Dilbert For Manager

Moving from the North Pole to the South Pole

2010-05-25T01:37:00.000-07:00

Dilbert had moved close to the South Pole after years
stint close to the North Pole. He is still enjoying new
country and working towards his PhD and citizenship.

Does he miss some of loved ones away, yes he does,
but he does not have a choice now and then. There
were push factors in addition to the pull factors too.

Life changes and solitude made one philosophical.
So now he is immersing himself in the intellectual -
he still reads news, history, politics and economics
- and professional (studies, papers and research).

He is still confident and making the best out of the
sabathical.

Turning Down 120K and Trading it for 20K

2010-03-12T12:36:00.000-08:00

Dilbert has turned down a job offer that pays him 100K
USD a year (in current exchange rate) excluding benefits
: 27 days a year vacations and health benefits, employer's
contribution for pension and he will be solely responsible
for software team. But he has turned it down. That is a
hard decision for him. He will go for PhDship that will pay
him only US $20K p.a. So he has traded 20 for 100? 120?

He has not sworn to stay poor and his 20K is tax free, it
leads to a PhD degree, he can qualify for CTO jobs and he
may run his own firm before the PhD ends. Who knows :))

So he thinks he is right and perhaps MBA learning journey
is a factor too. Perhaps he is justifying himself for push and
pull forces too. Well everyone has to make own judgement
calls and bear consequences, so will be he! Time will tell.

Who says Dilbert is doomed... Sharing an interesting EDN story

2010-03-06T18:05:00.000-08:00

Dilbert has been investing his time in a product development project he thinks innovative and Dilbert works in this line and he is very much interested in doom sayer's view.

"......

The economy is recovering, or so the economists tell us. The employment picture remains grim, however, and high levels of joblessness may be a permanent condition, according to a recent item in The Huffington Post (Reference 1) by Martin Ford, a Silicon Valley entrepreneur, computer engineer, and author of The Lights in the Tunnel: Automation, Accelerating Technology and the Economy of the Future.

Ford begins with a look at an article in Salon, “Why Dilbert is doomed: The jobs of tomorrow are not what you’d expect”

..."

read more at the link below...

http://www.edn.com/article/CA6720351.html?nid=2790&rid=16282744

C++, Qt, OpenCV, C, TCP/IP, Embedded Linux, IML and XML for SCADA

2010-01-28T16:54:00.000-08:00

Dilbert is excited with the progress he made in learning
and designing a basic SCADA system.

He intend to use C++, Qt, OpenCV, C, TCP/IP, Ethernet,
Embedded, Linux, ACE frameworks, IML (XML), PV
Browser for a basic SCADA product that can be marketed
for industrial automation such as oil pipelines, production
platforms, engine and generator controls and home safety
and security products, CCTV and etc..

No harm dreaming .......

A Master, another Master and now a Philosopher (Doctor of Philosophy)?

2009-12-29T13:46:00.000-08:00

Dilbert is moving to the land of milk and honey where he
pursue PhD full time in a public research university there.

He is quite motivated to earn PhD in 3 years from now
and a business plan to start up an industry and home
automation solutions firm by that time.

MSEE, MBA and PhD with one and half decade industry
and leadership experience will serve him good and the
citizenship from an affluent country, first world economy
will serve him well.

Pretending as a student - staying awake at 4 AM

2009-09-14T20:36:00.000-07:00

Your Dilbert is staying in a university hostel for
a management development programme which
he pursued 3 years ago.

Yesternight, he was woke up by noises in the
apartment. Then he foundhimself among hard
drinking mature students, his MBA mates who
are acting like full timers while they are in the
campus.

After having shots of Vodka, Dilbert found himself
pitching his class mate, a director of an automation
firm in Europe to invest, set up a R&D center in
a small South East Asian Nation which is well known
for subsidizing development centers with corporate
taxes, facilities subsidies, capital loans - the city
state even runs internship programs at all levels
to supply manpower for such foreign investors.

