Agile Shop Feh.

Allstate started terminating many of its contractors a couple of weeks before I bailed in February. The permanent gig thing came very close, only as a result my close friend and boss pushing and shoving masterfully but no one coughed up the cash.

If I told you I can virtually guarantee you a very conservative and documented  gazillion dollars savings per year- would you spend, say, two million?

Me, too.

We suspect there were two reasons none of the executives stepped up to the plate: 1. We weren't visible or showy (we were inundated with work) and 2. Many of those C-Level folks thought they already had Knowledge Management. They don't. They have a template vault and a couple of small databases with really cool names but little functionality. Oh well, it's a shame and would have been a boatload of fun. I hope it changes.

So, my cushy gig at Allstate is about ready to go bye-bye. I revise the old resume and start sending it out. A development shop downtown, using Agile methods, is looking for BAs. Senior BAs. It took about two days for me to find them and them to call me. We did three phone interviews (never, ever again) and I took the job.

I think this one was a record for me: it lasted five and one half hours. They seemed nice when i got there. I was huffing and puffing from the block long walk from Union Station. Being fat and out of shape is a bitch, especially if your knees start doing the funny things mine are.

The deal is, the team donates Thursday and Friday hours learning a new testing tool and we start work and start getting paid on Monday. While this sounded really strange to me (why doncha pay? it's just our policy, whaa? it costs me money to show up, yuh know)

The 'Scrum Master hands me a new Mac in a box like it's a big deal. I gulped and asked if we were doing the project in J2EE? No. Open Source (me: hunh?) Well, um, I probably should be using the same sort of machine the customer is using without having to relearn all that Mac stuff and virtually windowing it in a real hurry and I hate those single mouse buttons- is there a Windows Machine lying around? Strike One.

Scot, do you want Indian food for lunch? No, thanks, I brought my own lunch. Doncha like Indian Food? Um, not really- at least the things I've tried so far. Well the team has voted for Indian food (Mentally slapping my forehead with the palm of my hand, yuh think?). I just smile.  Strike Two.

Now, I'm donating time to learn this really cool plain language tool that creates boundary, functional and regression testing. It's so cool, the developers don't code a thing until the tests are done.

Guess who writes the tests?

Yeah. The BAs.

Only as we go along, I find the 'plain language' is, once again, nothing but pseudo code which needs to be tweaked by the system master. And the phrase mapping makes little sense to me. I look around, I'm the only person on this team who would prefer to use plain language rather than use a glossary/dictionary in creating tests? Yup. Strike Three.

We get held over an extra half hour. I lose the chance to grab an express. The next train's at 6:40. I'm having a diabetic reaction as I huff and puff and rest...huff and puff and get to the station. Let's see....butter rum lifesavers.  I pop 3 in my mouth and look around for a Pepsi.

I have about 30 seconds left in my cell battery, but the wife will pick me up. It's 7:35 in the evening.

I get home, shower and the wife hands me the phone as I crawl down the stairs.

"Scot?" Yeah.
"I left you a message." Sorry, Just got home.
"I've been home for a couple of hours." Oh (I think, 'that's because you live in Northbrook, asshole,. a totally different train line for rich people.' You'd be proud of me, I didn't say one word out loud).
'We're going to have to let you go.' Hunh?
"Yeah, your interpersonal skills and team building abilities weren't what we expected."And you're not going to give me a chance to adapt to your culture, is that it (and you could tell this after only five and a half hours)?
"No, sorry mate." OK. I hang up. I am very, very, very glad.

Wasn't meant to be. I just wish they'd paid me for the humiliating exercise and stopped me before I paid for a month's Metra pass. I can still use the new clothes.

Now, normally, I'd be crawling the walls with worry. Not this time for some reason.

I e-mailed my select network folks. It works right away. A former manager (you starting to see a trend here?) grabbed a peer and lied about me so well, I think the manager with the opening thought i should have a halo or something. Pro-forma interview and we're already talking about the first few projects. It's a five week contract, but she also has a permanent slot. Was I interested in that? Well, put your tongue back in your mouth and we'll talk after a month or so.

