Today we are talking to Kit Colbert, the CTO of VMware’s Cloud Platform Business Unit. And we discuss the difference between invention and innovation, changing your mindset when you transition from engineer to leader, and when it’s okay to take on technical debt.

All of this, right here, right now, on the Modern CTO Podcast

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Show Notes

• Been at VMware for about 15 years – started off as an intern in 2002 – came back full time in 2003
• How do they raise people up in VMware
• Did the podcast start?
• Interesting learning experience at VMware Vmotion – Techlead on it
• Technical perspective getting the feature out was not difficult – challenging to get resources for testing
• How do you sell your vision? Get buy in internally
• Difference between Invention and Innovation
• Validating a product idea
• Found a Product Manager who believed in the idea
• How do you feel about the rise of notification
• Value as CTO for VMware
• How many people do you engage with at VMware
• CTO of about 1300-1400 people
• MCTO book
• Flying is a good time to put down tv shows
• Many people think differently
• How has Kit’s thinking changed from engineer to leader – utilize delegation
• Looking at the bigger picture and looking at the people
• What are you excited about that you’re working on now
• VM as a whole for security
• VM is a very versatile technology VM was the end but now it’s the means
• VMworkstation was the first product – run windows on linux
• Does VMware have any open projects that people can work with – apis etc
• What is the difference between VM and Container?
• VMware loves containers etc
• Talking about kids
• How Joel got in to programming – going to work with his dad
• Kit is very rigorous about maintaining scheduling
• Advice kit would give himself 10 years – Patience
• Technical debt – Not against it when it’s a well thought out conscious decision
• Throwaway code
• Have to be able to put up the resources to deal with the Tech Debt
• Waterfall – Agile/lean car vs transportation
• Accidentally bringing value to the market