What a day!

A social networking tool NING for virtual (offshore) teams management

2009-08-13T15:05:00.000-07:00

Managing is difficult, right mix of supervising and leading.
Managing a software developer team is difficult as they
are elite knowledge workers. Needless to say managing
remote team, a team of virtual men (at a site in different
premise, in different time zone, culture) will be difficult.

A useful remote manager's tool for managing : coordinating,
communicating, controlling and coaching) leading a virtual
(offshore) developer team was created using NING, Web 2.0
social networking tool.

See below

http://virtoffteamlead.ning.com/

The site is private and so only invited NING users can see and
modify contents. NING provide tools and will see how to use.

Am I trying to emulate the outsourcing sites such as oDesk?

http://www.odesk.com/w/

No, what I have tried to do is to begin crafting own free tools.

Mrs. Kitty almost got an attack from Master Soon

2009-08-04T15:20:00.000-07:00

Today, "Dilbert For Manager" (D4M) read an old news about
how Ms. Kitty almost got an under belly attack from Mr. Soon.

I am referring to news about a Chinese Soon class submarine
submerged close to the USS Kitty Hawk, US aircraft carrier
by passing the security blanket provided by a dozen ships in
the close battle formation.

In war, generals do not show off their forces and weapons,
in business executives do not let opponents (rival firms) know
product plans and projects going on or personnel plan to hire.

Unless you want to deter the opponent's threats, or bound
their moves, why should you pull off carpet under his feet.

No wonder Chinese had learned Sun Tsu well.

Source:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-492804/The-uninvited-guest-Chinese-sub-pops-middle-U-S-Navy-exercise-leaving-military-chiefs-red-faced.html

Life time employment (at a firm) and cable installation for a new office

2009-07-31T01:55:00.000-07:00

I was born and raised in ex-socialist economy, earned my
first degree in an engineering university built by Russians.
My parents are junior civil servants, that is they had iron
rice bowls. At home, I was taught to be listen to teachers,
loyal to boss and those are values. At college, I was trained
to believe that the role of a university level trained engineer
is to seek government job, climb up the ladder to become
a technocrat. That was how it started, those were backbones
of my work ethics. Later, when local universities were forced
to shut down for some reasons, for I did not have enough
money to study with credit transfer to foreign universities,
I had to seek full time work in private firms start flourishing
in my country early 90s. That was why I earned my system
engineer certification before earning college degree. However,
this is not what I want to talk about. So I started as a PC guy,
a technician in a local technology firm headed by natives who
came back from United States after working for big firms like
TI, Seagate, etc.. So I assembled PC, installed DOS 6.22 and
bad old Window OSes, user support, etc.. Next I moved up
food chain, becoming a LAN network technician. Looking back,
I was happy with my monthly salary which now I can make in
less than a fraction of an hour now. But back then, I thought
I would go back college when reopened to earn the degree,
then will make career with that firm. All was perfect, I was
employed, learning while some of my friends were sitting idly.

But simple experience I learned at work changed my concept
about life time employment and life long learning for mobility.
I was installing a switch box for LAN and PABX for a foreign
owned local firm in newly built plaza in the business district.
So I was learning how to crimp RJ 11 (phone plugs), RJ 45
(Ethernet plugs) and will mount servers into the rack, and
PABX, etc.. There structured cabling was installed.

There I learned about decoupling ploy in cabling scheme.
The decoupling is made there so that let's say Mr. X has
phone extension #117, he sits in a table close to network
plug #0102 and he belonged in an Ethernet switch #3,
if he got moved to another room, he will still be able to
use same phone extension, his PC connected to different
network plug #0304 but his PC network card would still
connected to same port in the same Ethernet switch #3.
Being an electronic engineer, who loves to decouple all
sub systems I love it. Another thing I noticed is that
there were extra phone plugs there.

