Snow, Snow, Nowhere to Go

Growing up in the Northeast teaches you at least one thing, how to get around in the snow. When a good winter nor’easter blows through New Jersey or Connecticut, it could dump several feet of snow on the ground. Of course, just as you finish shoveling out your driveway, the snow plow comes down the street and blocks it right up again. I miss those good ol’ days!

That’s what I thought anyway until we got 5” of snow in Raleigh today. We’ve been living here for 3 years and this is the first time we’ve had any accumulation. We had a light dusting in the past and even in a light dusting, the state virtually shuts down. There are 870 closings and delays listed on www.wral.com, the local news channel website. Almost all of the churches cancelled both services tomorrow. I’ve never seen anything like it.

In New Jersey, I worked outside in blizzards when I was a paramedic. Snow never stopped us. In Connecticut, closing a church on Sunday because of the snow is unheard of, even if the Pastor preaches to an empty congregation.

Here in North Carolina it’s different. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a snow plow. I’m sure they have them, but I’ve never seen one. Maintenance crews begin spraying brine to prevent icing on the roads in the face of a winter storm warning. Spraying brine? I’m sure that’s really effective considering most of the roads are iced over.

Listening to the weather report a little while ago, the meteorologist said this mess is going to be with us for a few days. The temperatures are going to warm up Monday and we’re going to have rain on Tuesday. I suppose the hope is that the snow will all wash away.

Applying the Pareto Principle to IT Economics

I almost didn’t write my blog today. I’ve been working on the book since I got up this morning and just put it to bed a few minutes ago. I broke from the writing just to eat my meals and unpack a rolling carrying case that arrived for my laptop. The DV8T is heavy and I’ve been having recurring problems with my shoulders. Actually, I think something is off in my neck and the shoulder pain is a side effect. Carrying a beefy laptop over my shoulder is the last thing I need to do. Hence, the rolling bag. I suppose it’s a privilege of age to pull things around on wheels rather than lugging them.

I’m still working on Chapter 1 – Introduction. I’ve written 17 pages and it’s probably one of the hardest things I’ve ever written. When people browse in a book store, they usually read through the introduction. If it doesn’t grab their attention, the book goes back on the shelf.

I’ve completed the Basic Introduction and the section on Organizational Change Management and the SDLC. All afternoon, I’ve been tackling IT Governance and the SDLC. I’ll finish that section tomorrow and work on Project Management and the SDLC and the About This Book sections.

I heard from the editor earlier this week. She’s struggling with bandwidth—one of her editors is on maternity leave and her entire program is blowing up. She’s trying to manage a very busy department while trying to publish books too. It is not an ordinary time to be sure.

She said my original proposal needs some refinement. I offered to take care of it this weekend because she’s so busy. I’m doing my best to make the amendments to the proposal and finish chapter 1 so I can send them to her on Monday.

Today’s topic on IT Governance and the SDLC really made me think hard about a few things. I opined on how to apply the Pareto principle to an early iteration of requirements elicitation and analysis, before a project is approved. Let me share a little of what I wrote:

Vilfredo Federico Damaso Pareto[1] was an Italian industrialist, sociologist, economist, and philosopher who was born in Italy in July 1848. He made a number of important contributions to economics, particularly in the study of income distribution and the analysis of individuals' choices. He introduced the concept of Pareto efficiency and helped develop the field of microeconomics. He also was the first to discover that income follows a Pareto distribution, which is a power law probability distribution. The Pareto Principle was named after him and built on his observations such as that 80% of the land in Italy was owned by 20% of the population. The Pareto principle (also known as the 80-20 rule, the law of the vital few and the principle of factor sparsity) states that, for many events, roughly 80% of the effects come from 20% of the causes.

What has the Pareto principle got to do with IT economics? If we apply the Pareto principle to investment value and business requirements, the resulting axiom reads, “80% of the business value of an investment comes from 20% of the requirements.”

I’m not sharing any more than those two paragraphs above as this point. If you want to know how I conclude the argument, you’ll have to buy the book when it comes out.

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[1] Source: http://www.wikipedia.com

What was the nature of Adam and Eve’s Relationship Before the Fall?

On our way home from church last night, our nearly 15 year old daughter asked me a thought provoking question she pondered as she was doing her personal devotions at school. She posed the question to her two small group Bible study teachers earlier in the evening during youth group. Both of them were stumped to respond. The question is the title of this post, “What was the nature of Adam and Eve’s relationship before the fall?”

She’s reading the book of Genesis and got to chapter 3 verse 16 which says,

“Unto the woman he said, I will greatly multiply thy sorrow and thy conception; in sorrow thou shalt bring forth children; and thy desire shall be to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee.”—(Genesis 3:16)

This struck her like lightening as she considered what she had always been taught in school, Sunday school class, from the pulpit and at home, that the dad is the head of the home. But after meditating on Genesis 3:16, she questioned whether the familial hierarchy we understand today was always God’s design for the family.

She went back to Genesis 2:18 and read,

“And the Lord God said, It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him an help meet for him.”—(Genesis 2:18)

The term “help meet” is defined in the Enhanced Strong’s Lexicon as “one who is a companion and helper especially: wife.” When God formed Eve out of Adam’s rib, he created a companion, friend, and spouse. But nowhere beyond Eve’s creation does the Bible indicate a hierarchical relationship until after the fall of man. The hierarchical relationship was established by God as part of the curse pronounced upon mankind because of our disobedience to Him.

Since the Bible doesn’t specify, I’ve personally come to believe that Adam and Eve were created as co-equals, but I really don’t know for sure. What I do know for sure is that I am proud of my daughter for studying God’s Word so thoughtfully and sharing her insight with others.

Side Effect of the Job Loss, New HP DV8T Laptop.

One of the side effects of losing my job is that I also lost the use of a laptop. I've been in IT for 25 years and have never owned my own laptop.  My daughter has one. It’s a small ASUS EEE PC that she uses for school work. But I‘ve I never had my own personal laptop until yesterday.  As a writer and public speaker, I need the flexibility of a laptop so that I can capture my thoughts as soon as possible. It’s difficult going to events and making speeches and presentations without one. Two weeks ago, I ordered a DV8T from Hewlett Packard. It isn’t top of the line, but it is spec’d out pretty nicely. The computer shipped last Friday.  It made its way from Shanghai China to Raleigh North Carolina by way of Anchorage Alaska, Newark New Jersey, and Memphis Tennessee. It arrived at my home yesterday afternoon, no worse for the wear. When I first saw the box, I did have some concern for it’s health. The corner of the box was crushed pretty badly. It looked like it had taken a pretty good jolt. I began filming an unboxing video to document its condition. I wanted to make sure that if there was anything wrong with the computer, I had a record of it. I may post the unboxing video on YouTube later this week.

