it magical because they're not real no idea is that you've got to do this or you're not
24:06
you're not real right you don't have street cred unless you've you know done something right right and and and the funny thing is is like when we get it
24:17
we don't always accept it right so what i heard you say right you said hey i played for a sold
24:23
out show i was just a fill-in thing right but it was a sold out show here in san diego right and
24:29
so here's my thing at some point in our lives we probably said you know what if i ever play for
24:33
for a sold out show i'll have made it right yeah yeah and then you get there and you're like oh
24:40
yeah but me and i'm not like a real member of the band i was just a filling in for the guy
24:44
right like no no you you were there yeah i did it yeah yeah yeah that counts you get to cheat
24:52
that one is good yeah right yeah yeah but we don't accept it because it's hard for us to accept it
24:59
yeah our internal identity doesn't shift that easy right um and and and so you know we talk
25:08
about imposter syndrome and feeling like well they're gonna find out that i'm faking right
25:16
they're gonna figure it out they're gonna figure it out and um my wife and i were just talking
25:21
about this and she's afraid that i'm gonna finally figure her out we've been married for 10 years and she's gonna i'm gonna finally figure her out and realize that she's not as good as i think she
25:30
is and therefore i will choose to leave her to leave her right and i'm like i don't think i like
25:36
of all the people, I think I know you pretty well. Like I finished your sentences when you're like
25:40
Hey, do you remember that thing that we did those many years ago in that place? And I'm like
25:46
yes. And I tell her exactly what she's thinking about. Now think about that. She literally gives
25:50
me no clues, right? It was something we did at a time in a different place
25:57
Yeah. You know, and, and so, but I'm never going to figure her out the way she sees her
26:03
because it's not the way I see her. It's not real. And it's that insecurity
26:12
And I think we all have it, right? We all have it. It's in different places. And it's not, oh, I have insecurities
26:18
Therefore, I'm bad. No, you have insecurities. Therefore, you're human. Well, you know, to be honest
26:25
and I forgot to say this at the beginning of the show, is that I definitely don't like talking publicly
26:32
too much about personal things, especially personal issues like this one. And, um
26:39
you know, I was thinking, um, now I had a brain fart. I, you know, I was one thing I would say
26:45
I had a brain fart on that one. So I'll just continue with the other thing I was thinking
26:49
And that is, you know, um, Oh, I, I remember for, for actually the majority of my life
26:57
I always felt this thing dragging me down. Right. It, it literally felt like a boat anchor
27:04
on my ankle dragging me down and I couldn't get any higher in the, in the ocean because of this
27:13
anchor on my foot. Right. And I constantly felt this really bad. And, and in recent years
27:19
when I've started learning more about imposter syndrome and, and, and actually more people
27:25
talking about it gave me a kind of a license to not feel as bad, right? I mean, I still have it
27:32
I still grapple with it. I will for the rest of my life. But, you know, people talking about it more
27:41
especially in our industry, has helped me to start really thinking about it more, right
27:47
It's not a, you know, you don't stay in the closet as much anymore as we used to, right? We would
27:54
never talk about this stuff in the in the recent past right right right yeah let me so let me do
28:00
two things i'm going to talk so first i want to talk to you personally and then and then we'll talk to the guests okay so like pre-show we were talking about the fact you've got 17 mvp awards
28:09
now right here's the thing 99.9999 some infinite number of nines percent of the planet can't say
28:18
that. Right. Right. They can't. Right. And so when you go to that technical interview, when you
28:24
whatever, right. And you feel that insecurity and I get it, the imposter that whatever
28:29
but the reality is the reality, the markers, the truth, the history is 17 years and all the other
28:37
things that I don't want to list here, but right. I've done all these things. You know what? You
28:42
are qualified. You are in that spot. You are, you're there. And that's one of the things for
28:48
getting around imposter syndrome okay well what's the truth what's the ground state truth well i feel
28:53
x but it really is y right here's the thing right like so so i'm a pilot i don't get to fly much
29:01
but we were always taught look if your instruments say something that's right it doesn't actually
29:07
matter how you feel john f kennedy who flipped the plane like it doesn't matter your instruments
29:14
are always right cross check them right but but the instruments if all the instruments are saying
29:18
the same thing they're right and you're wrong right and and i feel that way about imposter
29:24