That was useful when a sales guy quit and if he was with
a direct telephone line connected to his desk, to make
sure that incoming phone calls to him will be answered
by his replacement. That is what was called redundency
and that was another excellent concept in engineering.
All those may not be needed for better network switches
and PABXes, but I was talking about LAN networking
in a low income country which is not even qualified as
an emerging economies and we were using PABX (PBX)
from OEM manufacturer from the far Eastern Asia.

But what stuck in my mind was that people move about
and they do move out. As business owner and manager,
you have to think even before you move into the office
premise, but as an employee one has to be prepared for
such career moves in professional life. After all middle
managers and executives are also employees, even owner
in a public corporation is still an agent for stock holders.

So that was the epoch for life long journey of learning and
upward mobility.

Business Model, Linear Programming

2009-07-30T01:34:00.000-07:00

If you are a product manager you have to know
how to break down costs: fixed costs and variable
costs from the Product (platform and derivatives)
from the respective Bill of Materials (BOM). It is
a tricky as it all depends on sourcing, fluctuating
prices, and the way you compute (FIFO or LIFO).
And you have to forecast (lucky you, if you have
historic sales data to build your model). So in short,
as project manager reports to engineering manager
or product manager reports to marketing manager,
you need to know how to model.

In that sense, business models are used to forecast,
or performance benchmarking.

One business modeling tool is Linear Programming.
It is simple, suppose you run a pizza joint, you can
sell 250 Grilled Lamb Pizzas (serving at the tables)
or 600 Kebab Pita (take away) - you are limited by
tables, operating time, kilograms of meat, oven and
man power - you are to maximize your profits and
a pie of Pizza makes 40% profit, while a Kebab pita
brings 30% profit per unit. Now you have to allocate
your Grilled Lamb to make P number of Pizzas and
K number of Kebabs. You have 20 kg of grilled lamb,
to make a Pizza you need about .03 kg of meat and
for Kebab it will take about .01 kg of delicious meat.

You can see LP is all about finding an optimal solution
(for profits) under restrictions imposed on operation
(also by financial constraints too). Equations are :

Maximize .40P+.25K

K <= 600 P <= 250 .03P+.01K <= 20 But if you are limited by Dough to make pita bread and Pizza pie. So one more constraints will be there. How about minimizing cost, not maximizing profit? Please note that the benefit of Business Modeling is to avoid fatal mistakes for business - rotten meat, stale bread, leftover food are not good news for joint owner. There will be more equations in LP formulations if constraints or objectives changes. LP is so simple!

Learn in limelight, also in twilight

2009-07-27T14:39:00.000-07:00

Life is full of ups and downs.

Some claim "Treat crowds good on the way up as
you will meet them down hill", but some retorts
back "The crowd you meet going downhill will not
be same crowd you treated nice on the way up".

One can learn while rejoicing success in limelight,
one can also learn while reflecting (retrospectives)
while licking wounds alone in twilight.

Treat people nice, learn in limelight and twilight!

New found love for hassles

2009-07-21T23:29:00.000-07:00

I used to feel contempt towards administrative
works. Now I love them - they are important.

I worked as a field engineer- a project engineer
responsible for field operations - before I have
switched career to become embedded software,
systems, solutions for a lot of industries.

As a field engineer after finishing the long and
tiresome job, I have to ask client representative
sign the P.O so that accountants can invoice the
clients. Not only that I have to check do QC of
data, package the data, give unofficial but crucial
field interpretations to the client and logistics
the way back to the base. Engineers have to fill
what tools we used, what services we sold, how
many crew were used for how many productive
hours and loss time, which specific systems or
equipment we have used into the database that
will be synchronize later when we will be back
in the office.

I switched my career to become design engineer,
software engineer for embedded systems based
products development. Then I fill in the tasks
I undertake, estimated time to complete tasks,
and percentage of the completion of those tasks.
I used to think that why should I waste time in
filling in forms while I can use time for real work.

But now, I understand that those are feedback
channels, raw data in to management information
systems. Without accuracy and completeness in
filling those data, no managers make an educated
guess, schedule and shuffle resources, predict and
plan operations, forecast future sales, cash flow to
finance capital and cash reserves, maintain service
quality, etc..

