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/superpowers: discover your talents
117 Plays1 year ago
This episode James and Arron are joined by Assistant CIO of the Federal Home Loan Bank of Cincinnati to talk about how to discover your own talents, and how to see them in others.
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Transcript
Discovering Unique Talents: Superpowers and Team Synergy
00:00:00
Speaker
But it was almost like there was these arrows showing me in my mind where to pass and I just kind of thought that's what it was and so that's where I started understanding the concept of superpowers because I can see passing lines and then with the databases I understood just intuitively how do I connect this data together um and that's when I started realizing hey folks have these different talents And I'm going to put, I understand what mine are. I'm starting to understand and I'm going to put mine together with others. And then, you know, it's kind of like the transformers you create this great super creature.
Introduction to 'The Forward Slash' Podcast
00:00:40
Speaker
Welcome to the forward slash where we lean into the future of technology. I'm your host Aaron Chesney with my beautiful co-host James Carmen. James, what are we talking about today? I'm beautiful again, after our point counterpoint episode last time.
00:00:55
Speaker
Yeah, I'll give it to you. you got You definitely have a face for radio. Today we have with us one of my favorite people, ah Holly labeling. ah Holly and I know each other outside of work from, ah where we run in the same running group. She runs a little faster than I do, but we're we're still in the same group. i'm i'm I'm the safety coordinator. I just go at the back of the pack and make sure everybody's safe. Like if anybody falls down, I'll eventually find them.
00:01:23
Speaker
That's my role. ah Holly, welcome to the forward slash. and Maybe tell us a little bit about um you know yourself and your career path, how and how you got to where you are today.
Balancing Career and Motherhood in Software Engineering
00:01:36
Speaker
Sure. Hello, and thanks for having me. I still consider myself a software engineer. When I introduce myself, I still say that. um I can't say I code as much as I did back in the day.
00:01:51
Speaker
but I'm an engineer. I've worked here in the Cincinnati area for, shoot, about 25 years now. And I'm a mom, so I had to work at different jobs, and I had to keep moving around to make sure that my jobs were flexible, because when a kid is sick or when when you have to, you know, volunteer for the PTO, that was me. And for a while, I actually did some freelance development in order to really have that flexibility.
00:02:23
Speaker
But the last couple of years, five years actually, I've worked at a place called the federal home loan bank of Cincinnati.
Understanding the Role of the Federal Home Loan Bank
00:02:32
Speaker
You said you're, you're currently at a federal home loan bank of Cincinnati, FHLB, as we call it. Uh, what, what even is that? I mean, some people may not be familiar with FHLB. It's kind of a unique business. Tell us a little bit about what, what they do. So I'll be honest. I'd never heard of this place before I came here.
00:02:52
Speaker
Um, and it's one of the best kept secrets in, in definitely in greater Cincinnati and the United States. ah So we, uh, we don't market it and we actually don't even have signage outside of our building. And so we're this, we're the secret. Um, and it's pretty interesting. We are a bank for banks and there's 11 federal home loan banks in the United States. FHLB system was established.
00:03:19
Speaker
in 1932 during the Great Depression. And our job is liquidity in terms of housing. We are supposed to be here for the banks. for our We're actually a co-op. So we have members. And we are here for them in terms of liquidity. We're here when other banks aren't. So we are very, very risk averse. We are safe. We are sound. We are deliberate.
00:03:46
Speaker
um Pretty interesting, we have three main business activities. We have advances. We give advances. We have a mortgage purchase program. So we buy mortgages. And then the one that I really, really like that kind of kind of drew me in, ah we have a housing and community investment program. So we give grants um back to the community. And it's actually 15% of our profits. So a lot of things like Habitat for Humanity builds and all of these other things
00:04:16
Speaker
Those are funded by us, the Federal Home Loan Bank, through our member banks. But again, we we kind of stay behind the scenes just supporting affordable housing. That must be a very rewarding point of part of your job, I would imagine. It it is. it's You don't think about these kind of things. You know, you you want a mortgage and you go to a bank, but the bank doesn't just go in the back room and have, you know, bundles and bundles of money there.