I took the job.

It's fun- so much so that if my former boss is successful and creates a f/t perm role, I'm going to have a really tough decision to make.

Friends. It's all about friends and relationships. I feel like I'm a Boy Scout again. Trustworthy, Loyal, Helpful, Friendly, Courteous, Kind, Obedient, Cheerful (OK, I'm still working on this one),  Thrifty (my wife thinks I'm working on this one), Brave (I have driven to and from Northbrook and Hoffman Estates for many days sand lived to tell the tale), Clean and Reverent (OK, you're right, this last one's problematic, but I try to keep it to myself as much as can by biting my tongue).

Didn't think I'd remember that boy scout stuff, didja? Didn't even use Wikipedia to look it up. Scout's Honor.

Economy Getting Better?

In my case, absolutely.

Last time out looking for work took 22 months.

Since Allstate is allegedly getting rid of hundreds of contractors by the end of this month, I got out. It took three days to find a job in an Agile Shop.

They were horrible communicators so our joint venture lasted exactly five point five hours. What that means, boys and girls, is just because they say they're Agile, it doesn't mean they're nice or understand anything other than team dynamics. Kids, it also means just because you have the title doesn't mean you're first amongst equals. Of course the converse is also true- don't through your weight around.

Funny how much you learn in five and half hours, isn't it?

So going back to Allstate was out (real shame- loved working with those folks and the projects were exciting if not being choked to death by internal politics), better reopen the Monster, Dice and CareerBuilder accounts.

All of a sudden, a 55 year old experienced BA is in demand. in long projects, short projects and permanent full time gigs.

Most of the idiot recruiters seem to have been squeezed out of the market. And I found if you just hang up on people who refuse to leave the script or I have ask "what did you say?" more than three times, you have a fine time.

Is it because you were closer to a job than you used to be which my most immediate past boss maintains?

Partly- people do treat you differently if you have a job. But with 25 million colleagues looking for work through no fault of their own, I'd  hate to think employers are going to be so callous. My time spent in Labor Economics 485 suggests this won't be the case- the supply-demand curve is going to change (and aI hope significantly) over the next weeks.

Am I lucky? I thank that's good portion of it- as the comedian s say 'timing!' companies are starting to gear up and move new development. Which has some real impact for us BAs`, QAs (Quality Assurance professionals- Inspector Number 11 that okayed your underpants for sale), IAs (Information Architects- what BAs write (design and requirements stuff), IAs draw), Change Managers (trainers, implementation architects, Internet Domain experts and engineers).

I'm just hoping it's not a fluke.

And it feels good to be part of Sears' IT again. Good people.

Gulp

I'm seeing things out here in unemployment land that really haven't changed much since my last dalliance:

• HR and hiring managers throw kitchen sinks, bathtubs and 5 gal. bottled water bottles into each and every job listing.
• They're not willing to pay for all that water and our kids are going to take it in the neck. Once I'd like to see realistic requirements...or know which ones are the most important, drop dead gotta have these.
  
• They (the people with the job form) keep calling it a job requirement. A job requirement, you uneducated idiot, is 'needs at least six months experience in JCL,' not 'Business Analyst.'
• And quit trying to cover up Abbott Labs. Uline left Waukegan a couple of months ago and other than Zebra Printers or Washburn Guitars, there's nothing up North except tea-baggers. Abbott doesn't pay contractors a living wage and the front doors should be built on skateboard metal wheels because they can't hold anyone there. Not like figuring out why is rocket science.
  
• The English- challenged refuse to even read the job 'requirement.' I am not a developer you illiterate boilerplate, I am an analyst. Interwoven/Autonomy and Documentum are on my resume showing my abilities in custom portal creation, not revising templates. 

How's that for Senior Business Analysis?