No wonder now I love those administrative works.

Embedded Systems development

2009-07-14T14:20:00.001-07:00

Embedded systems development is different
from desktop, enterprise software systems.

I am interested in finding the best practices
in embedded systems product development.

The development projects of the embedded
systems have unique characteristics those
deserve merits to be researched not only from
technology perspective, but also from finance,
project management, marketing perspectives.

I want to research that development processes
from project management, system engineering,
architectural, software, hardware design, and
development approach and integrate with the
general management framework.

I was thinking of doing that as MBA thesis topic
but it may be too ambitious for a MBA project.

How about finding research job in CS department
of AACSB, AMBA and EUQUIS triple accredited
Business School?

The thought of earning a seat to pursue research
while contributing expertise and experience
educating young minds, is really tempting though.

After all, ain't it the agenda of writing my article
published in industry leader "Embedded.com"?

Ideas are endless while life is limited. We will see!

Make or Sell, what do you do for a living?

2009-07-14T09:53:00.000-07:00

Sometimes I fantasized myself as a sales engineer.
I asked myself whether will I still be comfortable
to switch from developing products to selling those.

We all have to sell, even hard core engineers have to
sell ideas so I think I will be happy selling technology
products, giving input to new product development.

Perhaps, sales may be a career option worth to look.

Technopreneurship

2009-07-09T16:34:00.000-07:00

My first taste of entrepreneurship? Nothing solid yet!

I just started thinking now excited with ChromeOS news,
mobile broadband, HP calculator@iPhone, virtualization,
OSPF and IP routing, TCP/IP stacks, embedded systems,
Skype, hardware/software plug-in, cheaper hardware,
Linux, FSF, Web 2.0 and social networks - all exciting,
all keep me awake until 2 AM - I am not an owl usually.

And I got a template to use for drafting a business plan.

"Title of investment proposal?

First choice for industry classification?

Primary Reason for needing capital?

Amount of capital required?

Minimum investment from each investor?

Short summary. (250 words)

Long summary.(600-3500 words)

Share my proposal?"

Reference:

http://www.scandinavianinvestmentnetwork.com

"Persistence is to the character of man..."

2009-07-08T02:35:00.000-07:00

"Persistence is to the character of man as carbon is to steel."

Hill, Napoleon

"We are not retreating but advancing..."

2009-07-04T12:57:00.000-07:00

I just want to quote US Marine General OP Smith in the Korean
war who led 1st Marine Division way out of enemies' troops.

"We are not retreating but advancing in the different direction."

Social Networking sites and Web 2.0 technologies

2009-06-29T13:41:00.001-07:00

I was a kind of guy who thinks that social networking
sites such as Twitter, Facebook and Ning are sites where
teens waste time, all but not for working adults. I was
even skeptic about more straight laced LinkedIn site.

However, I became a convert. I found that LinkedIn
is not only useful as an online address book, but it is
equally useful for catching up with college, graduate
school buddies, ex-colleagues as well as source of job
tips from recruiters.

At first, I used Facebook for some big brother's acts,
I used it to learn more about my kid brother who is
in late teens, who has been pursuing BSEE in a public
university in the United States.

I learned that people like to share own information a lot.
They want to express inner feelings. Later I found out
fan groups those act as Yahoo groups which I find it
useful to find data. Now I use it for browsing technical
news, Facebook become another technical sites.

What is more in it for me? I will use those sites to poll,
survey, collect data for MBA thesis.

Unfairness and Acid Tests

2009-06-29T03:36:00.000-07:00

That was in 2001, I completed 3 months long formal schooling
part of field engineer training in one of the corporate training
centers in North Eastern Africa (there are training centers
everywhere), but I was lucky to be there where Queen Cleopatra
reigned thousands of years ago. So the last weeks two training
cohorts overlap, us who are going to be graduated and those who
are new engineer recruits who will go through coming 3 months.

