Episodes

  • From competing with Google to independent business advisor, an interview with Ittai Shiu

    From competing with Google to independent business advisor, an interview with Ittai Shiu
    Oct 4 2021
    From competing with Google on their advertising budget to an independent business advisor, an interview with business and advertising tech leader Ittai Shiu In this interview, I talked to Ittai Shiu, who is a marketing operation expert and a savvy business leader with 15 years of experience in advertising technology. I asked him about: * His experience in advertising space, how he competed with Google for advertiser budget in the early days; * Unique challenges in scaling up teams when you are in the hyper-growth stage, * His advice to fresh graduates looking for their first jobs, why you should avoid “spray and pray” strategy but really focus on a few roles and go all in; * His experience in working with his own mentors, and advice for others who are looking for mentors If you are interested to learn from Ittai directly, you can now book a 1:1 conversation with him at https://instamentor.com/mentors/ittai-shiu Thank you for listening.
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    24 mins
  • She microwaved fresh lettuce as an international student who never ate a salad, now a fearless female leader in tech | Chen Zhao

    She microwaved fresh lettuce as an international student who never ate a salad, now a fearless female leader in tech | Chen Zhao
    Aug 25 2021
    In this interview, I talked to Chen Zhao, a seasoned female leader in the tech industry, who's worked at some of the biggest technology companies in the world including Amazon, Microsoft, Tableau, and Deloitte. I asked her about: 1. Unique challenges as a female leader working in the tech industry, 2. Her best advice for female young professionals who want to break into tech; 3. How to decide which company/team to join after receiving multiple offers; 4. Why Amazon really values their leadership principle, and why it’s so important for the company culture? 5. Why does the data dashboard often fail and the 3 major factors (design, data/SQL, understanding the business) that lead to a great data visualization or a dashboard? 6. How several mentors encouraged, inspired, and helped grow her career. 7. In the end, we talked about her hobby in painting.
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    36 mins
  • Product owner’s mindset: software engineers key to career advancement | Chunzhao

    Product owner’s mindset: software engineers key to career advancement | Chunzhao
    Aug 17 2021
    Title: Product owner’s mindset: software engineers key to career advancement. In this interview, I talked to Chunzhao, a software architect with 15 years of software engineering experience, who currently works on Facebook’s distributed AI projects. I asked him about: His experience landing a return job offer after completing an internship at Amazon; Shift in the job requirements and expectations in the tech industry over the last 10 years; Pros and cons of working at a large tech company (FAANG) vs startups; Challenges in distributed AI vs. traditional centralized machine learning; In the end, we talked about a crazy business idea in AI. If you are interested to learn from Chunzhao directly, you can book a 1:1 conversation with him at instamentor.com/mentors/chunzhao . I hope you enjoy the interview.
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    28 mins
  • 2. Job search is hard, community and mentors are here to help | Alex Chao

    2. Job search is hard, community and mentors are here to help | Alex Chao
    Aug 10 2021

    I asked Alex about:

    1. His experience landing the job as the first data scientist at UBER’s self-driving car division;
    2. Challenges and opportunities for machine learning in the self-driving car industry;
    3. How he switched from a data scientist to a product manager role, how his data science background and skills helped him land the job at c3.ai;
    4. His experiences in mentoring others and advice to anyone who wants to get into the data science and machine learning space and eventually landing a job;
    5. In the end, we talked about a crazy business idea in AI.
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    29 mins
  • 1: Networking and showing initiatives, 2 secret weapons for your job search and career | Sam Yang

    1: Networking and showing initiatives, 2 secret weapons for your job search and career | Sam Yang
    Aug 8 2021

    In this episode, I talked to Sam Yang, who is an entrepreneur, investor, and a Stanford MBA, 


    After getting his bachelor’s degree from Brown University,  Sam started his career as an investment banker at Credit Suisse, after 2 years he left credit Suisse and joined a venture capital firm to become an investor.


    In the last few years, he has been advising a few startups, and gradually shifted to an entrepreneur.


    He is currently working on a startup idea, which will how companies will hire better AI or machine learning talents.


    In this interview, I asked him about:

    1. His best advice for anyone who wants to land a job on wall street and work at an investment bank.

    2. His newest startup idea, which potentially can help solve the problems in the AI and machine learning hiring space, and the problems the hiring companies are facing today.

    3. Why Leetcode is not a good option for companies to use for machine learning/data scientists roles, and his advice for anyone who wants to land a job in AI or machine learning.

    4. Tips and tricks in finding a good mentor and how it has benefited him.

    5. In the end, we talked about a crazy business idea in AI/ machine learning.


    Two takeaways from Sam that most resonated with me:

    1. Don't overthink. Go out there and start building;

    2. Asking people for their advice and keep doing it.


    If you are interested in talking to Sam and learning from him directly, you can find him on instamentor and book a 1:1 conversation. (link in comment)


    If you like this interview and are interested in learning more from industry experts like Sam in the future, please subscribe to this podcast. 


    If you are in a good mood, please consider give us 5 stars and leave us a comment.
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    21 mins