I worked for a firm as an IT manager when it was going through a relocation project.  We migrated from a shoddy IT infrastructure in a shoddy, unsecured server area (which had water pipes running around the back of the servers to the coffee machine with rodents visibly running around) to a shiny new office with a shiny new server room with a big door.  This new server room door had not only a normal key lock but also a swipe card reader.  

Unfortunately, the Director of Administration (really the Office Admin) wanted to allow access for all to the server room, so people could help themselves to toner cartridges when their printers ran out, without bothering to tell us so we could order more. (I’m skipping over the obvious horror of them having access to the servers and network)…  And we were told that using the keys to lock the room would be a disciplinary offence.  We tried to point out obvious security issues and were shouted down.

The important assets of the company were subject to constant pilferage and, come to think of it, ended up resulting in an eventual Employment Tribunal.  All of my “I told you so’s” came back to haunt them as details of their it in full in court, as the justices had read all of these details read in court and factored them into their ruling.

In a separate case, another acquaintance named Barry proceeded to tell me:

Our firm brought in a new Director of IT.  This individual wasn’t satisfied with overseeing a mere IT division.  Soon after coming on board, she set about systematically isolating and debilitating other managers in other functions, like the finance and accounting department.  If one of these managers didn’t align themselves with her, they sound found that office life was getting harder.  Service was taking longer. New installs, updates, and repairs were excruciatingly slow.  Meanwhile, those who played her game got all the support that they needed.  Most chalked it up to the simple ebb-and-flow of the business, not to premeditated planning.  But as time went on, it become more evident that she was employing a divide-and-conquer tactic to win higher level strategic battles in the executive suite.  In short order, she’d taken control of both IT and the money functions.  Turnover started to go up quickly and before another couple months had past, most of the old guard was gone.  Even these event seemed to be pre-planned, because the next thing we knew police officers were boxing up her office and taking her away.  The six-figure salary and frequent bonuses weren’t enough, so she’d evidently moved into to outright fraud or embezzelment.  We’re not sure which it was, but it landed her a multi-year sentence in jail!

Wow! Once again, I’m reminded of the value of checks and balances, in the second case, and the high value of listening to your team, in the first case.

As a bit of background, the PASS “officers” are also known as the Executive Committee (ExeCo), as described in the PASS Bylaws in section VIII.10.  The ExeCo was added to the governance of PASS back in 2004-2005 as a check-and-balance against the extremely powerful office of president as described in the version of the bylaws PASS currently had in place at that time.  Prior to the ExeCo, the president could do pretty much anything they wanted at that point – sign contracts, make binding pronouncements, etc. – while the overall duty of the board of directors was to manage specific portfolios and to set strategy.  The ExeCo verbiage was added to PASS governance to ensure that there was a reasonable balance of power by requiring a 3 out of 4 vote to enact major initiatives before they were brought before the board of directors.  (I should point out that my job as an employee of a major vendor was directly responsible for bringing the ExeCo into being.  When I was first elected by the board of directors to serve as president, the PASS board also wanted to ensure that a president working for a vendor would not show his employer undue favor with perks like better spots on the exhibit hall floor, mentioning them by name in presidential communiques, and so forth.  So the bylaws were changed to establish the ExeCo so that the president, any president, could not govern by decree).  OK – so the ExeCo makes executive decisions, comprendo?

So in looking at the the slate put forward for the 2012 officers, I noticed that two members of said ExeCo will now be working for the same company and this is deeply troubling to me.  (As an aside, those persons are Rushabh Mehta with Solid Quality Mentors India practice and Douglas McDowell with Solid Quality Mentors USA practice).

Now don’t get me wrong, this is not a personal attack in any way.  I know both Rushabh and Douglas personally and consider them both friends.  I have endorsed them for ExeCo leadership roles in the past, as individuals.  However, I have a deep conviction that the Executive Committee should not have any two members from the same company, even when they represent different business units.  Again, my feelings in this area transcend the current persons on the slate.  I simply feel like it’s a dangerous precedent to set because we cannot know or control the character and ethics of future PASS leaders.

Consider that the ExeCo can govern with a 3 out of 4 vote.  That means that two members of the ExeCo, with either an implicit or explicit alliance, could block any initiative each and every time it came up.  Furthermore, they could pass any initiative they wanted by winning one other vote.

I also feel that the ExeCo and the wider board is responsible for securing the future of PASS, one of which includes reasonable checks and balances on executive leadership.  We cannot know and should be somewhat skeptical that all future board members will be as ethical and upstanding as those currently on the board.  By allowing a single company to hold multiple seats on the ExeCo, PASS would set a dangerous precedent for future boards.

The press release makes no mention of Rushabh’s future plans.  It’s possible that he intends to resign at the end of this year and not assume the role of Immediate Past President, thereby avoiding the possibility of two ExeCo members from the same organization.  There are probably some other ways to remedy this situation.  But with only the information of the press release, I’m sorry to say that I cannot endorse the 2012 ExeCo slate.

What are your thoughts?

