Waterfall or Agile !!! You are the winner.

Picture this. You are a responsible professional who knows how to get the job done, having a committed team who works extra hours and weekends at the drop of your hat and the team worked months and months and months and months to get the delivery done and at the end of the day, nobody appreciates the pain and efforts - not the client who paid and feeling cheated and not your management because client is unhappy and they entrusted you with the job and the client to be taken care of well.

Business matters. The only thing that matters today. We are not in business of loosing clients. Of course you did your best and you fought day and night and you stole hours from your family time to make things delivered to the client but all that does not matter if we loose the business and the client.

So if you are in above situation, consider why the client's feedback is surprising you and your management at the eleventh hour, after eleventh months etc. etc. and so on !!!

And what can you do? Are you suppose to justify every dick and harry on hows, whats and whys coming your way or you will just have all this pass quietly !!! Both situation is not good and you will not be even allowed to sit, forget sitting quietly.

However, this is all still about you even if it is client who matters. You know the client, you have the team and you know the team and you know your management. You are the guru and the gyan and you are that hero who should have come out of the die hard mess all winning and smiling; But you are left like a side kick whose part ends dead in the first 5 min. or left wondering what happened or left making your voice and frustration heard among your friends and close colleagues in the dark alleys of the organization whose management was suppose to be with you.

Don't forget the days when the management was with you though. When you made them feel that you are in control and that you mean business and that you are their henchman and their commander. Good or bad, they are still with you because you need to cover your own mess.

Time changes. So why would you not want to change with time for your own good and for yourself and because you have to be selfish for client's good and for management's good!!!

Exactly.

Because if you are clever and selfish in doing good for everybody around you who look upon you, you should strive to learn the new tools and new frameworks of the age which will equip you to be a better commander and a better leader. 

Because if you allow yourself to let your guard down just to try and know that may be new age of fast track, no nonsense, no loss deliveries requires new strategy to do few of the following among the many possibilities, than you are the leader and the henchman and the commander:

1. Make delivery with in one to say two to three months for a faster feedback rather than after many many many many months later when it is to late
2. Plan small but plan more frequently and again and again not just between you and client but between whole team and the client so that everybody commits to the delivery
3. Keep client or a decision making representative by your and teams side so that risks, problems, delays etc. are known upfront by everybody at the same time
4. Neither side will ever feel cheated

And no, the old methods are not going away because they have been around since seventies or may be even earlier. Just may be that it is more clearer as to where old methods will work and will not and where new methods will be successful because the methods themselves are not faulty except that the areas where they need to be applied or will work might have changed with times.

And in my understanding, there is no line drawn between methods because even if are forced to follow the old methods of delivery, the new methods will make you more ready and alert and more risk averse. Also nobody is stopping you to apply few or all of the new way of working without even naming the new method or strategy because at the end of the day, what matters is the client and the business and the means to them is a successful delivery in the right way and in the expected time framework.

Be the winner.
Do not hesitate in picking up Agile along the way even if you plans to retire with Waterfall.
Waterfall has objections if it is continued to be blamed for the delivery failures and for being used for wrong projects and use cases.
Waterfall has no objections if you learn new methodologies and framework to deliver in new age.
Waterfall has no objections even if it has to die out sooner or later because the world has changed or is changing fast to adopt Agile - whether you like it or not.
Waterfall has no objections if you execute it end to end and again and again in Agile iterations/sprints of few weeks to a month long duration - which we exactly do keeping Waterfall alive through Agile.
So why do you have any objections or concerns in learning new means and tools !!!

End.

Come Home !!!

Dedicated to those who work on holidays, weekends, late nights - day in and day out.
It's that time year, when we have family fun;
Except that we will not, as you’re still in office marathon.

The work is important, the kid and I are aware;
We have supported you in your office adventures.

Agreed extra money helps buy a home & extra space;
But it cannot buy lost time, how hard you run the race.

The kid longs for you as he wakes up & when he cry;
He just needs you, however hard I may try.

He yearn for piggy backs, he misses the cuddle;
He deserve his holidays, we deserve our huddle.

Let’s not weaken you, put you in the spot;
Be back on time for us, try and give it a shot.

It's that time year when we have family fun;
Except that we will, not as you’re still in office marathon.

End.(I published the original article in LinkedIn on 31-Dec-2015)

Farewell 2015 and Reflections

This post is about me paying gratitude to my team.

Dear Team.

