When Mario Rodriguez emigrated from Cuba to the United States at age 14 with his parents — a university professor, and a teacher turned electrical engineer — they had already instilled in him the value of education and a love of learning. That passion has guided him throughout his career — as a program manager with Microsoft; then as part of GitHub, following Microsoft’s 2018 acquisition of the developer platform; and as a cofounder of a charter school in North Carolina. Now, as senior vice president of product at GitHub, Mario oversees the team developing the GitHub Copilot AI-assisted software development tool.

Mario joins this episode to share his views on product development, GitHub Copilot’s effect on productivity and job satisfaction, and a future in which more people can easily develop their own software.

Guest bio:

Mario Rodriguez leads the GitHub Product team as senior vice president of product. His core identity is that of a learner, and his passion is creating developer tools — so much so that he has spent the past 20 years in leadership roles across Microsoft and GitHub. His most recent work involves overseeing GitHub’s AI strategy and launching and growing the GitHub Copilot product line across thousands of organizations and millions of users.

Rodriguez also cochairs a charter school that he cofounded in an effort to help progress STEAM (science, technology, engineering, arts, and mathematics) education in rural regions of the United States.

Me, Myself, and AI is a collaborative podcast from MIT Sloan Management Review and Boston Consulting Group and is hosted by Sam Ransbotham and Shervin Khodabandeh. Our engineer is David Lishansky, and the coordinating producers are Allison Ryder and Andy Goffin.

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