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Showing posts from November, 2013

Soft Skills: Don't Tell Don't Ask

TL;DR: If you ask me any of the questions below I'll say ...  Sorry, I don't answer these questions, but would you like to talk about how my answer will affect you?   Are you quitting?   Is there a re-org?   Are you having a kid?    Is Igor getting fired? It's common for a questioner to  pose a question requiring a yes/no answer, with an intent to trap the respondent into disclosing information.  For example, assume Quincy wants to know if Rachel is pregnant, and Rachel is, but doesn't want to disclose that information yet. There are three possible behaviors for Rachel,  lie, disclose or abstain. Lie:   Quincy: Are you having a kid?   Rachel: No   2 weeks pass   Rachel: I feel awful for lying but I'm having a kid Disclose:   Quincy: Are you having a kid?   Rachel: Please don't tell anyone, no one should know, but yes. Abstain:    Quincy: Are you having a kid?    Rachel:  Go read this blog post. What you like to talk about how my answer will

SaaS: The Genesis Node

This is part of the  SaaS  series. Any connection to reality will be strictly denied. "Igor, you know the odds of shipping Reddog on time are slim to none." My boss and I nodded our agreement as the director of OS development for Reddog continued. "Every team is sending a volunteer to the newly formed DevOps team. With an expert from each team, DevOps will be an elite, rapid-response team, able to deal with every type of problem in short order. The budget will be wide open, and the DevOps team is authorized to take any action required - are you the man for this?" I'm a sucker for hard problems - building all new software, powering-up a brand new datacenter, delivering a product critical to Microsoft's success, and shipping by a date that would require a minor miracle. "I'm in," I said with pride. The full impact of those two words sank in that evening as Jay, my OS team mentor, briefed me on my new role. "You'll need to res

Soft Skills: Your life, the missing manual

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