syndrome is how do we how do we when we get in front of that interview and you feel that twinge
29:29
because i feel too right um you feel that twinge and you're like but what is the truth what's the
29:37
ground state absolute truth what's the history what are the things i've done what are the pieces
29:42
Right. And go through the list. Now, by the way, that's that's the part for you
29:46
But as you have other people who are watching the show, listening to the show and are saying, yeah, but I don't have 17 MVP awards
29:53
I'm one of the you know, the other ninety nine point nine percent. And I'm like, yeah, cool
29:58
But what have you done? Right. do you have a degree or did you do some special project or right
30:04
Like what are the things that you've done? Because I know you have them, right
30:08
Everybody does. Everybody does. Now, are they as big as, as .NET Dave
30:13
No, maybe not, but you have them. And so when you feel that twinge
30:18
right. And I call it a twinge and maybe for other people, they experience it differently. But when you feel that twinge
30:22
you go, yeah, but what's ground state truth. Right. Yeah. You ever
30:27
you ever read a piece of code or you, you're stepping through it in the debugger and it goes one way and you're like no it has to go the
30:33
other way like why is it going that way step step step no it made a mistake right and you and you
30:41
read the statement it's for me it's normally a boolean statement like one of those 14 part
30:46
boolean statements and i'm like i don't i just don't get it but the ground state truth is well
30:53
whatever the whatever the code just did whatever the debugger said it went
30:57
it made that choice because that's the right choice i've got something wrong in what i think
31:03
right right the logic or actually how you perceive it right yeah it's and and mostly it's a variable
31:11
like it's a variable i didn't think could possibly be set to true that is and yeah yeah well you know
31:16
a new article I'm working on right now is basically geared around, you know
31:25
inspiring people to speak up in their job, you know, about, you know, technology, you know
31:31
about what things are seeing good or bad in the project and make sure you bring that up and say
31:37
something, you know, because, you know, I start off the article saying that if you don't say
31:42
something, nothing's going to change. Right. And that's just the way it works. And so
31:49
so I've been thinking a lot about, you know, this imposter syndrome while I've been writing it
31:55
because, you know, that does play a lot into it. Right. That's why a lot of us don't speak up in
32:00
meetings. We don't speak up, you know, we don't reach out like, like you, you were talking earlier
32:06
about, you know, when you, like, if you have a performance question, you'll reach out to me
32:11
right and and and that's the way it should be that's why networking is super important this
32:16
in in this job and um and but you know that's even hard for us to do right it's hard to reach
32:24
out to somebody and say oh i don't know this because then they might think you know that
32:29
you're not as good as you think you are i know yeah you know right right right yeah and i and i
32:34
get over that because i i realize how big and broad the the system is and i ask really stupid
32:40
questions of people all the time. And I'm like, well, you know, the only way to get to only way
32:45
to get wisdom and to get smarter is to ask stupid questions. So I'm going to get them all out now
32:50
Yeah. Yeah. That's, that's actually one time a long time ago when I was speaking at the university
32:55
and I think I was getting frustrated about people in the class, not asking questions or something
33:04
And I reached out to a longtime friend of mine who's got his own software company, Daniel Appleman
33:09
who wrote the API book, you know, back in the 90s for us developers
33:15
And I became friends with him and some of his family members
33:20
And for some reason, I was talking to him and he goes, Dave, you know what
33:25
There are no dumb questions. There's people too dumb to ask them, right
33:30
And I'm not sure if dumb is the greatest word to use there, but that's what he said
33:34
And that's what I started telling my students, right? This is your and this is what I do on the show, too
33:39
This is your class. Right. And and you will get more out of it if you ask questions
33:46
Right. Yeah. And don't feel bad that it might sound dumb or anything
33:51
And if you really feel that way, then just email it to me and I'll I'll just say it to everybody in the class
33:57
I won't use your name. But, you know, you have to ask questions, especially in this industry
34:03
right yeah yeah so so uh someone's happy was um helpful and pasted over the link that i just sent
34:10
to you uh about exit loyalty exit voice and loyalty and it's an older book it's it basically
34:16
says you've got three choices right you can leave you can talk right right um oh and loyalty is
34:24
actually how you mitigate that right the more loyal you are the more voice you use versus exit
34:29
right um you can also use loyalty as a as a buffer and you do neither hoping it'll get better