A while back at a SQL Saturday in Indianapolis, I was enjoying the WIT panel discussion listening to the panelists discuss their  upbringing and how they became a success in the field of technology.  Their stories were, in some ways, similar.  They were smart.  They weren’t scared of math.  They had an important mentor who supported them and encouraged them that they could accomplish any goal.  They endured struggles such as financial hardship that, while difficult to overcome, also refined their desire to become successful in their careers.  Some of the women who had to deal with men of the previous generation even had to overcome blatant chauvinism.

But then another similarity among the panelists, just a hunch really, struck me.  I had to ask, to confirm my idea. “How many of you were a bit of loner or at least weren’t heavily influenced by your friends’ opinions before your professional career?  Because with my own daughters, it’s their friends who they want to please.  And they’d punt right away if their friends teased them about being good at math, or choosing a technical career, or anything else I can think of for that matter.”

It was pretty much unanimous.  All of the panelists were loners or had a very small social circle during their formative years.  Now perhaps I’m speaking from an inaccurate assumption, but most of my daughters are tight with their friends.  And friends mean a lot to them, perhaps more than any other aspect of their social lives (like their family).  So if their friends tell them that being interested in technology will “geekify” them, then they’d drop it like a hot potato.

So I wanted to put this question out to my female friends in the IT world.  Were you in a big circle of friends during your developing years?  What importance did you place on their opinions?  Did they give you any flack for going in to IT or doing well in technology related classes?

It seems like the days of overt chauvinism are behind us here in the US.  But I wonder if we need to start earlier with our daughters among their own peer groups to support them for a future in technology.

Thoughts?

Thanks,

-Kev

-Follow me on Twitter

Arnie Roland, SQL Server MVP and Doer of Good Deeds

It seems like I’ve known Arnie Rowland (blog | twitter) since the dawn of time.  But it’s really more like the last several years, or at least since Arnie achieved Microsoft MVP status, that I really got to know him.  Arnie has also been trying to get me to speak to the user group he leads in Portland, but coordinating it has been fiendishly difficult.  I hope to get out to Portland in 2011 (no promises, Arnie!!!).

One of the activities that Arnie is leading that has deeply impressed me is Project Phoenix.  Described here:

…we are inviting unemployed or underemployed developers to propose a software project for a non-profit agency, school, or church. The idea is that we will provide a package of the latest software, tools, and training resources to help you improve your skills, get up to date with current technologies, gain practical experience, potentially earn a recommendation for your efforts, and in general, enjoy the feeling of accomplishing something useful for others…

I’m a big proponent of professional ethics and paying it forward in ways like this.  So I wanted to discuss this further with Arnie.

Here’s a bit of our discussion…

Kevin>> Tell me about Project Phoenix. What does it hope to accomplish?

Arnie>> I appreciate the opportunity to introduce Project Phoenix to your readers. We are awarding a package that includes an MSDN Ultimate Subscription, software tools, training, and books to unemployed, or significantly underemployed, developers that propose and undertake a software project for a non-profit, school, or church. We are making one award each week of the rest of the year –more than 30 in total. The idea is to provide the recipient access to the tools needed to improve his/her skills, an opportunity to gain practical experience, the potential to earn a recommendation and/or referral –and to positively contribute to society as a form of ‘give-back’. No free lunch, just sweat equity –the kind that makes us all feel good for the effort. Additionally, one of our goals is to increase consciousness amongst IT professionals about the needs of the non-profit sector. Many agencies, schools, and churches need our help –yet their budgets often don’t allow them to fully engage with us. When they are lucky, they get half-baked solutions to try and solve the complex problems of our society. That’s just not right.

Kevin>> In what way can we help?

Arnie>> Great question Kevin. I ask your readers to help spread the word about Project Phoenix. Tell any eligible developers –heck, tell all developers you know since someone you tell may have an unemployed friend or relative. Bringing Project Phoenix to the attention of non-profits, schools, and churches will help to increase the potential that a profound solution will bubble up and out. And for those readers that are not eligible to participate in Project Phoenix because they are employed, we challenge you to ask your church, your kids’ schools, your local non-profit agencies how you can use your skills to help them with their mission. Participate in, or organize, a local ‘Give Camp’. Consider how you can give back to society some token of your appreciation for being so fortunate.

Kevin>> There are a multitude of ways to volunteer. What attracted you to Project Phoenix?

Kevin>> I had been presented with these very expensive software gifts to just hand out as I saw fit. I observed that some similar gifts were being handed out to folks that could guess what number is between 1 and 3, or some similarly lame exercise, some were handed out as ‘door prizes’ –sometimes to winners that didn’t really have any use for, or place significant value on, the gift. Some time ago, after giving out such a door prize, I was contacted by the recipient who was exploring how to gain some value, maybe a trade, or even a sell. I realized that often we in the industry were bestowing very valuable gifts to folks that just didn’t place much value on the gift. I wanted to do something different. I decided that seeking out those who clearly understood the value of the gift, and were willing to offer some of their time and effort in exchange had some potential. Tying the pieces together, I decided to create a ‘package’ of value for the recipient so that he/she was motivated to take on a real life project for a deserving non-profit, school, or church, thereby creating additional value from the participants’ efforts to learn to use new tools. Unemployed developers are quite unlikely to be able to afford the package of software, tools, books and training –yet they would most certainly gain significant value from the ‘gift’ if they used it to increase their employment opportunities.