On one evening, one American engineer who was assigned in
Beijing (read as good hardship allowance on top of good pay
without going through real hardship) was bragging his exotic
life there in the middle kingdom, while another Scottish chap
who had to started his pre-school training somewhere less
pleasant was complaining - I started my field engineer training
in a small oil town in small oil rich West African nation. While
listening their youthful and colorful (dating girls, food, wine,
hard liquor, pay, bonuses, hardship allowance, staff house),
while changing the sweaty socks those were killing my toes
(for field engineer job is a high paying blue color job so it trains
you not only to manage crew but to work like crew whom you
will manage), I realized one thing. When you are in the right
side of the unfairness you better be silent, but when you
are on the unfair (still better than those who do not get such
highly paid, demanding but rewarding job with a career) side,
do not complain either.

Being born in wrong side of the planet, in the poorest and least
developed part of the globe. I had to pace my steps faster just
to be on par with my more fortunate colleagues in the position.
However, the positive side is you have gone through that and
you survived and that is the acid test.

Technie or Politician? Where will you be in the spectrum?

2009-06-28T07:09:00.000-07:00

Once I was asked where will I fit in in the spectrum,
Technophile Manager at one extreme end and the
Master Politician (can be Techophobic) in other end.

I think I will be close to the imaginary center line
but I may be comfortable in the Technophile half.
It is hard to forget the first love, and I still am an
engineer at heart.

Working holidays before college

2009-06-27T15:47:00.000-07:00

I was an adventurous boy, working holidays in overseas in
late teen. Lonely journeys shaped my character. Then and
there I passed "Self Reliance, Calculated Risks Taking 101".

Barely 18, after high school graduation, before university,
I went abroad alone for working holidays in overseas that
lasted 2 years. For those years, I worked to support myself
to live alone in the capital cities in the region and cities far
and away. I even spent a year on board offshore towing
vessels in offshore oilfields, serving offshore platforms, etc..

I saw floating anti ship mines, worked on the deck in rough
high sea, floated in seas full of sharks and fished some, drifted
with sea currents. Those were wonderful character shaping
experience for a boy to become an independent young man.

Dilbert, the technophile

2009-06-26T13:52:00.000-07:00

Dilbert is transforming into pointy haired manager.
But he still is a technophile who loves gadgets, who
does not want to go far away from technology yet.

Your Dilbert is thinking of adding the following gadget
into his personal sets of engineering tools.

FYI, GESBC-9G20 Embedded Single Board Computer
that runs Embedded Linux Kernel 2.6.27 on ARM9
cored Atmel SoC. Cool? Ain't it?

http://www.glomationinc.com/product_9G20.html

Learning from a book cannot make you a manager but hey it is education

2009-06-26T13:33:00.000-07:00

I am trying to move into management from being in experienced
professional, specialist or individual contributor role for 11 years.

I have led men, managed projects, supervised professionals and
teams, coordinated activities, resolved conflicts, communicated
up and down, championed the causes, facilitated resources,
evaluated and apprised team and project personnel, scheduled
tasks, assigned resources and assert controls to deliver results.
I have been in project leader, technical leader, project engineer,
team supervisor roles for more than 5 years in several firms,
countries and in teams made up of international professionals.

However, I never have had any formal managerial title yet.
So in the process of transition from professional to manager
- for not having a mentor - I have no choice but to resort books.

May I recommend you a book from which you can learn a lot
about transformations stories into first line managers (from
individual contributors)

Reading a book cannot make you a manager. But learning
from other people's costly mistakes is called education.

FYI, below

Becoming a Manager: Mastery of a New Identity
by Linda A. Hill
published by HBS

Servant leader must learn Mafia manager

2009-06-23T13:45:00.000-07:00

Your Dilbert strives to be a benevolent caring servant leader .
However, he believes there is no harm learning moves of Don
Dogberto or Don Catberto who wants to conquer all cubicles.