After enduring the greatest and the most memorable rollercoaster ride, it's time to say good bye to 2015. But before we move on, let's recall some of the moments and achievements for which each one of us contributed from our blood and sweat. 

Team’s Emotions
In our journey, we felt able, adequate, angry, annoyed, anxious, apprehensive, assured, beautiful, burdened, capable, cautious, charmed, cheerful, comfortable, compassion, concerned, confident, confused, contented, courageous, crushed, delighted, depressed, determined, disappointed, dissatisfied, doubtful, drained, eager, elated, embarrassment, energetic, enthusiastic, excited, exhausted, fascinated, fear, frustrated, glad, glorious, good, graceful, grateful, great, happy, hesitant, hopeful, humorous, ignored, indifferent, inspired, intimidated, joyful, jumpy, lively, magnificent, nervous, ok, overwhelmed, panic, pleasant, positive, pressured, relaxed, relieved, sad, satisfied, scared, stressed, strong, surprised, thrilled, tired, uncomfortable, upset, wasteful and worried.

Yes – I am sure we can relate to all the vocabulary in above emotions which we have collected from our Team Temps. (though above list is actually from Google)

So Who are our Heroes?
May not be only those among us who are highly qualified and experienced in professional life and may not be only those who are equipped with the brilliant skills and knowledge - be it functional or technical.

Among us, our heroes are:
~ those with hunger and thirst of picking up technical and functional skills in less turnaround time
~ those who communicated their blockers and their concerns on timely basis which were stopping them and us to deliver their work
~ those among us who asked for help without hesitation
~ those who inspired us - among us - by challenging the champions around us with new ideas, fearless suggestions
~ those who listened actively, who communicates constructively, who came to meetings on time and participated and took initiatives
~ those who shared openly and willingly
~ those who cooperated and got help for us and who rescued us by being the problem solvers
~ those who went through that extra mile of making sure that their code will not break the build
~ those who made sure with non-stop queries that the acceptance criteria are clear
~ those who provided inputs again and again for our test scenarios and who tirelessly and continuously worked on the never ending scenarios
~ those who didn't wait to reach out, whether within the team or outside, and made that contact on their own without getting IM, TL, PM involved
~ those who supported their work and supported others as if they are the last person standing and the only hope of the our World.

Déjà vu right !!!
Am I sounding very dramatic !!! And why not, when we have Superman, Cat woman, Spiderman, Batman, Wonder woman and so on among us ... living and breathing among us, in our team rescuing each other and us every moment.

None of Us is as Smart as All of Us !!!(This quote is by Klen Blanchard who is a management Guru)

We in our team are among the best from our individual Organizations. We exist because we are expected to know how we execute our work using our skills. We exist not to be told and not to be micro managed of what should be doing and how we should be doing our work.

We delivered our mapping work, template work, foundation work with brilliant quality and testing (in whatever time we had). Absolute fantastic work and co-ordination in getting our technical work done though in Agile, we never say done unless we have business value delivered in which we struggled a bit and we realized finally (the way I see) that the model with Business Reps and us working together works and is producing brilliant results though one never know, as there could be even better options out there – the ideas still being explored - to make our delivery even more simple and less stressful on everybody.

Just a big load of Thanks from here on …
Courtesy our PMs and TL, they voiced our concerns, understood and supported our cause and justifications, worked hard for us to give a conducive healthy work environment, helped us move ahead continuously and kept us lively and kicking. Thanks to them for believing in us. 

Hats off to our members and a big applause to the team, who agreed late hours and weekend work, who changed their own plans in the last minute to accommodate work related support, and who believed in the plans and the goals, who stayed put holding the fort. 

Also, a big thanks to our friends and support, from outside streams, who supported us in our work be it development or testing related, who supported our environments, our batch runs and who supported us with the knowledge and skills which we may have lacked in our team.

Finally and the most important one, heartfelt thanks to our families and near and dear ones who let go of us – willingly and unwillingly - so that we can be available for our work and be with the team on odd hours and odd days. 

Ending this with a very big thank you and few inspiring quotes:

"And, when you want something, all the Universe conspires in helping you to achieve it."
― Paulo Coelho, The Alchemist

“The woods are lovely, dark and deep,  
But I have promises to keep,  
And miles to go before I sleep,  
And miles to go before I sleep.”
- Robert Frost

The battles are won. The war still continues.

Regards(I published the original article in LinkedIn on 18-Dec-2015)

A Beautiful Fearless Mind

If you are able to relate to anything in this post, well that's good. Nothing is very surprising here however I will try to keep this interesting.

