War of Attrition

January is always an “interesting” month at work. Usually this is the month when the results of the corporate-wide Fall Planning exercises, conducted by the Movers and Shakers at the end of the previous year, actually trickle down to the worker bees – the people that are most affected.

Fall Planning determines the budget allocated to each product team for the following year. Products that are kicking butt financially or products in new emerging markets get more money.  Struggling products get less money or sometimes get eliminated, with the developers moved to other projects (or worse). For all practical purposes, the amount of the budget equates roughly to the number of developers and testers.

Report Card Time

 The company gives us the results of our annual performance appraisal in the second week in January every year. There are 4 levels of performance. Your rating is supposed to provide an overall assessment of your work over the previous year, relative to your peers at the corresponding band level. The rating is a key factor in raises and annual bonuses, so I guess it is pretty important.

Of course, raises and bonuses also depend heavily on factors that are not entirely in your control - such as overall financial health of the economy, the company, and your business unit.

Where Did That Two Weeks Go?

“For the past few weeks I’ve been working with a fellow developer on a project that required an all-out programming effort. It’s done now, so we’re back to a regular schedule, but when people hear about the crazy hours they often say they’re sorry. They really shouldn’t be. I would never do this often, or for long periods, or without proper compensation if done for an employer, but the truth is that these programming blitzkriegs are some of my favorite periods in life. Under the right conditions, writing software is so intensely pleasurable it should be illegal.”  - Gustavo Duartes

One of the best blogs I have ever encountered is written by a software engineer named Gustavo Duartes. Gustavo has a wonderful writing style. He has a talent for describing complicated engineering topics with clarity and conciseness. Beyond the technical aspects of his blog, though, the real jewels are his observations about the software engineering profession.

The above passage is from a brilliant piece entitled Lucky to Be a Programmer. Recently, my time available for blogging has been drastically reduced due to my own little intense period of programming. Duartes’ piece is so spot on that it feels like he has written it explicitly for me and my life over the last 14 days.

880 In Greensboro

It was a pretty uneventful holiday break. The usual vices of food and drink were, of course, enjoyed - in far too much quantity. I did make it up to Greensboro on the Wednesday after Christmas to witness a historical event. Duke defeated UNCG for the 880th victory for Mike Krzyzewski, one more than legendary UNC coach Dean Smith.

Comparing these two coaching giants for the purpose of determining the single better coach is a fun, but futile, exercise. Brett Friedlander from the ACC Insider has a decent statistical summary. Their careers overlapped by only 17 years and the game (and the underlying culture) has significantly changed between the time Coach Smith took over UNC in the 60s and today.