A Celebration of the Fastest Growing Companies in CT

This week the Connecticut Technology Council held one of my favorite events – the Marcum Tech Top 40 – celebrating the 40 fastest growing technology companies in Connecticut. It’s so much fun spending an evening meeting such successful people and reconnecting with old friends. We have been lucky to have the opportunity to work with many of the people in the room.

The diversity of the companies is amazing: from online travel service Priceline.com, to oil-drilling equipment manufacturer APS Technology, Inc, to vaccine maker Protein Sciences Corporation, to IT Services provider OpenSky, the overall winner with 18,221% growth!

One thing I can’t help but ask myself is: what makes some companies so successful while others struggle? Listening to the speeches of each category’s winner, there was one common answer – the team. I’ve always believed that a small, talented, focused team can accomplish amazing things, and these CEOs were saying the same thing.

Congratulations to this year’s Tech Top 40, and to all those who aspire to join them – my best advice – surround yourself with the best and brightest you can find.

Making the same mistakes

I hear it over and over again from technology execs – I know we should spend the time writing specs or working on our process or on architecture or designing a good UI or testing or documenting or - fill in the blank.

Yet, time and time again, I see companies making the same mistakes. It kills me! I asked myself “why do they do it?” After all, it’s so easy to improve your delivery time and quality a little bit at a time. I know it’s hard to find a place to start, but for some companies I see, anything would help them. When in doubt, remember that good requirements make everything else easier!

Then I remembered something I’ve heard repeatedly “The pain of the change must be less than the pain of the status quo”. I get that change is tough, but some of these changes (i.e. good requirements definition) are not that painful. I think a more accurate assessment would be “The fear of the unknown must be less than the pain of the status quo”

Do any of you have less than optimal practices in your product development? We all do, in one way or another. Things can always be better. Why do you stay where you are?

Girls in Technology

A few weeks ago I spoke at Housatonic Community College’s Girls in Tech program. See this article in the CT Post for more.

Kudos to HCC for putting this on. It’s such an important issue. These were 7th and 8th grade girls, mostly from Bridgeport that had the opportunity to attend the expo and learn more about what kinds of careers are possible with a good solid STEM education. The possibilities excited them, and fortunately, this is the time to do something about it.

At this stage in their schooling they still have the opportunity to take advanced math and science classes and get the grades required to get into top schools and get scholarship money. This is the age where girls lose interest in math and science, but seeing what they can do with a strong STEM education, many of the girls were inspired.

Choices like nanotechnology and crime scene investigation are not obvious, but really inspired the girls. Many of them said they would devote themselves to their studies, with the goal of entering one of the intellectually stimulating and high paying careers presented at the Expo. I’d call that a success!

A sad yet preventable story of software failure

I read an article today reporting that Nokia had announced that it was abandoning its development of its own Smartphone platforms and APIs. By itself, that’s not so sad. It’s smart to know when to cut your losses, right? The reason this story makes me sad, is that it was entirely preventable.
According to reports from insider Mark Wilcox, “there was no proper requirement spec for this new framework.” Aggghhhh! This makes me crazy every time I see it, and I see it a lot.
Companies think they can save time, or they don’t want to be “locked in” or say, “We’ll just tell the developers what to build.” In 20+ years of personal experience, I’ve never seen this work well. In the very best cases, tons of time is actually wasted by long meetings, miscommunications, and do-overs. Usually the end result is not really what the project sponsor wanted, but they settle. In the very worst cases, like this one, companies spend 2000+ man-years (yes, you read that right) developing something no one wants! In this case, they had two competing teams (I’ll have to address that in another post – just too much to say on that one!) and according to Wilcox "both teams had built the wrong thing.” Both teams! (This post may be my personal record in use of exclamation points.)
Another comment he makes is that “the engineers were incompetent. Now by that I don't mean that they're incompetent engineers – far from it. They were incompetent at designing APIs for 3rd party developers (a very specialist engineering skill) and they were incompetent at designing UIs (which most engineers are, myself included). Unfortunately they were doing both.” These could have been very bright engineers, but as Clint Eastwood said in one of my favorite Dirty Harry Movies, “A man’s got to know his limitations.” This also happens frequently and is an error made both by engineers (ego, desire to learn, fearing for their job security) and management (don’t want to hire specialists, over estimating their engineers). Again, in the best cases I’ve seen, the engineers can muddle thru and get something passable. On the other hand, it can be a train wreck as in this case.
The aspect that makes me the most upset about this story is the effect on all those engineers. They worked hard, I’m sure long hours at times, to develop basically, nothing. We engineers develop software and products because we take pride in our work and want to build things that people love to use and these engineers spent years not doing that. I can’t even imagine how unfulfilling that was.