Kevin>> I’ve written a lot about the need for IT professionals to demonstrate good ethics on a daily basis in their profession.  Do you think there’s a correlation between good ethics and volunteerism?

Arnie>> Ethics is about doing the right thing. We in this industry have skills that are needed by societal agents that work diligently to better life for less fortunate members of our society. The right thing is to offer some of our time, some of our skills, to help. We need more IT professionals willing to give up a TV program, willing to give up a football or basketball game, or willing to forgo a few hours of video gaming, and go out and do the right thing.

Kevin>> Project Phoenix is great for IT professionals because it plays off of their strengths in technology.  But one of the downsides of IT is that the technology often puts distance between people, for example using an email when a phone call might better serve the situation.  Does Project Phoenix do anything to connect us with real, live human beings and make a difference in their lives?

Arnie>> I only wish it did. We recognize that many of the projects we award will be completed without any direct personal contact between the developer and the agency. Phone calls, emails, perhaps online meetings will be the norm. That is an unfortunate fact of life in our profession. We hope and encourage that folks receiving Project Phoenix awards will be inclined to share their experiences with others –perhaps at User Groups. However, we are helping folks that are directly interacting with their clients. If the projects we award reduce the administrative burden for those working in non-profit agencies, schools and churches, and allow them to have more direct contact with their clients –we have succeeded in increasing social benefit.

Kevin>> What would the results of doing work with Project Phoenix look like?

Arnie>> For the individual who proposed a project for a non-profit, school, or church, and was awarded, there will be the satisfaction of having completed a ‘real world’ project while learning new tools and technologies. There will be the satisfaction of knowing that their work is benefiting some organization that would not have been able to purchase the solution. There will be the potential for a recommendation from the non-profit organization. There will be something significant to offer during job interviews. And another  result is that some of the projects we award will be available in Codeplex for others to build upon; the efforts of our awards may seed many additional projects.

Arnie>> We recognize that we are seeding over 30 projects, and yet there is no insurance that these projects will actually complete and be deployed. So we have created a ‘completion bonus’. In March 2011, we will be evaluating the completed and deployed projects. One of the developers and projects that we previously awarded will be featured on the TechEd 2011 website and provided a full TechEd 2011 Conference pass courtesy of the Microsoft TechEd 2011 organizers. Telerik, a vendor supplying software development tools, will cover the airfare and hotel expenses to get the winner to TechEd, as well as feature the developer on their website. We are still working out the criteria for this excellent project completion bonus.

Kevin>> What are the next steps?

Arnie>> Continue spreading the word about Project Phoenix. Participate in, or organize, a local Give Camp. Ask your local non-profits, schools, churches how you can use your skills to help them. Society improves because we all care and take action. Show your care.

I’d been happily plugging away in my job as a {DBA/Dev/Terminator/Warp Drive Engineer} for several years, when I applied for the manager position.  I was surprised and thrilled when I got the job!  But now that I’ve been in the job for a while, I find that no one on the team is thrilled with me.  I know that I made a lot of changes.  But they were all for the good of the team.  What should I do to reconnect with my team and rebuild my friendships?

A common theme in this series, “Plays Well With Others”, is that the skills responsible for your success as a database professional have little in common with success as a leader and manager.  And this scenario is a classic example.  It’s especially important to our situation because the solution to this problem is entirely people-oriented and has nothing to do with all those great SQL Server skills you’ve developed over the years.

It's not always comedy

First of all, if you haven’t already, avail yourself of the excellent and time-tested Blanchard’s Leadership and the One Minute Manager as well as The One Minute Manager, both by Kenneth Blanchard.  Management and leadership books churn through the bookstores as quickly late night talk shows on NBC have lately.  But this book has proven its worth over the years and its advice still holds up well.

Next, recognize that most management hassles can be defeated or at least deflated by publicly getting in front of them.  In a sense, the best way to solve this kind of problem is a bit of proactive damage control.  So instead of launching into a bunch of new initiatives and changes for the team (especially the kind that reduce a former teammates’ power or privilege), announce that you’re considering a bunch of changes.  You don’t have to be specific about your plans, but don’t be intentionally vague or evasive either.  Further explain that some of the changes may be uncomfortable, but you’re convinced they’ll make the team much more productive and return greater value to the enterprise.

Ask everyone on the team for input and ideas of their own within the next X number of weeks while you formulate your plans.  It’s very possible that you might 1) get ideas from team members that exactly matches what you’d planned to do, and 2) get new ideas you never thought of but would like to add to the mix or even put higher in priority.  Be sure to thank everyone who steps up to the conversation (or email thread).