00:04:45
Speaker
So they call their friendly federal home loan bank. So any day we can be lending billions of dollars and some folks might want it longer term for a mortgage. And some folks might want it overnight because they have certain, you know, they have to have so much cash on hand.
Challenges in IT: Safety, Agile, and Reliability
00:05:01
Speaker
We, the federal home loan bank system, we're the second largest debt issuer in the United States behind the treasury department. I i could use some,
00:05:13
Speaker
Billions of dollars. When, when I first got it all when i when i got here and started looking at the systems, I had to go back like, and do the commas because I'm like, hold on, that's not thousands of dollars. That's millions and billions of dollars. And it's not probably high volume from a transaction count perspective, right? It's, it's probably more big dollar, fewer transactions, right?
00:05:42
Speaker
It actually depends. It depends on what our members need. So um sometimes we have larger members and they need larger amounts of dollars. so Sometimes we have a savings loan out in the middle of you know Western Kentucky that might not have a large volume, but they might need ah ah you know a little bit every week. We are just here waiting. And and typically we um are the inverse of the economy. If the economy is doing poorly, people need more money from us because they don't have it.
00:06:12
Speaker
But if the economy is flush with money, typically they don't need their federal home loan bank as much. What's the most challenging aspects of working at FHLB?
00:06:27
Speaker
For me, we, again, our mission, we are here when other banks aren't. So for me, there's a lot of um safety and soundness to make sure that we are here when other banks aren't. And in terms of me and my job, I'm in IT. So our systems have to be here when other bank systems aren't. So our DR has DR. We have to make sure that our systems are available. We have to make sure that our members, when they need us, can you know get advances or or view their reports that they have with us or anything.
00:07:09
Speaker
so Um, I think that is for me, pretty challenging, especially we, I have, um, you know, we practice agile, um, agile mindset, inspect and adapt, fail fast. Well, how can you fail fast if you i have to be so dependable? So for me, that's actually part of the challenge that I love about this. Um, my job's not easy, but game on.
00:07:38
Speaker
Yeah. It's, it's interesting when you have to provide that and I've heard it phrase, we phrased it that way at, uh, same gauge when I was there that, that dial tone level reliability, you know, and that doesn't make any sense anymore. There is no such thing as a dial tone because nobody has this landline, but like, you know, you pick up that phone and you hear, do you know, like it's always there. You pick it up and say, or you pick it up. It's there that level of that reliability. That's that's a different mindset. Um, for some folks, some businesses don't need that level of, you know, reliability, but you all absolutely do.
00:08:08
Speaker
it It is and how could we provide that without creating a stressful environment for our employees? um I don't want to be stressed. I don't want my folks to be stressed. So for me, it's, you know, a point of pride, like, how can we do this? Other jobs you might not need to do this, but I get to do this. I have the opportunity to do this every day. And I want to be surrounded with people who also feel like, hey, this is a challenge that I want to go after.
00:08:34
Speaker
So with with moving quickly with with Agile and Agility and whatever other buzzwords around moving quickly through a backlog, how do you balance that with security and compliance? Because I mean, I'm sure there's like a ton of you know red tape with it being a federal type entity and and all that moving large sums of money like that.
00:09:02
Speaker
ah so ah You're right. Again, safety and soundness is paramount. And um ah for me, it's all about the relationships. We have a great, very, very knowledgeable security department and also um an enterprise risk department. And I really understand, want to understand where they're coming from, what's important to them. um I don't want them to say no and they don't want to say no, but if I can understand the risks that they're concerned with,
00:09:30
Speaker
I can think about how can we achieve this if I make sure we have visibility here or controls there or backup over here. So I don't i tell you for a fact, we do not move as quickly as you know these these cutting edge companies or something like that. But I'm um pretty happy because we're constantly moving forward.
00:09:52
Speaker
And especially in you know what we do, it is important those relationships with with compliance and security. you know and And we absolutely as developers need to be empathetic to to their job because it is a hard job, right? but the The magic happens honestly, where you have that reciprocity there when, and and most of the time it's there, you just, we just assume as developers, Oh, they're never going to let us do this or of this. I've just found out that like, have that conversation, talk to them about, you know, what, what's your concern here? What are you trying to mitigate and let's talk through this and maybe we can solve this problem in a different way. And, but most, most people in those positions are pretty, they're not like the, no, no, you always do it my way or the highway. They're not those kinds of folks. They're usually pretty.
