Smart watch died, part 5 - 6 March 2025

Credit to Google, the replacement Google Pixel smart watch has arrived.  We now repeat the set-up procedure with the new watch. I will be more observant with the charging process to avoid a repeat of the original problem.  The set-up procedure is taking several minutes; I assume there is a download and update in progress.  There is no indication of what is going on, just "connecting to your watch".  Oh! and something failed, so we are resetting and restarting.  Oh! and again something failed in the set-up process.  Looks like the third time is the charm as I got to the signing-in stage.

This replacement process started on or about 23 February 2025 and completed 6 March. I say on-or-about because I went on vacation in January and I was planning to take the watch.  I went to put on the Google Pixel watch and it was exploded.  I chose not to take the exploded watch on vacation.

As to the photo, we had a dead tree taken down; it had been assaulted during the Seattle Heat Dome a couple years ago.  I hoped it would survive, but not so.  After felling, it became clear that there were internal problems in the tree with bugs and rot, so it is now cut up for firewood.  I did a deep crosshatch in the stump to accelerate the decay process.  Some advise the liberal application of epsom salts but I have not done that.  I am hoping that water, weather, and bugs will complete the process through the added access that I have provided.  I am not sure what the tree was; evergreen, certainly, and coniferous, and the general shape of the trunk suggests a Noble Fir.  It is now a face-cord of firewood.

Smart watch died, Part 4 - 5 March 2025

After going thru the required communications with Google Customer Service, I was finally able to package up the busted smart watch and ship it back to Google.  I was annoyed that I had to supply the shipping material and take it up to FedEx, but the FedEx process was smooth once I got there.  If I had a routine 9-5 job, it would have been a real pain to get to the FedEx office quickly.  FedEx conveyed the shipment quickly to Google and it has been a silent period.  No news from Google.  I received word today that they had inspected the returned item and were shipping a replacement.  Today's notice included a tracking number, but it seems that only the label has been printed. That is, UPS does not yet have the shipment but will pick up the shipment soon (tomorrow?) and they will deliver it eventually.  Note that this is a common technique - Google "prints a label" to make it sound like they are making fast progress, but the tracking number is not meaningful until UPS actually gets the shipment.

I am glad that Google has finally verified that the failure is a valid failure and is covered by the warranty for replacement, but I am still surprised at how s...l...o...w the customer-service process has been for a $200+ item.  

Smart watch died, part 3 - 26 February 2025

Through the magic of Federal Express, I returned the exploded Pixel Watch to Google for replacement.  

My experience continued the Google strangeness.  I received an email with an "RMA" (Return Merchandise Authorization) code and instructions and a confirmation email from Fedex.  In the RMA instructions, I was directed to return only the watch, and not anything else.  There was also a QR code that Fedex was to use to print the RMA lable.  An hour or so later, I received an email that continued the chain on the original support ticket.  It told me to disregard the directions in the RMA emails, that I should print the attached RMA label, and that I should package up everything (explicitly including the watch, the band, and the charging "puck") and take it all to Fedex to be returned.

After some rumination, I decided to follow the second set of directions.  I printed the RMA label, boxed everything up with bubble wrap, and took it all to Fedex (watch, band, and charging puck).  Fedex was very efficient and I only spent about 90 seconds in the storefront.  My round-trip was 30+ minutes of driving, but the storefront portion was efficient.

The package now goes to Google where they will inspect it and decide, yet again, if I deserve a replacement unit.  I am supposed to get the replacement unit in about five business days - early March.

Smart watch died, part 2 - 24 February 2025

I thought everything was all set to get a replacement for my dead-and-exploded smart Pixel Watch.  

Yeah, not quite.  After supplying my address and the serial number, I received a confirmation email that I would get a return-shipment label for my dead-and-exploded watch.  Overnight, I received an email requesting a photo of the serial number (that I previously copied over).  If you are not familiar with the watch, the serial number is hidden under one of the attachment points for the watchband.  It is embossed on a curved surface in small letters, but I took a photo and sent it back in return email.  Because it is so hard to read, I also took a photo of the serial number on the side of the box (I still have the box).  Google Support keeps asking for the same information over and over.  SMH.

