Rocky Pufflenuggets

I was sitting in this meeting yesterday and realized that there were four managers for the two people actually doing the work. All the managers individually said "Keep me in the loop" even though by the org chart, only one was the manager of the guys actually doing the work. Work has become Office Space - four managers for a project with two guys doing all the work.

I came to work at this place because it was lean. Only a few levels of people from the bottom to the top. Now it's been morphed into some 'classic' textbook example of an organization (on paper), and a monster in real life. I'm about to send this into the Daily WTF and see if they post it - they may not because it's almost too hard to believe.

I now know why all those guys in the WTFs are saying they left the place at the end of their story. This has already passed "funny if it weren't so sad", and is quickly approaching "a death march to match WWII". Forget this being a 'nice' place to work... about the only nice thing about it is the time I get to do the actual work - which could be done anywhere. Nope, this place is in the dumpster.

I wonder if they'll be able to pull out... and if I'll be around to see it.

I was talking to my good friend Tennessee again today at lunch, and we started talking about disaster projects that we've both been involved in at the jobs we've had. It's funny some of the things a project manager will do to try and make something work. It's almost like the project is started for the good of the business, but then takes on a life of it's own and must be finished no matter what the damage to the business. It's really like a child growing up to be a shooter in a bell tower. Something went horribly wrong - even with the best of intentions.

There have been books written about this problem... degrees handed out on the study of it... and millions and millions of dollars wasted because of it. But what this lead to in our conversation was the realization that many people leave a job not because of the day-to-day stuff, but because of one of these Death-March Projects.

You're pretty happy in the job, things are going pretty well - ups and downs, just like everything else, and then comes the Death-March. You start working on it - maybe not yet realizing it will become horrific, maybe it hasn't yet gotten to that point, but some point along the way it becomes that, and you start telling yourself "Hey, this can't last forever, it's going to get better." But it never does.

You go one like this for months... each week saying "Hey, it's gone on this long, it can't take too much longer", and yet each time you have a status meeting, you realize that it isn't getting any better. The specs change... or you find other dependencies... or someone says this needs to be done as well. All these things are reasonable, but it's the accumulation of these on a single project that is a killer.

Then you start to think it's never going to end. You get depressed about coming to work, so you put forth less effort, and this makes things take even longer. Pretty soon you try to think of things to do to keep from doing the Killer Project. But it's coming back to ge you... you can't run away.

Then you start to think that the only way you'll be free of this is to leave. You find it's a happy thought. You actually look forward to it. You interview and you're gone. Free at last, thank goodness!

I wonder why management doesn't realize all this? I'm sure they remember this, but they seem to forget it, or be oblivious to it once they get the nice office. Seems silly, really. But that's why Dilbert is so funny.

So I heard today that Mike Lee is leaving Delicious Monster. I can certainly understand his position. He started working for Wil to learn how to code Mac OS X at the feet of a true master. Excellent story, worth reading. But I'm not talking about Mike's story... I'm looking at the fact that the title of Mike's weblog is a word that I wouldn't say in front of my mother, but he does, and has every right to do so.

Free Speech. That's one of those catchy phrases that we throw around a lot. We're all supposed to have it, and as long as you're not hurting anyone with your free speech, someone shouldn't tell you you can stop what you're saying. Take out the slander... take out the mean-spirited remarks... your personal experiences and beliefs are yours, and if you want to express yourself you should have that right.

I say should, because in many places - most notably Big Business, you don't have that right.

I was talking to my friend Tennessee the other day and he was telling me about this CNN reporter that was fired for having said "certain things" on his weblog. Fired. I read the guy's post about his firing. It's really rather amazing. I mean, I've gotten into this issue with my friend Dante several times. Dante owns a little company - nothing that'll change the world of finance, but it's his little web shop and it's something he takes a lot of pride in.

Anyway, Dante always says that he works in an At Will State - meaning that he can fire anyone for any reason - so long as it's not discrimination. So if this person is being a slug and doing nothing - Dante can (and has) fired them. He can hire and fire at will. And I can understand why - it's his company, his name on the door, and his reputation.

But where does that end?

If you look at the CNN producer, he's writing about the industry he's in. OK, I still think they went overboard, but maybe. But what if it was one of the train conductors that I see every day on the trains I ride? What if one of them wanted to write about computers and the jerks he meets on the job and at the Big Box store down the street? Should the train company be able to fire him for that?

Where does personal time and personal feelings interfere with the job? And does this effect his job at all? The CNN producer was fired for something that had nothing to do with his job. Nothing at all. Dante doesn't fire people for what they do on the weekend, he's only fired people for what they do during the workday. And that should be the litmus test.

If the writing is materially effecting the job, then it becomes a work issue. If not, then it's personal.

I'm not silly enough to think that's the way it really works, but I do think that it should work that way. Big Business has the money and the lawyers on their side. People should have the right to say what they think and feel as long as it doesn't hurt someone else. And so long as the company isn't hurt, then employees should have the right to say what they think.

After all... Free Speech isn't the same as "Free Speech that offends no one"... we do not have the right to be free of offense. I don't have to like what you say, but that doesn't give me the right to make you stop.

This is going to change someday. Wait and see.

I had to take a test today for a certification that I need for work. Normally, this is a good thing, but the reality of this particular certification exam is that it's 'graded' by the computer and it's not using a very good algorithm for determining if the answer you provided correctly matched the expected answer. For example, do you care about the case of the answer? Do you care about whitespace? In both cases, this vendor's on-line test cared about each of these.

It tells you up-front, and when the question is very specific, that's OK. For example, if the question were about Java, then you could easily say:

Fill in the blank: To make an upper-case copy of a string you would use:

String c = aString.________;

This is easy as there's only one answer that will fit in the blank that will compile and work with regular Java. These are fair questions. But what if the user said toUpperCase and not toUpperCase() - do they get it wrong? Technically, they would because without the () it's not going to work. However, is that really necessary for the developer to get right in order to be certified on a platform? Maybe... maybe not.

But the real problems come into play when they have questions like this:

What does this describe: The native Java interprocess communication system

OK... so is it 'RMI', or is it the java.rmi package, or is it 'Remote Method Invocation'? If the computer is grading this, it needs to be pretty darn smart about it because all are valid answers to the vague question. But in fact, this vendor's online test was just this vague in parts and some answers were just this difficult to answer.

Again, the problem is you get one chance at this, and you don't know how you're doing until it's all over and you get your "grade". Thankfully, I passed just fine, but it was with the knowledge of the way they were grading this exam.

I come from a long line of teachers, and this is a horrible testing process. They need to have the test email an individual and have them look at it with a pair of eyes. That way it's not as important how you say it, as what you say. Then again... this is a crummy vendor, and not the first time I've had exceptions with online certification exams. Probably won't be the last, either.