The computer has an Intel Core i7-820QM processor operating at 1.73GHz with TurboBoost capability up to 3.06GHz.  It has 8Gb of memory and 1Tb of disk space. The video processor is a little lightweight. That’s a Nvidia GT 230M with 48 Cuda cores. I’m running Windows 7 Ultimate 64-bit as the operating system. For those of you who think I just spoke in Latin, let me translate. It’s pretty fast and can store a lot of data.

The screen is huge. It’s an 18.4” 1920 x 1080p high definition display. It comes with a blu-ray drive and two earphone receptacles. I am so looking forward to watching videos with my wife or daughter. Before I forget, it has a built-in high-def digital TV tuner. It is really a nice computer. I even have it lo-jacked in case someone decides to walk off with it when I’m not looking. In the unlikely event that it does get stolen, the first time the thief attempts to turn it on and connect to the net, law enforcement will be notified of their location. Lo-jack is built into the BIOS and cannot be circumvented.

I was up until 2am last night setting it up the way I want it. Like most companies, HP loads their laptop with bloat-ware, partner sales information and software that you never wanted or will never buy. I took all of that garbage off. When I was finished, I made the recovery disk set. I’m blogging from the laptop right now.

As nice as it is, it does have some quirks, but what PC doesn’t? Prior to making my decision for this machine, I spent a lot of time reading the posts from other DV8T owners on http://forum.notebookreview.com in the Official HP DV8 Owner’s Lounge. The forum has over 2,100 posts. I read a lot of complaints about the video drivers. The video drivers that come native on the laptop are buggy. They frequently stop working. The screen goes black for a moment as they reload into memory. It happened to me within 10 minutes of opening the box. If you go to the Nvidia site and download the latest drivers, they won’t install on the computer. This is because HP modified the original Nvidia drivers to work with their sleep button. The owners forum describes a little hack on page 161 that allows you to work around the Nvidia install issues. I performed that hack last night and the newest drivers installed without consequence. I have had no problem since. You will have problems if you use sleep mode, which I don’t. The real Nvidia drivers don’t have HP’s customization.

HP’s tech support denies there’s a problem with the video drivers even though the issue has been reported since the computer first came out last October. It’s hard to understand how a company of the size and reputation of HP can deploy a machine with faulty drivers. Maybe it’s going to take someone filing a class action law suit to drive a better quality assurance process.

Protecting our Children on the Internet—Part 6, What if it’s not my kid?

This is my final post on the topic of Protecting our Children on the Internet. We’ve looked at the dangers of unbridled access and learned of resources available to help us through any situation. We’ve talked about the need for establishing ground rules in our homes and signs to watch for that indicate the rules might be getting broken. We learned about Parental Control tools for the internet and cell phones. And lastly, we discovered a new threat to our children’s innocence called sexting.

Today I want to ask you a question. How will you react if you discover one of your kid’s best friends engaged in any of the behaviors we’ve discussed? Is your gut reaction to immediately have your child de-friend their friend on facebook because one of them made a post that doesn’t live up to your family’s standards? I hope not. There is a better way.

We never want to send our children the message that bad behavior is okay. Bad behavior is not okay. But when we encounter bad behavior, I think we need to look at the offender through eyes of compassion. These are your kid’s friends. You’ve allowed the friendships to form. These kids might be friends from school, a sports team, a youth group or some other venue. Their parents are working just as hard as you are to raise them as you are with yours. Despite what teenagers may tell you, they are not grown-ups. They can easily victimize themselves through immature attempts at humor, bad judgment or completely innocent mistakes. How we respond as adults can make a world of difference in correcting the bad behaviors and restoring the child to a proper balance.

Avoid knee jerk reactions such as immediate de-friending. That does nothing to solve the problem and may be sending the wrong message to your children on social responsibility. What’s wrong with sitting down with the child who made the offense and discussing your viewpoint with them? Ask the child to delete the offensive post. If the child listens to you, you’ve made a friend for life.

If the child doesn’t listen, take it to his/her parents. If this gets no response, then de-friend him/her. The point I want to make is to resolve the problem through gradual escalation. Don’t pull the big guns out at the first sign of offense. Work through the issue to help the kid’s mature. Restoring a fellow human being caught up in the consequences of their own poor judgment is always a right thing to do. We’ve all made mistakes, right?

Protecting Our Children on the Internet—Part 5, “Sexting,” a Disturbing Trend

One of the most disturbing trends I’ve ever encountered is a practice prevalent among teens and young adults called “Sexting.” There’s no way to say this delicately. Sexting is where these young people send nude photos or videos of themselves to their friends through the cell phone’s text messaging system. This probably surprises many of the parents reading this. It certainly surprised me!

We give our kids cell phones with built in digital cameras capable of shooting still photos or movies. Teens today communicate through text messages. I’ve been to functions and observed a group of teenagers sitting around a dinner table and nobody talks to one other. But they’re still communicating by passing text messages along their chain. This type of communication is an entirely different world to me and not one I fully comprehend. However, it’s here to stay.

In 2008, the National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy surveyed 653 teens and 627 young adults for 9 days between September 25 and October 3. For the purpose of this study, teens are defined as anyone between the ages of 13 and 19. Young adults are between the ages of 20 and 26. The results are startling and eye-opening. You can read the entire survey report yourself by clicking here, but for expediency’s sake, I’ll summarize some of the results.

• 20% of teens and 33% of young adults send/post pornographic pictures/videos of themselves, mostly girls sending to boys
• 39% of teens and 59% of young adults send or post sexually suggestive messages

Most of the teens and young adults admitted to sending suggestive content to their boyfriends or girlfriends. Others admitted to sending the content to those they want to hook up with or only know online. It’s bad enough to be sending this information to boyfriends and girlfriends, but it really breaks my heart to think that our children may be sending the most intimate details about themselves to people they don’t even know.

There’s a whole lot more in the report, but I chose these stats to start you on the road to awareness. If you are parents of a teenager, there is a 1 in 5 chance that your kid has already been involved in this kind of activity and an even greater chance that they know someone who has done this. As far as posting sexually suggestive messages, that’s a 1 in 2.6 chance. Do you know what your kids are doing on their cell phones?

I know many parents send their kids to Christian schools. Don’t think for one minute that this practice doesn’t go on in Christian schools. I’ve learned that the practice is just as pervasive on Christian school campuses as it is anywhere else. The son of a Pastor and missionary friend of mine was caught with porn on his cell phone. He got it from his friends in a Christian school. Principles are now banning cell phone use at school. If a student gets caught using or sometimes even possessing a cell phone on campus, they are suspended.

What are we supposed to do as parents?