I'm going to hold out for a face 2 face interview this time. I had a five and a half hour session of blood sweat and tears for what I thought was going to be a dream job. Turns out they were ass holes. My fault. Should not have agreed to the gig over the phone.

That said, so far (both days) in this search, I've found four or five really good recruiters.

Sorry.

Recruiters with English as a first language.

I'm a car carrying liberal, but why are these companies putting language challenged people on the phone. Once I say, "I'm fine, how are you?" their script is blow to smithereens and they can't recover. They've lost sales time and they've eliminated still one more e-mail with attachment I could have sent out that no one will read.

The local recruiters feel much more professional- this anecdotal evidence may suggests the fast money idiots are back trying to sell time shares.

I hope so and I hope I'm wrong, but id IS me, right?

Jamming with High School Friends You Never Thought You had

Today seems like a good day to be thankful for the wonderful times we've all had on FaceBook and especially last Sunday's Jam Session at Alan and Alouise' house- well before it sinks into the next flood.

Rich East High School's Classes of 1971-1975 are pretty much all up on FaceBook... probably because we're too cheap to buy classmates.com accounts.

Since graduating in 1973, I've learned to play a couple of chords on a guitar. I took two whole lessons going up and down the top top four frets and matching those tones to itty-bitty 'notes' on a sheet of paper.

After dumping the 'loaner' with action (space between the bottom of the string and the top of the particle wood fretboard) of about 14 inches or so, with Epiphone's version of a Gibson J-2000,  my sister (who was a whiz) introduced me to 'chords' and you could actually play songs with 'em. Why, oh why, do we introduce people to guitars with #60 strings and action that rips the tips off your fingers?

I got me a dreadnought size to drown my voice out. At 18, I didn't think I could sing. After finding out about his cool thing called 'keys' it turns out my adenoidal bellowings weren't too bad. But that was far in the future when my better half, with exasperation in her voice, told me to hum the song against the chords and then change the capo position.

Jeez.

I'd been playing rhythm in a couple of folk ensembles for a few years and found that, pretty much, every guy in the Class of '73 did the same thing I did to find girls...learn three chords and buy yerself a capo to raise or lower the pitch. They continued practicing and learning from the folk-rock songs to which we were listening in the 70s.

They kept telling me they were horrible players.

I believed them.

So I suggested a jam session. Lots of flurrying around, excited talk and plansd akin to the Manhattan Project floated around FaceBook for about a month. I figured I'd blow the room away.

Wrong.

These guys were good. And while we had, let's see, Drama, Speech, Industrial Arts, Radio Station, Speech Team, Newspaper and a couple of niches even I wasn't aware of were represented and all the barriers of school were gone. Pffts
.
I wrote a blog on FaceBook about a year about how high school is a troubled time for many (OK, all of us) and what stunned me (and continues to do so even today) is how great these people are and I missed all of it between 1969 and 1973. Blinders and much too concerned with being vulnerable protecting myself.

• Chip was kicking ass on his 12 string- playing so quietly I couldn't believe it was a 12 string. Who knew?
• Dave turns out to live a bike ride from my house...just like when we were kids. I plan on doing just that and inviting him over to my house. After cleaning. He'll be waiting a while.He's killer mean when playing in A or E. Seriously. When we played Gloria he was all over it like a bad suite. I also had an opportunity to put the Fourth Grade Fish Tank and Freshman QSL Issues to rest, for which I'm mighty grateful. I did in a crowd so he wouldn't hit me. Turns out, he's too much a gentleman. He just let the air out of my tires. I'll be here all week- remember to tip your waitress.
• Steve- I heard him before (in my basement) and he plays a very tasty acoustic guitar- he even brought a resonator guitar, which was trey kewl. He is so good, he hit all the fills in Poncho and Lefty exactly like my band's lead player does...almost to the note. And he bitched I was using barre chords. How can you not like someone like that?
  