The folks are all nice, but their customer management system is - what is the technical term? oh, yeah - the Google CMS is hoarked.  

Smart watch died - 23 February 2025

It is said that all good things must pass, but this is not that story.  Almost exactly a year ago, I bought a Google Pixel Watch, a smart watch.  I tried it out for a while and, really, there is not much benefit.  Clocks are everywhere including one on the phone in your pocket, so the timekeeping function is not really useful.  Various notifications come up on your phone in your pocket, thus notifications on your wrist are just a minor benefit.  The step-counting feature is wildly inconsistent and the heartrate info is only mildly useful.  The sleep tracking is not particularly reliable, so the inconvenience and discomfort of wearing a watch to bed is not helpful for sleep.  And, finally, you have to constantly charge the darn thing - at least daily - and if you wear it to bed, you cannot charge overnight so you have to take it off during the day but then all the other advantages are shot while it sits on the charger for an hour or so.

In the end, the $200 cost is simply not justifiable.  The $40 smart watches are no better.  And who really needs a watch these days?

With all this in mind, I am sad to report that my Pixel Watch baked itself on the charger:  it swelled up and exploded itself.  It was not a violent explosion, there was no shrapnel, but the watch seal is broken and it is no longer waterproof or even water-resistant.  The guts are just hanging out.  I played 20 Questions with Pixel Watch support.  They have been very responsive, but they only want to ask 1-2 questions at a time, so our email exchange went back and forth over several days.  They now seem to have everything they need, finally I thought, and so they have passed the support case to the next level for a decision in yet another deferral.

I am expecting them to offer a refurbished Pixel Watch as a replacement.  I am happy to return the dead watch to them.  We shall see how this plays out.

Jeff Bezos buys Bond, James Bond - 22 February 2025

With all the other crap going down, this is an issue that we can all agree on.  After a couple years of tug-of-war, it was announced this week that Jeff Bezos had cut a deal with Broccoli et al to take full ownership of the James Bond franchise, probably via the Amazon Studios house.  Of course, we are all excited to hear about this after the enormous success of Amazon Studios with the Lord of the Rings franchise.

For those having trouble hearing in the back - this is satire.  My prediction:  James Bond is now a dead franchise.  Bezos and Amazon will milk it for a few years, then it will decay and fade into reruns of the original films. 

Working Remotely has Problems - 23 April 2024

WFH, or Work From Home, has gotten a lot of support since COVID-19 started to ravage the US and the world.   When some people decided to move their homes greater and greater distances from the traditional offices, the WFH concept was been expanded to include working remotely and a cottage industry has grown up to advocate for remote work.  In the articles I have seen the analysis is shallow and focuses on two things, the benefits to the employee (reduced or eliminated commute costs, etc.) and the benefit to the corporation being mainly reduced rent for offices that are not longer needed.  But we need to get real.  

Working remotely has problems, big problems.

In a recent news article in The Stranger, a Seattle popular newspaper, a report was posted:

Texas Attorney General drops challenge of Seattle hospital: In December, a Seattle hospital filed a lawsuit against Texas AG Ken Paxton after he demanded the hospital turn over the medical records of Texas children who receive gender-affirming care from the hospital. Paxton dropped the request for medical records as part of a settlement agreement with the hospital, according to KOMO. However, the hospital also had to drop its registration to do business in Texas. That won't affect children receiving gender-affirming care, but it may be annoying to the hospital employees who live in Texas and work remotely for the hospital. [23 April 2024 as reported by Ashley Nerbovig]

To recap briefly, the Texas AG (Attorney General) had demanded medical records from a Seattle hospital based on Texas state laws and the hospital sued the Texas AG (I do not know why they did not simply ignore the demand, but that is not material.)  They settled the suit and mutually agreed to drop everything.