Until something serious happens, we may never begin to think about applying parental controls to cell phones. All major wireless carriers offer some level of usage controls for cell phones. When you shop with your teen for a cell phone, make sure it is compatible with the usage control services offered by your wireless provider. Not all cell phones are compatible, make sure to know what you're shopping for and don’t let your teenager talk you into something that doesn’t offer the protection just because it’s trendy or fashionable. The services vary by carrier and will add additional cost to your monthly bill. You’ll sleep better at night knowing that the small amount you spend during the year will help protect your priceless children?

Remember something else, kids who practice sexting are breaking child pornography laws. If you discover your teen has received inappropriate photos on their phone, don’t hesitate to discuss the matter with the other kid’s parents or if need be, call the CyberTipline and report the crime.

My Definition of Success

Success is living a genuine, authentic life with dignity and respect. It is striving to meet or exceed our constituency's expectations. It's not about making the most money, living in the biggest house, driving an expensive car or having the greatest number of facebook friends. It is about being a true friend and caring deeply for others and sometimes sacrificing your comforts to supply the need of those less fortunate than yourself.

Edward Everett Hale wrote, "The making of friends, who are real friends, is the best token we have of a man's success in life."

If you've made true friends in your walk upon this earth, you are a success indeed!

Protecting our Children on the Internet—Part 4, Parental Control Systems

This week, PCMag.com is running an informative article called “Child-Proof Your Computer.” The article is geared toward protecting your younger pre-school aged children from the dangers of the internet. School aged children and teenagers bristle at the idea of having any kind of restrictions placed upon them, especially if those restrictions apply to texting or visiting their favorite social networking site. Our responsibility as parents is to protect our children to the best of our ability, even if it means restricting certain activities. Sometimes, we need “Parental Controls” to help us along.

What are Parental Controls?

Parental Controls are tools that allow parents to choose appropriate content for their children. Parental control software is available for almost anything electronic, everything from TV (remember the V-chip) to the internet and cell phones.

The article mentions three “big-kid parental control systems.” These are Net Nanny 6.0, OnlineFamily.Norton and Safe Eyes 5.0. We use Safe Eyes 5.0 in our home and it works pretty well. We receive reports weekly detailing our internet use which capture website visits, applications used, instant messenger conversations, and much more. Safe Eyes runs on the PC or Mac and has a mobile version available for iPhones. At the time of this post, Safe Eyes cost $49.95/yr and may be installed on up to 3 computers.

I have no experience with NetNanny, but know it costs a little more than Safe Eyes for 3 computers. OnlineFamily.Norton surprised me. Symantec is not currently charging for the service. It is free. I read some posts on the Norton website that it was only supposed to be free for the introductory period which expired on Jan. 1st. But to the surprise of everyone on the forum, a Norton representative posted that they were not going to start charging for the service. I did read that users are saying the software is kind of buggy, but Kudos to Norton anyway! I may try it for myself when my new laptop gets here.

Regardless of the tool, they all provide similar services such as:

• Content controls where you select the types of website that are appropriate
• Block unwanted email
• Program controls: Control Instant Messengers, File Sharing, and other harmful programs
• Time controls: Control the amount of time spent online, and the times when the internet is available.
• Usage logging: Create and review logs of websites visited, programs used on the Internet, and Instant Messaging Chats
• Usage alerts—Be notified instantly via email, text message, or phone call when someone visits inappropriate websites

Because your desire is to keep your family safe, please consider getting one of these for your home. Since Norton is free, it’s probably not a bad idea to give them a try first. See how it works for you and sleep with the peace of mind knowing you’re doing everything you can to protect your family.

You do have a couple of alternatives also. If you are on a home network that has a router attached to the Internet, most routers allow you to create security policies to restrict internet access or impose time limits. I’m not going to tell you how to do that here, that could be an entire post just by itself. If you’re brave enough to try, read your manual for directions. But keep in mind, that router security policies won’t filter out the bad websites. You may be able to maintain a website filter list in your router, but there are so many out there, keeping up with it is a nightmare.

The last line of defense for today’s discussion is to take advantage of the parental control features your wireless carrier offers. All the major cell phone providers offer them. Be aware though, the cell phone needs to be compatible with the service and additional charges apply. Check with your wireless carrier for details.

I don’t post on Sundays, but next Monday, I’m going to talk about a very disturbing trend that we don’t hear very much of—cell phone “sexting.” You may be surprised at what I’ve discovered.

Protecting our Children on the Internet—Part 3, 10 Clues Our Children are Breaking the Rules

Yesterday we discussed the importance of setting ground rules in our homes to help prevent our children from being victimized by internet predators. Rules are great and needful, but kids can be like sharp minded attorneys. They’ll look for loopholes and push us right to the limit of our boundaries. Sometimes, they step over the edge.

Today, I’ll summarize 10 signs to watch for that suggest our children are breaking the rules, from an article found on the InternetSafety.com website.

If you do notice these signs in your children, please exercise prudence. It doesn’t mean they are breaking the rules, but it does mean you should put yourself on alert to investigate matters more fully. Do your best to engage them in an open dialog.

The signs:

1. You or your child receives unusual amounts of unsolicited email or pop-ups.
2. Your child tries to block the computer screen or quickly closes the window in which he is typing.
3. Your child spends an unusual amount of time online, especially in the evenings.
4. Your child changes her password and/or will not share it with you.
5. Your child uses an online account other than her own.
6. Your child withdraws from family or friends.
7. You discover photos of strangers on your child’s computer.
8. Your child receives phone calls from strangers.
9. Your child receives mail, gifts, or packages from someone you don’t know.
10. You discover inappropriate images or files on your child’s computer.

Sometimes your investigation will turn up matters that you may not be prepared to handle yourself. If that happens, it’s time to call upon expert help, our law enforcement officials. It is always appropriate to involve law enforcement if someone in your home receives pornography, or if your child receives a request of a sexual nature from someone who knows he/she is under the age of 18, or if your child receives explicit files or images from someone who knows he/she is under the age of 18.

I can’t emphasize this last point enough. Today’s teens widely practice “sexting.” They send inappropriate images of themselves to their friends through their cell phone’s text messaging system. I learned this from a friend who works as a principle at a Christian school. Many of the Christian high school teens, who were all raised in fine God-fearing homes, were caught doing this. The school banned cell phones on campus and expelled the teens caught red handed. Temptation abounds and nobody is immune.

In March of 1998, Congress authorized the creation of the Cyber Tipline. Many of our government’s law enforcement agencies as well as other international, state and local law enforcement are linked into the Cyber Tipline network. As of October 2009, they have received and investigated almost 750,000 calls, 46, 731 of which are for Online Enticement of Children for Sexual Acts. The numbers are staggering!

The Cyber Tipline is a resource available to all of us. The number is 1-800-843-5678. You can learn more by visiting their website at the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children. Their fact sheet can be downloaded here.

Protecting our Children on the Internet—Part 2, The Family Internet Covenant

One of the first actions we took when our daughter started to express an interest in online gaming was to institute a Family Internet Covenant. Most kids start using the internet with online gaming. As their peers influence them, they move to increasingly advanced activities such as social networking, chats, instant messaging and phone texting.

