Learning Servant Leadership from Marines

Marines can teach you a lot about
servant leadership.  You just have to listen.

The life of a software developer and entrepreneur is filled with adventure.  It is also filled with countless hours of meetings, moments of terror, and a few lighthearted memories.  This week I danced around my day jobs office like a portly fool to the popular summer hit “Happy” by Pharrell.  It did it because I had made a bet with one of the scrum teams that they could not get their work done at the end of a sprint.  They accepted my playful challenge and they came through for me.  I had no choice but to dance around the office.  This got me thinking about leadership and what software professionals have to do in order to be successful.

As a younger person, I remember being taught about leadership by two Marine Corps veterans from Vietnam.  Sergeant Major David Ogle and Lieutenant Colonel Richard Weidner were larger than life figures from my youth.  Like many teens in the classroom the lessons they gave me really did not sink in until later in life.  Both taught me a leader had two responsibilities to accomplish the mission goals and to look after the well being of the people under your command.  When forced to choose always accomplish the mission.  I didn’t understand this right away.  Marines made life and death decisions.  Getting a mission done often means getting someone killed.

It would only be later in life that I understood what this unusually lesson would mean.  First, a leader looked after his people because some day you will have to ask them to accomplish a mission.  The people you lead will have to sacrifice themselves and their family lives to get things done.  In a military context, they may risk injury and death.  The other part of this simple lesson was that the leader is not really there to lead others but to serve them.  This is why I noticed officers in the Marines eat last in the mess hall making sure their people ate first.  It is also why most senior enlisted men and officers did not rest until all of the people they led were safely back at base.

This left a lasting impression on me.  It also influenced me on how I lead software development team.  I refer to them as “ladies and gentlemen” since I have the rare privilege of working with co-ed software teams.  I stick up for my developers when there are struggling and give them a kick in a seat when they are loafing.  I purchase hard candy to keep them from smoking and dance around my office when I lose a bet with the team.  It just comes with the job of being a scrum master.  A scrum master is a servant leader who helps his people be the best they can be.

This is not an easy life but I find it very rewarding.  It is all part of the adventure.

Until next time.

The Vision Thing

We have a vision.

Technology is a shambling monster of innovation and conflicting visions.  One week, we view the future being made in virtual reality with companies like Occulus.  The next week we view self-driving cars.  It is enough to make someone’s head spin.  I myself wonder about all the new innovations and changes taking place.  As an entrepreneur, do I ride the latest trends or do I follow my own trail.  This week I want to talk about where my head and heart take me.

The two biggest trends in technology are the increase in mobile computing with smart phones and the rise of cloud computing.  I have been watching both grow for years and I have been talking about it for a long time.   I think that Microsoft has been leader in the area of cloud computing with its Azure services while they have stumbled in the area mobile devices.  I think with the launch of the Surface Pro 3 that they will have a device which will knock some competitors on their behinds.

When I founded this company four years ago I saw these trends in motion and wanted to help small and medium sized businesses take advantage of these technologies.  It is not glamorous or sexy but it felt like a niche which I could fill.  This way a small business owner has the same powers and features as a Fortune 500 firm.  They can use mobile applications and the cloud to help grow their business.  I imagine a sales person for a small firm doing a sale punching a few keys on their cell phone and the transaction going through with minimal human intervention.

This is the dream of my firm and I look forward to making it a reality.  Please contact us today and we will show you how.

Until next time.

A Little Help from My Friends and Family.

It is nice having people look out for you.

The biggest enemy of an entrepreneur is time.  Time to get your business up and running.  Time to develop your product.  Finally, time to pivot your business to deal with a changing market place.  It is exhausting and I do not think that I could keep it up without the help and direction of my friends and family.  This week on the blog I want to discuss the unsung heroes of the entrepreneurial movement.  

Many people have this weird notion that being an entrepreneur is a lonely business where and individual eats, breathes, and sleeps his business all day long to the exclusion of everything else.  There is a kernel of truth to this as we spend countless hours building products, refining sales pitches and marketing our organization.  It can be all consuming.  This is why it is up to friends and family to step in and make sure that you are taking time out to focus on your physical and mental health.  An entrepreneur is worthless if they are not sleeping and they are even more worthless when all they can discuss is the market capitalization of their start up.

Family members remind you to get a good meal and take some time off on the weekend.  Friends offer to play cards or have a beer with you and discuss something, anything other than work.  I am deeply grateful for the help and assistance they have given me over the years.  Without them, I would be an emotional ball of putty with frayed nerves.