In last many months, I have had those moments where I felt like a leader and then there were instances when I felt like manager. I am able to distinguish more easily between what it means to be a leader and a manager; more like the clarity which Buddha perhaps experienced when he was enlightened or when Archimedes had that eureka moment running naked on the streets of Greece.

When Buddha lived in around 600 BC, world population was around 100 Million. Today’s world population is around 7000 Million (~ 7 Billion). This is a useless fact from Google in context of this post however just something that may keep you interested or will as well distract you from context.

So I was a natural manager. You will have more insight in few moments (a moment BTW is around 120 seconds – I read somewhere recently). So like a good Indian - not in a patriotic sense though – I started as a developer in Microsoft Technologies, had few years of stint in Java using Struts MVC framework leading a small team, moved onto doing Data Migration for couple of years again leading few people, did Production Support and Environment Support and landed up being a Platform Manager.

I felt good leading a team; Felt like an important person reporting the stuff to the line above, had so called important meetings on the stuff with the team and gave my agreements and sometimes did not agree on how the team will do the stuff as expected by the management and so on.  I felt like an achiever. I felt like a commander in charge serving the company and the group. Being there for the team and group was like something very natural of me and my mindset.

Months and years passed and the key thing which I paid attention was whether I am having my right share of managing teams and work. After all I am working hard for the management. I must have my mojo and juice of being a project or team leader or being a project manager. There were few disappointments on the way however things turned out alright as I did my best to meet expectations of my bosses and expected the same from my team members.

However something changed in last 2 – 3 years or so. It’s not Agile way of working in current project, it’s not the current project. And still over time, things become clearer, like the fog moving away slowly. The direction and inspiration was there as if a Guru should guide though I must give credit to my efforts too working against risks, my fears, trying out options and still trying to improve based on the feedback – sometimes captured on my own and other times from external situations and people around.

Basic element which helped was to get better understanding of controlling my own fears – fear of management, fear of a senior person around, fear of not able to find right set of words when speaking, fear of mumbling, fear of what others may think of my idea or suggestion, fear of what if the senior person is not happy etc. and so on. Not yet a champion who have mastered my fears (and became a Batman J) but the first step of realization is good and the journey continues to improve myself as a team member and as leader.

Now fear is very good when you are afraid because it can help you run faster and it can help react faster to an unsafe situation. Fear in workplace is not good. Usually, few of us moves up and become managers managing work and people and we still fear people above us and we also keep people reporting to us in fear. Fear of how things are expected around, how the delivery should be done, how I am in control of those reporting to myself who is in fact in charge and if I am not pleased for the sake of delivery or my role or group, than the results may not be quite as expected.

But then life always finds its own way. Because of fear, people around us who do the real hands on and work (be it development, testing etc.) lack confidence in what they can do and what how they should think or interact or organize. We recruit right set of people by rigorous recruitment steps and after hiring them, most and most of them end up like zombies having brain controlled and action controlled by managers.

I am not generalizing Managers here. Some managers cross over to the other side and become Leaders. They believe in the strengths, they see the positive opportunities in negative situations, they strive for process improvements and they feed on continuous feedback which helps them improvise. Some of these trials and actions become inspirations and right direction for people whose actions like development and testing results in quality delivery. Teams with such people who fear less and who are given help to bring out the confidence by Leaders have better chance of self organizing regardless of the work methodology or framework we follow.

Please feedback on the above so that I can improve my way of writing and also feedback if possible on the content, thought process etc.

Thank you very much for your time.
(I published the original article in LinkedIn on 12-Dec-2015)

Your Pain is Mine

I have had a journey. I am still in transit. If I look back, I could have done many things better in my early part of professional life. However let me not forget that (I was lucky) my bosses were nice, down to earth and were fun. (Sorry if you had horrible ones). The colleagues and peers were always great and inspiring.

What I never understood during my early career days was how I was not aware of my projects goals, mission, how I could have contributed more, how I could have felt and shared the management pains etc. I remember the fun times, the parties, the events but I didn't remember anything about the other side of the coin.

I was contributing nonetheless. I was there during the day, late nights, on weekends because I was expected to be there, because I was told so. However, I now understand it more clearly that I was not making the difference as much as I should have had even when I was there, with them. I also understand my bosses were aware of this. But those were old days and there were old ways perhaps of how such situation was dealt with.

How can we solve such a situation today? Very keen to know and understand from the experience of others.

Happy Diwali !!!
(I published the original article in LinkedIn on 11-Nov-2015)