As they become more confident on the internet, they start exploring some of the popular sites suggested by their friends. I’m sure you’ve learned for yourself how easy it is to mistype a web address into the browser’s address bar. When you mistype an address you may be inadvertently redirected to an adult content site. Adult content providers purposefully reserve domain names that are very similar to popular web destinations in the hope that you will make such a mistake and go to their site instead of where you actually intended to go. It’s an innocent action on behalf of the computer user but dastardly on behalf of the site owner.

Look at these startling statistics from the InternetSafety.com web site:

• 70% of kids between 8-18 have accidentally stumbled onto a pornographic website, usually while doing their homework
• 79% of unwanted pornography exposure occurs at home
• 64% of teens say they do things online that they don't want their parents to know about

The Family Internet Covenant won’t prevent accidental exposure to bad sites, but it is a powerful first-line communication tool to alert our children to the dangers they face. It fosters an open dialog with parents and helps mature the kid’s sense of responsibility. And don’t think it’s just for the child. It’s a “Family” covenant. Kids watch what mom and dad do and want to be just like us. They imitate our actions and behaviors. We need to practice what we preach and comply with the covenant just as we require them to.

It’s paramount that we establish internet ground rules for our homes. I used “The Game Plan” from InternetSafety.com as the basis for the Font Family Internet Covenant. It is summarized below:

1. We will never give out personal information such as our last name, address or phone number. We will not give out the name of our school, our city, our siblings, our sports team or our parent’s workplace.
2. We all agree to not give our passwords to anyone outside of our family. I will not change the settings for my computer or my password without my parent’s permission.
3. We all agree to limit our online time so that it doesn’t interfere with other activities.
4. I will never meet an online friend in person. If anyone ever asks to meet with me off line, I will notify my parents immediately.
5. I will tell my mom or dad right away if I come across something that makes me feel uncomfortable.
6. I will not remain on or click on a page that says, “For Over 18 Years Only.”
7. I will only download pictures and files with my parent's permission.
8. I will not send pictures of my family or myself to anyone online without my parent’s permission.
9. I will be safe everywhere and will follow the same Internet safety rules at my friends’ houses, at school and at the library that I do while I’m at home.
10. I understand that nothing is private on the Internet. I agree that my mom or dad can read my mail or check the sites that I have been visiting—not because they don't trust me but because they just want to make sure that I am safe.

This works very well in our family. Both my daughter and I signed the agreement and posted it over my desk near the computer. Modify the content to suit your expectations or add additional points to discuss time limits or penalties for non-compliance. Whatever you do, make it personal between you and your children. Work on it together. Keep the dialog open. They’ll know you love them and are doing your best to guard their hearts. The full text of The Game Plan can be found here.

Protecting our Children on the Internet—Part 1

The recent news of the arrest of former United Nations weapons inspector Scott Ritter for allegedly exchanging explicit online messages with a police officer who was pretending to be a 15-year-old girl concerned me. CNN.com posted a graphic explanation of the alleged criminal activity. That article angered me as I thought about the possibility of my own daughter being victimized in that manner through no fault or intent of her own.

To add to my angst, about a week ago after Sunday evening service while waiting for my family, I chatted with the mother of one of the teenage girls in our youth group. She expressed frustration over her lack of computer knowledge and her inability to protect her children from internet predators.

The following morning, I sent an email to our Senior Pastor and the Youth Pastor asking if I could teach a class to any of the parents in our congregation who want to learn more about protecting their children on the internet. The senior Pastor responded within an hour saying it is a fantastic idea and he would get with the youth Pastor to schedule it.

This is the first of a series of posts sharing what I’ll be teaching to the parents in our church. As parents, we have a responsibility to guard our children’s hearts. They’re going to learn soon enough about our unfriendly world. While they are under our stewardship, we must do everything within our power to help them maintain their integrity, purity and innocence. It’s not an easy task when temptation can be found on almost every corner of the internet.

Our kids are going to make their own mistakes. We will never be able to prevent them from being victims of their own bad judgment and poor choices. At best we can coach and counsel them to help them over the rough patches. And if we strive hard enough, those rough patches can be relatively minor and may even turn into some of their greatest lessons in life.

Over the next few days, I’ll share with you the steps we have taken in our home to protect our family. As parents, we’re not immune to temptation either. Protection applies to us as well. Some of you may not agree with our approach and that’s okay. I won’t be offended as long as we agree to disagree. We’re all unique and as my beautiful wife says, “We all cross our T’s and dot our I’s differently.” I’ll talk about parental control tools, creating a family internet covenant and how to restrict access by setting a security policy through your router.

I appreciate all feedback and if you have further suggestions or want to share some technique or tool you use to protect your family, please post them in the comments for all to see.

Authentic Leadership: Follow up to the Leadership Framework Post

My previous post, “How Do You Define Your Leadership Framework, resulted in more positive comments and emails than I ever imagined. People said they’re challenged by the question:

“Imagine for a minute that you have to prepare a resume where you can’t highlight the college you attended, what degrees you hold, your work experience or the project achievements you have had up to this point. The only data you can put on your resume pertains to who you are as a leader and what you have demonstrated. How would the resume read?”

Thought provoking, it led many to deep reflection and to embark on the Journey to Authentic Leadership. I even had an opportunity to mentor Jim Gulnac from the Hickory/Lenoir, North Carolina area. Through email, we collaborated so he could write his own Leadership Framework. What a joy it is for me to have read the final version! I never met Jim in person and don’t know if our paths will ever cross, but Jim is a friend for life who knows the essence of his leadership.

From the comments, I learned that not everyone gets the notion of Authentic Leadership. A corporate Vice-President wrote the following, “Our organization has a set of core values and related behaviors that we call our “Leadership Framework.” We believe that everyone in an organization has the capacity to be a “leader” and leaders are those individuals who exemplify ethical behavior, and make principled decisions and not pragmatic ones. Our performance assessment process completely integrates not just evaluation of performance, but evaluation (including self-evaluation) of whether performance is principled and consistent with our Leadership Framework.
In other words, being a leader is exhibiting the core values of an organization”

This sounds really good, right? When framed in an organizational context, I heartily agree with the response. But what happens when people leave work for the day? What happens to corporate values and behaviors when we are no longer in the company of our co-workers?

As employees, we comply with corporate values and behaviors because we want to remain employed and secure a decent merit increase during the year-end review cycle. But as we work for different companies through the years, each one has different core values and behaviors. No two businesses are the same. Organizational leadership is not the same thing as Authentic Leadership. The two notions, while intrinsically linked, couldn’t be further apart. They’re as distant cousins living on opposite coasts, related by birth, but separated by miles. Authentic Leadership knows the essence of leadership. It understands the foundations upon which all our leader thoughts and actions are built. It supersedes organizational leadership because it is about you, the person…the leader within.