Now, it’s time to book some one-on-one time across the team and have the “tough talks” well in advance and in private with those who might be on the losing end of your changes.  Also, invite suggestions about how to best go forward.  You might be surprised by their team spirit.  By treating everyone with empathy and dignity, you might turn one of these potential grumblers into a reliable “wingman”.  On the other hand, arguments are quite likely so explain that the changes are non-negotiable, but reiterate their contribution and value to the team.

By handling this situation with foresight, you send several messages.  The first and strongest message is that you are the leader.  This might not be comfortable for your friends or even to you.  But it’s extremely important to establish this role early on.  And by handling the situation with dignity, you demonstrate that you have credibility, which makes strengthens you in a sort of positive-feedback loop.

If it’s too late to establish your “street cred” and you’ve already fumbled the early stages of the transition to leadership, you can still recover.  But as the old saying goes, an ounce of protection is worth a pound of prevention.  Usually in a situation like this, you should implement a goal-setting and planning session with the entire team.  Explain that the objective is to collaboratively define the goals and objectives of the team and to adjust team responsibilities, processes, and duties to best accomplish those goals.  Personally, you should remember the purpose of the meeting is, primarily, to get everyone on the team knows buy-in to your vision of “success” for the team and, secondarily, firmly establish your position as leader.  It might take as much as half a day to hammer this down.

Prepare ahead of time.  Make sure that your changes mesh with management’s goals for your team.  Ensure that you and YOUR boss are on the same page about what characteristics would mark a team as “successful”.  If you have some extremely strong willed team members or are expecting outright conflict, you may need to conduct your goal-setting session as a one-on-one series of meetings rather than a single meeting for the entire team.  Schedule a conference room (with a white board) and appoint an official scribe to record the details of the meeting.  Encourage a lot of brainstorming during the meeting.  Make sure to discuss these topics:

1. What are we here for? A comprehensive list of team goals that characterize the team as “successful”.  Be sure to project top management’s view of success to the team since you might be the only one who fully understands what management expects, plus you can contradict any false notions held by team members.
2. What do we do daily? The bulk of daily duties and processes performed by the team (before your changes) put in place to try to meet the goals in topic 1.
3. What could we do better? List any changes you put in place, as well as solicit ideas from the team.  Accommodate good ideas from the team, but not at the expense of meeting the enterprise goals.  Explain to the team that the goals of topic 1, as well as duties and processes of topic 2, are a sort of “contract” with the enterprise.  These are the things that the enterprise uses to evaluate whether you’re all successful or not.
4. What did we decide? Explain that, as the leader, you’re interested in maximizing the contribution of the entire team.  This might mean that the best solutions for the team are not always what each individual prefers.  Reinforce that everyone on the team has part-ownership in the team contract.  Express confidence in the team that they can make the changes especially effect and thank each one for their contribution and efforts.

At the conclusion of the meeting, you should now have buy-in from everyone on the team and a strong consensus on expectations.  Going forward, you can use the “contract” agreed to by you and your team as the basis for evaluating performance and, if needed, for correcting underperformance.

So, after all of that, does that mean you’re still the buddy of the guy in the cube next to you?  Chances are good that you and your cube-mates can stay buddies, if that’s your main goal.  Just be mindful that most peer-to-peer relationships do change when one of the peers is promoted to be the boss of the other.  However, you can avoid these relationship issues by clearly and explicitly defining everyone’s role and then getting explicit, verbal (or written) confirmation that you and your workmates are in agreement.

- Kevin

The US military knows a bit about leadership.

Last week,  I talked about one of the worst type of management scenarios to work under – the micromanager.  Now, let’s take that conversation from the “Dark Side” into the light to talk about great leaders.

To say that Dr. William Cohen knows a few things about leadership is approximately the same as saying that Moby Dick was a fish.  Not only was Cohen a former Air Force major general, university president, and business leader, but he has many degrees (including a PhD) and even holds several engineering patents.  One of the many books authored by Dr. Cohen is the 1998 Best Business Book of the Year, The Stuff of Heroes, also considered by many to be one of the ten best leadership books of all times.

If you’ve ever had a desire to lead, I recommend reading this book.  But even if you never read it, Dr. Cohen’s lessons are intriguing.  Even a quick list, like I’m presenting here, offers a lot of practical advice.  This summary can’t do Dr. Cohen’s material justice, but here are the main behaviors of extraordinary leaders, as revealed by his research:

1. Maintain absolute integrity.
2. Know your stuff.
3. Declare your expectations.
4. Show uncommon commitment.
5. Expect positive results.
6. Take care of your people.
7. Put duty before self.
8. Get out in front.

A common cliché these days is that someone is “a born leader”.  The better adage is that leaders are made, not born.  Consider the eight behaviors above.  Which of those behaviors require innate ability and are not something that can be learned?  None of them!  In fact, closer inspection of the eight behaviors of excellent leaders shows pretty clearly, at least in my mind, that each behavior results from a conscious decision on the part of the leader to behave in a certain way.

In effect, great leaders are constantly mindful that they are scrutinized by the teams which they lead, are committed to those teams and the results they deliver.  Whereas poor leaders spend lots of time thinking about what their teams can do for them, great leaders think about what they can do to make their teams produce better results.

