The "Wooo! moment" Factor

This is another one of my general life blogs and follows up from my recent article about what makes a good programmer where I refer to a ‘Rocky Balboa’ moment that encompasses everything about being a great computer programmer.

I would like to clarify that this post has nothing to do with the incessant number of reality talent shows and is not in anyway linked or endorsed by those in the entertainment industry.

However, I recently went to the Smackdown/ECW world tour event here in Auckland, New Zealand.

Like most of the other hardcore WWE fans I registered for the internet presale, logging in a minute or two before midday and continually pressing the refresh (F5) button in Internet Explorer until the ticket selection page popped up. A quick combo-box click later and an anxious wait ensued whilst the system allocated my tickets and then the “Woo! moment” came.

I knew it was a full on “Wooo! moment” as it did turn the heads of a few people in my office.

The reason being was that I was lucky enough to get front row tickets, seat numbers 1 and 2 which was not only the closest you can get to the ring but also the closest you can get to the entrance ramps for when the wrestlers strut their stuff as part of the pre bout entertainment. The arena held thousands and thousands of people and to get to two best tickets in the house was reason enough for me to celebrate. Actually, celebrate for my daughter, as she is the wrestling fan. I just have transient knowledge.

For anybody that follows the WWE Wrestling you will probably know a guy called Ric Flair. He is a 16 times world champion as well as being regarded as one of the all time greats. He is also famous in WWE circles for his tag line “Wooo!”. So much so that the last three shows we have been to, Ric Flair has never been there, he has been retired since March 2008 and yet everyone was shouting “Wooo!” as the excitement began to build in the arena.

Now for me life is about experiences and the memories thereafter. We have both good and bad times that shape us all individually in some form or another. And one hopes that over the balance our lifetime that there are many more good times rather than bad and it is these good times that I affectionately refer to as the “Wooo! moments”.

Now if we spend on average a minimum of between 50 and 70 hours travelling and working each week I often ask myself why do people put up with a job or a career that doesn’t provide them with “Wooo moments”. I have been pretty lucky in this regard over the years. I am an analytical person and love computers. As a child at my local school jobs fair in 1983 I expressed that I wanted to be a computer programmer. After a few minutes searching the database (list of jobs on paper in those days). I was asked if I wanted to do commerce, a funny choice at first until you realise that it was the closest alphabetically to computing.

How times have changed.

Now everyone wants to do computing and whilst there are now more areas to become expert, I also believe that computing remains at risk of be dumbed down. I say this because many people are getting into computing because they see a higher than average salary trend, they only see the exciting parts of the job glamorised by Hollywood films or they see it as easy.

For me I got into computing because of the “Wooo! moments” and I continue to adore this line of work. But also as I get older I also find myself enjoying the fact that others around me are having their own “Wooo! moments”. I'm a little like grandparents who enjoy watching those cute little bundles known as grandchildren.

But of course it doesn’t stop there.

You may have a job that only has one or two “Woo!” moments in an entire career span. A recent example was the recent mission to detect life on Mars. Some of those guys had been working on that mission for 10 years or more. But that “Wooo! moment” when that million dollar craft landed on Mars and started to do its stuff.

Wow!!!!

The screams of joy and relief I could hear just by watching the footage on a 21” TV was there for the world to see.

The “Wooo! moments” are what drive me to get up each day and if you find yourself having less and less of these moments whilst at work.

Ask yourself why?

Work does dominate and validate many of ours lives so you might as well enjoy what you are doing. But please don't moan to me about your job. Do something about it.

Please, ensure that you do. Life is too short.

Thanks for reading.
Lee.

The lunchtime effect and an insane piece of Job’s Worth.

The other day I had to visit the immigration department to renew my daughters’ residency visas.

This is a process that you have to repeat every time you renew your main passport because if you want to re-enter the country you will definitely find it useful to have this little slip indicating that you are a legal alien tucked up nicely in there somewhere.

The process is quite simple. You bring your old and new passports, fill out a form and pay the fee.

Simple!!!

A short time later (minutes or hours) you leave feeling robbed but also happy in the knowledge that you’re able to travel to and from your adopted homeland.

The key, as you all know, is to avoid the queue or at least pick the day when the most counters are open. We were going to the hospital as my wife had an appointment for one of her ailments so the time we had available in between the school runs and the appointment was basically lunchtime.

Or put it another way. Rush Hour. Usually when you have to go somewhere on a time constraint then you will always pick the bad day. Well for some reason it was empty on this occasion. We were through to the application triage officers within minutes. These guys check the forms and provide assistance before you get to a case officer.