Authentic Leadership starts with serious reflection about what you want to achieve in your life. John Gardner, author of “On Leadership”, talks about the importance of “discovery:”

“Meaning is not something you stumble across like the answer to a riddle or the prize in a treasure hunt. Meaning is something you build into your life. You build it out of your past, out of your affections and loyalties, out of the experiences of human kind as it is passed on to you, out of your own talent and understanding, out of the things you believe in, out of the things and people you love, out of the values for which you are willing to sacrifice something.”

All the ingredients for Authentic Leadership are present in your life. You alone can discover and blend them together into the unique pattern that you are as a leader.

I’m discussing this topic in more detail at the March 18^th meeting of the Association of Information Technology Professionals in Raleigh, NC. If you are in the Raleigh area at that time, please come. Guests are always welcome. For details, visit the AITP Raleigh Chapter website at http://www.rtp-aitp.org/.

IT Professionals: the AITP is worthy of your time and scrutiny

Until two weeks ago, I never heard of the Association of Information Technology Professionals. I've since learned the AITP is a vibrant, helpful organization worthy of membership. My friend Vern McDonald is the Executive Vice-President of the Raleigh Chapter. He’d been reading my blog posts on leadership and asked if I would be willing to speak at their March 18th meeting. The meeting’s theme is leadership. Since leadership development is one of my passions, I readily agreed. My topic is “The Journey to Authentic Leadership.”

Now that I’m going to speak, I figured I may as well check out the organization to find out what I had just gotten myself into. I trust Vern’s judgment, but there’s nothing more meaningful as a hands-on experience. I attended the meeting this past Thursday evening. It was held at the NC State University Club. I know how passionate people in the Raleigh area are about college football. And just because the meeting was held at NC State, I don’t want any UNC or Duke fans to feel slighted. It was a meeting venue only, that’s all. It’s not a reflection of team preference. The laser etched NC State logos on the faucets in the bathroom surprised me. Those are just a little over the top!

Anyway, on the main AITP site it says, “AITP is the professional association comprised of career minded individuals who seek to expand their potential—employers, employees, managers, programmers, and many others. The organization seeks to provide avenues for all their members to be teachers as well as students and to make contacts with other members in the IS field, all in an effort to become more marketable in rapidly changing technological careers.”

The meeting exceeded my expectations. The first speaker was Gregory J. Clary. Gregory is the CEO and Co-Founder of Mi-Co, a Triangle-based mobile data capture software company that solves business process challenges in historically paper-intensive arenas like clinical trials, field inspections, healthcare and government. I understand he holds 7 IT related patents. He stands among the IT elite. His topic was “Current Trends in Mobile Computing.”

Informative speech! I learned more about mobile computing than I ever thought. Dr. Clary really knows his stuff! After the first speech is a time of open networking. There are many high level executives in attendance as well as recruiters from some of the most well known companies in the area. The attendees literally make up a Triangle’s Who’s Who list of IT professionals.

After the open networking, dinner is served. During dessert, Mark Dronzek began his presentation entitled “A Look into the Future: Considerations for IT.” Mark is a CIO in transition. He shared his perspective on where IT will be in 5 to 10 years, including industry and corporate trends and directional changes. An excellent and engaging speaker, my favorite part is the open discussion Mark encouraged when he mentioned millennials and social networking. The discussion was intelligent, pertinent, and fun. We talked a little longer than we should have and Mark had to rush through his last few slides to end the meeting on time. I hope to hear Mark speak again in the future.

To wrap things up, Andrew Hall, the chapter President, handed out door prizes. He had quite a few Microsoft books he was giving away for free. I grabbed one on Windows Powershell Scripting. It makes a great bed time story.

The bottom line is this, if you are an IT professional in the Raleigh area, do yourself a favor and come to one of the AITP monthly meetings. It is definitely an organization worthy of your time and scrutiny. And if you only go to one meeting this year, make sure it’s the one I’m speaking at in March. My topic is transformational. It is one presentation you won’t want to miss. The Raleigh chapter web site is: http://www.rtp-aitp.org/. Please visit the site for more information.

Of Rainbows and Hope

We turned onto Rock Service Station Road on our way to evening service and hadn’t even driven more than a quarter of a mile when my wife suddenly gasped. It was the type of gasp that set me on alert thinking she saw something startling. Then she says, “That’s the most beautiful rainbow I’ve ever seen.” I wasn’t in a position to see what she was looking at without taking my eyes off the road. I thought, “A rainbow has another end doesn’t it?” Then I saw it! Looking out my front windshield at about the 2 o’clock position and I almost gasped. It is the largest, most beautiful and breathtaking rainbow I had ever seen in my entire life.

The colors are so bright and beautiful. Shades of red, blue, yellow, and violet sparkled against the darkened rain heavy skies. It is so broad I can’t begin to estimate its width. Its brightness is almost blinding. I had to avert my gaze and I saw an after image everywhere I looked. You’ll know what I mean if you ever kept your eyes open while someone took your picture with a flash. You look around and see the flash. You close your eyes and see the flash. This time I look around and I see the rainbow. It is gorgeous.

I think of God’s covenant with Noah on behalf of all humanity in Genesis 9:12-16:

“And God said, This is the token of the covenant which I make between me and you and every living creature that is with you, for perpetual generations: I do set my bow in the cloud, and it shall be for a token of a covenant between me and the earth. And it shall come to pass, when I bring a cloud over the earth, that the bow shall be seen in the cloud: And I will remember my covenant, which is between me and you and every living creature of all flesh; and the waters shall no more become a flood to destroy all flesh. And the bow shall be in the cloud; and I will look upon it, that I may remember the everlasting covenant between God and every living creature of all flesh that is upon the earth.”

I thanked God for allowing us to see His beautiful creation, a colorful painting on a canvas of clouds placed there by His gentle Word. For me, the rainbow is a sign of His goodness and grace toward us, a symbol of hope. In this time of transition, not knowing where I’ll find a job or when I’ll get my next paycheck, the rainbow reminds me of this verse from Psalm 71:5,

“For thou art my hope, O Lord God: Thou art my trust from my youth.”

Catching Up on the Week

It sure has been a demanding week. I am busier now since I lost my job than when I was working. It didn’t help any either that earlier in the week my sinuses seriously troubled me. I’ve been living on Zyrtec since moving to North Carolina.

Monday the Colonial JobSeekers was time well spent and richly rewarding. Dr. David Marsh, a psychologist with the Wake County Human Health Services, gave a very enlightening speech on “Keeping It Real.” It’s a message about sustaining a realistically optimistic outlook during the transitional period. You are more likely to get hired if you maintain a positive attitude. He discussed self-efficacy which has been described as the belief that we are capable of performing in a certain manner to attain certain goals. It is a belief that we have the capabilities to accomplish the courses of actions required to manage prospective situations. I’ve always believed this.