40 years of Innovation at PARC

As many of you know, Advanced Decisions turned 40 this year, but this post is not about us. I recently came across this article about Xerox’s Palo Alto Research Center (PARC), which also turned 40 this year. I don’t know if you realize, but many of the things we’re calling innovative in 2010 found their roots decades ago. I think many of us have heard the stories about Xerox’s initial Graphical User Interface that later became the Mac interface and is the basis of how we use computers today (anyone remember using DOS? Wow – that was a different experience!). What I did not know was that in the 80’s they invented the PARCPad – a precursor to the iPad, and the PARCTab – the first PDA.

Another area they innovated in was culture. Work and play mixed, beanbag chairs were scattered throughout and shoes were optional. Sounds like the roots of the 90’s dotcom startup culture to me.

Having worked in a pure research environment early in my career, I know first hand that the most exciting aspect of an environment like this is the minds that surround you - not only the most technically elite, but wildly creative as well. The diversity is amazing, lunchtime conversations are completely engrossing, and in every lab, something is going on that could change the world. A great book about the early years at PARC is Dealers of Lightning. Full disclosure - it gets mixed reviews for technical and historical accuracy, but I found it extremely inspiring. If you have a budding engineer, scientist or inventor in your life, this might make a great holiday gift.

Qualities of Top Developers

We’ve often heard about the two fold (or five fold or ten fold) productivity increase between the top developer and the average developer. I’m sure we’ve often (ok, always) wished for a team full of these folks, but somehow we rarely get that. We tell ourselves that top developers are hard to find, they’re one-in-a-million, or that it’s just luck to hire them. There may be some truth to that, but there are certain characteristics that software experts share, and if you recognize these characteristics, you are more likely to either find them or cultivate them on your team.

First, and most obviously, top developers are among the most technically competent on your team. The have a wealth of tools in their toolbox, and the ability to use the right one for the right job. Both the breadth and the depth of their expertise are usually built over time and a variety of project challenges.

In addition to skills and experience, the best technicians tend to have great natural ability. Their brains just work in a way that makes designing programs easy. This has enabled them to build up their toolbox by allowing them to learn tools and techniques easily, and determine which ones are valuable and which are not.

A third characteristic is attention to detail. Whether it is in the requirements, design, coding, or testing phase, attention to detail will help ensure the work product is high quality. In their own personal growth, attention to detail is also important as it helps them develop new techniques and avoid old mistakes.

Fourth is the desire for continuous learning. Top software professionals are always “sharpening the saw”. They are learning new languages, processes, tools, or just simple techniques to build more good code faster. They are always up on the latest trends and eager to work with new technologies.

A final characteristic that is found in many of the most effective developers is teamwork. In most companies these days, interpersonal relationship building is a necessary skill. Most developers are not people oriented to start with, and those that can develop this essential skill have a huge benefit over those that do not.

Every top developer may not have all of these qualities, but be assured that they have most. Screening for, interviewing for, selecting, and nurturing these qualities will go a long way towards improving the effectiveness of your teams and your software development efforts.

How to Be a Successful Woman in a Technical Field

I’m on the workforce development committee for one of the professional organizations I’m involved with. Recently there was a conversation about how the girls that were being recruited for a technical program (with the expectation they would take technical jobs in a field that’s predominantly male) were not the right girls. My knee-jerk reaction was to take offence to this comment, but when I thought about my early career for just a second, I realized the speaker was absolutely right. It’s not for everyone.

Back (20+ years ago – yikes!) when I was starting out as an Electrical Engineer, there were pictures, cartoons, and calendars in the labs that you’d get fired for today, the older engineers called you “honey”, and the VP in my organization was well known for feeling up all the “girls” he could get near. We all learned real quick to stay an arms length away.

The focus on sexual harassment has changed the most overt issues, but it still takes a special kind of young woman to be successful in a predominately male field.

I think my initial visceral reaction came from a sense of justice – it shouldn’t be this way, but you know what, it is.

Until we reach that state of utopia, what’s a young woman to do? My feminist friends may take issue with some of this, and I’d love to have a discussion about it, but here are my thoughts:
1) Have a sense of humor - Running to HR every time you overhear a raunchy joke is going to do nothing for your career, or your relationships at work. Am I saying women should put up with harassment – NO, absolutely not, but not everything is harassment.
2) Have a thick skin – Men (and women) can be rough. It’s usually not personal. Men don’t usually have an issue with this, but young women sometimes take things too personally.
3) Stand up for yourself – If you’re going to be intimidated by a big gruff crusty old engineer who yells and swears, it might not be the right field for you. If you are going to back down to the young male engineer who’s threatened because you’re smarter and work harder than him, then maybe it’s not the right field for you. Believe me, it’s not always easy to do, but it’s the only way to earn respect.
4) Work is work – Men get this. Watch them. They can argue like crazy about business issues, then go out, and have a beer together.