Until next time.

No BS, Why people are software developers.

We don't write the software for the money.

Software developers are and odd breed of people.  We work long hours and view the world through the lenses of code.  Why do they do it? I have been thinking about it for some time and I wanted to share with you why software developers do what they do.  This week on the blog what drives software developers.

One of my favorite books on the subject of software development comes from the Bill Pfleging and Minda Zetlin called “The Geek Gap”.  The principle thesis of the book is that software and engineering professionals are motivated by building things that work.  Business people are motivated by influencing others to get work done.  Often these to world views come into conflict.  This is because business people are motivated by schedules and business needs while technical professionals are motivated by building systems that work and our easy to maintain.

I have experienced that conflict first hand as developers have argued with management about unrealistic deadlines and management has looked at the creative process involved in software development and groaned in frustration.  This is one of the reasons why agile software development has been so successful.  The role of Business owner has acted as a “go-between” role between business people and the technology staff and it has helped smooth out the rough edges between the two different tribe of business groups.

That still does not answer the question of why software developers do what they do.  David Graeber, a professor of Anthropology at the London School of Economics wrote a provocative essay “Bullshit Jobs” in the article he argues about the growth of jobs which seem to do nothing more than being involved in meetings, filing reports and administrative support to the business.  Software development is the antithesis of the “bullshit job” because we are building actual things which people use- software.  Granted it is not the great American novel or a cure for the myriad kinds of cancer that exist, but every phone app, web page and application you use in business was created by hand in the mind of a software developer.

This creative process of wrestling code into something that people will actually use is pretty awesome when you experience it.  Four or five hours can drift by and it can seem like five minutes.  You are in a state that developers often refer to as flow.  When you are in flow, I compare the experience to having the hand of the creator guiding your mind toward a better solution.  It is one of the most sublime experiences that I know.

This is one of the reasons I founded my own software company.  I wanted to share that sublime experience with others and help them do better business.  Give us a call and we will show you how.

Software developers are an odd breed of people but by understanding that we are a building things people use and are not involved in “bullshit jobs”; it is one of the best professions to be involved in.

Until next time.

The Magic of Doing the Right Thing

Doing the right thing is not magic.

There is a lot of news that has bubbled up through the web and media about doing the right thing.  From administrators mismanaging VA hospitals and providing inadequate care to our nation’s veterans to the ongoing controversy regarding the National Security Agency; each day we are confronted with people who made impossible choices and exposed wrong-doing or corruption.  Setting aside the politics of this news, it is clear that people will do the right thing even when it is not in their best personal interests.  This gives me hope because as long as there are people in business and politics willing to do the right thing there is hope for the future.  I wanted to discuss this in my blog this week.

Doing the right thing is a very vague term.  If you Google it you are taken to a weird mixture of self-help sites, quotations, and a shout out to the Spike Lee joint by the same name.  During the revelations of the Pentagon papers, Daniel Ellsberg was considered both a traitor to the nation and a hero to the counter culture.  Looking back on the situation, it is clear that without Ellsberg’s efforts open debate about how to prosecute the war in Vietnam was greatly informed by the leaks of this classified information.  Thanks to Ellsberg and his efforts, congress understood how Democratic and Republican administrations lied to them about involvement in Vietnam.  It was also a valuable source of scholarship for historians and military professionals seeking to understand the conflict.  As Ellsberg said himself, “I felt that as an American citizen, as a responsible citizen, I could no longer cooperate in concealing this information from the American public. I did this clearly at my own jeopardy and I am prepared to answer to all the consequences of this decision.”

In 2009, Mattel the makers of Barbie and other popular toys was dragged into court because they had violated the federal ban on lead paint in their products.  This time the whistle-blower was a Chinese factory worker and the plant manager committed suicide before the full extent of the contamination was exposed.  Thousands of toys were recalled and the company had to pony up 2.3 million dollars to pay fines.  Worse was the hit to the reputation to the company, as it went into the holiday shopping season and had to explain to nervous parents how their products were now lead free.

These two stories have one thing in common.  When someone was confronted with an ethically dubious situation or a clear example of corruption, they decided to expose it and then they took responsibility for their actions.  They did not “play ball” and allow these situations to continue rather, they decided to change them with the only tools they had at their power which was information.