Tuesday I heard from my editor. She loves my concise proposal. She said it is “excellent,” and that’s a quote. She asked for additional bullet points highlighting the business benefit of my book. In her email she said she’d be out of the office for the balance of the week and wouldn’t be able to respond right away. I sent her the business benefits later in the day. I also had to work on my wife’s computer. It crashed during an upgrade to Windows 7 and I had to restore it back to Windows XP. Even though the Windows 7 upgrade advisor said everything was fine and I could move forward, I suppose at 8 years old, the computer’s too old to learn new tricks. I hate blue screens!

Wednesday I helped my friend Rick Trollinger. Rick is the owner of Agape Cruise Travels. He is one of the nicest guys you’d ever want to meet and he does one of the best jobs I’ve ever seen at providing customer service to his client base. He came over to our house and I spent the morning with him helping to jumpstart his network on Linkedin. By Thursday morning, he already had 645 contacts, 5 leads from individuals wanting to book a cruise and 1 lead from a sales organization in Pensacola that wants to book their group for a sales seminar at sea.

Rick specializes in group cruises and meetings at sea. Have you ever thought about having a sales meeting or training class on a cruise ship? If not, you haven’t “missed the boat.” Cruise ship meetings are very convenient and affordable. If you travel to a land destination for multi-day meetings or training sessions, you could be spending way too much money. In these days of scarce funds and fiscal conservatism, a meeting at sea can save you up to 33%. And cruise ships offer amenities that land based meeting venues don’t. There are free meeting spaces and receptions, all inclusive food, free entertainment, and much, much more. Give Rick a shout if you’ve ever thought about this. Now is the time to act. Rick’s email is rick@agapecruisetravel.com.

Thursday I worked on my book. It was the first time I’ve worked on it in about a week. I read through the introductory chapter, didn’t like what I had written and trashed most of it and started over. It flows much better now and I’m almost happy with it.

Thursday evening I attended the Raleigh Chapter meeting of the Association of Information Technology Professionals. I’m booked to speak there on March 18th. My topic is Authentic Leadership. I am so pleased with what I experienced, I joined the association and will be a regular participant in their monthly meetings. My next blog post will be all about the AITP.

Yesterday was all about social networking and building relationships. Oh yes, I finally opened a facebook account. I’ve done my best to resist facebook but caved earlier this week. It reminds me of the Borg on Star Trek, “Resistance is futile. You will be assimilated.” In less than one full week I have 349 friends. Won’t you please by my friend, too?

Linking in Brings Results!

What a week this has been! I’ve never felt more blessed than right now. Even with all the times I’ve been greatly blessed in the past life events with my marriage, the birth of our daughter, and the purchase of our first home, since I’ve lost my job I’ve never felt more free and unencumbered to pursue opportunities that are most meaningful to me. I love writing. I love public speaking. And I love helping others. Linkedin has been a big part of the blessing by giving me the opportunity to do all three.

People from all over the world have been noticing my activity on Linkedin. I’ve received more emails and comments from my blog posts, especially the ones on Authentic Leadership, than I could have ever imagined. I’ve even had the distinct pleasure to mentor someone remotely to hel[ him draft his own Leadership Framework. He is a friend for life and we’ve never met.

This all started because of the book proposal, which is still moving forward by the way. Yesterday I completed a 1 ½ page concise proposal for the editor which she uses internally within the publishing company for the global sales and marketing groups. She asked me to complete it and leave the rest to her. If she’s half as determined as I sense she is, I’m hoping I’ll be able to tell you soon that we’ve gone to contract.

I’ve landed a public speaking engagement because of Linkedin. I’ll be giving a 45-minute presentation on Authentic Leadership for the Association of Information Technology Professionals on March 18th at 5:15pm. I’m not a member of the AITP…yet that is, but the January meeting is being held at the NC State University Club on Hillsborough St. I plan to attend to get a feel of things. I won’t have the specifics about the March event until later. Depending on how things go in March, I may have a second opportunity to speak on the power of social networking later in the year.

Yesterday I had a face to face meeting with a senior level recruiter. He told me he had been watching my activity on Linkedin and has never seen anyone “work it” as I have been doing. I’ve been having a lot of fun with this and never considered that I would be perceived as “working it.” He said that every time he turns around and sees another Linkedin update, it has my name mentioned. He wishes he could teach all of his clients how to network as effectively. Then we discussed some opportunities he has coming up. He asked my permission to present me for a Chief Information Officer position that has just opened up in Durham. Of course, permission granted.

There are other opportunities being presented as well, but it’s way too much to write in a single blog post. For now, I want to thank you all for being such a great encouragement to me. Even though we are still recovering from the greatest recession since the Great Depression, you are living proof that cream rises to the top. Your thoughtfulness and consideration makes it easy for me to get up in the morning. Please keep the emails and comments coming. Let’s make sure to shake hands at an upcoming network group meeting. I’m looking forward to meeting you. Who knows? You might just become the topic in my next “Person of Interest” blog.

Person of Interest: Terry McSherry

I first met Terry McSherry at the December ExecuNet Raleigh meeting at the Café Carolina and Bakery. Other than the quick speed-dating like introductions we shared sitting at the same table, we really didn’t speak that much. This past Monday I met him again at the Colonial Baptist JobSeekers group. And we had an opportunity to talk during the 8:00am open networking session. Terry has compiled a wealth of information about this whole job seeking thing in the Raleigh area.

A long time IBMer, Terry found himself in the same position as so many of us these days, suddenly out of work and wondering what to do first. He shared a PowerPoint presentation with me called “Stepping into the UNKNOWN, What just happened to me?” It’s very brief, only six pages long. But wow, does he do a great job helping people understand what the next steps should be!

He starts at the beginning, sharing his thoughts and feelings when he found himself suddenly unemployed. The topic is one that every listener can empathize with. He then offers practical suggestions on what the next steps should be and where to find networking groups to support you through the process. He engages you along the “Road to Recovery through Dynamic Interaction,” and finally, provides a “Restoring Personal Integrity Worksheet” to help you regain your life’s balance.

Terry did an absolutely wonderful job pulling all of this diverse content together. Now he’s engaging the primary groups (Wake Tech, Job Seeker Groups in the area) for their buy-in. He also understands this is a working document and feedback from those involved is critical. I think Terry’s information is so good; I want to help him increase his audience through the power of networking.

I like networking because I like to help people. I believe if we have the wherewithal to do something good for another human being, and we don’t do it, then we’re selfish and wrong. If you know of any support groups, outplacement services, employment agencies, school groups or career counseling services that could benefit from having Terry speak, give him a shout. Let’s use the power of networking to encourage his efforts. Link to him on Linkedin. His email is terry.mcsherry99@yahoo.com.