34:35
um but but you know that's those are the choices we have we can try and run away from it which is
34:42
never a good idea no to something is good running away is bad yeah it's not gonna be running away
34:47
is not gonna fix anything no just think like a bear is chasing you that's bad running to something
34:52
you like that's good right yeah um uh and and so we got to figure out you know if we've if we've
35:01
gone through three or four jobs and all of the management and all the other developers are idiots
35:05
um there's one constant in that and that's us right like we're the ones that are maybe we should
35:12
try and figure out what that is right um and not to say that you can't have three bad bosses in a
35:17
I'm not trying to say that, but, but, but you, you know, how do we take ownership for
35:23
the way that we, what we bring to the world and bring to others? Yeah. Yeah. And that's
35:28
you know, that kind of leads me into my first question for you is, you know, I, at least for me
35:35
I know, because this is a lot of work I've been doing for on myself recently is where did this
35:43
start, you know, how did it start, you know, because for me being, being a software engineer
35:49
I need to know why things happen, right? That's just the way I've always been. And, and I know
35:55
mine started in childhood, right? I know for sure that, and I know who did it or who contributed to
36:03
that. And so do you think most of this does start in childhood somehow? Yes. So first
36:12
Let me put the disclaimer in. I am not a professional. Yeah. Or a psychologist or anything else
36:17
All of my stuff is not to be used for any kind of behavioral health care. This is just two guys talking
36:22
Okay. Now that that's the other way. So here's the thing, right? Like I think imposter syndrome is human
36:27
I think it is a artifact of the way that we have this identity
36:33
And sometimes what we perceive from the world around us doesn't match our identity
36:38
Right. Right. When you're sitting in an interview and somebody is, is, you know, badgering you with these really detailed, obscure, weird questions and you're like, oh my gosh, how's come I don't remember that
36:49
Right. And, and, and, and you feel like, oh my gosh, I, I should know that because I'm the guy and do the thing and whatever
36:56
But then, but then if you take a step back from it, you know, nobody's going to know the answers to these questions except for the guy with the beanie and the little car on his head
37:06
Right? Like, this is stuff I look up. I don't know. Right? Yeah
37:12
And so I think it's our identity, whoever we think we are, a child, as an adult, and how
37:19
does that shift because the world around us doesn't reflect it to us
37:24
Right Right And the other thing with that is you know that something I been realizing like I kind of alluded to a little bit ago is that you know I going to be dealing with this for my entire life
37:37
Right. It's for me. I can't speak for everybody, but for me, it's never going to go away. Right
37:44
And so my job, just like with any other kind of mental thing, is I have to sit down and think of how to deal with it properly
37:54
right and and to like you were saying accept things you know the reality of things as per se
38:02
the the what i think things should be right like i should be i should be as great as guitarist as
38:08
joe perry from aerosmith right that that's not going to happen right right i'm not going to be
38:13
that person right i'm not that talented right um yeah i think it's at i i think managing our
38:22
expectations is is super important and also you know you say you're gonna deal with it i think we
38:27
all will deal with it right like totally you can't tell me that even somebody like elon musk i'll
38:34
pick on him just because we can pick on other people too right you can't tell me that at some
38:39
point in the last few years he hasn't gone oh man i don't know that i can do this right like i get
38:47
like i get he's like do do do when he goes to the media right but what's it like at night
38:52
what's it what's it like when you can hear the clock ticking yeah but he's all by himself in
38:59
his big mansion right right right um or in somebody else's big mansion in this case right
39:06
okay um but that but in those still dark moments i call them the still dark moments right they're
39:16
the moments when all of the distractions of the world, whatever they are, are gone. Maybe the
39:21
power's out, maybe the internet's out, you know, maybe everything is quiet and dark. And what do
39:29
you say to yourself? Yeah. How do you see yourself? Right. And that's, I think we all have to deal
39:35
with that. Yeah. Yeah. I definitely agree. I, like you said, I think all of us have it in some
39:40
degree, you know, and a lot of that, I guess, depending on what country you're in, you know
39:48
is some of it's caused by the society, right? Because, you know, if you don't sing like Beyonce
39:57
you just shouldn't sing, right? And that's silly, right? If you're not as great as Elon Musk
40:04
then you shouldn't be doing whatever you're doing, you know? And those are the things that I think we