This obviously is to avoid you waiting for a period of time to find out that you have completed the wrong form or worse still used the wrong type of pen colour.

At this stage I leant over the counter and enquired as to the lack of visitors. You see. I have been to the immigration department before and joined a queue that left the building. To give you another indication in the old building there was a portable café outside to serve food and drinks………..

Apparently it was just a slow day. I was wondering whether this was as a result of what I refer to as the lunchtime effect. I am sure I am not the only one out there but it could be due to the fact that I am an IT guy I was thinking. Why was this room empty? Was it because others had considered that it was lunchtime and therefore made the assumption that it would be busy, thus avoiding the ‘so called’ busy period when there are more people and less staff!!!!

Actually, who cares? I got the visas sorted in record time, but, I am grateful for all those who were considerate to enough to think of the lunchtime effect.

But the jobs worth moment is certainly worth writing about. For one reason alone, I am adamant that the person who came up with this rule was not an IT guy as there is no binary representation of what I witnessed. No IT guy in the world could have come up with an answer other than 0 or 1 (On or Off). And this to me is 5.66645645- and fifteen sixtenths.

As we were applying for three visas the costs were $100.00 per application. This makes sense I guess. Until you hear the triage officer ask “Are either of you two (Wife and I) applying for the visa also?”.

Our answer this time around was “No” because our passports are 10 years and the kids are 5 years in renewal intervals. “Shame” was the response, she then continued, “Because if one of you i.e. principal applicants are applying as well we can do this as one application with 3 dependents and therefore you will only be charged one off fee of S100.00.”

So the logic is that we will do the extra two applications and produce 5 instead of 3 visas. Key in details for 5 people and not 3, print, remove and secure 5 visas in the passports and not 3 and we will do that for one price.

But as a principal applicant isn’t applying then we need to treat it as 3 separate applications!!!!!!!!!!

If someone can shed any light of this I would be grateful. Until then I am proud to call myself a Software Development Professional. I certainly wouldn’t want to explain the aforementioned rule for my living or associate my name with inventing this process.

Thanks for reading.
Lee.

What makes a good software developer?

I have decided to move on from my current role after over four years working at my present company. My reasons are varied and plentiful but as always the lure of a fresh new challenge often commands the majority of my thoughts.

I have started once more on the interview merry go round, first with agents and then in the coming weeks with potential employers. This is an interesting time in my career and certainly a change I am looking forward to albeit a little nervously as I have only ever had three IT related job interviews in my life.

During my early stages of interview with one particular agent I was asked a really good open question. The question was “What makes a good software developer?”. I waited no more than 2 seconds before I began rattling off my opinion. Normally in these situations you take the time to consider what you want to say and then lead up to the answer.

This felt different.

I guess this is because although I have never answered this question before (personally or via my blog), I have hired enough developers and non-developers over the years to understand what I believe a good developer to be. After all, one of my own interview questions to potential new hires is “Why software development for a career?”

I ask this question as I want to know what motivated them to get into software development and what maintains that desire to be a software developer. At my last firm a new project manager joined and we got talking about stuff. You know, the technical stuff. It was quite obvious to me that this guy didn’t want to be a project manager and that he still harboured that technical development desire. I knew this because as a project manager he would say stuff like “Worst case I can write that program.” or “Couldn’t we do this in x language or y language.” It was pretty obvious to me that this guy couldn’t let go, and this is what I look for.

For me the number one thing is the passion. I want to see this in the eyes of the candidate as they express to me their achievements and technical prowess. I look for the body language that backs up these passionate views.

I have been part of and built software development teams. I have written in other posts that you do need a mixture of people at varying stages in their careers with a good balance of personal motivating factors. Passion is certainly the one I look for when I am considering the lead roles within a team. The reason being that I believe as a lead developer you must bring others on by example.

Other factors to look for, especially for a permanent employee are:-

* Longevity in the industry and loyalty to an employer or two.
* Proof of learning multiple languages and having the desire to adapt to development trends.
* Good understanding of general development concepts and practices.

These are pretty generic but with passion, loyalty, desire, adaptability and a good all round understanding of development I believe I can teach any developer the technology of the month.

Without these attributes I guess you could be selling your business short. If I had to choose one then passion is the one I would go for.

If you see a developer struggling with some code all day but eventually they let out an enormous scream of relief as they finally solve their issue, jump up and then start punching the air in delight in the style of Rocky Balboa.

I’ll have that person in my team any day.

Thanks for reading.
Lee.