Episode 383 | Cameron Presley - The Meaning of Professional

Guest:

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Cameron Presley talks with Dave Rael about having mentors, being a mentor, being a professional, leading, organizing user groups and conferences, and multiplying the impact of teams

Cameron Presley is a software engineer, avid boardgamer, and Microsoft MVP living in Oak Ridge, Tennessee. He currently works for SentryOne as a software engineer, focusing on improving the lives of Microsoft Data Professionals! When not slinging code for his day job, Cameron spends his time organizing content for Functional Knox, co-organizing Lambda Squared (a single day, single track functional programming conference), working with speakers for CodeStock and helping developers improve their craft and career through Code Connective.

Chapters: 0:36 - Dave introduces the show and Cameron Presley2:06 - The human element in creating software and Cameron's ambitions to teach math4:09 - Being a mentor and having mentors8:46 - Cameron on organizing user groups and conferences11:50 - Connections and getting great speakers14:04 - How Cameron got started in software16:13 - Cameron on remote work19:28 - Cameron's story of failure - working n isolation and slamming in changes without due diligence22:36 - Cameron's success story - making lives better by embedding in a dysfunctional team and fixing some destructive practices24:00 - Being a professional and the importance of interacting as equal participants29:02 - Cameron's book recommendations33:23 - The things that have Cameron most excited35:50 - Book club utility and mechanics37:25 - Cameron's mentoring efforts with Code Connective39:53 - Humility, better ways of offering suggestions for better code, and collective code ownership43:43 - Cameron's top 3 tips for delivering more value45:14 - Keeping up with Cameron

Resources: Cameron's Blog FunctionalKnox Lambda Squared Code Connective Geoff Mazeroff Carl Friedrich Gauss Kansas City Developer Conference Reid Evans on Developer On Fire John De Goes on Developer On Fire Paul Snively Emily Estes Julie Moronuki David Koontz LambdaCast The Haskell Book Bryan Hunter on Developer On Fire Remote: Office Not Required - Jason Fried David Heinemeier Hansson on Developer On Fire Dave Thomas on Developer On Fire Ted Patterson Sandi Metz on Developer On Fire

Cameron's book recommendation: The Clean Coder: A Code of Conduct for Professional Programmers - Robert C. Martin The Effective Engineer: How to Leverage Your Efforts In Software Engineering to Make a Disproportionate and Meaningful Impact - Edmond Lau Managing Humans: Biting and Humorous Tales of a Software Engineering Manager - Michael Lopp

Cameron's top 3 tips for delivering more value: Make sure you understand what you need to deliver Try to get feedback on what you are doing Get to know your team