40:10
all deal with. And a lot of people, you know, I would say don't ever deal with it. Right. And
40:17
and, and that becomes problematic in their own life and their own, to me, not only in their
40:24
career and our personal life also, right. It will hamper the whole thing if they don't
40:28
try to come to grips with it. Right. And so speaking up about coming to grips with it
40:35
Then now that we've talked about some about an imposter syndrome, just what are kind of the I mean, you've been saying some things, but kind of what are the kind of some key takeaways or key steps that people can do to, you know, what are your suggestions on how to start grappling with this or how to make it better
40:56
Well, I think so we've talked about ground state. We've talked about what's the what's the reality, what's the truth. Right. And that's where I start with folks
41:02
um we've talked a little bit we kind of touched on the idea of expectations
41:07
are the expectations that you have realistic um if we take a step back so an expectation is based
41:16
on a judgment right you've judged you should be able to you shouldn't be able to x versus y right
41:21
like you've built this expectation from a judgment and the thing is is is the judgment fair
41:28
right are you being are you being nice to yourself or are you being mean to yourself
41:34
right and and i think a lot of us uh are very mean to ourselves i think the internal voices
41:40
the voices we hear in our head are not kind at all and and how do we say you know what i don't
41:47
need that voice right and and and the voices that we the way that we talk to ourselves is really hard
41:53
because those are really formed in childhood by the people around us and what did they say
42:00
And then somewhere those voices become internal. It's not someone outside of you saying something
42:05
It's someone inside of you saying it. And because it's your voice, you believe it
42:09
I wouldn't lie to myself, right? But the thing is, we do lie to ourselves all the time
42:15
We judge ourselves harshly when it's not fair to judge ourselves harshly
42:21
Um, and so, you know, ground state, checking your expectations, looking at the way that you're judging yourself and asking yourself, is that fair? And, and, you know, you mentioned job interviews, so just contextualize it. They expect that I know this random piece of data, um, this random API or whatever it is
42:44
That doesn't mean that that is real. Right. That means that person thinks it's super important
42:52
Right. You know, here's so here's an example. So here's an example
42:58
So so so do you happen to know the transmit pin on a DB25 for RS232
43:08
I do have to look it up. It's two and receive is three and ground is seven
43:14
Right. And I'm never going to get rid of that. And it's totally useless in about 98 percent of my life
43:20
And I'm sorry, ninety nine point nine nine nine percent of my life. Right. Like I didn't I don't ever use that. Right. Right
43:26
For whatever reason, it's stuck in my memory. And if I'm the person doing the interview and I ask you that question and you're like, I don't why would I know that
43:35
I can look it up for you. But but I gave you an extreme example on purpose
43:41
Right. Because we get these kinds of questions all the time. We get the, you know, questions that you can't answer without a reference
43:49
And why would you try to? Right. Right. Right. So my wife is a, is a advanced practice nurse and we were talking about meds and she's like
43:58
I just don't remember the meds like I used to anymore. And, and I'm like, right
44:03
But you're going to look it up to make sure that you're a hundred percent right because
44:07
it's a med. They all have an app, right? They can look it up on, right? Yeah. Hercules
44:11
Right. Yeah. It's, it's, there's an app. You look it up. you verify it you go oh yeah that's exactly what i thought it was it does there's no
44:17
contraindications this is the thing i do but you do that because that's truth right and you don't
44:24
rely on memory but but we somehow have expected that in the technical interview or whatever in
44:31
other situations in life well we should just know right and it will never go away right it should
44:37
Right. They should never forget. And trust me, I would love to forget the pinouts of a DB25 RS232 connection. I could use that space for so much more useful information
44:47
Yeah. But we somehow built this idea that we have to remember it It has to be in memory and we have to know it We can I mean our brains aren that big right We can in any world keep all that information inside of our brain Right
45:09
Right. But we expect it. Right. And our brain is constantly deleting things so it can make room for
45:15
new things. Right. And so, you know, the, the, the one thing I've said, and I'm not sure because
45:21
of the expressions, people really understand what I'm saying. But, you know, I freely admit now that
45:27
I've forgotten more about software engineering than I know. Oh, yeah. Right. I've been in this
45:31
world long enough that I've forgotten much more than I know now. Right. Right. And because of the
