There’s a new tech meetup in Ann Arbor, organized by engineers. Web app developer Mohammed Abouzahr of ITHAKA, Soar Technology software engineer Dana Foley, and front-end web developer Jacquelyn Aimee Olson have organized a new meetup in Ann Arbor for people getting into tech when they don’t have a background in the industry, or even a degree. It’s called Bloom In Tech, and the first one is 6 pm tonight Thursday December 5th in northeast Ann Arbor.
Sam Lolla is one of the creators of MadeinA2.com and the founder and director of Directed Works, a company focused on product development and user experience design for startups. Lolla taught product design at the University of Michigan, and these days works independently with clients from Ann Arbor to the San Francisco Bay area to create products using a new app he put together to make collaborative design more efficient, called Shuffleboard. Recently, Lolla put together a video series on his journey designing and building a startup and documenting every step on Youtube.
We met him at the TechCity Jam early this fall. The local jam session for tech workers who have music careers or hobbies on the side included everything from pop songs to electronica to incredible traditional Armenian music. We wanted to know who was playing in this award-winning band that came seemingly out of nowhere to the stage and played a brilliant set that would be inadequate to just call foot-tapping. Ara Topouzian, pictured right above, plays the qanun (kanoon), an Armenian 80-string harp that goes back to the 5th century and is still played today. The music sounds traditional, and yet it’s still extremely catchy.
It’s a common story in startup culture: people comfortable with the risks of starting a new business often have a background in which they became comfortable with chaos, whether that experience was a difficult early start in life or work in the military. Red Hat’s Chris Short is a disabled veteran whose service-connected injuries have taken years to manage. Short is a DevOps professional turned marketer and community advocate as Principal Technical Marketing Manager for Cloud Platforms at Red Hat. He is a Cloud Native Computing Foundation Ambassador, Kubernetes SIG-ContribEx member, a public speaker and blogger, founder of DevOps’ish, and believer in open source principles bettering interactions and promoting conversations.
Can’t believe it’s already the end of 2019, but we’ve still got some great tech events to end the year. This month, since everyone is busy with the holidays, we’re highlighting some special events and foregoing our usual meetup coverage. We have included some public or semi-public events below that require registration but are open to new members.
“I get to do non product-specific things for my company,” says George Miranda, who recently spoke at DevOps Days Detroit on handling disasters in devops. “That often boils down to creating a how-to for organizations.” We met with him backstage to talk more in depth about the work Miranda has put into outlining best practices for devops professionals–or anyone in business, really–who wants to learn more about how to manage operations. He recently launched several protocols PagerDuty is sharing with the public to this end.
Did you ever wonder how candidates land jobs at hot tech companies like Duo out of Ann Arbor and StockX in Detroit? It’s a high-growth space, but operates mostly through back channels–or at least it seems that way in a landscape that is still frequently underrepresented in media coverage of business and local news. Ryan Landau is founder of re:purpose, a tech-focused startup recruiting firm that works with fast-moving companies. Startups and tech firms including Duo, StockX, WeWork, Bloomscape, Atomic Object, Detroit Venture Partners and the like come to Landau to source talent in an environment that still has trouble holding talent from leaving for the coasts.
“It’s unusual, experimental, and avante garde,” says Ann Arbor Film Festival Director Leslie Raymond of her historic film festival in Ann Arbor, Michigan, recently rated #1 in the country by USA Today in its 57th year. The Ann Arbor Film Festival is the fourth oldest film festival in the United States and the oldest experimental film festival. What makes Ann Arbor consistently rated one of the best places to raise a family (CBS Local, Livability, Niche, Money) is the cultural events like this, particularly with a long and storied history like the Ann Arbor Film Festival. It’s one of the reasons people with Michigan roots come back to raise kids here, or stay to found startups. From software to security to life sciences to mobility tech, SE Michigan is now an increasingly attractive option for tech workers who love a balanced livable lifestyle and the cultural events that make any community a great place to live and work.
The full video coverage of DevOps Days Detroit 2019 is now available online. You can find the playlist here, to check out keynotes from a variety of speakers from across the U.S. who came to Detroit a couple of weeks ago to talk all things DevOps. Here’s a link to veteran Chris Short’s talk, DevOps Is Not War:
Today we caught up with the new Phimation Strategy Group and Ann Arbor SPARK sponsored Rising Leaders program, which piloted this year to mentor business leaders in the Ann Arbor area. At the Circ Bar in Ann Arbor, we heard speeches from several tech, talent, and business leaders to hear their best career advice and leadership lessons.