As part of the agreement, the hospital cancelled its registration to do business in Texas.  I do not know what else a Seattle hospital might do in Texas, but the Seattle hospital can no longer have employees based in Texas because the hospital no longer is registered in Texas.  I deduce from the report that the hospital must have have employees in Texas or plans to have employees in Texas.  A company (or hospital) that has employees in a state must usually pay taxes and provide benefits for the employees to that state, and that implies some sort of registration process so that the state knows who the employer is and what reports and payments are required.  Texas has no state income tax but they do have unemployment tax and other state-specific fees and taxes, therefore the hospital  must register as an employer if they have anyone working in Texas.  (Attendance at conferences, business meetings, and training events and other business travel are usually exempted from the definition of "working".)  

As a result of this decision to drop the case and drop registration, the Seattle hospital must move or terminate all employees in Texas because they no longer have a business registration there.

This is a consequence of working remotely that most employees do not see and most analysts do not include.  If a complay has even one employee in a state, they must be prepared to withhold taxes, pay taxes, and pay for benefits in that state.  If a company has health insurance for employees but the insurance company is not registered to work in a particular state, the company cannot offer benefits in that state without a special contract with another insurance company(s).  This is a burden that most companies would take only reluctanctly (read that: only for VPs or perhaps Directors, but not for regular employees below an executive level).  The situation is made yet more complex and expensive is "remote" includes other countries.

At the end of the day, this requirement for registration in every state is one of the key reasons that working remotely is a bad idea.

AI Is Going Great, Part 1 - 3 April 2024

A couple years ago, Amazon.com announced automated stores in which customers pick up items, put them into a cart or bag, and then "just walk out".  A cloud of cameras and scanners would watch the selection process of each customer and automatically total up the bill.  AI would drive the whole systems.  Well, not so much.  It turns out the whole system was driven by 1000 people in India paid to watch the cameras and create the receipts for "automatic" checkout.

According to a report today, 

Amazon ditches "Just Walk Out" tech: The futuristic cornerstone of Amazon's grocery store experience was a lie. Amazon advertised this experience where a completely automated process tracked your moves in the store, watching what you grabbed and tallying your bill as you "just walked out," nullifying the need for any pesky cashiers. However, it turns out the process wasn't automated at all. Instead, over 1,000 people in India were watching the cameras and assembling bills for whatever you put in your basket. 

https://gizmodo.com/amazon-reportedly-ditches-just-walk-out-grocery-stores-1851381116

Ratcheting as a Management Technique - 26 March 2024

I have experienced ratcheting, a subtle management technique that is easy to apply and hard to detect.  I do not recommend it - in fact, I abhor it - but there are some defenses.

Ratcheting is a simple method of management in which a manager continually asks for more and more work in less and less work time, often sliding into uncompensated overtime.  The most obvous technique is to simply assign more work or more complex work while holding a deadline steady.  I will not be able to cover all techniques with examples, but some examples will help explain the practice of ratcheting.

"Hey, about that report on router efficiency - can you include some analysis of the file servers, too?"  

"I was thinking about that analysis of router efficiency.  Can you also apply some regression analysis and give us some idea of the problems caused by each primary traffic type?"

Alternatively, the manager can pull in the expected delivery date.

"The meeting to present the report on router usage got pulled up to Thursday, so be sure you are ready for that."

"I have a preparatory meeting with the VP, so I need your preliminary numbers by noon, tomorrow.  Keep working on the final numbers, but be sure there are no surprises in the interim."

The obvious defense is to agree and then ask what other work can be dropped or delayed to compensate.  The ratcheting response is to minimize the work or the disruption.

"It is just an Excel sheet, so you should be able to pull in that deadline."

"The changes are pretty simple and the text editor / word processor program should handle most of the work."

The offered techniques for work simplification usually do not affect the workload.  The "automated work" is often just a fraction of the total workload.  In my work, the bulk of my energy was usually spent in collecting and cleaning the input data while the analysis was pretty mechanical;  filling in the gaps required thought and not just typing.

Finally, the ratcheting causes some sort of breakdown.  The employee explodes or rejects the new work and the manager backs down.  A little.  This is when the ratcheting technique makes clear its value.  Now that the employee is used to the higher level of work, the manager pauses a little bit, and then resumes the ratcheting when the employee has calmed down.  The employee gets a day or two of relief and then the ratcheting starts all over again.

