Best talks that I recommended in 2023

 As some of you know, I maintain a database of the talks and podcasts that I watch or listen to. I usually save a description, the topics discussed, and a rating. I often use this database to make recommendations or to search for ideas and content.

This is the list of all the talks or podcasts that I recommended during this past year (2023) and to which I assigned a rating of 5/5:

• "Simple Made Easy" (12-minute redux) by Rich Hickey (2011) (Rich Hickey) [Architecture, Inspirational, Scalability, Software Design] [Duration: 0:12] This is a 12-minute redux of the 1-hour talk by Rich Hickey, for really impatient people. Original: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SxdOUGdseq4
• Architecture for Flow with Wardley Mapping, DDD, and Team Topologies (Susanne Kaiser) [DDD, Engineering Culture, Technology Strategy, Wardley maps, team topologies] [Duration: 0:43] This talk illustrates the concepts, connects the dots between DDD, Wardley mapping and team topologies, and demonstrates how these techniques help to evolve a fictitious legacy system for a fast flow of change.
• Master Class with Marty Cagan (Marty Cagan) [Inspirational, Product, Product Discovery, Product Leadership, Product Team, leadership] [Duration: 1:21] A great presentation on skilled product teams and leading product organizations. The questions at the end are also very interesting.
• Artificial Intelligence seen from the software development lifecycle perspective (Nerea Luis) [AI, MLOps] [Duration: 0:54] Great introduction to the differences between traditional software development and the development cycle with AI models. Nerea introduces concepts such as Continuous training, model deployment, MLOps, and collaboration between data scientists and software engineers. Highly recommended for software engineers looking to delve into these topics and collaborate more closely on AI-based feature development.
• CONSTANT Changes To User Requirements Drive Me CRAZY (Dave Farley) [Agile, Continuous Delivery, Inspirational, Lean Product Management, Lean Software Development] [Duration: 0:13] This presentation by Dave Farley shows that software development is not just about translating perfect requirements into code, but rather a process of discovery and exploration. It acknowledges that the nature of the problems being solved has changed and that it is impossible to have all the answers. It emphasizes that successful software products must be able to adapt and evolve over time, and that the key to success is embracing change and making it easy, safe, and low-cost.
• Systems Thinking for Developers (Jessica Kerr) [Inspirational, Mental models] [Duration: 0:55] Great explanation of how system thinking arises and its basic concepts. System thinking is a fundamental tool to work with/in complex systems such as software systems.
• Simon Sinek Performance vs Trust (Simon Sinek) [Company Culture, Culture, Inspirational] [Duration: 0:02] Great description of the impact of trust on team members and leaders.
• Improving Software Flow (Randy Shoup) [Devops, Flow, Inspirational, Lean, Lean Software Development, Technical leadership, leadership] [Duration: 0:50] In this session, Randy explains how they improve the overall flow and the engineering capacity following the ideas in the Unicorn Project (Locality and Simplicity, Focus, Flow, and Joy, Improvement of Daily Work, Psychological Safety, and Customer Focus). It is an excellent talk about generating/improving an engineering culture following lean principles.
• Many More Much Smaller Steps with GeePaw Hill (GeePaw Hill, Chris Lucian, Austin Chadwick) [Evolutionary Design, Lean Software Development, Software Design, Technical Practices, XP] [Duration: 0:39] Good conversation about GeePaw Hill's software development approach based on taking continuous small safe steps (Many More Much Smaller Steps).
• Tips For Technical Startup Founders | Startup School (Diana Hu) [Inspirational, Lean Software Development, Lean Startup, startup] [Duration: 0:28] Diana Hu shares her advice for being a technical founder at the earliest stages - including topics like how to ship an MVP fast, how to deal with technology choices and technical debt, and how and when to hire an engineering team.
• Oredev 2011: Sleeping with the enemy (Gojko Adzic) [Engineering Culture, testing] [Duration: 0:52] Gojko Adzic describes why independent testing should be a thing of the past. He explains how testers engaging with developers and business users create opportunities to accomplish things they cannot do otherwise.

It should be noted that I recommended them last year, but that does not imply that the talk or podcast is from 2023, in fact I think most of them are much older.

I hope you find these recommendations helpful.