Hello world! I’m Jim Hodapp. You may already know me from a podcast and urban community that I founded called Livable City. That’s a passion of mine - walkable, safe, livable cities.
But I also have another passion, one that began years before I ever lived outside of the west suburbs of Milwaukee, Wisconsin. That’s a passion for the expression of creativity by building things and solving problems via software. The act of bringing something imaginative into being through programming a computer to do things that solve problems for real people. This is what causes many of us to fall in love with the software craft.
During my career in software engineering that later morphed into engineering leadership, I discovered a deep passion for better human relationships and great leadership. Unfortunately, there’s not an abundance of great examples of either in the tech industry.
So I see this as an opportunity to help provide perspective and to help fill some of the void. I’ll write about what I’ve experienced and learned along the way. Even though much of what I’ll write about applies well to other areas, I’m choosing to focus on better human relating and better human leadership in tech. Focus is good.
You’ll get a lot out of my writing if you:
Are already in tech or thinking about joining tech professionally or as a hobby
Have a deep desire to grow in how you relate to your colleagues (and others in your life)
Want to grow as a leader, whether you have an official manager or tech lead title, or not
I hope my writing deeply resonates with you and with others out there. If so, please do share this newsletter with those who might also benefit from this and enjoy it. And also please engage with me and other in the comments or DM me on Twitter.
For my first post which will soon follow this one, I’ll tell some of my story about how I got started programming computers and developing a deep curiosity about devices. You’ll get to see the power of relationships in our lives as well - how they set our direction and shape us into who we are.
Please enjoy, and share your thoughts with me in the comments!
Peace,