• Alan- all over Cat Stevens...I mean ALL OVER some of our favorite tunes from the 70s...and his Jimmy Page riffs were dead on. Wonderful Host. Five Stars.
  
• Tom- Alan's brother and closer to my music (folk, old timey, acoustic blues sort of stuff) is as good on his music as his brother. Banging on his guitar, my foot. Cool songs, very cool songs and great taste. He's a member of the Old Towne School, so how could he not?
  
• Mimi- Wow. Just Wow. Her significant other seems like a good guy as well.
• Sheree- just as pretty and intelligent and delightful as in school. One of the women my radar said 'totally, absolutely way above your station in life.' Never partied with her or Mimi- and that's just enough of a rationale to kick myself.
• Alouise- a delight for not only letting is use her basement, but to have around the party without a single sarcastic chuckle. Alan picked good.
• Peggy- A SAINT- who the hell could have put up with me for 34 years? And a crack percussionist. Definitely out of my class. No, not High School.

Funny how your early mind games come up to kick you in the ass in Middle Age.

We missed a few folks and the short notice left out some folks who might otherwise have shown. We won't make that same mistake- because there will be a next time.

Team Clock

I've got a friend from high school. Steve Ritter is his name.

He came over to my house a while back for a guitar jam and blew out the room. Haven't heard hide nor hair from him since. I don't think the rest of us were all that bad...

Now, in the wake of his "I don't usually play acoustic" (he has a $2500 Martin, I'm not stupid, Steve, just tome deaf) and doing electric riffs on heavy acoustic strings- the only thing I had going for me was my writing skill. I knew I was a better writer than he is. Had to be. He was in the plays while I was on the newspaper, yearbook and radio station.

Steve tells me he wrote a book, could I review it?

Sure- just had unemployment (ethics requires me to purchase stuff I review, especially from a friend) and getting used to a new job  kinda delayed it.

Here goes:

Turns out the SOB is also a better writer than me.

Bastard.

Now I have no reason to live.

Seriously, though, Steve's book is titled Team Clock: A Guide to Breakthrough Teams.

Steve took the old group communication model (he uses the psychological version, which is the same goofy storming and norming, etc.). But Steve made almost the same leap Maslow (you remember- 'self actualized' and 'hierarchy of needs') made in the 1950s.

Team Building (communication) is a continuum, not like the seven steps for grieving.  Ritter uses the face of a clock for his model... and the walks you all through the complete life cycle of a team. Any kind of team.

If you are a Project Manager, a Scrum Master, a Portfolio Manager, a Business Analyst or an Architect/Lead Developer, go buy this book.

All that PMI crap about inputs and outputs are nothing compared to what Steve's accomplished in 88 pages. And you don't have to memorize a thing.


There are direct application (pun intended) for software development teams.

Those just getting organized.

Those ready to take the plunge into Agile methods.

Those who's lead developer is now working for Google and pretty much everybody on the team thinks it's great, but why did she get the job and not me?

Oh, sure, if you need some help, the Team Clock Institute is standing by with operators waiting to take your call. i think they take American Express. And, yeah, if Steve and his colleagues are half as successful with your issues as he's been with those who confirmed his theories, you're going to wish you called him a long time ago.

But if you want to know (you PMs and BAs need to know this stuff a heckuva lot more than memorizing that certification drivel) how to motivate and manage your team. This book will explain. If you can help push your team out of the comfort zone into unknown or untried region- Steve has an outline and an example for you.

It's not a How To book. Steve wrote a Think About This Way book.

If my team was having major issues or I couldn't deduce what the problem was, I feel confident Steve and his team would find me an answer and a method of 'fixing it' or at least understanding it.

Team Clock is not a panacea. In fact, Steve mentions that there are times team members have to leave. But unlike goofy management books like The One Minute Manager, Ritter wrote a book that I can use as a team member and a team manager for years. Not many $20 investments can say the same.