45:37
world, our world changes so rapidly and so much than other maybe compared to some other industries
45:44
that we we can't know. We can't keep that in our brain. It's just impossible. Right. Well, and I
45:51
know you do a lot of writing. I do a lot of writing and I, I write, I write and I take notes and I do
45:55
those things so that when I forget, not when, that I can refresh myself quickly. Exactly. Yeah. That's
46:05
actually one of the reasons I write. And actually the last few years I've kind of turbocharged my
46:12
writing because I feel, I was even thinking this yesterday. I was, I feel I'm, I'm writing like
46:18
crazy right now because I'm afraid of what I do know leaving my brain. And I want to get it on
46:25
paper or a website or whatever before that happens so I can look it up. That's what my website's all
46:33
about is those kind of things. Since my website started in 1994, I've always tried to focus on
46:42
the things that are, is hard to find, right. And hard to remember. And so I don't want to do the
46:50
same article that everybody else does. Right. I want to do the hard stuff that is harder to find
46:56
So I want to make it easier to find when you do need it. Right. Right. Yeah. For me, it's always
47:01
what thing did I have to solve? And I know I'll forget how to solve it and all the details
47:06
intricate details. I've got one article on my site about Kerberos delegation because it took me
47:15
two weeks to work through all the details. And I'm like, oh my gosh, I'm writing it down
47:21
Exactly. Right. Because I never want to go through those two weeks again. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. That's exactly why I write for the most part, you know
47:30
is because of that, right? Because, you know, sometimes I feel, you know, our brains are just
47:38
Google links now, right? That's all it is, because we can't just keep as much information as we need
47:44
in there. So we have to make sure we know where to go Google it or Bing it. Sorry. Sorry, Microsoft
47:50
No, we're just going to become AI prompt engineers. It'll be fine
47:55
Yeah. Once AI comes out, we don't have to worry about anything. um so um so those some of the the things that uh the key steps of dealing with that is there any
48:08
other suggestions before i have to let you go about you know how where can people go to start
48:14
working on this if they feel this is um you know hampering them in their career or life
48:21
yeah so i don't i don't have a i don't have a great resource i can't point you to something i
48:26
can tell you this is stuff that we've had to figure out over time i know uh we've talked in
48:31
the past about the extinguished burnout uh stuff that was last show um and so you'll find some stuff
48:38
on imposter syndrome there um but but i don't have a great thing um i will say that the one of the
48:46
keys is to recognize your results right what have i done what what because that's the past it's not
48:57
changeable right like i've done these really cool things um and don't forget them um they may not
49:05
mean that you should be at a shot show in las vegas with 60 000 people i mean you're not an idiot
49:12
it right like they mean that you have value you've done things and stuff um and i think that's super
49:21
important yeah i i think it is too and and to highlight those things and and be proud of them
49:26
you know that's that's one thing that i have seen lacking from developers uh lately is it's it feels
49:34
to me like no one's proud anymore right it's just yeah i'm gonna bang it out and i'm gonna go home
49:40
and that's it. You know, I don't really, I don't care much, you know
49:44
but, you know, I'm proud of the accomplishments I've made. You know, I have to remember them
49:51
in key moments, but, you know, I'm proud I'm a patent inventor
49:55
I'm proud, you know, I'm a Microsoft MVP. I'm proud, you know
49:59
I'm an award-winning developer and many companies have written papers or whatever about me
50:04
and things like that. And I'm really proud I get to travel the world
50:08
like at the end of the month and go to Denmark to help other developers, right
50:12
Because that's what really brings happiness to me personally. But that's hard to keep there, right
50:19
And it's hard to think that, especially when you're being rejected for jobs
50:25
you're being rejected for conferences, you know, all those things. It's, you know, those things really drag you down
50:33
Even if you are proud of the work you've done, those things still drag me down, right
50:38
Oh yeah, they hurt everybody, right? Like, and I, so, so I'll tell you, you know, there are really good people who submit to a conference and they'll get rejected
50:48
Not because the person's bad, not even because the topic's bad. It's just because the market doesn't want the topic
50:54
Right. Right. Or there's too many speakers usually. Yeah. And we think it's personal
50:59
It's not personal. Right. I got a really good friend of mine, like really good friend of mine
51:04
And he called me one day and he's like, Rob, you know, I'm the conference chair for this conference