00:10:34
Speaker
willing to work with them. Yeah. Especially if you're, if you're asking them, you know, about what it is they need, like what, what do we need to get, make your job easy? And they're all about that. Cause a lot of times they have all these specs that they have to fill out and, and pass and different things like that. And it's, it's so much better when you do actually talk to them and say, Hey, how can, how can we give you exactly what you need? So we don't have to have this back and forth that goes on for weeks.
00:11:06
Speaker
I think about early in my career, IT t folks worked kind of a solo, right? You had a cube, you sat in your cube, you worked in your cube. And I think about how we work today. ah And um it's almost like you know a bunch of prairie dogs because you know ah you see the head pop up from behind the monitor and you're grabbing the rollable whiteboard and and you get some markers and now we're diagramming together and working together. And you know folks have their heads downtime,
00:11:36
Speaker
But there's that power and the collaboration with folks bringing in their superpowers and their experiences and putting all those lenses
Evolving Work Culture: From Isolation to Collaboration
00:11:42
Speaker
together. And you you always get a better product that way. I had to stand on a chair at a prairie dog over Cuba.
00:11:51
Speaker
No, we don't stand on chairs at the federal home loan bank because that's a high risk activity. You could potentially fall. You're a liability risk.
00:12:08
Speaker
Oh, I see. Yeah. um That is actually not accurate because I am not taller than that. But my colleague, um Tim TG, as we call him, TG is, i but I don't know, six six or something. And so when I first started working there, he was showing me around and I finally said, listen, do you mind bending down? Because he was talking over my head. I couldn't hear what he was saying. He's a foot taller than me.
00:12:36
Speaker
So poor TG's back was hurt because he was hunching over the whole first day, walking me around, showing me stuff. We worked with a guy like that. He had to he had to duck every time he entered a conference room. ah My clock recently with a time change up on the wall, I couldn't reach my clock. And TG walked on over, put his one paw up, brought it down, switched the time, and put it back up there. This is paw.
00:13:04
Speaker
Sorry, PG. She said it, not us. He's a former basketball player. It is a paw. So what, um, you know, when it comes to technologies and you know, and you're moving these big dollar amounts. So what, what's your, what are your go-to technologies at the, at FHLB? What do you guys use?
IT Infrastructure and Development Strategies
00:13:23
Speaker
What's your tech stack? Yeah. In, in previous lives, we, we were best in class. That's usually with the companies that I've worked with.
00:13:31
Speaker
But um you know here at FHLB, we are risk-adversed and we want to keep things simple. And we also feel like it's very important to have support contracts um on the software and the technologies that we use. And so we stick with one stack um just for safety and soundness, and that's the Microsoft stack.
00:13:54
Speaker
So, you know, you got your.net, your SQL server or your Azure SQL DB. And then in terms of clouds, it is Azure. It is, it is single cloud and oh, oh, angular front end as well. I'm a big fan of angular. All right. So you mentioned earlier, you don't get to do any, any coding anymore, but like if.
00:14:17
Speaker
If someone was holding a gun to your head and said, write a software product right now, what are you reaching for? Like what what's your tech stack that you would, you would do it. Wow. That's funny that you say that when I came to my current job, I've been here five years. They said, would you like a visual studio subscription? And first of all, I'm a Mac kind of girl. So I had to figure out how to use a windows computer, but I was, this was like a pivotal time. You could almost hear the music in the background. I felt like I was making a really important decision. And so I said, no, I would not like a visual studio subscription because in my role, I really shouldn't be coding. So I felt so proud of myself that I made this decision, but I'm i'm pretty good at coding. So um I've been offering to my folks like, Hey, I can pair with you. We can pair program.
00:15:14
Speaker
we can I can help you with TDD and things like that. And nobody will take me up on anything. And so I've pulled up my chair and sat down. And I think I've scared people to death. like They think I'm like assessing them or something. um But in my ah ah yeah you know at home, if I had to but pick up something and do it, I've really enjoyed you know Spring Boot back end and an Angular front end.
