en-us http://www.keithwatanabe.net/index.php Keith Watanabe's Website http://www.keithwatanabe.net/blogs/2007/7/22/dd0b3ae6d0dbe0565ea408af5c5ed09f.html
I work in life insurance (finance) and it is well known that the environments for such companies are not typically suited for creative, bombastic and non-conservative types. Then when you work in a place like Tokyo, the arena becomes even more competitive since the proximity of IT companies allow for people to easily switch companies. If a company then cannot afford good engineers, what can they do?

Engineers are fickle and typically are not the most easily social bunch. They have idiosynchrasies that basically are best described in the online comic Dilbert. To put in words though, engineers have certain requirements/tendencies when it comes to work:

• They are NOT business people
• They do not easily understand requirements, nor usability; they merely build it
• They enjoy technology for the sake of technology
• All tools ought to be fair game
• They are very skill minded and constantly worry about the technologies they use to update their resume
• There is a general tendency to dislike suits and stylish clothing
• They are lazy and do not have good physical habits on average (washing, brushing, eating healthy)
• They are creative and must be respected for this aspect
• They do not like being pushed around and have even less respect for those who are mentally inferior and/or accomplished less than themselves
• They are intellectually competitive
• Money is not necessarily an end goal
• Long hours in front something that makes them go blind, have swollen hands, and bad backs make them even crankier
• We are not slaves
• We do like women; very BEAUTIFUL women

These attributes I think most average engineers would agree upon. Those who don't probably either belong to a special echelon or are wannabes that are seeking money. With this in mind, my suggestions for employers having problems locating good engineers are as follows:

• Never create a prohibitive environment; engineers are smart and will find some way to beat the system anyway
• Never monitor your engineers' activities. We all have probably read 1984 or at least recite from it on occasion. We all read slashdot.org and are against draconian business environments
• Allow for casual dress. If you start to restrict how your engineers dress, your focus on the IT department is completely misguided
• Never allow your project managers to ever think for a second that they know more than the engineers, unless they have been in such a position for a significant amount of time to allow them the privilege of guiding such a group
• Allow engineers gadgets and tools for them to do their work. You can't build a house solely with a single hammer.
• Enterprise standards are good; but make certain that those standards make sense to the engineers
• Allow engineers signficant periods of time between meetings to perform their work. Building systems is a heavily intellectual process and requires a great deal of concentration. Meetings and constant distractions are a detriment to an engineering project.
• Allow engineers to dictate when project needs to get released. Project failures that I've seen are a result in misguided assumptions about deadlines. Engineers know better than anyone their own limitations and what they can and cannot do on a project.
• Allow the engineers to decide which part of a project they will take up. Again this goes back to the idea of engineer's capabilities
• Engineers need like minded people to bond with. Engineers are a bit snobbish and will call people dumbasses behind their backs in believing that they know more than the people around them.
• Engineers care about the reputation of their company. The company's reputation is a reflection of the engineer's potential next job. If the company is doing poorly in the IT aspect, it will likely only attract the poorest level of engineers.
• Upper management need to be a reflection of what the engineering department should look like. Your upper management should know more than the engineers. Never put a puppet CIO/CTO or whatever in charge as it will only cause confusion and resentment amongst the people in IT.

These are the abstract levels of building a good department. In addition, here are some interesting methods for growing this idea with some hard benefits:

• Offer a growth program for engineers. Set aside a budget for all permanent employees hired per year that involves things like seminars, online courses and certification. You need to reinvest in your engineers to improve the quality of your department.
• Afraid that the above will only cause engineers to be depleted? Have a contract that says engineers can only be allowed to take such courses so long as they stay within a certain period
• Provide perks related to the engineers' interest. Discounts to computers, PDAs, or other forms of equipment. Setup deals with companies that benefit both companies.
• Attract good looking females and make them "one of the boys." Everyone who's been around IT for a significant amount of time probably has realized that the guy-girl ratio is quite bad. Add that to the usual "sexual harassment" policies, and you're creating a sausage fest of frustration. But just adding token women isn't a true encouragement for this situation to improve. Women need to become more "geeklike". No, not thick taped glasses wearing, PDA carrying people who don't bathe (i'm certain even geeks would avoid these beings). I'm saying offer opportunities but never allow women to take advantage of their looks or whatnot to gain an advantage. Show true equality but giving them a chance, but making them earn it as well. This is a two way street that needs to evolve.
• Allow for more work-life balance styles. I do my best work at odd times of the night. In fact, I find most working hours to be counter productive for me since I'm a late person. We're in the age of Web 2.0 so I can't see any realistic reason for people to maintain the old 9-5 work hour schedule. Also, allow for engineers to cut down on the necessary days in the office. Things like 3-4 day work weeks should become more en vogue; it certainly makes more sense for an engineer to concentrate on a piece of his project for 8+ hours straight rather than breaking his concentration and outputing only 4+ hours of quality work per day. And offices need to realize that trying to suck out more energy from an engineer does not necessarily imply higher quality work.

Anyway, these are some small ideas to get started. Hopefully, some major employers will see the true merit behind these.]]> Sun, 22 Jul 2007 03:53:38 -0600 http://www.keithwatanabe.net/blogs/2007/7/22/dd0b3ae6d0dbe0565ea408af5c5ed09f.html