51:08
I'm like, yes, I do. And you submitted sessions and I'm not going to take them
51:14
And and it doesn't mean I don't like you. It doesn't mean you're a bad presenter. It doesn't mean that the topics are bad. This audience won't be able to use that content
51:25
Yeah. Right. And you don't get those calls very often. No, I never get them. It's just, yeah, we didn't accept them. Try next year
51:34
yeah it was a special yeah this it's a special relationship i have with this guy but but so
51:40
but the thing is right like that's that's personal it's not personal um if so i'll leave you i'll
51:46
leave with one last thing so there are three things to consider when anything happens to you
51:51
first of all personal or not personal guarantee you it's it's not personal nine times out of ten
51:58
it's not about you it's about life right second is this uh uh pervasive does it happen everywhere
52:06
are you going to get rejected for every conference all the time right or every conference and the
52:11
answer is no you're going to get some if you submit enough like it's like baseball right like
52:16
their batting averages are 0.3 about every third of the time they're actually going to hit the ball
52:21
You can't expect 100. And then the last is persistent Is this always going to be the same way Right And the same thing with imposter syndrome So is it me Is it everywhere And is it forever And the answer is really it not It can be all three of those things Right Like nothing is permanent Nothing is pervasive into every molecule of the universe Right
52:49
um and it isn't all about you despite what you may or may not think it is not all about you
52:56
right right and that's that to me i think is one of the hardest things to to to deal with
53:02
when you have imposter syndrome right well and we believe in a lot of personal agency we believe
53:09
that it's all about us and we can make stuff happen and i'll tell you um our belief and i
53:17
meanness for every human right elon musk fits this category too he can't make it happen right
53:23
right like he's still blowing up rockets right he's maybe he's getting closer and social media
53:32
companies yeah xnay on the twitter on the x whatever that thing is yeah yeah yeah yeah you're right uh
53:44
Well, I don't know about everybody else, but this has been a really illuminating conversation between you and I
53:52
I've really enjoyed it. I've really enjoyed having you back on the show. And I really enjoy how you talk about this information and make it very accessible to others without judgment or things like that
54:07
Because that just never helps imposter syndrome. them. So before I have to let you go, because Simon keeps counting down the minutes
54:14
Yeah, I see that. He's got something else to do. So he's trying to get rid of us. So I asked you one question at the
54:23
end last time. This time I'm going to ask you a different one. And that is, you know, what brings you happiness in your tech career? So I'm going to dodge the question
54:34
uh i know i'll tell you that so here's the thing i will tell you i love solving problems
54:40
yeah right and we solve a problem and i just love it right like it's it's a puzzle solved right and
54:46
and there's human stuff and i get dopamine it's all good but that actually isn't the that isn't
54:51
the thing that i care about most anymore right and like okay please do not boo me immediately
54:57
right the thing is i love helping people yeah that moment when i get to see somebody go oh
55:05
that that's the thing i live for that that helping people that that seeing lights come on
55:13
i'm like cool i just made their world just a little bit better yeah awesome let's rinse and
55:18
repeat do that again yeah yeah that's that's it's exactly what makes brings me happiness in this
55:24
tech career is helping other people. And I've, I've written a lot about this, you know, about
55:29
those moments, you know, I do highlight them on my website, in my books and things like that. But
55:35
yeah, when you really succeed at making someone else's life better, right, with, with the code
55:42
that you've written from essentially nothing, right? That is the most rewarding thing to me
55:48
along with helping developers in their career, right? That's. Yeah. So, so next week I'll tell you
55:55
so next week I teach for three days and I hate instructor led training
56:00
I hate it. It's tough. And, and I love doing it. I will be exhausted
56:08
I'm an introvert. That's who I am. I get it. And I know who I am. And so doing that's very hard for me
56:14
but I know that I'll get at least one spark. I'll get at least one aha moment
56:20
I'm like, dude, that can fuel me for a month. Yeah. And that's all I look for is that one thing, right
56:27
I don't want everybody to have an aha moment. I just want to inspire one person
56:33
That's actually the tagline on my website is improving software development, one developer at a time, right
56:39
That's my goal. If I can be in front of 200, 300, 800 people in India
56:45
And if I can inspire just one person, I've succeeded. That's my bar of success is one person
56:53
