A Technical Manager's Perspective

Listening to Audio Books

I apologize for the lack of posts here, I recently changed positions which has kept me fairly busy. I have been coming up for air on the weekends and plan on resuming my posting. I am in a new environment with a new set of challenges and technologies to learn. What a difference in work environments. I left a very structured and rigid Healthcare organization for an open collaborative academic institution. It's a real breath of fresh air.

Most of you that know me, know that I am a big fan of Podcasts. I am still listening daily but have expanded my scope to include audio books. This new trend started after listening the "MIT Sloan School of Management Podcast" called "Tough Choices" by Carly Fiorina. Carly spoke to MIT Sloan students in October 2006 and spoke of her experiences at Lucent and HP. Listening to Carly talk about real examples surrounding Ethics, Leadership, and Managing through change was compelling enough to make me search out the full edition of Carly's book "Tough Choices". I looked at both audible.com and Itunes and Itunes had a better price. I downloaded the full edition of Tough Choices last week and spent the weekend listening to it. This week I pulled down "The Google Story" and have identified a dozen other books that look compelling enough to pull down and listen to.

I do not have the time to sit down and read a book like this over a weekend, however I was able to listen to Tough Choices over the span of two days because I could listen while doing errands and working around the house.

If you are interested in learning more about this, check it out, AudioBooks at Itunes or Audible.com.

Technorati : Technology Management

Weekly Content Consumption

In 2005 when I started listening to Podcasts, my focus was purely technical. Then I discovered Manager-Tools and Management Craft added Management and Leadership podcasts to my weekly rotation. In the last year I have expanded my listening choices to a bunch of non-technical podcast that focus everything from Boston events to Business events. I listen every evening on my way home from work, when I do errands on Saturdays and when I do yardwork and chores around the house. I have also started watching more Video from a variety of sources on the Internet, mostly focusing on business and technical topics.

I find that listening every week helps me to stay current with Technology and exposes me to the new trends in computing. Back in July of 2006 I outlined the Podcasts that I listened to on a regular basis and identified the podcasts that I listen to on a daily and weekly basis. That list has changed a little and I wanted to share with you what I am current listening to and encourage you to check out these podcasts and video-casts.

Daily Feeds:

• KenRadio World Tech Roundup - Ken Rutkowski and Andy Abramson talk about the MET News (Media, Entertainment and Technology)
• Buzz Out Loud - CNET's Molly Wood and Tom Merritt discuss top stories and happening in the Tech World
• Wall Street Journal Tech News Briefing - From the WSJ, a business focused review Tech Companies and Strategies

Weekly Feeds:

• Business Week Cover Stories- Great Show Every week well worth listening to
• Manager Tools - Mark Horstman and Michael Auzenne provide and excellent weekly show that will help both the experienced manager as well as the first time manager. Well worth checking out.
• This Week in Tech TWIT - Leo Laporte and others discuss the week in tech
• Management Craft - Lisa Haneberg interviews authors and others from the Management Space
• Between the Lines - ZDNET - Dan Farber, David Berlind and Larry Dignan discuss Tech news with a nice skeptical twist
• HBR Idea Cast - Harvard Business School show about business problems and solutions
• In the Trenches - George Starcher is carrying on for Kevin Devin and focuses on the System Admin and Network Admin Space
• Windows Weekly - Paul Thurrott and Leo Laporte discuss the Microsoft space
• PaulDotCom Security Weekly - Paul Asadoorian, Larry Pesce and Twitchy discuss security issues and vulnerabilities. This is a great show to listen to to get your weekly dose of security info.
• The M Show - John Wall produces a weekly 10 minutes show about business, news and Boston.
• Marketing Over Coffee - This is a new podcast featuring John Wall and Chris Penn from Podcamp fame.
• Hanselminutes - Show featuring Scott Hanselman with great content and delivery. If you like Hanselminutes you will love .NET Rocks ...
• .NET Rocks! - Carl Franklin and Others discuss development tool on the Windows Platform

Weekly Video Feeds:

• Best Damn Tech Show - Flemo, Sir Adam Plante, Rand, Smitty and almost forgot Dr Drew - Check them out
• IT Idiots - Are you a visual learner ? Is so The ITIdiots site is the place to go. You can watch as they configure a server or step thru Virtualization. Great site, with great content.
• Business Week Video - Business Week has made a nice transition to the web delivering great Web, Audio and Video content
• Revision3 - Some Tech but much more
• Scriggity - No Tech, Just Life

Technorati : Management, Podcast, Technology, Video

Minor Changes

I thought I would change the look and feel of the blog so I went with a little more Blue.

