a user's confession

We were all gathered for a meeting this morning, with the agenda being sent out to our mobile phones at 11.09 pm yesterday night, saying we need to discuss the various ways to work as one, how to build trust, come with an open mind without prejudice.

One of us said he always remembers our boss' line "please remember to bring your brain when going to work" and she said that it's not a nice thing to say in this context.

I then said, aren't we already working as one? She said no, we are not one. There are times where we are one when everyone contributes without comparing who does what. (read: without comparing how much work she does)

When I said that I still think we are all working as one and she could call it blind faith. Her response was "blind faith does not help as it is blind. Faith builds on honesty works far better". (whatever this means)

Then she said goodnight to everyone, and "we will definitely make it a meaningful meeting for everyone".

The goosebumps kept me away till past midnight, and it didn't help that I was jolted out of bed before my alarm rang.

Our user started her confession, like things are moving too fast at the working level for her to keep up (read: she is management level not working level), she knows her roles and responsibilities but maybe we do not know, she needs a team to work, she cannot be the user PM herself, she has always worked in teams (read: teams have to work for her), she is very involved in the project (like vetting emails, engaging users, etc), yadda yadda yadda...

Seven of us sat there like the seven deadly sins, listening to the human heart.

Towards the end, I finally heard what I wanted to hear, she said that in the past, she had to pressure the IT team to ensure the systems are delivered properly. Now that she is in the IT team, she "cannot be nasty to the IT team anymore".

That unlocked the mystery to her confession - she is being suppressed and cannot be nasty to others.

luck of sorts

It was another lucky day today. I was fiddling about some DB2 drivers to transfer the data from the DB2 to MSSQL. Well, I didn't have to do it, but I just thought that I had been blessed by lots of luck these few days especially, so I need to return some favours.

I started with 1 driver that was using port 446 for the database connection and the error message said connection failed. Network-noob-me went to ask the network admin how to check whether the port is blocked. He took out a spreadsheet, checked a two records and said port is not blocked. I was impressed. Server-noob-me then went to the server admin to ask him how to check why I cannot telnet, he said telnet isn't installed by default from win server 2008 onwards. Network-noob-me went back to ask the network admin why after installing telnet, the connection still could't be established, he said because the other server isn't listening on that port. Ah ha, slapped myself for not knowing network fundamentals. Server-noob-me went back to the server admin to ask him how to check what ports are listener on the source server, and within a few clicks, there you go! A bunch of ports, except 446, so I looked through the list of ports used by the DB2 and picked port 50000.

Googling the port actually revealed that I was using the wrong driver. I was lucky to get the right port 50000. It's quite enlightening actually because DB-noob-me usually has an expert-DBA to help me with all the database connectivity and setup but there was no DB2 DBA this time round. A few more googles, I set up my drivers to connect to the DB2 DB but had problems mapping date fields. Googling didn't help that, so, call-a-friend.

The vendor PM, acclimatised with my incessant random questions and all, found a way out and the DB2 to MSSQL test concluded in just under an hour. Don't I just make things sound so simple? I think it's luck of sorts.

I will need to do my good deeds to return this luck; or maybe I had been doing lots of good deeds to receive this luck; or maybe ...

as an isolationist

The past 2 weeks was possibly one of those weeks where I had dreams every night of all sorts of strange events. I was jolted out of bed once in the morning at 6+ am by a vibration of my phone (silent mode) that was one metre away from me, and I normally wouldn't have noticed. I was woken up at 5+ am almost everyday because yaya was choking over her cough in her sleep. I met up with a network vendor today, the vendor asked why my namecard says applications, and said that nobody will know that I don't have any infra experience. Passed.

So I was just looking back at all the events and thinking about how different I am from others, prompted by a HR guy asking me what kind of education I went through to produce a someone like me (apparently word of mouth has spreaded that I have proven that any applications person without network/infra background can learn and pick up the knowledge easily), because he wants to hire more people like me, which was flattering, but at the same time means I have a higher market value. Hmph.

Background: I was assigned a new role 2 months ago, covering both application and infra (server and network) security, so it's like a third dimension to my work.

I also got hooked on a book, Susan Cain's Quiet, that really helps me understand myself better, and I will extract some content here:

Tom DeMarco, a principal of the Atlantic Systems Guild team of consultants... noticed that some workspaces were a lot more densely packed than others. He wondered what effect all that social interaction had on performance. To find out, De Marco and his colleague Timothy Lister devised a study called the Coding War Games. The purpose of the games was to identify the characteristics of the best and worst computer programmers; more than six hundred developers from ninety-two different companies participated. Each designed, coded, and tested a program, working in his normal office space during business hours. Each participant was also assigned a partner from the same company. The partners worked separately, however, without any communication, a feature of the games that turned out to be critical.