We could spend more than one article on each of these eight behaviors.  (And we actually can, if popular demand takes us in that direction).  So take a few moments and think about both the great and the terrible leaders in your experience.  Compare their behavior to Dr. Cohen’s checklist.  How do they come out?  I’ll bet that they are probably doing a good job of exhibiting the eight behaviors of excellent leaders.  Now that you’ve thought about it – share your thoughts!  Send me your emails with examples of excellent leadership in action or, sometimes even better, share your stories of leadership train crashes!

If you don’t have the opportunity to lays hands on Dr. Cohen’s book, at least look up his web site and read more there.  I’d start with his recommendations for 30 Vital Actions for Leaders at http://www.stuffofheroes.com/30_vital_leadership_actions.htm and then explore from there.

And as always, your comments and thoughts are appreciated.

- Kevin

The last few weeks we’ve watched the drama unfold in regards to the PASS BOD elections. We’ve seen people attack criticize the NomCom, the board, PASS itself, the process and the decision of feeding of Gremlins after midnight. Thankfully the fireworks have died down and we can take a look at everything that has happened and make strides to move forward in a positive (and more importantly) constructive manner. Given that, I’ve been asked by my good friend Kevin Kline (Blog | Twitter) to respond to the following:

Many in the community seem to think that the PASS election process is badly broken. Do you think that PASS needs to implement fundamental and far-reaching changes to its election process, or does it only need some fine tuning? Please explain your thoughts?

I’m not going to recap the entire reality series-type drama that unfolded regarding the final slate of candidates but you’re more than welcome to read it yourself here. While I could rail on about how I believe Steve was slighted, unfortunately there’s nothing more to be done about it now so let’s look forward, shall we? The issue here is that the NomCom chose (and rightly so from my perspective) to follow the processes set in place for them and acted accordingly. Okay, fair enough. What we need to ask ourselves now is: “Is this process still appropriate for our organization?”

All together now…IT DEPENDS! Just kidding. Seriously though, up until now the entire (or at least much of) the process involved in electing someone to the board was hidden behind a veil of secrecy. Thankfully after last year’s elections issues the folks at PASS (and yes this includes both the board AND headquarters) worked extremely hard to change things for the better. This year we now have the PASS Elections Portal which offers much more transparency into the whole process than we ever had before. I think this move was a huge step in the right direction however much like Uncle Ben warned young Peter Parker, “with great power comes great responsibility”. Now that we have this transparency it introduces a new issue that wasn’t prevalent before: accountability. Prior to this year’s elections we, the community at large, didn’t have easy access to things such as the NomCom scores, process documentation, direct/easy/clear communication lines to those involved. That being the case this year you’re seeing the results of a very PASSionate community demanding answers to outcomes that quite simply don’t make sense to the masses. I think the one of the best posts/discussions to show this fact was Stuart Ainsworth’s (Blog | Twitter)  post addressing issues raised directly. As a small aside, HUGE kudos to Stu for meeting the community head-on and not being afraid to answer questions. I think we all owe him a big ‘thank you’ along with the other NomCom folks who openly communicated and helped clear up what they could.

While Stu’s post somewhat answered lingering questions the problem remains that there were things with those scores that simply “didn’t add up” when viewed publicly. This is where the danger in transparency comes in. People are going to question your methods and motives. Now that I’ve rambled on for a couple of paragraphs though we need to come back to the question of the process. The official process can be found from the elections site (pdf) so you can read the wording yourself. Ok finished reading it? Good, we’re all on the same page now. So far we’ve heard NomCom folks state that they had a very specific procedure to follow. Ok…well I’m looking at the procedure wording and it still doesn’t explain what happened this year. Unfortunately this is where the arguments start breaking down due to the only answer starts becoming “can’t talk about it due to privacy”.  Again the veil impedes the view. So how can we improve “the process”?

The process currently states that the NomCom is as such:

Finally, the NomCom meets to pick the interviewees on the list they think should be the candidates. This is the slate. The NomCom must always strive to put a minimum of (n+1) candidates on the slate, where “n” = the number of available slots – that means the slate should contain at least 4 (3+1) candidates. However, if the NomCom is in strong agreement that n or <n (“n” or “less than n”) candidates are of sufficient quality to go on the slate, it has the right to present n or <n candidates to the Board of Directors. (e.g. If the NomCom has good reason to believe that only 2 candidates are good enough to serve as Directors – where 2 is clearly less than 3 – it has the right to put only 2 candidates on the slate.) The responsibility for this decision falls on the Chair of the NomCom. This situation is less than ideal and the NomCom will strive to avoid at all costs.

Ok well what I’m reading here is that the NomCom still has the power to submit more or less people to the slate than is needed/asked. That being the case this reads more like Pirate Code from Pirates of the Caribbean wherein Captain Barbossa explains, “the code is more what you’d call “guidelines” than actual rules. Welcome aboard the Black Pearl, Miss Turner .” Maybe we should follow Captain Barbossa’s sage advice and realize that some of the wording we try to stick to are more guidelines. Perhaps we need to just really re-word the official documentation rather than the process as the process itself makes sense in the grand scheme (for the most part). Are there tweaks we can make? Absolutely!