Knowing tricks of the enemy can help protect one's own people.

Dear reader FYI below

The Mafia Manager : A Guide to the Corporate Machiavelli by V.

Occam's razor

2009-06-23T12:11:00.000-07:00

I received trainings in product development and for being
a product guy (software, IT, network, firmware, electronics)
made me understand "KISS or keep it simple and stupid".
However, I learned this beautiful word"Occam's razor"
from a colleague. I think the word aline is worth blogging.

Should it be translate "Less is more","Made it simple"?

Occam's razor - a beautiful catchy word for designers!!

Occam's razor - a reminder for strategists and managers.

Personal attributes, assets and capabilties as basis of career building

2009-06-22T09:55:00.000-07:00

This weekend, I was reading about Strategy and practice in
operations to create better financial standings for the firms.

For a firm to survive and thrive in the market place, or for an
employee to get hired and promoted in work place, individuals
and institutions formulate theories those will work for them
explicitly or unconsciously. Those are called strategies.

However, a person cannot act or pretend forever in a role he
is not, without having real character or competencies in him.
Likewise, companies cannot transform into their role model
entities without having or building up real core competencies.

Core competencies made firms or employees unique, valuable
(in the eyes of customers or employers). Based on the unique
and strong competencies or strategic capabilities businesses
build their sustainable competitiveness in the market place.

Along that line, I compiled what are my core competencies,
what are my "strategic", "complementary" and other assets.
Strategic thinking for competitive advantage has to have
environmental analysis (know the terrain), market based view
(know the enemies, allies and opportunists), resource based
view (know your own force, morale, strength, and combat
readiness). Self reflection of one's own strengths, assets and
capabilities will be resource based view.

I believe high level of energy, drive, ethics of honesty, hard
work in combination with unique international experience,
ability to communicate at all levels, cultural awareness, skills
in advanced technology and product development are core
competencies. I must build up my career based on on those.

Complementary assets are academic qualifications: college
degree in engineering and post graduate advanced degree
in software technology product design, industry certifications
: recognition certification from an industrialized Western
European nation and engineer certification from a leading
technology company in US. Learning from MBA studies and
an array of 20 plus hands on professional training courses.
I guess those assets complement above core competencies.

Valid work permits, permanent residencies at hand, or under
progress will make me more eligible in the eyes of employers.
The readiness to relocate, loyalty to employer and boss, ability
to present and presentable personality, sincere care of well
being of juniors will constitute as make-or-buy assets.

Diversity, seniority consciousness

2009-06-21T03:20:00.000-07:00

Throughout assignments in 3 continents, I work with colleagues
from all races and cultures: Anglo Saxon, Scandinavian/Nordic,
North African and Black African, South East Asians, East Asians
and South Asians. I have learned that the concept of leadership
(a servant leader who cares his men, who serves his men for
a purpose in a task force) and respect of seniority differs from
culture to culture - in some cultures it is anticipated for a boss
to fetch coffee for his men while the reverse may be true in other
cultures. Although it is not wise to stereotype an individual with
his country of origin, or region, continent, or sub culture. It may
not be a bad idea to understand how things work in his context.

After all, it will be boring if you are forced to spend 40 to 50 hours
a week with people who are born and brought up in the same place
or way as you are, who went to same school where you graduated,
who started in the same job as you did. I think it will be enjoyable
and stimulating to work with colleagues who can be different from
you in all but equal only in integrity, merit, talent and competence.

Business cards and Personal branding

2009-06-18T15:14:00.000-07:00

I used to be my employers' company man - I used to hand
out the business card that is printed by my employer that
has company name and logo, my name, job title, the project
and department I belong to together with corporate email,
direct line and mobile. Some companies allow you to print
the name of academic degree you earned and sometimes
the specialization or major you have pursued.

I still am loyal man to my employer who wants to develop
career within one firm. However, I think it is wiser to have
a personal brand. Last week I ordered my first business
cards those are not tied to the employer. However they do
tie to another business brand, the business school I have
been pursuing MBA degree by part time.