Look for more changes in the future.

Keep Smiling

Technorati : Blog

Moving forward

Things have really changed at work as the strategy and pace of our new company is really starting to take hold on a daily basis. Four weeks ago we had a major layoff within the IT ranks, and folks are finally starting to settle down feeling somewhat relieved that we still have jobs and that there is a need for us.

I really feel bad for all of those impacted by the layoff, as I have been in their position and understand what it feels like to get up every morning and not have a job to go to. I was layed off from my last position, and it took me four months and a large cut in pay to find a new position. Good Luck to all of you.

My new boss resides in New York and was on-site this past week. We speak on a daily basis, and have really started to get in sync over the last two weeks. Up to this point, he focused on his infrastructure in another state, and I focused on the infrastructure in my facility. However, it is apparent that we need to start focusing on both infrastructures, and this will be good for both of us.

He asked me to set up one-on-ones with my staff and that worked out very well. At first the staff was skeptical and a little concerned, but it was a very positive experience for the staff. I think they thought it was going to be some test or challenge, and instead it was more of a get to know you - what do you want to do with your career type session. It worked out very well and left my staff feeling comfortable with their future. I heard the same key points over and over again this week:

1) There are no planned layoffs in IT, and we are safe as long as we do our job.
2) Now we have two Data Centers to support, and not just one.
3) Let's move forward

My outlook is changing and becoming much more positive but, time will tell if they really walk the talk.

I think they will.

Technorati : Management, Management; communications, Manager

Consolidation Strategy

We have about 900 employees in our office complex and 62 were given a severance package on Tuesday. Only one person within our division was impacted and at this point my staff remains in place. The severance notices came out the day before a Company wide Town Meeting, and the overall impact was less than expected.

Tuesday was a real edgy day. No one really knew was was happening, rumors were rampant and slowly but surely the facts came out. My Director called me and let me know what happened and I communicated that to my folks, however they knew before I officially told them.

The Town Meeting went well as they identified a centralized consolidated strategy for all groups and applications. They identified a time frame of one to two years to complete the consolidation which was a relief to most folks. On Thursday we had a all IT meeting and I asked if there would be further consolidation on the system/infrastructure side. Our CIO stated that they were concentrating on the divisional and application consolidations and when that is finalized they will look at the remainder of IT and identify where they may gain additional efficiencies. That was a long answer for not at this time, however what this means for my staff and myself is, we do not have to worry about being lay-ed off in the next couple of months which will give us to time to show the new management team how we work and what we can do.

Company wide Town Meeting

We were recently acquired by a small healthcare company who came in and communicated that they would need 90 days to pull together a clear strategy for our company. There is a company wide Town Meeting set up for next week to deliver their new strategy and there is a lot of speculation that some folks will be terminated next week.

My team supports the Middle Tier of applications deliver within our company so we are fairly safe at this point in time. We have met with our new owners on multiple occasions and it appears that they will need our services through some sort of integration period and then there could be some shake out within the group.

A concern I have for my group would be the impact of watching folks from other groups terminated, especially if the terminations occur with no communication before the company Town Meeting. It is hard to watch coworkers that you have worked with for many years leave, especially when they have no choice in the matter.

It is going to be a rough week, however hopefully, we can stat to move forward and will have more information on our new organizations with some clarity surrounding where we fit into the big picture within the new company.

New Years Wish

I want to wish everyone a Happy New Year along with Health, Happiness and Success in 2007.

Good Management Decisions

If you read my earlier posts Changes at Work and Managing through change, then you know that we have just completed a change in ownership at work and tensions are high. This week was a little better than last management communicated well and made every attempt to address the fears of the organization.