I believe Andy “The SQL Godfather” Warren (Blog | Twitter) wrote in a recent PASS update post about his view and how things could change for the better. In there he states that the NomCom followed procedure and anything less than that would open things up to a new world of trouble and I agree with him. So again, is it the process or the WAY the process is worded that is causing issues here? There are things that could definitely stand to be reworded for clarification. For instance, in the ranking for interview we’ve got Steve Jones being ranked in the average of 2 for Leadership. Really? Okay, I’ll bite. We need a CLEAR definition of what exactly they mean by “leadership experience candidate has demonstrated”. In my eyes being the community leader for the largest SQL Server community website on the planet tends to hold weight. I’d like to know what it is about this category that would cause members to vote so low (or so high in other cases). To be fair and balanced let’s look at another category and candidate. Under education Douglas McDowell comes in at perfect 4.0. What exactly are they looking for in terms of “education”? Does Douglas hold a PhD and everyone else is lower? Does this relate strictly to academia or other areas?

Earlier I mentioned this process isn’t broken and works for the most part and I feel I need to explain that a bit further. As of now the process is that we have a NomCom that sifts through all of the potential candidates and weeds out the weaker applications and comes up with a batch of candidates they feel (again based on given criteria worded in existing process documentation) are strong enough to move forward with. From there they take that batch and interview them with another ranking formula. After the interviews the applicants are ranked, sorted and based on those rankings another smaller batch emerges as those up for candidacy. Now this is where breakdowns occur, in my opinion. Here the NomCom is able to modify the batch of candidates to be either more or less than is stated in documentation (again we should defer to the Pirate Code on this). Here is where NomCom could say “numbers don’t add up, let’s talk” and fix this. Where this year’s rancor is coming from is that we seem to be missing the piece of the puzzle where (or if) this occured. Now we have a final slate presented to the board. Again, here, the board can look at the slate and say “good, good…errr this doesn’t seem right, you sure?”. Once more we haven’t seen anything from the black box of the board on this, all we know is that they approved the submitted slate. This final slate is what will be presented to the community and from there a general election will be held.

Now the process itself makes sense and potentials are vetted multiple times before we finally get our final candidates but something kind of seems “off”. Maybe it’s me but maybe there needs to be a more balanced check system. As it stands you only have two bodies that ping-pong a decision back and forth. Would adding a third body like our government system be a better way to check this? Perhaps that third body can get results scrubbed of personal data (e.g. name, employer, location) and only be presented with answers and they do rankings based on those. This blind ranking system can then be matched up with what NomCom finds and the board can make decisions based on aggregation of those results? This third branch could be made up of purely community folks so there is no percieved bias of board influence. Barring that we COULD have a board member on in that group but with no voting rights and their role is simply to moderate. Again, just bouncing ideas. Would this be too much to deal with? Do we really need to go to these lengths to please the masses? Only time will tell.

Outside of the election process itself I’d also like to take this time on my digital soapbox to encourage the board members as well as HQ to please PLEASE don’t be afraid of communicating with the community. Blog, Tweet, interpretive dance. Take a note from Andy Warren and see that it’s OKAY to publicly state your thoughts and opinions. Even if you feel your ideas may be “less than popular” at least you’re doing something more than the percieved nothing. In this age of transparency and numerous communication avenues (blogs, twitter, forums, mailers) there really is no excuse for not reaching out.

After all of this ranting and word vomitting, I’d like to 1) commend you if you’ve actually gotten this far and 2) Invite you to voice your own thoughts. If you’d like comment here on this blog or take the talk to the elections portal forum. It’s a new day in PASS and with the right people in place and the support of this amazing community I think we could transform this organization into something truly wonderous (as if it’s not already awesome enough). Thanks for your time, I’m going to go ice my fingers down now from writing this mess…

Want a seat in the board room? Better bring your A game.

The skills that enable a person to be a top-tier database professional have very little to do with being a successful member of a board of directors. So what skills are needed for a person to be successful on a board of directors for any large organization?  Here are a handful of skills, in no particular order, that I’ve seen demonstrated by very successful directors from days past:

Strategic thinking

Let’s face it – technology is detail-oriented work.  No database professional can be truly effective at their job if they never get the parameters correct when calling a function, can’t remember the correct syntax for simple SQL query, or know their server only as a “DL something-er-other”.  You have to know the details to be able to get your work done quickly.  However, getting into the details at a board-level discussion is the exact opposite of how a director most effectively spends their time.  Instead, board members need to figure out all of the elements of the big picture first.  This time of assessment is predicated upon have a strong understanding of the organization’s top few strategic goals, usually no more than 3-5 goals in any given year.  Every new program needs to be evaluated against those strategic goals and, many times, what might seem like a great idea turns out to conflict with the organizational goals.  After a new program or idea is vetted against PASS’ strategic goals and passes the test, it needs to be fully conceptualized – sort of like a programmer’s model of a program in pseudocode or a database in an ER diagram.  Once that’s done, the various elements of the big picture are handed off to either specific board members or other high-level PASS volunteers for implementation.

