Gina Maini talks with Dave Rael about broad interests, F#, community, care-taking, shaping experiences, growth, and freedom
By day, Gina Maini is a mild-mannered, Digital Service Expert working at United States Digital Service, a cross-cutting agency inside the White House which helps other federal entities provide better services to citizens, immigrants, veterans, and many others (https://www.usds.gov/). By night, she’s a functional programmer and FSharp Board member.
Today, Gina is speaking about her personal background surviving art school, being a self-taught programmer, her engineering days at Jet.com & WalmartLabs, and now her latest adventure— the public sector and care-taking. In her spare time she likes: being a cat lady, Brazilian Jiu Jitsu, biking along the Potomac, ukulele, philosophy, fiction and poetry.
Chapters:
0:15 - Dave introduces the show and Gina Maini4:11 - Progamming languages, tools, and community6:15 - Gina on care-taking, research, family, geeking out, and a supportive work environment9:52 - Gina on working for the US federal government, making an impact, and finding fulfillment14:02 - Gina's story and path to software23:50 - The masochistic nature of both theater and programming26:58 - Finding better ways28:33 - Gina on being an F# board memeber30:43 - Gina's success story - providing feedback, growth opportunities, and mentoring35:50 - How Gina stays current with what she needs to know41:04 - Gina's top 3 tips for delivering more value
Resources:
Gina on SoundCloud Playing Ukulele
F# Board of Trustees
Codecademy
OCaml
HackerRank
Mathias Brandewinder on Developer On Fire
Phillip Carter
Harvard Business Review
Von Neumann Architecture
Gina's book recommendation:
Type Theory and Functional Programming (International Computer Science Series) - Simon Thompson
Gina's top 3 tips for delivering more value:
Lower your general stress level (including using meditation)
Unplug every now and then (and use your body in a physical way)
Realize all the things we take for granted are really silly - don't get too attached to specific tools