by Alan Willett | Executive Leadership, The Dev Team, The Engineer
Pat, a director of a team of software developers, cried out with dismay. “What do you mean that technical debt is strangling me more than I know?” Pat had already laid out all the reasons technical debt was a bane to the entire organization’s existence. Here is Pat’s...
by Alan Willett | Executive Leadership, The Engineer, The Enterprise
“This is the power of gathering: it inspires us, delightfully, to be more hopeful, more joyful, more thoughtful: in a word, more alive.” ALICE WATERS I have observed many all-hands meetings. The mediocre sessions address a distracted audience. The worst ones have an...
by Alan Willett | The Engineer
“I also believe that it may happen that one succeeds, and one mustn’t begin by despairing; even if one loses here and there, and even if one sometimes feels a sort of decline, the point is nevertheless to revive and have courage, even though things don’t turn out as...
by Alan Willett | The Dev Team, The Engineer
“You’ll find I’m full of surprises.“ Luke Skywalker Despite how much we complain, there is a joy to working on urgent items. They give us a ready excuse for not working on the hard things. We might shout, “Oh, I can’t work on the crucial long-term work. This crisis...
by Alan Willett | The Dev Team, The Engineer
“I have learned all kinds of things from my many mistakes. The one thing I never learn is to stop making them.” Joe Abercrombie About 23 years ago, I did a course in software development where I tracked every mistake I made. It was shocking and disheartening. I made...
by Alan Willett | The Dev Team, The Engineer
“I’ve had a lot of worries in my life, most of which never happened.” Mark Twain Last night, it snowed about 7 inches. The snow was not a surprise, and we were prepared. I was out at daybreak, clearing pathways for all to enjoy. I have always appreciated the Mark...