Complementing the ratcheting technique is the continuous offer of benefits or a threat of consequences.  The manager promises the extra effort will "help your career" in some non-specific way that never quite materializes, or lack of the extra effort will put the employee behind the curve of the rest of the team and their bonus or promotion prospects will suffer.  This latter has then benefit that the employee feels they are disappointing the rest of the team and so the extra work is required as a matter of group loyalty.  None of this is true and none of it ever happens, but the employee is now acclimated to the new work level.

If you feel stressed at work, take a moment to look for evidence of ratcheting.

Career Notes #5: How To Get Promoted, Not - 22 March 2024

It appears to be common wisdom in the technology business that the way to get promoted is:

As one of my managers used to say:

If you want to get a promotion, you don’t need to complete 1,000 tasks; you need to figure out how to eliminate the need for the 1,000 tasks. 

This particular example of the common wisdom comes from the SeattleDataGuy via his newsletter on Substack.   

This is balderdash.  Naive, well intended, perhaps even a closely held belief, but balderdash.  Let us take a look at this in more detail.

If you hold a task-driven job, it may be the right path to eliminate those 1000 tasks on your way to promotion, but a task-driven job is pretty low on the totem pole, so this might get you promoted among the minnows and guppies but it will not help your career much.  Note that I am not saying that it is a  bad idea to eliminate tasks, but it is far from sufficient for promotion and it is not necessary.

If you do hold a mundane, task-bound job, then automating tasks is a good idea, but it becomes part of a promotion case when you share the automating scripts with your colleagues.  You  may get a bonus or an award if you automate your work, but a promotion will be tied to your ability to improve the group, not just yourself.  We can generalize this.

To get promoted, think about the responsibilities that your boss has and help solve them.  Making the group more productive is clearly a responsibility of your boss while your own productivity is your own responsibility -- therefore, creating and sharing improvements is the proper path forward.  Creating improvements is necessary but not sufficient.  You must also make sure that your boss (and collegues) know the source of the improvements is you.  This does not have to be a billboard or major production on a stage, but you do need to be sure that your contributions and solutions are tied to the improvements.  Think of it as "reporting the news".  

Reporting The News is a key concept.  Many people are concerned that they will be seen as braggards or that they will be confused with the people that steal the work of others.  Nope.  I am not suggesting braggadocio, but rather a simple news reporting function.  Put it in your status report (you do not write a status report?  start now!).  Announce the improvement at your next group meeting ("I have found a simpler/faster way to perform this task") and share it with your team.  Put it in the source tree for your project(s).  

To summarize, automate, eliminate, or streamline tasks that are measured by your organization, and report the news of your improvements to your boss and colleagues.  Do not just do 1000 things, even if they are important to you; study the larger picture.

Web3 Is Going Great (Not) - 16 March 2024

In a move that surprised no one, Starbucks is shutting down its NFTs.

OK, to be precise, Starbucks is passing the Starbucks Stamps NFT Program over to a third-party and washing their hands.  The Starbucks Stamps NFT Program started out as a way to reward regular customers of Starbucks, but it has languished and finally gotten to the point that it is more trouble than it is worth.  So Starbucks is dumping it.

At one point, NFTs, blockchain, and blockchain-contracts were the triplet powerhouses that were going to drive Web3 into the future.  NFTs are failing left and right, blockchains and crypto-vendors are rug-pulling weekly, and e-contracts are often used to steal from crypto-vendors, so the future of Web3 is looking a little disorganized.  #NoSurprise

Reference - Engadget article, 16 March 2024 , subtitled The program ends on March 31 and its NFT marketplace will be shifted over to Nifty.

Sad Tesla News - 10 March 2024

We start today with a tragedy.  According to a news report in The New York Post, "Angela Chao, the billionaire former CEO of dry bulk shipping giant Foremost Group, tragically died at the age of 50 on Feb. 10 after accidentally backing her car into the pond while making a three-point turn." If that name does not ring a bell, note that Angela Chao’s sister, Elaine Chao, is married to Senator Mitch McConnell and served as Secretary of Labor under President George W. Bush and Secretary of Transportation in President Donald Trump’s administration.  Mitch recently retired as Minority Leader (R) in the US Senate.