Our new senior management became aware that the decision to move our production computing environments to their current data center in another state had been communicated to the masses and this prompted a set of meetings to try and calm the folks down and communicate their intentions. For the most part, Senior management succeeded in calming the folks down, however some of us are still skeptical.

Our CIO pulled together a meeting of all managers and directors to discuss the impact and to try and alleviate any fears. This was a good move and I would have done the same thing, however it was obvious to most of us, that our CIO is not in the new senior management decision making process, and that has some of us concerned. Our CIO let us know that the new Senior Management team would be onsite the following day to speak with all IT folks. This was a good move and really calmed down my staff.

Senior Management let us know that they had hoped that the long term strategy for the production environments could have been communicated differently with an emphasis on the actual deployment timeframe along with a resource impact statement. They stated that their staff was just beginning our Integration planning process and that we would be involved in that, however the new team was still in the process of integrating a company that they acquired 2004 and they were concentrating their efforts on completing the 2004 integration.

They emphasized that the timeframe for most of the migrations to another data center would be 12 to 18 months and they need us for the migration and support after the migration. Their support strategy was to perform remote support from our facility to their facility. With the right infrastructure (network, kvm, monitoring tools) this is certainly possible.

I was pleasantly surprised to see how genuine they appeared. There were no airs about them and there was no spin. They answered all questions and spoke easily and openly. This meeting relieved some of my fears, and now I feel comfortable that I will have a job in January, however I am still skeptical about my long term future with this company.

Technorati : Management

Changes at work

I work in a mid sized Healthcare company with about 1400 employees. In April we were alerted to the fact that our current owners were putting the company up for sale. Our company has been in business for 26 years and the three primary owners were looking to sell.

There was some early discomfort with some projects getting canceled and others moving up in prioritization but there was not a lot of early change. We (my staff and I) spoke on many occasions about the future and we all decided to take a wait and see approach. In September the new owners were identified, however Federal Securities Laws prohibited the two companies from talking for 30 days. During this period, my staff and others were very uneasy and it took extra effort to continue to communicate effectively and keep our Production environments supported appropriately.

The 30 day period ended about 2 weeks ago and we were introduced to our new management team. It was a little disconcerting as the new management team read from prepared statements and did not appear that engaged. All members of our Senior Staff were released in an appropriate manner and they probably sailed out with a nice big severance.

Our new management communicated that together we were going to make a great team and their strategy was to take the Best of Breed Applications and Practices within each organization and merge them into one. They communicated that they were working on a 90 day plan that would identify the strategy for the future.

As we work toward our 90 day strategy, discussions surrounding our Production Applications have come up and it appears that the overall strategy will be to move all of our Production Applications to their datacenter, 4 states away. Now this has not been formally communicated from our new management, however the word got out and our internal management did a good job of getting in front of this strategy and communicated what they knew.

Internal Management did communicate that the long term strategy would be to have all the Production equipment in one facility, and that facility would not be our facility. They emphasized that this is a long term strategy and would take 6 to 12 months to accomplish, however it has become very clear to most of us that at some point, there will be layoffs and our overall headcount will be downsized by 75%.

This leads to a lot of speculation, poor moral and loss of productivity.

How do you try and maintain a stable support environment when everyone around you is distracted by the possibility of loosing your job ?

More to come ……

Quick Update

I have fallen behind on my posts and podcast as too many conflicting priorities from both work and home have impacted my schedule.

A lot has happened in the last 2 weeks, Microsoft released Internet Explorer v7.0, it looks like Vista is on schedule and for anyone looking to explore the Virtualization space VMWORLD 2006 is scheduled for the first week in November.

It appears that that the conference market is starting to gain some traction. VMWORLD, VOIP, 3G Consumer Electronics are just a few of the many conferences scheduled over the next few months. This infers that companies are willing to send employees to conferences in the hope of gaining some payback from the conference. Personally, I question how much value is gained from attending conferences. I do see conferences as a nice perk that could with strategy and forward looking thinking, however there is rarely a ROI on the investment, especially if travel is involved.

Technorati : virtualization