This incident was during the days when as a company we were aiming towards CMM certification and the Master was moved from Project Manger role to Quality Manager role by this time. Unfortunately, he owned to get CMM certification for our company.
So, we had some CMM consultants flying to our place to provide us 'Gyan' on what this is all about. The world of Quality manager till such time was limited to only bugs and it took a lead assessor to fly to our place at the company's cost to make him understand Quality processes are just not limited to bugs but it is far beyond that.
Target dates were aligned from the CEO, the project got kickedoff and our clock started ticking towards achieving our goal.
To ensure every one is aware and contributes to this noble initiative, we had regular team meetings in our office pantry area where there was enough room for all of us to sit. The documents were projected on a big white wall near the pantry area and all of us had to listen what the SEPG (Software Engineering Process Group) member had to say. People who had gone through the process of acquiring training on quality process would definitely understand how boring the sessions would be unless the presenter is humorous to crack jokes during his presentation. I mean for one who is generally with a coding / design mind set.
During couple of such presentations Master use to close his eyes and sit quietly with out much movements. Well, we all knew that he was sleeping as we heard a mild snore but we only whispered among ourselves to show others watch Master sleeping.
It so happened Master suddenly woke up with the sound of our giggle. Immediately without any hesitation he simply said that he was just closing his eyes and was in a Transcendental Meditation.
I really appreciated his presence of Mind thought no body believed him :-). From then on, he use to sleep without any worries as all of us knew he is in Transcendental Meditation (Deep Sleep) :-)
Thursday, January 25, 2007
Master's Leelas -1
I am back to my master's leela's during my early days in the career. You can ready my post Master if you are keen to learn more about him.
Being a project manager and not knowing anything about the application that is being built inspire of multiple knowledge training sessions, one has to spend lots of time to make him understand what we are trying to explain.
As a software engineer we always have problems with the application. The application (web application) is suppose to schedule a resource and the bug reported was that there is some time zone problem.
So to understand and find a fix for the issue a brainstorming session was called and for obvious reasons master was also called.
He was in his own world thinking for a scenario that he can talk at the same time trying to pick up the discussion from what is going on..
The discussion went on with multiple scenarios and Master suddenly raised his voice to explain a scenario that stuck his mind.
Makalae! (children) being a web application, what happens if some one is travelling in a flight from India to US and in the mid way he is trying to schedule a resource?
Though we tried explaining him that the application is not intended to be used by a person who is travelling but he never accepted it. He in fact came up with the test case but we put him down that we cannot travel just for this.. Perhaps we can change the time zones in the computer to simulate a similar situation.
Believe me it really took so much effort to make him understand the scenario can be created by changing the time zone in the computer and we do not need anyone to travel for this sake.
Being a project manager and not knowing anything about the application that is being built inspire of multiple knowledge training sessions, one has to spend lots of time to make him understand what we are trying to explain.
As a software engineer we always have problems with the application. The application (web application) is suppose to schedule a resource and the bug reported was that there is some time zone problem.
So to understand and find a fix for the issue a brainstorming session was called and for obvious reasons master was also called.
He was in his own world thinking for a scenario that he can talk at the same time trying to pick up the discussion from what is going on..
The discussion went on with multiple scenarios and Master suddenly raised his voice to explain a scenario that stuck his mind.
Makalae! (children) being a web application, what happens if some one is travelling in a flight from India to US and in the mid way he is trying to schedule a resource?
Though we tried explaining him that the application is not intended to be used by a person who is travelling but he never accepted it. He in fact came up with the test case but we put him down that we cannot travel just for this.. Perhaps we can change the time zones in the computer to simulate a similar situation.
Believe me it really took so much effort to make him understand the scenario can be created by changing the time zone in the computer and we do not need anyone to travel for this sake.
Friday, January 05, 2007
Climbing up the ladder
I am sure every employee keeps waiting for his promotion at least once in a year so that he can climb one step in the ladder. But there are very few fortunate soles who get it before completion of 1 year while most get it immediately after two year.
With respect to the software industry every company will have its own traits against which it will compare its employees. I am sure every company follows this strictly while the bug is in the subjective judgment of the Manager. If the employee is on the good books of the manager then he obviously get a plus points. No matter the poor guy who would have been really good in what was expected out of him. He would have exceeded all his expectations and perhaps even beyond but does not get any additional points.
The conflict now is who needs to be given more points when compared with the favourite and a hardworking guy. Obviously the one who is close to the manager gets an easy pass rather than the genuine guy who falls into all turmoil.
Thought theoretically the Manager should not have any bias, hallow effect, Horn effect etc., but practically I am not sure how many managers can be out of all these bias ? After all he is also an employee and his deeds will be judged by his Boss !
practically from the lesson I have learned so far , all that should happen is:
*You need to have a good relationship with your boss and definitely with your Boss's Boss as you do not know when your boss will leave you to graze green paddy fields !
*Update your boss and if his boss so that you get into the good books
*Ofcourse you definitely need to have some percentage of job knowledge
*Share all good things and try to manage situations to the most extent possible but keep the Bosses informed - this is for your back up support.
*Volunteer to take responsibility but make sure you are not drowned as you have your own things to do.
*Keep even the bad things posted to your boss and if required to his boss aswell
Hope with this you will be in a better visibility and position to fall into the good books of your boss and there by a candidate for promotion nomination.
With respect to the software industry every company will have its own traits against which it will compare its employees. I am sure every company follows this strictly while the bug is in the subjective judgment of the Manager. If the employee is on the good books of the manager then he obviously get a plus points. No matter the poor guy who would have been really good in what was expected out of him. He would have exceeded all his expectations and perhaps even beyond but does not get any additional points.
The conflict now is who needs to be given more points when compared with the favourite and a hardworking guy. Obviously the one who is close to the manager gets an easy pass rather than the genuine guy who falls into all turmoil.
Thought theoretically the Manager should not have any bias, hallow effect, Horn effect etc., but practically I am not sure how many managers can be out of all these bias ? After all he is also an employee and his deeds will be judged by his Boss !
practically from the lesson I have learned so far , all that should happen is:
*You need to have a good relationship with your boss and definitely with your Boss's Boss as you do not know when your boss will leave you to graze green paddy fields !
*Update your boss and if his boss so that you get into the good books
*Ofcourse you definitely need to have some percentage of job knowledge
*Share all good things and try to manage situations to the most extent possible but keep the Bosses informed - this is for your back up support.
*Volunteer to take responsibility but make sure you are not drowned as you have your own things to do.
*Keep even the bad things posted to your boss and if required to his boss aswell
Hope with this you will be in a better visibility and position to fall into the good books of your boss and there by a candidate for promotion nomination.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)