Angela Chao was hosting some friends on a ranch in Texas and wanted to return to the main ranchhouse at the end of the evening.  As it was cool, she decided to drive her Tesla rather than walk the four minutes from the guest houses to the main house.  At some point along the way, she backed her car into a pond where the car sank.  

The tragedy is multiplied by the design of the Tesla.  Rather than mechanical door handles, the main doors are opened electronically with a button.  Obviously, this is not a great design for an electric car sinking in a pond (loss of power).  There is an emergency mechanical door latch, but from the descriptions, it seems that it is hard to find, especially when sinking into a pond.  Chao was trapped inside the sinking car, unable to get out.  She had enough air in the car to be able to use her cell phone to call friends, but no one was able to help in time.

Many of the prior deaths in Tesla accidents have involved fire, but this is the first to involve water.

Condolences to the Chao family.

Reference: https://nypost.com/2024/03/09/us-news/angela-chao-made-panicked-call-before-dying-in-completely-submerged-tesla-on-texas-ranch/ 

Career Notes #4b: WF, Remote Work, and Soft Metrics - 7 February 2024 (original) - 1 March 2024

Someone said something on the Internet and I am upset.  

When last I wrote about WFH, I was upset at the radio, but I have now returned to being continuously upset about what someone said on the Internet.  I am a creature of habit.  As to subject matter, I was complaining about Work From Home, WFH, also known as Working Remotely.  I had spoken about "hard metrics" and was about to discuss "soft metrics".  Allow me to reestablish the rant, uh, conversation.

In the classic goal-setting process of management-by-objectives (MBO), the emphasis is on specific and measurable goals (part of the larger "S.M.A.R.T." framework for goal setting).  A classic goal is "deliver a report to the customer by the end of the quarter".  This is much more useful than "be a good employee" or "do good work" and it has the welcome attribute that there is little argument because the report gets delivered on-time or it does not.  What can one argue with?

Well, one can argue with this because of the soft metrics.  I can deliver a "report", even a long report, that is on-time but full of garbage.  The word "report", even qualified with some number of pages, is a soft metric, and so we see that metrics can be misleading and metrics can be gamed.

WFH or remote work has virtually the same problems as SMART.  It is overly fixed on things that can be measured and these things are often a narrow part of the job.  If the job is full of rote processes, then WFH can be perfect.  A customer service agent (first-line) can answer calls and reset passwords or refund orders with little supervision needed.  The rare problems can be handled with voice recordings of the customer transactions and depend on the customers to escalate situations to higher levels of support.  But not all jobs are rote and simple metrics are usualy inadequate.  Engineering, software, business and accounting positions require at least spreadsheet or database work, and art positions require lots of computer interactivity, thus many positions now include some sort of computer programming.  All of these (engineering, software, business, accounting, art) require some degree of originality and inventiveness, perhaps within bounds but still require novelty.   The behavior we want to encourage is more than just words and formulas on a page, requiring human judgement beyond simplistic metrics.  

But that human judgement often requires exposure and observation.  Management can often tell a difference in actions when practiced at the office that is not visible when working from home.   I management cannot see the individuals as they practice their expertise, it rapidly becomes hard to evaluate the level of expertise.

And that is why WFH only works for rather rote role and starts to fail as one moves through a career.

Note: I got stalled and distracted by this note.  It took multiple tries to edit it down to something readable and focused.  Therefore, there are multiple dates on the title line.

Health care has become a top target for cybercriminals - 29 February 2024

A warning about computer security for medical computing systems was recently raised by a neighbor named Steve Moeller.  He wrote:

Here is an article from the Seattle Times talking about the threat from cybercriminals to the national and local healthcare system: https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/health/why-health-care-has-become-a-top-target-for-cybercriminals/#Echobox=1708874045 

From the article:

When a cyberattack hit Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center late last year and exposed the personal data of nearly a million patients, many were caught off guard, stunned a breach could infiltrate such a large and highly resourced health care organization. 

This is a problem and it is more widespread than most people realize.  