Remember, one of the big keys to professional success are the relationships you form, and if you’re working in a male dominated field like engineering you MUST be able to form healthy, professional relationships with those in your field – men. I’m curious to hear what other women think of this.

Making ethical decision making easy

When I was joining my firm, I spent a lot to time talking with my future partners about a wide variety of topics – compensation, benefits, division of responsibilities, growth strategies, future personal plans, and values – many, many conversations about values. I thought this was odd at first, not that we talked about it, only how much we talked about it. I don’t know why I thought it was odd, considering I had left my prior position in part because of a mismatch of values.

Five years later, I am still in awe of what a strong foundation we’ve been able to build because we share the same values.

I was listening to a speaker recently talk about when leaders have to make tough decisions, and how sometimes they make those decisions consistent with their values and sometimes they do not. He made me feel so grateful about my situation. When we’ve had to make those “tough” decisions, it’s actually been fairly easy. When one of us wavers, and it happens, the other is always there to be steady. I can’t think of a single instance where we’ve made a decision that went against our values.

In fact, we were participating in an RFP and the purchasing agent suggested we do something we weren’t comfortable with. It was not so egregious as to be called unethical, but it was not consistent with the way we wanted to run our business. He subtlety suggested we’d get more business if we did it. This was about a year ago and getting more business was a HUGE challenge! We talked a lot about that decision and in the end, we decided to stick to our guns, and if we lost the business, so be it. Turns out that was one of the best tough decisions we ever made. We did not lose any business, and MUCH more importantly did not lose any self-respect. Shared values are critical to making ethical decision making easier.

How to tell your customers they’re wrong

We often find ourselves telling our clients they’re wrong. Of course, we don’t say it like that – “You’re Wrong! Mr. Client!” No.

Sometimes they have a problem and already have a solution in mind. Our engineers can often tell very quickly their solution is not going to fix their problem. These discussions are usually easy. The engineers can come up with better solutions and it’s obvious we’re working in our customers’ best interests.

But what if you think they’re solving the wrong problem? This is a much more difficult conversation. Especially, if they are passionate about solving a problem that you don’t think is a problem. Maybe you’re not the one having this problem, but other’s are. Maybe they’d appreciate the solution. Who’s to know?

I heard a great suggestion on how to handle this just the other day (Thanks CS!). I love it because it’s open, and honest, and all about starting the relationship off right. Just ask – at the beginning of the relationship, or conversation, or wherever you happen to find yourself, just ask if they’re open to questions about their assumptions if you hear something that does not make sense. It might sound something like this “You know, Mr. Customer, sometimes I’m talking with other CEOs and they say things that just don’t make sense, they find it very helpful when I question these statements. Is that something you would find valuable?” I’d be shocked to get a no, but whether they say yes, or no, at least you know where you stand. And who know, you may just learn something.

Soul Searching in Saudi Arabia

In mid May, I was offered the amazing opportunity to be part of the inaugural Global Women’s Leadership Institute, held in Saudi Arabia. The purpose of the institute was to develop women leaders and create a cross-cultural network of those women leaders.

Once I was accepted into the program, reality set in. Two weeks in a very conservative Muslim country - What would I wear? What local customs are important to know and follow? Would I be able to run outside, or would I have to resort to the dreaded treadmill? Could I learn enough Arabic to be polite (Hello, Please, Thank you, etc.) before I go? We had an orientation, which answered most of my questions, but the most notable thing was the caliber of the women – CEOs from a variety of industries, Heads of Non-Profits and NGOs, women from State and National Government as well as academics. This was going to be an interesting trip!

After 24 hours of travel, we finally arrived at King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST) where the program was being held. A good night’s sleep and our adventure began with a tour of the amazing campus. KAUST was designed to rival the worlds’ elite technology universities, and from my point of view, they are off to an amazing start. Some of the highlights included the Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR) Laboratory with ten of the largest electromagnets in the world and the Visualization lab, where we were able to see a picture of El Capitan at a resolution high enough that we were able to zoom in far enough to see license plates on the cars. Perhaps the highlight of the visualization lab was the 3D chamber, where we put on a set of goggles and a hat with motion and position sensors had the sensation of entering an atom. I could see it all around me, and as I moved my head, it moved too – amazing!

