Senior IT leaders on the detours that got them there.
ITsmiths with Mike Smith gets senior technology leaders talking about how their careers actually unfolded, including detours through construction work, police work and the Marine Corps. Alongside the life stories come hard-won views on management, team-building and sales, told in a relaxed, conversational back-and-forth.
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ITsmiths with Mike Smith is an interview show from Aerocom Inc. about how people reach the senior ranks of IT and what they learn on the way up. Its guests hold titles such as CIO and VP at Red Wing Shoes, CISO for the University of Tennessee Health Science Center and Global CTO at Unisys. The titles are the least interesting part. Mike Smith asks open, friendly questions, sometimes nothing more than an invitation to tell a particular story, and the guests run with them. Mike Madden went from digging holes on a construction job to a top IT role at Cardno. He describes how nerve-racking it was to head a startup IT department without having worked in IT professionally, and credits Chris Lunt, an experienced hand brought in to help, with building out the servers and routers. The plan at the time was to link remote offices in Seattle, Arizona and Northern California on a single network. Dennis Leber traces his discipline to the Marine Corps and its lesson to improvise, adapt and overcome. His story also takes in 14 years on a police force. It includes an Army unit that learned about his degrees and asked him to run its S6 computer and communications shop alongside the logistics job he was slated for. He said yes, seeing more training, certifications and knowledgeable colleagues in the bargain. Doug Saunders was moving up in IT at Republic while working as a part-time NHL official. He also spent about 15 days aboard the USS Carl Vinson, the carrier from which Osama bin Laden was buried at sea, and remembers the heightened security on board. Thomas J. Sweet, Vice President of Cloud Services for GM Financial, describes Wilmington as a Norman Rockwell sort of place, with sugar maples and the Harnden Tavern, which he connects to the Underground Railway. His Microsoft story, from the SQL 2008 'Kilimanjaro' release, goes from polished onboarding and a two-monitor desk straight into a heated discussion among about 40 people. Stories like these sit next to practical advice. Dennis Keane ranks people first, process second and technology third, and admits he had it the wrong way round when he was young. His shorthand is getting 'aces in their places'. Running a small consulting and engineering company taught him the value of networking, with a friend who already ran a local firm of about 20 employees as his guide. Vishal Gupta built one of the first AI-based search engines, using neural networks on an Air Force-funded project, without grasping at the time how much it mattered. His sales thinking is direct: if a deal is going to be lost, lose it early. He also explains 'column fodder', the extra vendor added to an evaluation after the buyer has already decided, as the reason to shape the requirements, even the RFP. Madden's remark that leading and mentoring are learned skills, as learnable as configuring a router, could stand as the show's premise.
Made for: Suits a listener who is building or rethinking an IT career and wants to hear how CIOs, CISOs and CTOs actually got there, told as stories rather than checklists. Also fits someone curious about leadership lessons from people who came into technology by roundabout routes.
What sets it apart: Instead of product talk or technical detail, ITsmiths keeps the focus on the person behind the title. A construction job, years of police work or an NHL officiating sideline gets as much room as the executive role itself.
"How did they get that awesome IT job?" Mike Smith interviews fascinating IT professionals, holding high profile positions, with cool companies. You'll hear these ITsmiths recount the trials that nearly broke their spirit, the "aha" moments, and the memories of mentors they'll never forget. Prepare to be inspired!
A 1999 iThing prototype is your cue: IT careers take stranger turns than the org chart admits.
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Short reviews from the PlayNext desk, based on the episodes we processed.
Dennis Keen looks back on an IT career shaped by networking, negotiation, agile thinking, and a practical belief in putting people first.
Dennis Keen frames his move through IT around a lesson that took time to settle: people, process, and technology only work in that order. Technical knowledge still matters, and a bit of structure helps teams move, but his emphasis lands on the human side of the job.
A construction worker's path into IT leadership becomes a grounded story about learning the job as the stakes rise.
Mike Madden's route to a senior IT role at Cardno starts well outside the usual tech pipeline, moving from construction work into IT as a learned trade.
A grounded career story about using service, training, and persistence to move into cybersecurity.
This single-episode review follows a cybersecurity career built less on a sudden pivot than on service, timing, and a steady habit of saying yes to useful openings.
A wide-ranging career story finds its clearest charge in the manual precision of an aircraft carrier flight deck.
Doug Saunders' move from golf course design to the CIO office of a billion-dollar company gives IT Smiths a solid frame for a career shaped by unexpected turns.
Tom Sweet links early interview feedback with lessons from Microsoft that shaped his cloud leadership.
Tom Sweet's path to Vice President of Cloud Services for GM Financial comes through as a career story shaped by feedback that did not fade after the interview ended.
Specialists walking through software's tradeoffs, one system at a time.
Founders and engineers on AI coding agents like Claude Code, and supply chain security.
Dennis Keen says the biggest lesson from his career is 'people first, process second, technology third' after seeing the right people in the right roles change team outcomes.
Mike Madden says management is a learned skill like building a computer or configuring a router, and he treats mistakes as part of that training.
ITSmiths with Mike Smith follows Dennis Lieber from Louisville, Kentucky, to the CISO role at the University of Tennessee Health Science Center.
Doug Saunders tells Mike Smith how he moved from golf-course project work to vice president and CIO at Advanced Disposal Services after starting at Republic Services in 1998.
Tom Sweet, Vice President of Cloud Services at GM Financial, tells Mike Smith on IT Smiths how a civil engineering start in Massachusetts turned into cloud leadership in Texas.
Vishal Gupta tells Mike Smith how a 1993 Dartmouth project funded by the U.S.
Ryan Johnson, now vice president of operations at Keap, describes moving from a Northern British Columbia farm and graphic design into IT leadership.
Mike Smith interviews Ron Herardian, Senior Director of Technology at Capgemini, about how surviving a 1975 civil-war evacuation from Beirut shaped his attitude toward career risk.
Nick Gilbert, current CISO for Cherokee Nation Businesses, describes moving from a small Minnesota town and an Army military-police role into international IT leadership.
Jeff Brand explains how a computer-science and mathematics graduate from Pitt became a CIO in the legal industry at age 29.
Mike Smith interviews IT professionals about their career journeys, mentors, and challenges.
Vice President of IT Eric Rosenzweig shares how cross-departmental interaction helped him advance into IT leadership.
Mike Smith interviews IT executives about their career paths, challenges, and lessons learned, starting with Andy Smith's story of developing software and becoming a VP.