The Internet was designed with open access in mind, so it is proving hard to make it secure.  This means that *anything* attached to the Internet has some degree of exposure that depends on how much thought and effort the "owner" has put into security.  The answer to "how much effort" is often little to none.  This means that everything from your medical records to your banking records are at risk.  Further, your power grid, your road systems, and even your personal cars are all at risk.  The old phone system is relatively secure (ok, I remember 2600 and phone phreaks) but the new wireless systems are far more exposed.  Social media like Facebook, Instagram, Xitter, and Snapchat are all exposed, and even giants in the field like Google and Microsoft are exposed.  

My point?  You should be checking with each and every supplier you use to ask them what their security policies are.  In the main, you will find that the corporate security policies protect the corporation but you?  You are left dangling.  We need legislation that places the burden back on the corporations. 

Dell is telling the truth about remote work - 23 February 2024

A recent article from The Register reports on consequences of a recent return-to-the-office (RTO) program at Dell Computer.   From the article:

The implications of choosing to work remotely, we're told, are: "1) no funding for team onsite meetings, even if a large portion of the team is flying in for the meeting from other Dell locations; 2) no career advancement; 3) no career movements; and 4) remote status will be considered when planning or organization changes -- AKA workforce reductions." 

The last three points are the most significant.  The first point is optional - some companies will fund team meetings and some will not.  I think Dell is wrong on this point, but it is their company so they make their rules.  

The most important point is - no career advancement.  Let us say you are the manager and you are faced with a key decision, assigning important tasks, choosing a promotion candidate, or simply assigning bonus budget.  You have two employees, one who is often in the office where you see their work, see their interactions with other team members, and see their presentations, and a remote employee that you see intermittently, see no interactions, and see only video presentations.  Which one are you going to select for rewards and the best assignments?  Pretty obviously the on-site person.  If you think that is wrong, ask your mother if it is OK to just call from now on, and you will stop your in-person visits.  Ask yourself if you would rather put your kids to bed and read them a story rather than read a bedtime story over the phone.  No mother or kids?  What would your dog think?  Expanding on this, no career movements is a reasonable extension.  As a manager, you can choose a local candidate that you see routinely or you can choose someone who is always at the far end of a phone line.  Not hard to choose.  Finally, the old rule is "out of sight, out of mind" and that will trump over "absence makes the heart grow fonder" - when it comes time to downsize, it is far easier to lay-off someone on a phone line compared to someone you see routinely in the office.  It just is.

Note that "routinely in the office" includes hybrid and full-time office sightings.  Seeing someone Monday-Wednesday-Friday is closer to Monday-Friday than never or rarely.  I am not arguing against work-from-home, simply stating boundaries.

Furthermore:

Another employee said: "Choosing to be remote does indeed put career advancement at a standstill."

As one advances up the ranks, there are more and more leadership and team skills required to work on larger projects.  If your job is one person (you) in one place (your home or office), then advancement within these constraints is possible.  But if your job requires interactions and teams, that is best done in-person.  To advance, you need to demonsrate those leadership and team skills, and you cannot do that sitting alone in your home-office with the dog.

So if you want to be a Lyft driver or work on small projects for the rest of your life, work from home.  But if you want to advance in the corporate environment, get to the office.

Bad Reporting #1: Radio Tower Stolen - 9 February 2024

No.  One does not just steal a 200-foot tall radio tower.  No.  There are two major problems with this simple-minded assertion, size and power.

The obvious problem is the size of the 200-foot tower.  It takes time and equipment to down it and haul it away.  You need a couple of hours to rig it, to lower it to the ground, to dismantle it, and then to haul it away.  The word "stolen" implies surprise or stealth.  The radio station had hours to respond to any surprise attempt to take the tower.  The police had hours to respond when called.  This tower was not stolen.  

The other problem is the electrical power being pumped into the antenna.  There are thousands of watts of power being pumped into the antenna in order to broadcast, perhaps as high as 50,000 watts, but likely less in this case.  When you walk up to the tower and touch it, you become the path to ground.  Big shock - literally.  Someone had to have the smarts to cut off the transmitter before anyone touched the tower.  Yes, the report talks about evidence of a break-in, suggesting that the thief did have the requisite smarts.  But radio stations monitor their signal - they listen to themselves to make sure they are still transmitting.  Again, no surprise is possible when the transmitter gets cut and the antenna gets "stolen".

