Debugging Communication Errors

Eli Lopian    .NET Tests, Community, Debugging, Management for Geeks, Time Management, Unit Tests    

I couldn’t sleep all night, thinking that on the last company meeting, when one of my employees complained that he can’t finish his tasks because of personal issues that he has with other employees,  I basically told him and the rest of the team to help each other and be a team, I was managing them instead of empowering them, and knew that the issue probably remains unresolved…

For the next meeting, I decided that no matter what I do, I will make sure that my team goes back to work after they resolved their issues themselves, empowered to continue working and achieving  their goals.

I started the meeting by asking each of them to bring up a personal issue that he has with another employee and to resolve it with the other on the spot. It was amazingly interesting to see how they raised the problems, and found the solution at the same time.

One of the employees complained that he requested help via email. He sent the email, but didn’t receive any answers. He needed certain people in the company to fill out part of a form, but none of them did. Nothing but a simple communication problem; they all got the email but didn’t understand the call for action. His way to resolve the matter was to sit with each one of the people involved personally and to fill the form together, that way he will make sure that they understand their share, and he will make sure that it’s done on time.

One of the developers complained about having troubles with managing his time.  I explained that this is not an interpersonal problem, and asked him questions which led him to realize that his lack of time is because he is always helping people. He can’t say no to anyone, and he doesn’t want to look bad or disappoint anyone, so he ends up making everybody happy by helping them, but having no time to do his own tasks. When he understood, it was a major breakthrough, and he realized that he will have to start saying no to people or at least to say I’m busy now I will help you later; I would love to follow and see if he would really do it…

It’s only two examples out of many. The amazing and inspiring part was to see how each one of them was empowered and found his own way to resolve his problem without being told or managed.

Last, out of the entire company there was one developer that claimed that he has no personal issues with anyone in the company. When I asked him if others has problems with him, he was confident that their answer would be no.

On the second round that we did, each one of the developers needed to share their successful interpersonal communications, almost everyone mentioned him.  I guess that it was as obvious to them as it was to him.

One of the more gratifying surprises from the exercise was hearing about the successful communication routes that have developed that I did not know about.  For example, two developers found the time and were sensitive enough to help a third that was in major distress.  They simply encouraged him, but it was exactly what he needed in order to get back on track.   Another developer thanked the sales team for providing him with relevant historical customer support information.  Yet another thanked a team member in marketing for helping him with the wording in an important email to customers.

By the end of the process, it was clear that the team understood the power of effective communication and they now had better tools to resolve interpersonal issues with team members independently.  And at Typemock we know – your result (read: code) is always better when you’re working with the right tools.

When you know immediately when something is wrong, you are able to fix it, and get an immediate indication that your code is correct without the involvement of the QA. In other words, exactly like the Manager that empowered his team to resolve their problems without his involvement and without managing them, the unit testing helping the developers’ resolve problems on the spot and avoid QA involvement.

Crossing the Chasm and Excellence

Eli Lopian    Agile, Community    

Roy sent me this podcast: The state of Alt.NET.

Although Scott Bellware seems to be angry about the state of things, I am actually seeing great progress in our profession, and the ALT.NET is one of them.

To the point I must agree with him about the following:

1. Alt.NET – you cannot be in the chasm as the chasm is a void, it is when there is no growth, it is when 15% of the .NET developers are practicing Alt.NET. It is fatal to jump over the early adopters and try crossing the chasm before reaching the chasm

2. I’ll take the chance of misunderstanding Scott here, but if I understand correctly, what is happening with ALT.NET is that instead of bringing excellence to software development, it has lead to many developers to follow practices. What we need as a profession is to be professional, is to keep on growing and learning and striving for excellence. 

Only when we strive for excellence, can we do the impossible and grow. It is not easy to become excellent and to grow, but the results are amazing and satisfying

Typemock needs a slogan

Eli Lopian    Community    

Roy Osherove has voted to let the community choose Typemock’s slogan! What a great idea! Don’t be left out of the New slogan for Typemock party!

Technical Support, our policy pays

Eli Lopian    Community    

I have spoken before about our Support Policy, and it seems that  it pays off, as good technical support is one of the differential factors when choosing Software tools according to Soon Hui

I must first thank our great team of developers that are in the front line of our customer support as well as being in the front line of the technology and development world.

As a team we get a lot of feedback from the issues that our customers have and we become better developers, as we know how to add real value to our customers. Being transparent about this (through our online public forum) and having communication skills and collaboration as a value, just makes us a better team. (It is also an Agile value)

TypeMock Ltd has Secured $1.5M

Eli Lopian    Community    

I am delighted to announce that TypeMock has managed to secure $1.5M.

We have had an excellent year, and have seen how unit testing is starting to become a main trend in writing software. There are still many problems to solve in this area and we have raised the money to create new tools and solutions for the community as well as innovate and push developer testing to a new level.

At this point I am going to be taking the position of the CEO. I still have a sweet spot for coding and will stay tuned to all the technologies and will post features on this blog. TypeMock has already become a very strong team and you will be hearing about our new tools in the near future.

Happy new year

A Big Welcome to Roy Osherove

Eli Lopian    Community    

I would personally like to give Roy a big welcome to the TypeMock team.

I have worked with Roy while introducing TDD to an enterprise ‘legacy’ software company and have been wanting to work with Roy even since.

Roy has decided to join TypeMock at an excellent time, and will bring his expertise to help us produce better tools and promote pragmatic unit testing throughout the .net software industry.

Good Luck Roy.

Welcome Ron Shoshani

Eli Lopian    Community    

I would like to welcome Ron Shoshani to our Team.
TypeMock is having a great year and we are growing, Ron will head the Marketing activities in TypeMock and will help introduce tools and techniques to developers around the world, enabling them and their teams to create quality software at speed times.

Welcome Ron! 

TypeMock Facebook

Eli Lopian    Community    

TypeMock now has a facebook page. The industry leaders are  already there. Don’t miss the party.

Click here to join the typemock group
or the typemock page.