Discovering the Power of Networking

To be sure, since I got laid off I’ve been on a voyage of discovery and am learning that through networking the possibilities for opportunity are limitless. Let me share with you what’s happened since discussions with the publishing house opened. In the first email I received from the editor expressing her interest in my book proposal, she asked, “Do you do any blogging or personal promotion that you can point to for pushing your book?”

The only answer I could say is “No.” Up to that moment I had never considered personally promoting myself for anything. I mean, I have some music videos on YouTube and I did have a light blog for awhile on our family website. But those things I did for self-enjoyment, not self-promotion. I never meant any of it to be taken seriously. And I have since deleted the blog from my family website. The videos are still on YouTube. If you want to have a laugh, go check them out. The url is http://www.youtube.com/user/vfontjr.

I started thinking long and hard about the editor’s question and looked at my network statistics on Linkedin. As of December 22, the statistics were:

My trusted friends and colleagues: 255
Two degrees away: 41,200+
Three degrees away: 3,125,800+
Total users I can contact through an Introduction: 3,167,300+

I sent these stats to the editor. She was impressed and importantly, so is her publicity manager. The 255 friends and colleagues are people I’ve worked with over the past several years or know on a personal level. As I kept thinking about these statistics, I knew I could improve them. So I embarked on yet another mission to determine how fast and how large I could build my network. Remember, the numbers above are from Dec. 22nd.

Today, January 7th, a scant 2 weeks and 2 days later, my network stats are:

My trusted friends and colleagues: 1,691
Two degrees away: 615,400+
Three degrees away: 12,078,700+
Total users I can contact through an Introduction: 12,695,800+

That’s a whopping increase of 663% and these numbers are growing daily!

To further test the power of networking, I established 2 blogs at http://victorfont.wordpress.com and http://victorfont.blogspot.com. These blogs are identical in content. I usually write on the Wordpress blog and cut and paste to the BlogSpot blog. Julie Powell, the author of Julie & Julia, got her start on BlogSpot. Unfortunately, BlogSpot either doesn’t provide statistics or I don’t know how to find them. On Wordpress though, the second day I had the blog open, I had almost 100 readers! I am convinced that to accomplish BIG things, you must network.

Yesterday I received a phone call from Vern McDonald of Vaco, LLC. First he told me that I am doing a great job networking. He’s been watching my progress on the Linkedin update digests. After a brief conversation about what I’ve been doing, he asked if I’d be interested in being a guest speaker at the AITP. The AITP is the Association of Information Technology Professionals. Vern is the Executive Vice President of the Research Triangle Park Chapter. There are two topics that I am passionate about: Authentic Leadership and Networking. We’re meeting tomorrow to discuss opportunities. So because I am discovering the power of networking, don’t be surprised if you get an invitation to come hear me speak.

Transition: The State of Change

The 11th edition of Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary defines transition as:

a: passage from one state, stage, subject, or place to another : CHANGE
b: a movement, development, or evolution from one form, stage, or style to another

I suppose that at any time, most of us are in a state of some sort of transition, whether it is due to a loss of job or another significantly life altering event. Gone are the days when you could work for 30-years at an 8-5 job with ½ hour lunch and 2 15-minute breaks. Gone are the days when you can count on a pension from your life-long employer. And maybe the days to count on Social Security being there to support us through our retirement will soon be gone as well.

Transition is a time to take stock of ourselves; to inventory our strengths and weaknesses and fervently seek the blessing and direction of the Author of our lives and pathway. It’s time to seek a new vector in life; to discover what really makes us happy and find a way to support ourselves doing it.

As I look back at my 25-year career in Information Technology and the years I spent in Emergency Medical Services prior to that, I count myself among the blessed. Sure, things haven’t been easy, but over the years, I’ve worked in professions that made me happy and provided a sense of accomplishment and fulfillment. The greatest satisfaction comes from knowing that I’ve performed to the best of my ability serving the needs of others. It makes me happiest when I exceed the expectations of my constituents.

So what now? Maybe it’s time to walk away from Information Technology and seek new windows of opportunity. With my broad experience and deep knowledge, I won’t be happy with any position less than a VP or an office in the C-Level suite. I’ve held both titles in the past and know full well how to do those jobs competently.

I’ve always been interested in real estate. I started taking a course to obtain my license in the state of Connecticut the last time I was in transition due to a job loss. I got about half way through when I landed a job in Raleigh, NC. Locating to Raleigh from Waterford, CT was one of the biggest transitions my family ever endured. We sure don’t want to go through that again if we can avoid it. Perhaps I can take a course again, finish it this time and pursue that avenue.

This past week I had the pleasure of meeting Annmarie, the Broker-in-Charge of the Garner, NC Coldwell Banker office. Annmarie really knows her stuff and absolutely radiates integrity. We talked for about an hour about the real estate profession in NC. I learned a lot and am praying about whether to go to school or not. I can earn my provisional broker’s license in six weeks. It may very well be possible that my wife and I can work together at this as a team.

There’s also the book. Even though I’m writing, I am not motivated to really buckle down and focus on it full time until I hear something definitive from the publisher. And then there’s ministry. There isn’t anything in life that gives me greater satisfaction than helping others. Ever since I met Pastor Paul Zeron in Bayonne, NJ when I owned the Bayonne Computer Center, I’ve been serving in ministry. I’ve taken on many roles: Deacon, Church Treasurer, Worship Leader, Adult Bible Class Teacher, Discipler and from time to time provided pulpit supply as a Preacher/Evangelist. My wife I perform regularly with the Friends in Christ Singers as part of the outreach ministry of Friendship Baptist Church in Raleigh. Within the past week we’ve been asked to perform a concert for a neighborhood party in May and in the fall to open for a popular Gospel group, the Daybreak Quartet. There are still a few details that need to be worked out about the fall concert, but if it happens, I promise you’ll hear about it first.

The only thing I’m definite about is the uncertainty in that I don’t know where I’m headed. But with the irons I have in the fire, I am confident the Lord is blessing.

Colonial JobSeekers: Support Group with a Purpose

Since first entering the job market, I’ve had many opportunities to seek employment. My first job out of school was working as a deck hand on a deep sea diver’s tender. You know what I'm talking about, the guys with the big metal helmets and weighted boots. No, we weren’t in the deep sea. We were working in the Hackensack River in Hackensack, New Jersey. That’s where a WWII submarine, the USS LING, is docked and open to the public for guided tours. The Submarine Memorial Association operates the NJ Naval Museum and the USS LING as a permanent memorial to the men who served and died in the submarine service. The work we performed allowed the boat to be docked in NJ. The diver had been hired to bury telecommunications cables deeper in the muddy river bottom so the Ling had enough room to pass over them without issue. It was the best paying job I ever had up to that point. I was earning $17/hr. for moving hoses around and making sure the air and water pumps continued operating. That was a small fortune in those days equivalent to about $90/hr today when indexed for inflation. Interestingly, I got that first job through networking.

