Well, I started my third Masters course at U/Saint Thomas last night: SEIS620 – Systems Analysis and Design Tools – 14 evening sessions, a bit more than 3 hours per session. So far, the instructor is a hoot and based on the first night, he should make this topic quite interesting. There are almost twenty of us, this time about 2/3s male and 1/3 female – unlike last semester where it leaned more toward 50/50. Several (4?) of my classmates from my previous two courses are in this one as well.
As an experienced Software Developer, I would hope I have also acquired a Systems/Business Analyst mindset and/or skills over these (…mumble…yawn…mumble…) past years (ok, for those that are interested: 30+). However, I know that in all of the many (7) different programming environments I worked in at Unisys, quite a few (4?) of them were ad-hoc and not totally “software development professional” programming organizations – that is not to say, especially during my time in Eagan/MACS – the IT DataCenter org was professional – as a DataCenter. But we weren’t an IT applications org, we were an IT DataCenter/Infrastructure org, and some of us basically were “Coding Cowboys”, coding without doing any “real” systems analysis, any “real” SIT/CAT/UAT testing, any “real” code reviews (except for those last four yrs on the Remedy team under the direction of MM who brought “discipline”, and “structure”, and “release scheduling”, and “requirements planning/review” to the team). [Boy, that was a long run-on sentence – whew].
Anyway, as I was saying, as an example of how much of a lack of “structure” there was in my professional life, I only worked on one (count them: one) team (out of seven??), where we actually had team code reviews – any time you wanted to install your code, you had to present it to the entire team in a conference room and you would walk them (actually – the senior most people) thru your code, line by line, module by module, taking notes as they made comments on what you did and what changes you had to make before they “approved” it for production. I learned a lot from that particular Software Development team but was only on that team for a little more than a yr, but along the way, there were many more ‘missed’ opportunities to become a true software professional – now, don’t get me wrong, yes, I consider myself a software professional – however, even now, at USPS, we don’t do Agile or use Scrum, yes, we do “requirements gathering”, but we aren’t doing “scheduled release cycles”, and who has the f’ing time for “peer code reviews” or “detailed design docs”??
Ok, big sigh – that is what these Master’s classes are about – hopefully, to help better myself – but they are also for me to share what I’m learning – with my colleagues here at work – but, again, are they interested? Perhaps…do they have the time to listen as I explain what I learned the previous evening? No…Any desire to learn new stuff – No. Sorry, maybe the desire is there, they just don’t have the time – they are as busy as the next person – just trying to fit in 10 hours of software development in an eight hour work day – since everyone is under a deadline to get something done by such and such date. On the other hand, outside of my team, there are other teams in this office that are supposedly learning to use Agile/Scrum, but I don’t know any of “those” people [they are like aliens from outer space – wearing socks with sandals, and baseball caps indoors – who are these guys??).
Ok, gotta wrap this up – I think this is going to be another great class – although I wish it was offered on alternating Saturdays…no matter – one session down, 13 left to go. Oh, I didn’t fall asleep at all during class last night – yea [Would have been really embarrassing since I was in the front row and there are only 5-6 rows in the classroom].
I’m trying to interest one of my colleagues in this Masters program – he is very sharp and this would be a good program for him as well. However, almost two yrs ago, he and his wife adopted a young 3-4 yr old boy and I think he wants to spend as much time with his son while he can before his son grows into a teenager. I’m hoping my colleague will consider this program since he earned his Bachelors in Economics – so, it me, that means, he’s a pretty sharp cookie [took me 3 times to understand and pass MicroEcon]. On the other hand, all he wants to do is retire (early) and farm on his family’s farm (i.e., be his own boss). Ah, the dreams of a quite young ~40 yr old.