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Because you can't please everybody, right? It's not going to happen, right
56:58
And I felt this a lot and it was kind of difficult sometimes to deal with when I was teaching at the university is there's always going to be someone there that doesn't like you, who's going to blame their grade on you somehow and things like that
57:12
but you just have to remember it's that one person, right? It's not the other 30 people in class
57:18
Right. Well, thanks so much for being on the show. I really enjoyed this conversation
57:23
I wish we could get long, go longer, but Simon is counting down the minutes
57:28
He's helping us stay on task. So you're always welcome to come back on the show
57:32
and talk about anything you want. And so I hope to have you back on the show
57:37
And if you want to hang out afterwards, I don't know where Simon's going, but we can just have a little bit of that
57:42
words yeah okay all right thanks so much robert thank you well that was a great uh uh guest i
57:50
really enjoyed that i like i said i invited him on kind of selfish uh uh things because i wanted to
57:57
talk about this because you know i'm i'm feeling imposter syndrome pretty heavy right now so um
58:05
i'm really glad robert would say i was able to schedule robert uh and come on the show this
58:10
month. And so I hope you all got something out of it. If you want to reach out to Robert, I'm sure
58:16
he'll be more than happy to help you out. Okay. Here's some geek humor for today. I kind of like
58:23
this one. Do you have a life? No, you're hired. IT company. That's basically it. And I was actually
58:31
on an interview this week and I forgot to say this, that I'd like to work smarter, not harder
58:38
so if you're working 10 12 hours a day every day of the week there's something wrong uh so yeah our
58:45
life doesn't have to be it it shouldn't be it tell you the truth all right uh we still have to think
58:52
about our friends in ukraine unfortunately uh they're still dealing with even more increasing
58:58
issues in their country and uh uh every week it makes me sad so if you can reach out or help or
59:06
support anybody, our friends in Ukraine, please do that. Um, so we can get this over with and we
59:14
can move on and, and, uh, uh, hopefully life will be better, but, uh, please think about our friends
59:22
there. Um, as always every week, uh, I will, I hope you will help me help the kid, the kids from
59:29
the slums in India. This is pictures from when I was there last October and we gave them
59:37
computers and all this kind of things. Dave and Chandi, they're right there in the picture
59:42
They do wonderful work for these kids that are suffering from the slums in India
59:49
I know this for a fact because I've been there multiple times now. And so there's many ways to
59:54
help them, the most direct way is just to go to their website. You can
59:59
make money. You can buy school supplies for the kids. You can buy clothing for the kids. You can
1:00:05
buy all kinds of things if you just don't want to get direct cash. They really need support. And
1:00:11
they're such awesome kids. When I got to meet and there's one of them right there, she was really
1:00:18
inspiring. I know how old she is, but she was very inspiring when I was there last year
1:00:23
so help me help the kids from India thank you in advance so my next show will be all the way on
1:00:32
September 8th I think it's the 9th I think I put down the wrong date whatever Saturday that is
1:00:39
that's I'm gonna have my friend Bob Reiselman on he's been on before I've known him for a really
1:00:44
long time and so I hope you come back beginning of September and and I'll have stories to share
1:00:52
for my trip to Denmark. As always, please go donate blood at your local blood bank
1:00:59
There's a picture of me last Sunday. I hit 17 gallons donated
1:01:03
at the San Diego blood bank. And I was really proud of that
1:01:08
Speaking of being proud of something you've done, I'm really proud I hit 17 gallons
1:01:12
I'm already looking forward to hitting 20 sooner than later since I'm not traveling
1:01:18
as much anymore. So, but all the blood banks right now are in a shortage and I'm sure, you know, the events in Hawaii is not helping anything
1:01:27
So please go donate blood at your local blood bank. You don't have to get hooked up to a machine like I am because I do that for two hours
1:01:35
You just need to spend 30 minutes of your time and just donate red blood cells
1:01:40
So please do that. I really will appreciate it. And so will your fellow human
1:01:44
And so will you someday when you need blood, because we all will need it someday, probably
1:01:50
Okay. With that I want to please ask everybody to send me emails on suggestions for the show who you want me to be on the show what you liked or didn like about the show There my email address
1:02:05
I don't get enough emails, so I don't think you guys like me speaking of imposter syndrome
1:02:10
So please reach out and email me there. And with that, I'll see you in September
1:02:24
Thank you
1:02:54
Thank you
1:03:24
Thank you
#Career Resources & Planning