00:15:44
Speaker
And I just really, really like databases as well. it's I don't really like that middle. i'm I like front end and I like databases. I'll tolerate the ah middle services. Now, that we may not have to not be friends anymore. you don't You're not talking like stored procedures, are you? Please don't. No. OK. No. What, stored procedures are bad? You know what? They weren't 20 years ago. oh That's the original like reusable logic, right? And yeah make sure everybody uses the same logic. But in terms of, ah you know, back in the day, back in school, you know, you're yeah learning these technologies. And when I started getting into databases and database design and the normal forms and everything, everything just made sense to me. And I am a um ah former college athlete, I'm a soccer player as well. And I didn't realize that everyone couldn't see the passing lanes.
00:16:43
Speaker
But it was almost like there was these arrows showing me in my mind where to pass. And I just kind of thought that's what it was. And so that's where I started understanding the concept of superpowers, because I can see passing lines. So I could really, you know, um understand how to move the ball. And then with the databases, I understood just intuitively, how do I connect this data together? um And that's when I started realizing ah Hey folks have these different talents and I'm gonna put I understand what mine are I'm starting to understand and I'm gonna put mine together with others and then it you know It's kind of like the Transformers you create this great super creature so you talked about the that how Playing soccer actually helped you in your IT career Do you think that it's important for? you know
00:17:36
Speaker
developers or anybody in the IT world to get out there and, and do some type of sport type activity to make these kinds of correlations in work, different skillsets that may actually cross apply. I do. And, and I think soccer is a, is a really interesting type of sport because with basketball, if you are taller, typically you are more successful.
00:18:06
Speaker
And in track, if you are faster, you are typically more successful. And and soccer is kind of different because you can have different skills and still be successful. You just have to, number one, modify you you know how you play and also um how how the team attacks problems. And i'm not um I'm not a fast person, but because I saw the passing lanes, I was really able to Uh, make a plan in my head. Okay. When I get the ball, I can pass it here, here, or here. And I didn't have to necessarily be able to run around people. So, but I think it's, it's really interesting because that's how work is. Right. Everyone has different skill sets and you think about what yours are and how you can match them with other people. And and also soccer, the game of soccer is really player centric.
00:19:01
Speaker
And let me give you an example. When I was done playing, I coached. I coached ah little ones. And I remember our first game, it was like a U12 team, U12 girls. And we had our first game and there was a corner kick. And all the girls, I could see it like it was yesterday. They just turned their heads around and looked at me. And so I just turned around and looked behind me because I thought like maybe there was a cow because we were playing out in the field. No cow. So I yell out like, why are you looking at me?
00:19:31
Speaker
And they said, What do we do? And because they had been used to, you know, having coaches who told them to play. And so I said, Figure it out. And so of course, some little, a little tiny girl tried to kick the ball and it took her five kicks to get it 10 yards and, you know, but at the next practice, we talked about it. But I said, How do you think you should solve that problem? And You know, of course, there's some parents who are like, win, win, win. But I'm thinking problem solve, problem solve, problem solve. And that's just like work, especially with Agile. What do you think? How do you think we should solve this problem? And so we might have lost a game or two, but those same U12 girls, they came back, I was coaching high school, they kicked my tail.
00:20:22
Speaker
these girls, I would play their high school teams and they would win, win, win. And then they'd come over like, Coach Holly. And I'm thinking, I taught them everything they know. Why did I do that? Now they're dating me. Well, I was really happy to see that, but starting from a young age, you know, hey, figure it out. What skills do you have? Because if, you know, if you think about, again, basketball, um you know the but the coach calls timeout and all the players gather around the coach and then the coach gives the play.
00:20:51
Speaker
And then the player's job is to execute the play and that's okay. But I also like the idea of the player saying, what can I do here? Let me think about this. And they try something and it might not work, but then they learn from that experience and then they go and try something else. And that's what we do at work every day. Yeah. And I, I coach hockey as well in, in my guys are, um, now kind of towards the end of their like youth career.
00:21:18
Speaker
And that was one of the things I would, I would tell my guys too is when you come back from a shift, try and figure out what went wrong and how you can improve in, in every shift, make it a little better, you know, incrementally improve and, you know, self analyze.
