The Joe Reis Show

Do fundamentals still matter, or are we all just "vibe engineering" our architectures now?
Coming to you live and sweating from the hillsides of Phuket, Thailand, this week's Freestyle Friday dives into the tension between chasing the newest tech and mastering first principles. After a recent LinkedIn debate suggesting teams "don't have time" for fundamentals anymore, I had to set the record straight.
I cover why building data platforms without a theoretical framework is like building a house on a Thai hillside without a geologist (spoiler: it ends in a mudslide), the limits of Kimball, and why the rise of AI actually guarantees that data engineering is going to become more critical, not less.
Plus, an update on my upcoming book, Mixed Model Arts, and where you can catch me keynoting around the world in the coming months.
Links to my Upcoming Events:
April 29: Agentic Analytics Summit (Cube)

May 6-8: Data Innovation Summit (Stockholm, Sweden). Catch my Keynote on May 7th and my Mixed Model Arts workshop on May 8th!

May 18-20: Current (London, UK)

Wes McKinney is back to discuss his complete transition from AI skepticism to becoming heavily "locked in" on coding agents.Wes shares how he overcame his initial "existential dread" about the future of software engineering and completely rebuilt his personal productivity stack using tools like Claude and Codex. We dive deep into the reality of coding agents, why he believes Go has become the ultimate language for AI agents, and how he manages massive, multi-agent workflows to build production-level software without touching DevOps. Wes also breaks down his mission to fight the platform decay of services like Gmail by building his own local data sovereignty tools.

In this Freestyle Friday episode, I catch up with Eric Weber after our recent walk through downtown San Francisco. We dive deep into the very real fear and identity crises sweeping through the tech industry as AI accelerates. We discuss how packing a year of change into a single week is disorienting workers and how the constant hustle culture in SF might finally be hitting its threshold.
We also get into the darker side of this shift, including the "reverse centaur" effect where humans are reduced to parts of a machine. Are white-collar engineers about to face the Amazon warehouse treatment through token consumption leaderboards? Eric also shares why he took a step back from leadership, his focus on writing, and the importance of genuine human connection right now.

Eric Weber: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ericweberdata/

I recently sat down with Amit Prakash, the brilliant mind who co-founded ThoughtSpot and led AI teams at Google and Microsoft, to talk about a massive shift happening in the data world.For decades, we’ve been forcing the "messy reality" of business into rigid database tables, losing about 90% of the actual information in the process.Amit is now building Ampup to flip that script. We dive deep into how he’s using dynamic ontologies to extract high-fidelity insights from unstructured data, like the nuances of a 60-minute sales call—to drive massive ROI.In this episode, we explore:- The "SaaSpocalypse" and the Future of Agents: Why the early stages of the sales cycle might soon be a "dance" between AI buying and selling agents.- Sales as Athletics: Why high-stakes negotiation is more like football than a desk job.- The "Business Brain": Moving beyond simple CRMs to a central strategy engine that understands every department’s unstructured data.- Human-to-Human Trust: Why large contracts will always require a human touch, even in an AI-saturated world.- Amit’s perspective on how AI can deliver real value to the GDP by fixing the "distribution bottleneck" of innovation is a must-listen for anyone in tech, data, or leadership.

In this episode, I sit down with Chris Gambill, a data strategy and engineering leader, fractional consultant, and career coach. We dive into the realities of the data engineering job market in 2026, exploring what it takes to stand out, the massive shift AI coding tools are causing, and why mastering the fundamentals of data engineering remains crucial.
Chris shares his unfiltered thoughts on coaching career switchers into data engineering , why finance professionals make great data engineers , and the exact resume and portfolio strategies hiring managers are actually looking for. We also get into the weeds on the latest AI development tools, comparing GitHub Copilot, Claude, and Codex.
If you're looking for solid, no BS advice on the field of data engineering in 2026, this is a great discussion!
Gambill Data Engineering: https://www.gambilldataengineering.com/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/databasemanagement/