So what does my card say

Mr. Dilbert The Manager
Firmware/Software Product Design/Development
M.Sc (Computer and Software Engineering)
Current participant on the XXXX MBA

(+44) XXXXXXXX
dilbertrealname@mybusinessschool.ac.uk

Those business cards will help establish my personal brand.
We will see.

Monetary value of citizenship or residency

2009-06-15T14:30:00.000-07:00

Today I had a conversation with a friend about varying degrees
of difference between remuneration packages of expatriate vs.
local employees in rich and poor countries.

I started my career as a local (technical) professional in one of
the least developed nations on earth. So my first monthly pay
was pathetic sum of less than 50 US Dollars per month.
After several months of internship there, I moved to an oil
exploration project of an American corporation as a local staff
(contracted or seconded from a local firm to the foreign firm)
I made about 300 US Dollars (absolute dollars) and that was
the princely sum in a country where average wage of labor
per day was less than 1 US Dollar. However, I do realized that
what I made for a month was less than a day rate of average
expatriate contractors in the oil industry.

Next I went abroad, moved up the food chain to become
a locally hired expatriate staff in a neighboring country which
is relatively more prosperous than my native country. There
and then I made about a thousand bucks a month.

Then I earned my engineering degree, hired and expatriated
to poor places (peer to my native land) and my pay per month
become 6 to 8 times of my remuneration I earned previously.

I moved on and now working as a local employee in one of the
richest nations on earth. Here a local employee may make more
than an expatriate of same rank.

While it is not an unknown secret that where you were born and
educated is important, when you are still holding a passport that
does not favor your wallet, I think it is time to think emigration.
It is time for economists to measure the monetary value of the
passports and permanent residencies of rich and affluent nations.

Who will relocate for the job? At what price?

2009-06-10T14:02:00.000-07:00

I have been a nomad living in different cities around the globe
for study and work. I noticed that it has become popular and
so I created a short survey made up of 10 questions.

Thanks in advance if you bother to take sample survey below.

Click Here to take survey

Electronics, Firmware and Software Intensive Product Design and Development

2009-06-08T23:42:00.000-07:00

I have led, contributed the design and development
of electronics, firmware and software driven products.

What made them so special and what made me love
the job? I think technologies, processes and people
are different either from software products those
run on Wintel PC desktops, UNIX boxes or Macs.

When you develop Web, Games, Database applications,
product team : project manager, architect, designers
and developers do not need to know intrinsic details of
underlying hardware unless they design device drivers.
However, for firmware intensive products, engineers
have to know micro processor and/or micro controller
powering the product, persistent (permanent) memory
storage devices, run time memory, interface and buses,
file systems, operating systems and even clock crystal
that drives the CPU, by giving clock ticks or the heart
beats of the system. One has to know what is ROHS
compliance and how to achieve that. What is BOM, how
to keep BOM organized, how to run environment tests
such as hot and cold weather cycles, shocks, wear and
tear of mechanical parts and mechanical parts will not
be sharp and edgy to cut someone's hands.

Devices must not electrocute people and animals
come into contact with devices - it is possible for
people to abuse such outdoor/field devices.

How to make batteries live long enough or sleep
where there is nothing to do to consume less power,
to conserve battery power, etc..

How to test Alpha, Beta tests and how to make sure
changes (if major hardware changes are inevitable)
can be accommodated?

The manager has to understand patents laws, how
to protect own innovations while bypassing other's
if necessary.

And so on....

I will love to write more about best practices I have
learned myself. Are you interested in?

MBA will not make Dilbrt to Dogbert, the manager!

2009-06-06T01:12:00.000-07:00

Today I saw an inquiry from an fresh MBA graduate how to
get a management job in a social networking site LinkedIn.
No wonder Professor Henry Mintzberg claimed that MBA
degree programs are educating wrong folks, misleading them
breeding wrong expectations in his "Managers not MBAs".

