I’m always amazed at the number of people who take a job because it’s steady employment, or don’t choose to leave a job when they’re no longer learning. Eric Sink’s Career Calculus is an excellent essay on the value and necessity of continuing to learn throughout your career. He lumps all learning together. I think […]
The Pragmatic Manager, Volume 1 #4 Contents: This month’s Feature Article: Use Overtime as a Last Resort Announcements On the Bookshelf Want to hear more from Johanna? Want to read more of Johanna’s writing? =-=-=-=-=- Feature Article: Use Overtime as a Last Resort Overtime is the last degree of flexibility in a project. Unfortunately, too
The only good thing about this current spate of worms and viruses is that the spammers seem to sending less spam. Naively, a few months ago, I bemoaned the state of automated spam filters. Now I wish my mail program (Eudora) and spam filter (SpamSieve) could detect these ridiculous pif files and delete all mail
Dilbert is always good for a laugh. Make sure you have common sense when you interview. Don’t trash your previous managers or coworkers. Relate your experience to something useful for the hiring manager. Send me things you wish you’d never heard in an interview (whether it was from you or the other person) and I’ll
Earlier this week, I was at the Rational User Conference. I was part of a dynamic panel, “The People Factor: Experts Weigh In On The Soft Side of Software.” One question was about how technical managers or project managers have to be. Murray Cantor, one of the other panelists, summed it up this way:
One good thing about the slow economy is that organizations are no longer spending money on extras such as teambuilding sessions. Those sessions typically come in two styles: physical challenges such as ropes courses or shooting rapids; or touchy-feely sessions where you’re supposed to confess your deepest, darkest secrets to your co-workers, and then hug
I’ve long been a fan of phone screens, to make sure I only invite candidates for an in-person interview who are a reasonable fit for the job. Now that online services and some recruiters make candidates list every technical tool they’ve ever seen on their resume, it’s hard to tell who’s actually qualified for the
Release trains, the technique of planning releases on a particular date several times a year (such as quarterly releases, on the 12th of the last month of the quarter), can help you manage your development and test staff as well as machines and tool resources. I wrote about release trains a while ago here.
I spoke this morning at WIND (Wednesday is Networking Day), helping candidates learn how to interview when the interviewers don’t necessarily ask great questions. At one point, one of the participants said, “Start with a zinger, then explain with data, then discuss your process.” When you answer a question such as “Tell me about a
Recently, two colleagues got stuck in their negotiations over a job offer. The candidate thought he heard “How little will it take to make you happy?” The hiring manager thought he said, “What do you need?” Argh. Both of these are bad questions. When you’re asked how little you need, you feel as if you’re