Reporters really need to pause and think before they report this stuff.

Source: Alabama station in disbelief after 200-foot radio tower stolen at NBC News.

Privacy and the Internet Giants - 1 February 2024

Twelve years ago, Facebook went public as a multi-billion dollar company.  On today's market, Facebook (now META) has a market cap of $1T and a user base between 2 billion and 3 billion, depending on who is counting what.  This suggests that the value of a Facebook user has gone up from about $6 to about $333 (very roughly).  Why such a significant rise?  Does Facebook offer more value and function to you today than it did a decade ago?  Not really.  55x more value and function?  Far from it.  The stock market has assigned the price, so where does this value come from?

In a recent report from Consumer Reports, "Using a panel of 709 volunteers who shared archives of their Facebook data, Consumer Reports found that a total of 186,892 companies sent data about them to the social network. On average, each participant in the study had their data sent to Facebook by 2,230 companies."  And as noted by Bruce Schneier, "This isn’t data about your use of Facebook. This data about your interactions with other companies, all of which is correlated and analyzed by Facebook."

This is not Facebook/META alone - this is all the big Internet companies, including a bunch you do not know about like Palantir Technologies.  You are not a hapless victim.  Contact your representatives and senators to demand protection.  Consumer Reports probably has some good suggestios of where to start.

Career Notes #4: WFH and Remote Work - 30 January 2024

Someone said something on the radio and I am upset.  There is probably only one motive more stupid to write about than "someone said something on the Internet and I am upset", and that is the subject of my first sentence.  Someone said something stupid on the radio and I am upset.  However, I have always barged in where angels fear to tread, so I will share my thoughts on the recent resurgence of the RTO push for workers to return-to-office.  Since shortly after COVID began, there has been a vibrant discussion about the merits of working in an office compared to working from home (WFH).  It is the fodder for serious commentators as well as for the comics.  After hearing someone potificate on the radio this morning about managers who will have to learn how to support and encourage people who are WFH, I rather got to the end of my tether and -- I have thoughts.  I should say up-front that I retired as a senior manager in engineering at a high-tech company and I managed mostly highly educated people (nearly all had PhD degrees from major universities in the US).  These were (are) bright, educated, talented, and highly  motivated people eager to advance their careers and advance the fields of engineering.

When COVID began, there was a medical reason for everyone to avoid crowds and that included avoiding the shared office.  When I decided to close our local ABC Corporate office (a branch office of about 100 people and anonymized), I expected that it would be for 2-3 weeks until the pandemic abated.  I think it was pretty commonly understood that closing offices and sending people home was temporary and we would return to normalcy in a month or so.  As time went on and people continued to die from COVID, it became clear that our initial estimates were naively optimistic and that WFH (work from home) was a long-term state, verging on a year.  

While a high proportion of ABC Corporate workers could be sent home to work, there were key jobs that needed to continue on-site and in the office.  In our branch location, there were about 10 employees that needed to be in the office daily and 2-3 more that would come in occasionally.  The 10 folks needed access to labs and equipment that could only be on-site and could not be taken home.  The 2-3 folks varied each day from the 90 who were WFH - they were not usually the same individuals, but there were consistently 2-3 of them in the office.  

In our group (about a third of the 100 people in the branch), we had long-standing key metrics (KPI - Key Performance Indicator - is a common industry buzzword, but we did not use the phrase KPI).  The primary metric among these was the continued delivery of high-quality results as promised in the schedules and contracts.  As a general rule, the team was able to maintain successful delivery of all the group metrics.  From this, one might conclude that WFH was acceptable as a stable, long term strategy for the team.  After all, the overall team was spread across four primary sites already, so dispersing to homes was of marginal impact, right?  Wrong, but I have gone on too long in this posting and will reserve further thoughts for a second posting.