I have spent the bulk of my career trying to do the right thing for my customers, co-workers, and clients.  In some situations, I was rewarded with unemployment.  In others, I was demoted or marginalized.  That did not change how I operated because I always felt that when the chips were down others would always remember when you were under tremendous pressure and still did the right thing.  This was one of the reasons why I founded E₃ systems.  I wanted to be the owner of a software development firm and I wanted to continue to do the right thing.  Please look us up and we will tell you more.

So as we come out of a long holiday weekend commemorating the sacrifices of military during the history of our nation.  Take a little time to recognize the people big and small who sacrifice every day doing the right thing for others.

Until next time.

Stepping out of the Office

New Orleans and it feels
so good.

The software developer and entrepreneur does not live in a vacuum.  They have to interact with customers and other organizations.  If you don’t get out of that comfort zone you will stagnate and fall behind the times.  This is why I attended the Scrum Alliance Gathering in New Orleans this last week.  It was a very healing event as I got to meet other like-minded people and mingle with others who are attempting to build their own organizations and products.  This week on the blog I want to talk about the experience and let you know what that means for the future of the organization.

The Scrum Alliance is the membership organization which charters the training and education of scrum professionals.  The certification for all the major branches of agile professionals flows through the organization.  My career prospects improved instantly once I became a Certified ScrumMaster and I felt that my four years of agile training and experience culminated in receiving the certification.  Little did I realize, that being an agile developer was not preparation for being a full time ScrumMaster.

What the conference did to reinforce what I have learned over the last five years as a developer and ScrumMaster.  I had a chance to meet people who had the same problems I did.  I got to share some knowledge that I gathered over the years and share it with others.  I especially want to give recognition to Arne Ahlander and his outstanding presentation “The Listening ScrumMaster”.  This session taught me that I needed to spend more time trying to listen to the people on my team rather than attempting to coach them. 

I also had an opportunity to learn a little bit more about values of Agile which are: commitment, courage, openness, respect and focus.  This was a very important course for me because I can see these values waning in my business and in my agile teams.  It takes a lot of energy to get people to work together so it was nice to see what it needs to be done to mold at team into a high energy outfit. 

I am going to take these values back to my organization and company and see if they work.  It is nice to get away from the office and go to a conference.  It is also nice to escape the vacuum of isolation and get a fresh perspective. 

Until next time. 

The Insanity of Software

At times someone distills perfectly what it means to be a software developer.  This week Peter Welch posted the following article to Gizmodo and I strongly recommend it to my readers “Why a Job in Programming Is Absolute Hell”.  This week, I wanted to comment on this blog and try to let you know that while programming is hell; the trip is worth it if you can help customers try and solve their problems.

Welch’s thesis is that while software development does not require you to lift 50 pounds or dangle from a building while you wield together iron girders, it is filled with stress and insanity.  I can attest in my career that software is one of the few products we make in western civilization which is made completely by hand.  That said many of the people who build software see themselves as artists and craftsmen.  This is a recipe for mental illness and conflict.   Because no two software developers will build the same thing the same way, this means that the more software developers you have working on a project the more disagreements about how the work is going to get done.

I am going to postulate something known as Wisniowski’s theorem.  For every developer on a software team, the amount of disagreement increases by the power of the number of developers on the team.  Thus, a team of seven developers is two to the seventh power more likely to disagree about how to build something than a team of two developers.

To prevent this from spiraling out of control, scrum masters and project managers were created who were supposed to act as guides and leaders to prevent conflict from spiraling out of control and get work done on time.  This has created an entirely different set of problems because many project managers and scrum masters do not come from a technical background.  So they do not know how to mediate conflict in a technical team or even what questions to ask.  This means that developers become insubordinate and work around the project leadership to get work done.  By the time someone has realized what has happened, it is either too late or the developer has decided to switch jobs working someplace else.  If this sounds like madness, it is.

So what company to do?  Well many people purchase software in the hope of never having to figure out how it is constructed.  Others pay millions of dollars for consulting companies to build the software and hope that it works.  Finally, the truly brave hire developers and IT professionals and hope that they can keep the organization afloat.  I have lived it for over 15 years and I have to scars to show it.

This is why I founded E₃ systems.  I wanted to help businesses with low cost and low hassle solutions to fleet maintenance and inventory management.  Contact us today and we will tell you how.

Software development is filled with stress and insanity.  It has rewarded me with a modicum of independence and a middle class lifestyle but I know for a fact that there has to be a better way to practice my profession.  So enjoy that working software because someone had to go a little insane to make it a reality.

Until next time.