During this tour, we began to get to know each other. I have to confess – initially their outer clothing made me feel like we were different, but it wasn’t long before that feeling went away. Just like us, some of them were more outgoing, some more thoughtful, some quietly funny, and even a poet in the group.

The syllabus was chocked full, so the interesting conversations took place offline. I had so many misconceptions, like, how do you marry if you can’t talk with men you’re not related to? Answer, they actually do talk with men. Another – how can you run a business if you can’t handle money – Answer – they can and do handle money. I had so much misinformation about Saudi culture, but they set me straight. One of the most amazing things about the trip is how fast Saudi society is changing. The Saudi women come from a culture where women in the recent past have had very few rights and opportunities, now they instrumental making changes. One of the women is an executive at the Jeddah Chamber of Commerce where previously women had not even been involved. Many Saudi women own and run businesses, including doing business with men, One is the head of the Saudi National Dialog, one of King Abdullah’s pet projects whose aim is to get people talking, in a constructive way, about the contentious issues of the day.

Another example of rapid change is in voting. Women currently can’t vote, even in municipal elections. The women I met all fully expect that to change by the next election in 2011. In fact, some of them are even working on projects to prepare women to run!

One of my favorite parts of the trip was learning more about Islam. Unlike the United States, where we work hard to separate religion from government and business, religion is their culture. The Quran is their law, and religion permeates everything they do. Five times a day the Adhan sounds, a beautiful soulful call to prayer coming from every Mosque. Without even knowing what it was, I immediately found it connecting me with that spiritual place in my center, like the sound of Om. The absolute highlight of the trip, was sitting on a rooftop of a building in Old Jeddah at sunset, hearing the Adhan sound across the city, each Mosque on a slightly different timeline, spiritual, spooky, amazing!

Their religious ties were also interesting in other aspects of the program. During a discussion on environmentalism, I learned that Islam teaches that we are all custodians of our planet, that God gave us, and it is a moral obligation to take care of the planet, as if it was a temple. Hmmm, not a bad way to look at things, if you ask me.

The last bit of religion I found interesting is the liberal use of the phrase Insha'Allah (God willing) in a business context. As in, “We hope to have 30 women registered for this program, Insha'Allah.” We may think something like that, but we hardly ever say it!

There’s so much I take for granted. That I can vote, run a business, and for the most part, be judged on merit vs. gender. Although I can’t imagine what it’s like to walk in the Saudi women’s shoes, the closest I can come is the civil rights and women’s movements of the 60’s in the US. The big difference I see is that the changes in Saudi Arabia are happening over a matter of years instead of over a decade or two. I feel truly blessed to have had this opportunity, to meet such amazing women, and gain such clear perspective about both their culture and my own.

KAUST: An Amazing Example of Project Management

As part of my experience with the Global Women's Leadership Institute, we were treated to a presentation on the creation of King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST) by Nadhmi Nasr, the Executive Vice President of KAUST. What an amazing story!

This incredible, 9000 acre, state-of-the-art University was built and operational in approximately 1000 days. Mr. Nasr was asked to take on the leadership of this important project by the King in July of 2006. He assumed that he was responsible for building something that had already been designed, but within a week, discovered that it was just a concept. He quickly brought in partners, consulting firms with various specialties to help with the planning, which he attributes as one of the keys to his success.

Mr. Nasr is very humble. It was apparent in his presentation that his unwavering focus on the vision was, in my opinion, by far the most important reason for the success of the project. I know software companies that have not been able to build a product in 3 years. This man was able to create a magnificent oasis in the desert, taking it from an idea to a thriving high tech community. On September 5, 2009, the first day of classes were held on schedule. Having managed many projects myself, and being here and seeing how incredible this place is, I’m in awe of what he’s accomplished.

One Of My Favorite Innovative CT Companies

I had the pleasure of crossing paths with the Dr. Moinuddin Sarker of Natural State Resources a few years ago at a Connecticut Technology Council event. For those of you that are not familiar with this company, they have discovered a method to make fuel from recyclable plastic. You can read about them here.

Dr. Sarker was gracious and generous enough to give me a tour of his lab, and I was blown away! First of all, what a brilliant idea – talk about killing multiple birds.

As noted in the article, the EPA estimates that Americans produce about 31 million metric tons of waste plastics annually and only about 10% of this is recycled. I can believe this. The “tree hugger” in me wants to recycle everything, but until just last month my garbage company took very little – only 1s and 2s, and I think this is very common. What a great solution as to what to do with all that extra plastic.

