Luke Hohmann on Figure Skating, Innovation Games, and Participatory Budgeting | Humanizing Work Show
In this episode, Peter and Richard talk with Luke Hohmann, best known as the creator of Innovation Games. We discuss how Luke moved from high-level figure skating into software development, how Innovation Games started, and what he’s doing now with his new company, FirstRoot, to bring participatory budgeting to schools.
Episode page: https://www.humanizingwork.com/luke-hohmann-on-figure-skating-innovation-games-and-participatory-budgeting/
Connect with Luke:
https://twitter.com/lukehohmann
https://firstroot.co/
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00:00 Intro
02:57 Lessons Luke learned as a champion figure skater that shaped who he is today, including tenacity, persistence, analysis, retrospection, and how to peak at the right time.
08:43 How self-belief is not enough, and gratitude runs
10:50 How Luke got into computer programming, reinforcing loops of liking what we're good at and being good at what we like, and how that shapes great teams
12:30 Moving to Michigan and finding concentrations of talent
15:20 First full time job at EDS: "I worked my way from beneath the ground up"
18:20 From floor grub to VP in less than 10 years, a journey of gratitude, Dan O'Leary and Vern Olson
21:00 Turning around broken projects and inventing the precursors for Innovation Games
23:40 What Luke learned from Vern Olson: when not to work, the importance of celebrating
30:45 The distinction between the domains of being and of doing
31:21 Fit for purpose cultures: is your culture working for you?
32:20 How the agile community sometimes plays to small
34:00 Small retrospectives vs. large ones
35:25 Agile–being prepared to take advantage of changes in your context that you don't control
38:30 Shifting from a scarcity mindset to an abundance mindset
40:15 Building products should be fun
41:00 Dependencies are just code for broken collaboration
42:00 Luke corrects Peter on how they first met
44:00 Building trust through early delivery of value
45:00 Luke's experience founding Conteneo, a self-funded enterprise startup that was acquired by Scaled Agile in 2019
49:00 Top thee goals Luke had for how to lead First Root
56:10 What it means to take a growth posture
58:09 Believing in a mission
59:18 The precarious position of democracy in the U.S., and how real collaboration is an antidote to extremism
1:03:30 Luke's advice