Sports and IT: Enhancing Skills and Problem-Solving
00:21:34
Speaker
And because everybody's game is a little different. And then it's one of those things is like the same way I taught slap shots. It's like, these are the basics.
00:21:44
Speaker
But you have to go out there and hit puck after puck after puck to figure out how it applies to you and make little adjustments until you get the shot that you want. And you know in that and that worked for a lot of them. I actually had um one of my guys in one of our last games ah actually score front with ah with a blue line slapper. I'm like, ooh, look at you go. And it's it's from those little adjustments. And and I do think, and I think Every sport has kind of its, its piece that can be applied to, um, you know, I T like for me, it's the peripheral vision because peripheral vision and hockey is really important because you need to be able to see all the other players. Right. And I think that helps me in being able to see what's off to my right hand or left hand side that might interfere with what I'm trying to accomplish. And, and for like.
00:22:44
Speaker
risk analysis and and things like that. We talked a little bit about risk analysis ah so earlier, but when we're coding, we think about risk to trying to accomplish you know ah a story or something like that. It's like, what are the risks and in applying this? And sometimes you can see those hidden dependencies or hidden risks in a story when when you take a look at the periphery. right So yeah, I think that's that's that's really cool. And shout out to coaches.
00:23:13
Speaker
So I only learn about hockey from watching letter Kenny. So you said when you come back from a, what, I don't know that I've ever heard that term. Uh, a shift. So it's it's yeah. So when you do a line change, it's your, usually your shift is like a minute to a minute and a half before you're, before you're gassed and you got to, you got to come back to the bench. And so you're it's, it's very interval training centric. So you go out.
00:23:43
Speaker
minute and a half of, of hard, you know, top speed skating in, in play. And then you come in and the next line goes out. And so, and that's your shift. So every time you come off of a shift, you think about the last shift that you had and, and say, okay, what, what didn't go well in that shift? Like maybe you missed a pass or maybe your position was off or.
00:24:10
Speaker
Maybe you could have done something different with the puck to get a better scoring opportunity, those types of things. So when you come off your shift, you've got, you've got your downtime between shifts on the bench. And you can think about those things, which is kind of unique about hockey. Cause there's not a lot of sports where you get that like downtime to think about your play. Maybe like baseball might be one, like when you're on the, when you're on the, uh, when you're at bat and you're you so you're sitting on the bench, you can think about your fielding plays.
00:24:39
Speaker
Um, that you had in the previous inning, um, when you're out in the field and, and that kind of thing. Um, I don't know of any other sport that changes as rapidly because I know soccer, you you don't make subs that often. So you don't have that downtime. So you got to do it between games. Um, my partner is an ice hockey, a former ice hockey player. And so there's so many parallels with ice hockey and soccer.
00:25:07
Speaker
However, one big difference is, um, I asked him to run with me and he was like, Oh, five K that's such a long distance, but he's used to the 32nd or one minute shifts. And so I can get him a couple of races a year. He'll run a five K, but you know, he's like, Oh, that was so long. And I'm thinking, Oh, the five K is my warmup for my other races. Yeah. I sometimes, uh,
00:25:37
Speaker
relate, um, I, I think probably the closest sport to hockey is, is probably lacrosse, but I also have called it soccer and I, so we've actually brought out a soccer ball and had them play soccer on the ice, which is funny. It's a budget guy skating around, tried to kick a soccer ball on the ice. that Well, so you have the the tactics, which are similar, but the skating itself is such an art.
00:26:07
Speaker
Um, and actually we had tickets to the blue jackets season tickets. And so he would tell me all about look at the skate and all of these different things. And I just didn't realize that there was such an art to, to ice hockey. And it's so much more difficult. I mean, with soccer, Hey, I just had to run on the ground, which, although sometimes I had trouble staying on my feet, if you're listening to this coach, Jordy, sorry about that. Um, but, but, but this is a whole other level. And again, lacrosse, I really appreciate lacrosse.
