Alex Balazs talks with Dave Rael about his role at Intuit, diversity, listening, impact, and finding your voice
Alex Balazs is Chief Architect for Intuit. He leads business and technical architecture, drives product and engineering excellence, and stewards technology talent across Intuit. Intuit products serve over 45 million consumers, self-employed and small businesses in the US and around the world.
Alex previously served as chief architect for Intuit's Consumer Group that delivers products like TurboTax and Mint. He also served as chief architect for Intuit’s 100+ million Identity Ecosystem.
He is passionate about solving big unmet customer needs through technology and building the next generation of technologists and leaders. He is a leading expert on Intuit's Node.js initiatives and part of a consortium of leading tech companies that are adopting the technology. Alex sits on the executive advisory board for Tech Women at Intuit and serves on the advisory board for the Galisano College of Computing & Information Sciences at the Rochester Institute of Technology.
Chapters:
2:19 - Dave introduces the show and Alex Balazs and Alex's history with writing software6:53 - Alex's long tenure with Intuit9:39 - Architecture in a business making acquisitions11:18 - Alex on the architect role13:47 - Alex on leadership15:55 - How Alex stays in code17:17 - Standards and technical diversity20:03 - Being lit up on writing software and having some distance from writing production code21:48 - Tech Women at Intuit24:57 - How to be a better listener27:20 - Alex on vulnerability29:51 - Alex's story of failure - Taking too much time to deliver and asking too few questions32:54 - Finding your voice and asking questions - starting small37:17 - Alex's book recommendations41:56 - The things that have Alex most excited46:29 - Alex's top 3 tips for delivering more value48:31 - Keeping up with Alex
Resources:
Intuit
Intuit Technology Blog
Hungarian Mathematicians
Hungarian Computer Scientists
Fred George on Developer On Fire
Intuit's Follow Me Home Program
CES Reflections - Alex on the Intuit Technology Blog
Alex's book recommendation:
Thank You for Being Late: An Optimist's Guide to Thriving in the Age of Accelerations (Version 2.0, With a New Afterword) - Thomas L. Friedman
Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less - Greg McKeown
Alex's top 3 tips for delivering more value:
Deliver more by saying no - deliver a smaller set of things, but do them well
Have a broad vision, but execute narrowly
Seek diversity