I’ll give you an example.  One of our past directors for PASS, whenever a new program was being discussed, would immediately begin to throw out detailed solutions to the program in question.  “Oh! We could code that in ASP.NET and, now that I think of it, it’d be really cool to try the new .NET framework.”  People would then start to argue about what’s the right technology to use.  “No, we should use C#!”  Sometimes, the discussion would devolve into an argument between different technological zealots who wanted things done “the best way” – that is, the way they like it.  But wait a minute! The board hadn’t even come to consensus on what features the program would include, when it would be launched, who would be accountable for its success, how it would be funded, and who would do the grunt work to complete it.

So, to me, the first characteristic of a successful director is strategic, “big picture”, thinking.

Values drive the Mission. Mission drives the Strategy. Strategy seeks to accomplish Goals.

Vision

I’ve had the pleasure to work with many directors, both elected and appointed, over the years on the PASS board.  There are a lot of reasons that motivate people to put their name into the hat for a seat on the board.  Some are motivated by ambition.  They want to see that cool entry of “director” on their resume and the new job opportunities it might open.  Some are motivated by zeal for the community.  PASS enabled them to learn a lot and they want to pay it forward to future generations of SQL Server professionals.  Some are high-achievers who are a little bored by their day-to-day job and would like to liven it up with new challenges that are still pertinent to their career.  Yet, no matter what motivates a candidate to seek a seat on the board, I’ve noticed that those who have a vision for change they’d like to accomplish in their time on the board are those who are most likely to make a difference.

Now when I saw “a vision for change”, I don’t mean an amorphous, pie-in-the-sky ideal.  I mean, literally, that these successful candidates want to do one (or more) clearly defined projects for the benefit of the SQL Server community.  They have in their mind a before- and after-picture of PASS.  “This is what PASS looked like before I came to the board and, thanks to me, PASS looks different in this after-picture!”  By comparison, directors who have no particular vision or who have a vision that is at cross-purposes with the organization, at best, muddle along in mediocrity or, at worst, flame out and walk away from the board with hard feelings.

Here are a couple examples.  First, I’ve seen many fine technologists take a seat at the director’s table over the years whose attitude could best be described as “What the heck am I doing here?!?  I sure hope someone tells me what to do.”  If you’re not inspired, not burning with powerful desire for change, don’t particularly want to see a particular something happen within PASS then I really need to point out that this job might not be for you.  A few such board members later caught fire, but most of the board members who came in without a vision for change, unsurprisingly, accomplish little.  As the old saying goes, if you don’t know where you’re going, you won’t know when you get there.  Second, we’ve had a couple board members who came to the board with a strong mission in mind targeted on altruism of some sort, like training underprivileged kids or organizing PASS members for volunteerism outside of PASS.  These kinds of goals, while very worthy, need to be met outside of PASS through organizations that specialize in that kind of work.  Let’s be honest, PASS has tiny budgets.  And its directors have a very finite amount of time and energy for their volunteer activities.  Any moneys or personal energies spent on things that don’t accomplish PASS’ strategic goals in fact decrease it’s ability to do so.

Where are we now? Where should we be tomorrow?

Emotional Intelligence

Many of us went into technology because we don’t LIKE to spend all day trying to read people’s subtle clues about what they want or how they are feeling.  SQL Server 2008 Enterprise Edition works just as well for you if you use harsh tones with it as if you soothingly reassure it that you’re on its side.  And you can’t debug a CLR routine any faster if you use affirming body language.  Unfortunately, for the technophiles out there who’d rather send an email to the person in the cube next them instead of walking three steps to have an interpersonal discussion, board work is almost 100% person-to-person.  The most effective directors have been those who can tell when someone is tuning them out, chose their words in a way that holds and retains interests of their audience, and can perceive the difference between when a person is truly supporting them and when a person is merely being polite.

Believe it or not, though, I’m not saying that effective directors are always the most suave or polished.  That’s not the case at all.  We’ve had some very gruff, even abrasive, directors over the years.  But many of them were successful all the same because they understood how to communicate their most important messages effectively and, at the same time, read the subtle and nonverbal responses of their peers on the board for support.

Here’s a worst-practice example.  Immediately after getting a seat on the board many years ago, a former director spoke up in topic after topic at board meetings and calls throughout the year.  By the second board meeting of the year, other board members would roll their eyes when he’d jump in.  It didn’t matter to him that he was off topic – he had the floor, by gosh.  It seemed that, more and more, this director was primarily speaking up in search of “pats on the back” and “you’re so smart!” sorts of positive strokes, not to actually advance the conversation.  Everyone came to feel like he was wasting their time.  When this director presented a proposal for a major new initiative to the board which he was sponsoring (which took several hours, by the way, about three times the length of a normal proposal), he basked in the spotlight at the podium like a rock star.  Unfortunately, he failed to present a cohesive proposal and, on top of that, hadn’t vetted his ideas before hand with a single other member of the board.  I sometimes wondered if he worked alone because he didn’t want anyone to share in the glory of his great ideas.  His proposal, and his wider tenure on the board, fell flat because every exchange with him felt like his time on the board was all about him, instead of all about the organization.

