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Erik Gfesser

📍 Greater Chicago Area

New Book Review: "Running with Purpose"

New book review for Running with Purpose: How Brooks Outpaced Goliath Competitors to Lead the Pack, by Jim Weber, HarperCollins Leadership, 2022: Copy provided by Amazon. One of the unique aspects of this book is the author's explanation of the history and purpose behind writing it in the

Media Query Source: Part 41 - CIO (US digital magazine); Today's most notable data strategy trend

* CIO (US digital magazine) * Today's most notable data strategy trend * Data lakehouse adoption * Combination of data lake & data warehouse The responses I provided to a media outlet on October 17, 2022: Media: What is today's most notable data strategy trend? Gfesser: Data lakehouse adoption. Media:

Community Comment: Part 24 - Self-service data product use cases exist, with caveats

* Self-service data product use cases exist, with caveats * Users need to know what they're doing * Stakeholders need to be aware of benefits & drawbacks * Some commercial products (e.g. Power BI) introduce unique risks The comments I provided in reaction to a community discussion thread. Owner & Data

Community Comment: Part 23 - Architecture diagrams can often mislead

* Architecture diagrams can often mislead * Databricks isn't a storage solution * Databricks is a Hadoop successor * Both ETL and ELT involve input & ouput The comments I provided in reaction to a community discussion thread. Product Manager at Data Modeling Product Firm: It's interesting how data storage

Community Comment: Part 22 - The phrase "it depends" is still relevant!

* The phrase "it depends" still relevant * Decisional factors need to be accounted * Never bow to unjustified pressure * Your clients & customers will thank you The comments I provided in reaction to a community discussion thread. CEO at Consulting Firm: Software meetings best practices: ❌ Never say: Never. ✅ Always say:

Community Comment: Part 21 - Premature optimization is root of all evil, with caveats

* Premature optimization is root of all evil, with caveats * This maxim often taken out of context * Functional correctness is first priority * Expected workloads impact architecture The comments I provided in reaction to a community discussion thread. CEO at ELT Platform Firm: NEVER focus on load times when you first stand

Personal Reading List: 3Q2022

My personal reading list for July, August, and September 2022. Color Key: Special Notes, Completed Reading. Updated throughout the Quarter. At Bat (Schnell) AWS Certified Database – Specialty (DBS-C01) Certification, by Kate Gawron, Packt Publishing, 2022. Copy provided by Packt publicist Nivedita Singh. Machine Learning Engineering in Action, by Ben Wilson,

Community Comment: Part 20 - Shifting the debate from 10x engineers to 10x interactions is unwise

* Debate about the "10x" engineer continues * Shifting debate to 10x interactions unwise * Excessive interaction is often a symptom * Say "yes" to beneficial interaction only The comments I provided in reaction to a community discussion thread. Senior Principal Engineer at Food Delivery Firm: Too many companies delusionally

Product Reviews: Part 10 - My Amazon reviewer ranking continues to hover around #3000

My ranking at Amazon continues to hover around #3000 as the 733 reviews I've written reached a milestone of 3500 helpful votes yesterday, an average of 4.775 helpful votes per review. Since the milestone when my reviews reached 3000 helpful votes in August 2021, Amazon merchants have

Media Query Source: Part 40 - CIO (US digital magazine); 10 key roles for AI success

* CIO (US digital magazine) * 10 key roles every AI team needs * Data engineer role is foundational * Suitable data leads to trustworthiness My responses ended up being included in an article at CIO (June 7, 2022). Extent of verbatim quote highlighted in orange, paraphrased quote highlighted in gray. Above image from