Now that's out of the way:

Steve:

1. When did you become such jock?
2. You're killing me with three syllable words- there are perfectly good single syllable words, amigo: it's u-s-e, not utilize and t-i-t-l-e, not entitle (entitle means having a right to something). There are a couple others.
3. I'm just yanking your chain- you did a fabulous job. Very little psycho-babble and right to the point.

Now. How do I sweet talk him into our band?

What I'm doing on my Summer Vacation

I had a couple of minutes last week, so I looked in the enterprise phone book. This is like Googling yourself. It turns out my new employer....er...client thinks I'm an Architect/Designer.

The boss says she doesn't have a problem with that because a. I can do and b. I pretty much am doing it, as a sort of junior- deputy-assistant, associate Architect. That means I have no clue about process, people or things. But I'm learning.

Anyway, I wanted to know what the heck an IT Architect does since I thought it was like a super Team Lead- the kind of person who lives and breathes data layers, web services and other tools we BAs usually nod at like we understand what they're saying. I figure as long as they draw the graphics, they can call that stuff anything they want.

It turns out, I was close- especially on the technical end. But it turns out it's more of a blend of skills and knowledge:

Architecture is a business in which technical knowledge, management, and an understanding of business are as important as design.- wikipedia

Designer? Yeah. I'm not a full fledged Information Architect, oooops! An Information Architect at my client's site is a regular old software architect, not a trained designer and requirements gatherer. Actually, that's the group I'm in.

Anyway.

I'm not a full-fledged web-designer-user experience specialist, but I play one on television.  Everyone other than my boss thinks it's amazing I have more than one skill set. Muahahahahaha.

So, I'm writing and drawing, drawing and writing. We came up with the concept in the first couple of weeks and are now making the case for Knowledge Management. Oops. Sorry. Knowledge Sharing.

You have any idea how cool it is working for a place that could care less what titles and functions mean on the outside? It's confusing as hell. But its pretty cool.

Big and Small

Well, it's been about a month.

I'm reminded constantly that I'm working at a big....large...um...HUGE company and the stuff I learned at the fast-agile firms in recent times ain't gonna cut it.

The saving grace is that I have the time to anticipate, to talk, to work things out with the really smart people I work with. And that's not a bad trade off.

Yeah, it sucks having your laptop locked down. It's worse using Internet Explorer 6 and Office 2003. But I'm beginning to understand why.

This company has about a gajillion (that's 1x10+3 higher than a bazillion) laptops and PCs out in the offices. I remember one agent's kid putting a Golf on his Agency PC. The kid didn't install it correctly and Dad's PC was toast. Of course, it was the IT department's fault.

So, a little sweet talk, a few sentences about how technical my gig is and a superb boss, I got local admin rights to the laptop, M/S Project, IE 8 and Snag It installed. OK. They gave me Snag IT Release 8 and Techsmith just released version 10- but 8 still has that great little image editor- which means I don't have to ask for PhotoShop.

I've been relying on the "people skills" I learned as a Parachuting Business Analyst (drop in for a few weeks and off to the next project). Yes, I should have learned these skills years ago- but a radio news guy is supposed to be a curmudgeon.

So, I've been listening carefully, holding off riffing with my strange, yet obscure sense of humor; until I know you very well- and even then I'm careful about my jokes. It's hard, but it beats getting fired. And it seems to be working pretty well.

I'm also trying really, really hard not to interrupt someone when they're speaking. Then I went to a status meeting of the Enterprise Architects. There wasn't a topic that didn't result in at least one interruption- except when the Director spoke. Hmmm. Kinda funny, no?

I'm using the extra time to extrapolate requirements and high level designs for what could be a terrific Capture/Store/Disseminate system based on existing, every day tools with a little bit of extra horsepower. If this goes the way I'm thinking it will, the only real issues we're going to have are cultural. But we're on top of that, too.

I'll ask the boss what's proprietary and what I can talk about as we go through the process. I'll letcha know.

I really like this gig- and I've been there for about a month.