When the results came in, they revealed an enormous performance gap. The best outperformed the worst by a 10:1 ratio. The top performers were also about 2.5 times better than the media. When DeMarco and Lister tried to figure out what accounted for this astonishing range, the factors that you'd think would matter - such as years of experience, salary, even the time spent completing the work - had little correlation to the outcome. Programmers with ten years' experience did no better than those with two years. The half who performed above the median earned less than 10% more than the half below - even though they were almost twice as good. The programers who turned in "zero-defect" work took slightly less, not more, time to complete the exercise than those who made mistakes.

It was a mystery with one intriguing clue: programers from the same companies performed at more or less the same level, even though they hadn't worked together. That's because top performers overwhelmingly worked for companies that gave their workers the most privacy, personal space, control over their physical environments, and freedom from interruption. 62% of the best performers said that their work space was acceptably private, compared to only 19% of the worst performers; 76% of the worst performers but only 38% of the top performers said that people often interrupted them needlessly.

So you know my secret - isolation.

Hint: When your interrupt-ers (irritating-like-hell-mates-or-users) are on leave, you will be able to perform better.

can i have your email address?

Yesterday I received a call from a guy who claimed to be from HP.

Him: Are you the IT manager?

Me: Who are you looking for?

Him: I am looking for the IT manager.

Me: How did you get my number?

Him: Your CTO gave me your number.

Me: What is his name?

Him: *gibberish*

Me: Sorry that's not my CTO.

Him: Sorry I am from India and I am not good with chinese names.

Me: Spell it to me.

Him: *spelt wrongly*

Me: Whose names did he give you?

Him: Lee which is this number and another person *he got the name and number right*

Me: Ok, why didn't you talk with him?

Him: He said he was busy and told me to call you instead.

*running through my head was - my account management scope also covers getting redirected calls when my user is busy*

Me: What do you want?

Him: I want to know whether you have any problems.

Me: What problems do I have?

Him: Do you have any server or network problems.

Me: No.

Him: Are you looking to buy any servers in the next 6 months?

Me: Yes.

Him: How much is your budget?

Me: I don't know.

Him: How much do you intend to spend in the next 6 months?

Me: I don't know.

Him: How big is your company?

Me: Are you really from HP?

Him: Yes I am from HP.

Me: Our account manager should be able to tell you how big we are because they meet us every month.

Him: Are you able to give me a rough estimate?

Me: No.

Him: 100, 1000?

Me: What is our account manager's name?

Him: Ok nevermind. What is your name?

Me: *gave my name*

Him: And your job title?

Me: I thought you said I am the IT manager?

Him: Are you the IT manager?

Me: Well you said the CTO said I am the IT manager.

Him: Ok. Can I have your email address?

Me: How do I check that you are from HP? I would want to confirm your identity before I release my email to you.

Him: Ok I am Frank.

Me: What's your email address?

Him: You don't need my email address, you just need to give me your email address and I will email you our product brochures.

Me: I will email you my email address. What is your email address?

Him: I don't have my email set up yet.

Me: You said you will be emailing me, but you don't have your email set up yet?

Him: We will send you from another email.

Me: Ok, then what is your email address?

Him: I don't have an email address.

Me: Will you be able to give me your colleagues' or boss' email address?

Him: I don't have anyone with me right now.

Me: How am I supposed to believe you?

Him: Ok I will get someone else to call you.

Me: Ok.

He hasn't called back. Maybe his HP doesnt stand for the HP we know of. Did I say I must also thank the CTO for giving my number to an unknown fella.

On this topic, I received a call from supposedly Fuji Xerox few days back. The receptionist called me and said that a lady from Fuji Xerox said that he was looking for a guy called Kelvin who is in charged of printers but she can't find such a guy in our directory. I took the call. As I am the so-called account manager for the receptionists as well, I get called to collect gifts for my boss when his secretary isn't around, and I also get called when they can't find who is in-charge of whatever they need to look for. Anyway, back to the story:

Her: I am conducting a customer satisfaction survey and would like to check whether I can have your email address to send the survey to you.

Me: I may not be the correct party, what product or service is it regarding?

Her: It's for the xerox printers.

Me: I don't think we have a contract with you for xerox printers. Do you have the contact person's name and telephone number?

Her: The person is called Kelvin and the telephone number is the main line.

Me: Ok I don't know any Kelvin who looks after printers.

Her: Can you call me back after you have found the person?

Me: Ok.

Her: *she gave me her number*

I didn't call back.