On the output side of the equation is the fuel, and at the point that I first met Dr. Sarker gas was still hovering around $4 per gallon. Natural State Resources is currently estimating they can produce fuel for as little as $0.75 per gallon. With gas prices getting ready to do their annual summer-time rise, this sounds mighty attractive!

I’m thrilled to see Natural State Resources, Inc. getting so much press and recognition. I wish them all the best. This is the kind of ingenuity that America needs! Kudos to you and your team, Dr. Sarker!

Advanced Decisions is 40!

Advanced Decisions is turning 40 this year. That’s amazing to me. I’ve been spending some time thinking about what’s lead to this longevity and the one thing I keep coming back to is relationships.

We have customers we’ve been doing business with for 20+ years. In such a crowded marketplace, they have many choices, but have formed bonds with us and trust us. Even when the individuals change companies, they still remember and call us. We recently got introduced to a brand new company in just this manner.

We also have employees that we’ve known for close to 20 years. They’re our “go to” people. When we have a tough challenge we immediately think of Brad, or Jose, or Linda, or Dave, or many of the others we’ve worked with “forever”.

We even have service providers that we’ve known for that long. In fact, the company that does our internal IT troubleshooting is owned by one of my very first mentors, way back when I was a Northeastern co-op student working at Pitney Bowes.

The continuity of these relationships is comforting and stable, but would be boring if not for the new – the new employees like Zach, Jovin and Joanne, the new clients like ClearView Edge and Wilkes, the new vendors like Response and many others who keep us growing and evolving even as we retain our “roots”.

I’m incredibly grateful for the presence of those that have been part of Advanced Decisions’ success, whether for 20 years or 2 months. I hope you all can come and celebrate with us on Thursday May 13th here at our offices. To another 40!!!

Feast or Famine in Software Development Organizations?

In so many areas of my life I go thru these cycles of feast or famine – social engagements, work load, car problems, what have you. I either have lots or none, or is that just my perception?

There’s one area that I can think of in which I’ve never had this problem – the software development organizations I’ve been a part of. Sure, we’ve had that with bugs, or turnover, but never, ever, ever workload. There was ALWAYS more than enough work to do. Maybe it’s just the nature of the beast – companies always want to improve their products and there are a wealth of ideas on how to do that. It’s also a positive thing. I love being busy, and if a company can not keep it’s developers busy, why does it need them?

The downside however can be a feeling of overwhelm, or inefficiencies, or continual long, long weeks. What kinds of things can we do to smooth this out a bit, or at least mitigate the negatives? I have some ideas:

1) Prioritization – so many organizations are SO bad at this. The priority is the priority of the moment, based on the loudest customer, one data point, or the whim of an executive. A well thought out prioritization can allow your development teams to get more done, just by finishing what they’re already working on. I’m not saying it should never change, but it certainly should change less frequently than you change your clothes.
2) Focus – knowing the big picture will help with number 1, as well as with coherency of design and team morale. If you’re building something to do x, don’t try to do y. Pick one thing (at least to start) and do it exceptionally well
3) Learn to say “No” – I find that people (not just in development organizations) spend an inordinate amount of time exploring roads not taken, as in “maybe we should have done x”. I once heard a speaker call this “Killing the un-chosen alternative.” I like that, and not because I’m violent – I’m not. I like it because it allows you to devote 110% of your attention to being successful on the path chosen and stop second-guessing yourself, a time wasting distraction if there ever was one.

I for one hope there isn’t a famine of new product ideas or developers to carry them out. Let’s just try to do it sanely.

Partnering with other engineering firms

We’ve been interested in partnering with other engineering firms, but have never quite made it work. I’m not exactly sure why, but looking back, I’m not sure all the previous attempts have been true partnerships. We’ve been approached by a few firms recently, so it’s got me thinking about it again.

It seems like it would be a good idea. We often have consulting jobs and don’t have the right person, and occasionally we have a consultant free that may be able to do a job for another firm. In this economy, it makes sense to maximize any opportunity, and by working with other firms, you can expand your network and broaden your offerings.

So what would a perfect partner look like? Well, first of all there would be some commonalities. For example it makes more sense for us to partner with someone working in product development than say distribution. Second, there should be some extension of services. We’ve met a great mechanical design firm in the past, which could be a great potential partner. We do very little of that, and they do very little software and hardware design. Finally, there needs to be common values. We would never consider partnering with a firm that did shoddy work or engaged in unsavory (in our opinion) business practices.

I’m looking forward finding those good fits. I guess with anything, patience is key.