There’s a new tech meetup in Ann Arbor, organized by engineers. Web app developer Mohammed Abouzahr of ITHAKA, Soar Technology software engineer Dana Foley, and front-end web developer Jacquelyn Aimee Olson have organized a new meetup in Ann Arbor for people getting into tech when they don’t have a background in the industry, or even a degree. It’s called Bloom In Tech, and the first one is 6 pm tonight Thursday December 5th in northeast Ann Arbor.
Sam Lolla is one of the creators of MadeinA2.com and the founder and director of Directed Works, a company focused on product development and user experience design for startups. Lolla taught product design at the University of Michigan, and these days works independently with clients from Ann Arbor to the San Francisco Bay area to create products using a new app he put together to make collaborative design more efficient, called Shuffleboard. Recently, Lolla put together a video series on his journey designing and building a startup and documenting every step on Youtube.
We met him at the TechCity Jam early this fall. The local jam session for tech workers who have music careers or hobbies on the side included everything from pop songs to electronica to incredible traditional Armenian music. We wanted to know who was playing in this award-winning band that came seemingly out of nowhere to the stage and played a brilliant set that would be inadequate to just call foot-tapping. Ara Topouzian, pictured right above, plays the qanun (kanoon), an Armenian 80-string harp that goes back to the 5th century and is still played today. The music sounds traditional, and yet it’s still extremely catchy.
It’s a common story in startup culture: people comfortable with the risks of starting a new business often have a background in which they became comfortable with chaos, whether that experience was a difficult early start in life or work in the military. Red Hat’s Chris Short is a disabled veteran whose service-connected injuries have taken years to manage. Short is a DevOps professional turned marketer and community advocate as Principal Technical Marketing Manager for Cloud Platforms at Red Hat. He is a Cloud Native Computing Foundation Ambassador, Kubernetes SIG-ContribEx member, a public speaker and blogger, founder of DevOps’ish, and believer in open source principles bettering interactions and promoting conversations.
Can’t believe it’s already the end of 2019, but we’ve still got some great tech events to end the year. This month, since everyone is busy with the holidays, we’re highlighting some special events and foregoing our usual meetup coverage. We have included some public or semi-public events below that require registration but are open to new members.
“I get to do non product-specific things for my company,” says George Miranda, who recently spoke at DevOps Days Detroit on handling disasters in devops. “That often boils down to creating a how-to for organizations.” We met with him backstage to talk more in depth about the work Miranda has put into outlining best practices for devops professionals–or anyone in business, really–who wants to learn more about how to manage operations. He recently launched several protocols PagerDuty is sharing with the public to this end.
Did you ever wonder how candidates land jobs at hot tech companies like Duo out of Ann Arbor and StockX in Detroit? It’s a high-growth space, but operates mostly through back channels–or at least it seems that way in a landscape that is still frequently underrepresented in media coverage of business and local news. Ryan Landau is founder of re:purpose, a tech-focused startup recruiting firm that works with fast-moving companies. Startups and tech firms including Duo, StockX, WeWork, Bloomscape, Atomic Object, Detroit Venture Partners and the like come to Landau to source talent in an environment that still has trouble holding talent from leaving for the coasts.
“It’s unusual, experimental, and avante garde,” says Ann Arbor Film Festival Director Leslie Raymond of her historic film festival in Ann Arbor, Michigan, recently rated #1 in the country by USA Today in its 57th year. The Ann Arbor Film Festival is the fourth oldest film festival in the United States and the oldest experimental film festival. What makes Ann Arbor consistently rated one of the best places to raise a family (CBS Local, Livability, Niche, Money) is the cultural events like this, particularly with a long and storied history like the Ann Arbor Film Festival. It’s one of the reasons people with Michigan roots come back to raise kids here, or stay to found startups. From software to security to life sciences to mobility tech, SE Michigan is now an increasingly attractive option for tech workers who love a balanced livable lifestyle and the cultural events that make any community a great place to live and work.
The full video coverage of DevOps Days Detroit 2019 is now available online. You can find the playlist here, to check out keynotes from a variety of speakers from across the U.S. who came to Detroit a couple of weeks ago to talk all things DevOps. Here’s a link to veteran Chris Short’s talk, DevOps Is Not War:
Today we caught up with the new Phimation Strategy Group and Ann Arbor SPARK sponsored Rising Leaders program, which piloted this year to mentor business leaders in the Ann Arbor area. At the Circ Bar in Ann Arbor, we heard speeches from several tech, talent, and business leaders to hear their best career advice and leadership lessons.