I am a MBA participant (by distance learning) myself. Even
though I have 11 years of professional experience - 5 years
leading people, supervising international teams and managing
projects - I considered myself a light weight. Although I think
I am ready for an entry level manager role, I dont think I am
ready for a general management role yet. Education is not
a substitute for experience.

No wonder there are MBA haters, they are not wrong at all!

A believer of lifelong learning? Here is what I learn these days in addition to my full time work...

2009-06-03T03:56:00.000-07:00

List of what I learn in parallel to full time work commitment

What I learn in Part B of MBA part time studies

o Corporate Finance
o Human Resource Management
o Strategic Advantage
o Modeling and Analysis for Management
o Project and Dissertation

In Part A of MBA part time studies, I learned

o Accounting and Financial Management
o Organizational Behavior
o Market Analysis
o Operations Management
o Economics of the Business Environment

I believe MBA studies will value add my professional career
as a product guy, a system designer, a solution developer, etc..
After all, lifelong learning is something you have to believe in.
Are you a believer too?

A hammer to hit all nails : organizing tasks, managing project, modeling business, etc..

2009-05-31T10:32:00.000-07:00

I think spread sheets software is alike a Swiss army knife
useful to do a lot of things, a modeling tool for an business
analyst, an online log book for engineers, a budgeting tool
for a manager, a project tasks tracker - I learned in an
project management seminar that Microsoft engineers use
Microsoft Excel as their project management tool instead
of its MS Project - to organize tasks and track progress.
It is a workman's hammer to hit all nails in a work place.

In a "low volume - high variety" prototyping place, a
spread sheet can be developed for task organization.

A spreadsheet with product or prototype's attributes:

1) products platforms and
2) derivatives (variants of the product platforms)
3) prototyping/production stage: design, development,
debugging, or distribution of the prototype
4) different color or shading scheme can be used to
discriminate the tasks' priority, the prototyping stage, etc..

Such a simple tool can help one product guy to track and
manage multiple products.

Meanwhile, a "high volume - low variety" manufacturing
place, a spread sheet can be developed to collect statistics
from production and to analyze and reduce the variances.

Some thoughts about leadership and management - what made a good leader and performing manager

2009-05-30T09:28:00.000-07:00

Since I wanted to be a leader, professional manager,
I always ask the questions what are managerial and
leadership qualities to make a performing manager.

I believe managers should lead while leaders should
manage to get things done and deliver results.

In my opinion, a manager should be a honest man
(or a woman) with courage, communication skills
considerations (compassion) and domain knowledge
and competency.

Honesty or integrity are essential to earn trust from
his men and bosses. He should be a person who will
tell his bosses about the situations as those are, a man
who will let his men know how important are mission
and the deathly consequences of missing deliverable
results and deadlines.

Courage to make decisions especially unpopular ones.
courage to hear the truth, accept hard facts however
unattractive they are.

Communication skills are also important because he
will be the the center of the web, coordinating with
the team, championing the work of the team and
result to the upper management.

While a better manager can be tough and demanding
he can also be considerate, caring and compassionate.

After all, there is a saying that people leave bosses
and not organizations.

A few words about me........

2009-05-28T12:20:00.000-07:00

I am an experienced engineer with 12 years of IT, Software,
Networking, Firmware Product Development, Project/Field
experience in Europe, Africa and Asia - I spent more than
one third of my life in overseas - I turned 36 in 2009.

I earned industry certification in system engineering before
earning Bachelor of Engineering education. I earned post MSc
degree qualifications in Engineering from European and Asian
universities. I earned business and management education
leading to MBA from a well regarded business school. I have
been pursuing MBA via distance learning and executive mode
to learn new skills, to improve upward career mobility and ...

I created this blog to be served as online professional resume',
a career blog. My intention for this blog is to supplement the
short and breif resume' submitted to gate keepers, you are
welcome and thanks for visiting.

Reach me via "dlmba2007@gmail.com". I look forward to
hear feedback from you.