Summary

There are lots of minor skills that help a candidate become an exceptional director.  Knowing how to create and read a budget helps a lot.  Having project estimating and project management skills certainly yields good fruit.  Running a good meeting and helping to drive for consensus are great skills to bring to the board room.  Being diplomatic and learning how to build political capital can help a director implement ideas that they favor.  But, all things considered, successful directors do these three things:

1. Think strategically rather than in terms of low-level details
2. Have a vision for one or more changes that they want to enact during their time on the board.
3. Know how to communicate interpersonally and gain the support of their colleagues on the board.

The good news about these three key skills is that, while not natural to most SQL Server professionals, they can be learned.  Where to start?  In my next column, I’ll point out some on-line resources which can help you learn these key skills of strategic leadership.

-Kevin

Do I have a dog in this Fight? If I did, it'd be the Warner Brothers Barnyard Dog.

After my term of service on the PASS board of directors ended in December of 2009, I fully intended to stay far, far out of the way.  It’s an intention that I’ve largely been able to fulfill,excluding the odd conversation with an occasional board member or committee chair looking for a little impartial advice when weighing some consideration or other.

If you keep up with going’s on within PASS, then you’ll know that there’s been some hullabaloo lately.  Please reference paragraph 1 again at this point to understand that I don’t really know much about all this hullabaloo.  (I read one blog post by Stuart Ainsworth and decided to henceforth avoid all other mention of the situation). I mentioned that I’ve been trying to stay out of PASS’ way, correct?  But sometimes you just can’t dodge a bullet, even when you’re bustin’ out some Matrix-like moves and goin’ all Neo/Keanu Reeves on it.

To wit, I was happy to volunteer in hosting our first Music City SQL Saturday, which also happened to occur the day after the PASS board of directors wrapped up their quarterly meeting here in beautiful (and hot) Nashville, TN.  The two events were destined by the stars to overlap.  Which also meant I was going to be hearing about said hullabaloo (reference paragraph 2, above), despite my better efforts to get out of its (the hullabaloo’s) way.

(I’m being a bit disingenuous about being surprised that these events having some overlap.  I hosted a party at my house the Friday before our SQL Saturday for our event speakers and also invited all of the PASS directors and staff who were still in town as well.  So they were all coming together, like neutrons hurtling towards a chunk of uranium 236.  You DO KNOW what happens when neutrons are hurtled at uranium 236, right?).

Yeah, and then what?

Foghorn's idea of a dog fight

So despite trying to steer clear any PASS-related controversies, I’m compelled to speak up, albeit in as limited a fashion as I can manage.  Most of the people involved, from candidates to committee members, are friends.  I wrote endorsement letters for almost half of the candidates who made it to the Nomination Committee (NomCom) interview stage.  So I’m far from being a totally impartial judge of how individual persons were treated.  But, for what it’s worth, I’m trying to make my post less about personalities and more about the overall direction of the process.  In other words, I’m trying to be constructive, not destructive.

A lot of people have put out opinions about the PASS Election process and you can read more yourself here:

• PASS Election Discussion Forum
• PASS Candidate Discussion Forum

Since the call to vote is now open, I hope you’ll take some time to get informed about the overall process as well as the candidates standing for election.

So what’s your point?

Lots of people have complained about lots of things in this round of elections (so far), but what’s anyone going to do about it?  Well, my point in this and subsequent blog posts is to produce recommendations about the election process that will better it for PASS and the wider community.

I’ve asked several friends in the SQL Server community, as well as individuals unrelated to PASS or SQL Server but who have experience on corporate boards of directors, to join a group discussion focusing on the question:

Tit-for-Tat, eh Foghorn?

“Many in the community seem to think that the PASS election process is badly broken.  Do you think that PASS needs to implement fundamental and far-reaching changes to its election process, or does it only need some fine tuning?  Please explain your thoughts?”

So now that some of the personal aspects of the discussions have calmed down, the main point I want to make is that we can make this better.  But this will take a concerted and focused discussion to decide on the consensus.

Guest posters are waiting in the wings. Let the discussions begin!

To forward this discussions, I’ve asked guest posters to make open with their initial thoughts on their own blogs or here, for those who don’t have their own blogs.  Some have already posted their opening thoughts, which I will repost here.  Once the opening statements are all posted, we’ll begin to work through the various points and topics (refer to the PASS discussion forums  above) to see if we can drive consensus for concrete methods and steps for the nominations and election processes.

With that, you’re also invited to participate. If you have thoughts around process (not personalities), I invite you to participate either through posting comments here and on our future posts and, if you’re interested, to participate as a guest poster yourself.

• Join the wider discussion here.

I look forward to your thoughts and feedback!

-Kevin

Follow me on twitter at @kekline