Thursday, March 23

b-day shoutouts

Happy Birthday Mom!

Happy Birthday April!

Happy Birthday Besty!

posted by shelly @ 12:31 PM 2 comments

Wednesday, March 15

work related

Bringing The Jobs Homes
By Anne Fisher, FORTUNE senior writer

What does Michael Fields know that other software CEOs haven't figured out?

The number of jobs offshored from the U.S. to India and elsewhere has tripled since 2003, to a projected total of one million in 2006, with roughly a quarter of them in high tech. Yet Fields, a former president of The Man* USA who now runs $60-million-a-year software maker KANA, is bringing his company's programming jobs home to Menlo Park, Calif. He calls it "backshoring" and predicts that once they start doing the math, other software makers will follow suit.

"For companies our size, sending jobs to India just doesn't make economic sense," says Fields. Since KANA and its confreres aren't big enough to open their own overseas facilities (like The Man* and Microsoft (Research)), they end up entrusting the work to outside contractors. That means KANA's intellectual property is in the hands of nonemployees over whom it has little control--especially scary now that, as even far bigger companies are finding, turnover among engineers in India is rapid, loyalty is nil, and poaching and piracy are rampant.

And that's not all. Fields notes that software development is a collaborative process that works best when everybody involved--designers, programmers, project managers--is together under one roof. "If your team isn't closely bonded, you'll see more rewrites, more performance issues, and more delays," he says. "For us, having the designers and architects in California and the programmers in India has actually meant longer delivery times and higher costs."

Fields expects that having everyone side by side will raise productivity to the point where KANA can deliver a better product with about a fourth as many engineers. "Our industry went through a period when money was free," Fields says. "Now that it isn't, software companies have to run like real businesses, so we'll see more of them taking a close look at their end-to-end costs." If he's right, backshoring could become the next Silicon Valley buzzword.
---

As an employee of The Man, whose job has been affected by offshoring, I think Michael Fields is a wise, wise man.

*Again, though The Man is not an inappropriate pseudonym, I have hidden the actual name of my employer in the effort of avoiding it's wrath. See previous posts.

posted by shelly @ 11:12 AM 1 comments

et tu, brute!

The Soothsayer knows.

Beware the ides of March.

see prevous warnings

posted by shelly @ 7:05 AM 0 comments

Tuesday, March 14

four

Four jobs you have had in your life:
yogurt dispenser
center for the arts office lackey
rowing coach
software consultant

Four movies you would watch over and over:
bring it on
chasing liberty
amelie
x-men 2

Four places you have lived:
vinton, va
glenn dorm, georgia institute of technology
atlanta, ga
san ramon, ca

Four TV shows you love to watch:
buffy
angel
scrubs
greys anatomy

Four places you have been on vacation:
key west
cape cod
coco beach
new zealand

Four websites you visit often:
the superficial
ew freescreenings
monkey begun
imdb

Four of your favorite foods:
doritos
samoas
obp barbeque
tomatoes

Four places you would rather be right now:
on the couch watching more angel
the beach
visiting friends in far places
at the mall shopping

posted by shelly @ 8:15 AM 3 comments

Thursday, March 9

lazy sunday

The Chronic-What?-cles of Narnia

"you can call us Aaron Burr from the way we're dropping Hamiltons"

I know, I'm behind the times, but it's still funny.

posted by shelly @ 7:30 AM 1 comments

Tuesday, March 7

qotd

"the moment a person stops pursuing career advancement, they have reached the summit of their potential" - M. Kiefert

posted by shelly @ 6:15 AM 2 comments

Monday, March 6

things done

Things to Do 2006: an update

1. Do two of the unaccomplished things from Things to Do 2005. Likeliest candidates: I. Go to the arts. II. Take a class.
Nope. No progress. It'll be spring in a couple weeks too, so the dress I wanted to wear is quickly becoming out of season.

2. Join/start a Book Club.
Check! Officially started a Book Club - We Read Good. I didn't want to claim victory on this one until we had an acutal meeting, which was yesterday. I was really pleased that we held discussion for over 90 minutes without any guide. I feel so literary.

3. Write a letter for employment to George Clooney...
Employment with now Oscar-Winner George Clooney may prove to be slightly more challenging than originally anticipated.

posted by shelly @ 8:59 AM 0 comments