00:26:36
Speaker
But again, that's running on the ground. This is, it's a pretty interesting sport. Although, you know, if you think about like your footwork that you have to like, cause I've played, I've played some indoor soccer and I'm like, I was amazed at like some of the footwork that, that some guys had or some, even some of the ladies, because I played on a co-ed team, you know, just the way they were able to manipulate and move the ball. It just was impressive. Like there was one guy, um,
00:27:05
Speaker
Who was French and had been playing soccer a long time. He used to be able to do this thing where he would reverse the ball from the top with his toe, like, and and just, and he'd be able to move backwards and just move and turn the ball. I'm like, that's amazing. Like that's that's awesome. With my coaching, I love starting with you littles, but they don't know any better.
00:27:28
Speaker
And so everybody has a ball and it's right foot, it's left foot, it's all different parts. And I would mentally, when I was preparing a training session, a thousand touches for that session. Now think about that. If you train a couple times a week and I even encourage them and talk to their parents, you know, if you have a little bit of a deflated ball and as they're, you know, on the phone or watching TV, if you're just touch, touch, touch, touch, touch, it's amazing.
00:27:53
Speaker
And even today, it just happened the other day. I knocked a glass off the counter and I caught it with my foot before it dropped. And it just becomes second nature. So what about like at FHLB when it comes to like, are we going to build this or are we going to buy
Custom Development vs. Off-the-Shelf Solutions
00:28:11
Speaker
this? Like how do you, how do y'all go through those sort of evaluations at FHLB? ah So we always do a buy versus build analysis. But one of the things that really attracted me to FHLB is we do a lot of custom development.
00:28:23
Speaker
and as a software developer or not development leader, um that interests me because I really like solving those types of problems. But we have some pretty unique um ah business model and challenges here. So um at times we buy, typically we build, we will do an analysis. And um we also, if we build, we can then support and we can be more nimble because if we need a change,
00:28:48
Speaker
we can implement that change instead of waiting potentially for a a third party, a COTS software, you know, the package to roll out or this or that. We can go ahead and make that change. And again, it's all about being there for our members and and serving our members in the quickest way possible. What about open source? Do you guys embrace open source? I appreciate the beauty of open source, but again, in terms of risk, um we we do use some open source software.
00:29:18
Speaker
but we do have vulnerability and scanning and all of that kind of stuff. And we typically don't utilize a lot of open source software because of the the vulnerabilities or potential for them. Yeah. It's pretty common in the high high compliance world and and risk averse world to not use open source. Hurts my heart being an open source aficionado, but I get it. I understand.
Humorous Lightning Round and Closing Remarks
00:29:45
Speaker
All right, Holly. So one of the things we do here is what we call the lightning round and it's a series of rapid fire questions. You're just going to answer right off the cuff of the first thing that comes to mind as an answer for any of them. There's no right or wrong. Well, maybe in our minds, there's a right and wrong, but for the most part, there's no right or wrong answer. So James, you want to kick us off with your first lightning round question. Yeah. I mean, we really want to be, um,
00:30:11
Speaker
very you know proper about this, of course. ah What's your favorite type of muffin? Blueberry. What's your favorite number? 14.
00:30:25
Speaker
ah Have you ever tasted soap? Yes. Thank you, mother. Name one of the seven dwarfs. Sleepy. I know this question is going to be tough.
00:30:41
Speaker
Climb a mountain or jump from a plane? Climb a mountain. Also, negotiate my way out of both of those. so
00:30:52
Speaker
What's your ideal outside temperature? 80 degrees. Would you eat a day-old taquito from 7-Eleven? No. If the toilet paper roll is really low but not completely out, do you replace it or leave it for someone else? Replace it.
00:31:11
Speaker
I'm kind of OCD on that. Would you rather come face to face with a miniature hippopotamus or a giant cockroach? Both are in a bad mood. Miniature hippopotamus. Do you Instagram your food? No. Super Mario Brothers or Zelda? Super Mario. All right. And for the final one, say something cool.
00:31:41
Speaker
A.
00:31:45
Speaker
Love it. Great. That's fantastic. And that concludes this episode of the Forward Slash. I'd like to thank our guest, Holly Laveling, for joining us today and my co-host, James Carmen, and all the folks that make this podcast possible. Hit subscribe button to be informed when new episodes are available. Thank you for listening to the Forward Slash, where we lean into the future of technology.