Although the key metrics, including consistent, timely, high-quality deliverables continued to be met, these are all "hard" metrics.  These are hard metrics because they are countable.  The deliverable was provided or it was not; the deliverable was on time or it was not; and the customer accepted the deliverable or they rejected it.  However, there were other, less countable metrics that were not always met, and many of these "soft" metrics are also on a scale, but hard to quantify.  Without covering all of the next post, consider "innovation".  There is no good measure of innovation.  There are simple measures (e.g., the number of patents authored) of these soft metrics, but simple measures can easily miscount or mislead (e.g., an idea can be patentable but it may be kept as a trade secret instead).  A more critical measure is readiness for promotion or other recognition, which is very hard to measure.

Until next time when I discuss soft metrics.

Moving Close to the Office - 29 January 2024

In a recent decree, IBM has announced that all employees must be in the office for at least three days a week, or they should plan to separate from the Company.  There is a big debate today about the value of in-office work.  A weak string of responses in Slashdot gives the usual responses of people trying to be clever, but resistence is futile.  For better or worse, IBM management has decided that this shall be and so it shall be.  Comply or pursue a voluntary separation.  

Of course, some people could try to delay in the hopes that plate tectonics will come to the rescue as the New Pangea reassembles itself.

Talking to Executives - 27 January 2024

An underappreciated skill, learning how to talk to executives can boost your career.  This sounds trite, but it is true.  Many an engineer has capped out because they talked too much.

These boil down to a short list.  In this list, I lump "manager" and "executives" together.  With a manager, you are more likely able to bend these rules, but the higher you go in the manager-executive chain, the more you want to adhere to these rules.

1. Be succinct,
2. Actionable,
3. Focus on results and impact,
4. Define the problem but always offer a solution,
5. Subject lines - meaningful (not just "FYI" or "interesting event"), and
6. Be terse - yes, redundant with succinct because it is that important.

If engineers as a group have a fatal flaw, it is the failure to be succinct.  Ideally, when they ask a question, a manager or executive wants to hear "yes" or "no", to hear a single number or date.  Answering with a "yeah, but..." is not going to succeed.  In many cases, you can respond that you will get back to them with an answer, but be succinct.  And if you promise to get back with an answer, give them a date for the answer and meet that date.

In a bit of cognitive dissonance, managers are creatures of action and of delay.  On the one hand, managers want to get things decided and done, minimize delays, minimize waste, eliminate idleness.  On the other hand, managers will wait if promised more information, but it must be high-quality information that will inform a better decision.  Balancing these two is hard, but it is what managers are paid to do.  In the end, advance actions and options.

As an aside, some managers get confused.  One type of manager will made decisions fast in the belief that any decision is better than no decision.  Another type of manager will kick the decision down the road in the hope of avoiding blame.  Both of these are wrong.  Each decision will be different - some will invite immediacy and some will demand delay - but a manager that always leans one way or the other is wrong.  Either that, or they have no authority (delay) or they have no understanding (immediate).  End of digression.

Results are what a manager seeks.  Negative results are often called consequences.  Ultimately, the manager is not as interested in the work, but in the results or impact of the work.  A particular proposal may require an engineer to work nights and weekends, but the manager is interested in avoiding impact on the customer, and impact that might cause the customer to change to a competitor.  

Clarity in defining the problem is critical.  If an engineer delivers a perfect technical solution to the wrong business problem, it is not a solution, it has no value.  

As a particular point of communication, email has become a dominant way to communicate with managers, and the first line if that communication is the Subject line.  Write your subject lines to be clear, concise, and meaningful.  Bad examples include, "that answer you wanted", "FYI", or "suggestion".  A journalist would say that you have buried the lede.  You want the Subject line to be relevant to the  manager and give them something of value, something to catch their attention.  Subjects like "solution for Jones case", "Q4 capital request", or "retention problem" are going to catch their attention.  Your email is not a mystery novel - state the key inforamtion up-front, name the murder in the first sentence.  Sometimes you need to temper this for confidentiality, and so some vagueness is in order in the subject line.  You want to say "retention problem" rather than "Jones about to quit" in case someone is reading over the manager's shoulder.

Be terse.  This bears repeating because being succinct is critical.  All your work to craft a brilliant three-page document will be wasted if no one reads past the first paragraph.

There are managers and executives that will try to isolate you from the "next level up" and even peers will try to squeeze you out in an effort to out-compete you.  If you work to become a good communicator with executives, they will seek you out.