My second job came through networking as well. A friend of my mother’s worked as a plant manager for Litton Automated Business Systems in Clifton, NJ. He hired me on to work in the machine shop. I started out on the drill presses and worked my way up through grinders, chuckers, lathes, and finally the big computer controlled Cincinnati Acramatic milling machine. I made parts for early mainframe computers, machining the core memory drums out of aluminum stock. These were eventually covered with a magnetic coating that recorded the data. The tolerances were in the .0001’s of an inch with the aluminum polished to a mirror finish. It was exacting work.

My third big job came through networking as well. After I became certified as an EMT in the state of New Jersey, one day when I was working at a gas station, I witnessed a young girl get struck by a motor vehicle. I ran across the street to render assistance. When the ambulance arrived at the scene, the responding paramedic said he was impressed with my field assessment. He told me the Jersey City Medical Center was actively hiring EMTs and Medics. I landed a job there the next day. The paramedic I had met had already told the department chief about me.

For some reason, after landing three successful network provided jobs, I began looking for work through traditional methods: submitting resumes, applying for jobs and talking to recruiters. For me, networking wasn’t a big draw when I worked in New Jersey, New York and Connecticut. Here in North Carolina, networking seems to be one of the best ways to go. One of the largest networking groups in the Raleigh area is offered through the Care Ministry of Colonial Baptist Church in Cary. I attended the Colonial JobSeekers group yesterday and must say it is quite an experience!

Meeting every Monday, there are approximately 200 people in attendance. It is the best organized and structured group I have seen within my limited networking frame of reference. There is a time for open networking starting at 8:00am over free coffee and bagels. At 8:30, there is a Spiritual Encouragement session in the Chapel where one of the church’s Pastors presents a Bible based devotional. After the devotional, the large group breaks up for more open networking and then moves on to the Special Interest Groups. Because it was my first time, I had to stay in the Chapel to attend the new member orientation, but later joined the Senior Management Group. There are groups for Admin, HR, Training, Education, Bio/Pharma, Manufacturing, Construction, Telecom, IT, Sales/Marketing, and Engineering. They also provide Interview Prep Workshops, Career Transition classes if you are seeking a position in a new industry, and basic and advanced Linkedin Training. The group meeting ends at 11:00am.

I met a lot of interesting people and am encouraged by what I saw. During the Chapel session, after the Pastor speaks, group members get up to share job landings, upcoming job interviews and prayer requests. Of the six or seven people who reported they’ve landed a job and are starting work next week, all of them found their jobs through networking. Yes, I’m encouraged.

Feedback, the Mightiest Gift of All

Okay, so now I know what a peer review is. It is feedback to the book proposal from a fellow author. Back in the day when I worked for Warner-Lambert, I learned what a mighty gift feedback can be. I consulted with them for almost two years, working in the HRIT department. For each of those years, I wrote and managed the compensation planning system and process. When I arrived on the scene, the process was to distribute individual spreadsheets to managers so they can enter proposed merit increases, bonus awards, and restricted stock distributions for their employees. I don't remember exactly how many spreadsheets were distributed, but there was probably close to 2,000, if not more. Warner-Lambert had an employee count of approximately 47,000. The entire compensation cycle was cumbersome, error prone, and tedious.

My first assignment was to write a system to automate the compensation cycle process. I think we used dBase III for that one. Later iterations were in Clipper and FoxPro. Whatever the backend, I developed a tool that distributed the databases on 3.5" floppy disk to help automate the roll up and reporting procedures better. It worked, but it wasn't the best design. The second iteration was client-server with a centralized database. No roll up necessary. It provided better control and fewer errors, but it was slooow! Put more than 20 managers on the system at any one time and the system bogged down. The third system I designed but didn't code was the web-based Combined Compensation System or CCP. That was the winner. It was also one of the first applications to go when Pfizer bought Warner-Lambert.

After two years of consulting with Warner-Lambert, I heard there was a position open for a manager in the department. It was a technical manager role. There were no direct reports. I asked the department director at the time, David Erikson, if there were any rules in place that prevented me from applying for the position. Today David is CEO of Mindkey Global A/S. I am happy for his success. When I asked David, he was sitting behind his desk with a pen in his hand. He looked up, put the pen down, and said the job is yours. I know you and we don't need to look any further. He asked me to submit my resume so he could get the hiring process started. After 13 years in consulting, I was tired of not having any paid time off. I wanted the job for the paid vacation and benefits. It was a good move even though I took a big pay cut. I am ever thankful to David for giving me my start in corporate life.

Warner-Lambert employed an anonymous 360 review process as part of the employee appraisal system. It was the first time I ever received a report card from my co-workers. After my first full year as a manager, I almost derailed my career. When the 360s came back from my peers and subordinates, I was completely shocked. The feedback from my superiors and customers was fine, but what I heard from the people I work with on a day-to-day basis ran shivers up my spine. To summarize, "Victor is arrogant, condescending, and makes me feel stupid." I was blown away by this! I thought I was performing to the best of my ability. I had no idea I was making people feel this way. It certainly was not consistent with my personal values and heart attitude. I was completely unaware of the impact my management style was having on others, although my wife may have raised a red flag a once or twice.

Our new Director, Chris Erikson (no relation to David), cared deeply for us as people, more so than as employees. She recommended the Leadership Development Program at the Center for Creative Leadership in Greensboro, NC. The tuition stood in excess of $6,000...$7,000 if you include travel, lodging and expenses. Our department didn't have that kind of training money in the budget for an individual contributor. I asked two of my customers, the VPs of Compensation and HR, to fund the training. They agreed to split the cost. The course was the most amazing diagnostic I had ever been through. I've never attended anything like it before or since.

What I learned was eye-opening. The behaviors called out in my 360s were readily apparent to the observers. For the 13 years prior, I earned a living walking into a company and providing right answers to technical problems. I became highly successful by telling my clients how to do things the right way. These behaviors didn't change when I became a corporate manager. I did not realize that the behaviors that drove my success as a consultant would not allow me to progress as a manager. You must treat people differently when you are their leader. What a revelation to me!

I've been gifted with an ability to define technical solutions to problems very quickly. Within a few brief moments of understanding an issue, I can usually visualize a solution in my mind. Telling clients how to fix a problem is what consultants get paid for. Telling teammates how to fix a problem, isolates them from the solution, hurts their feelings, and does absolutely nothing to foster teamwork. The psychologist assigned to mentor me through the diagnostic suggested altering my approach through targeted questions. Even if I could visualize a solution early in the problem solving process, don't tell your teammates what that solution is. Start asking questions to steer your teammates to the solution. Let them develop their own thinking through your influence. It drives buy-in, teamwork and collaboration. The changes worked phenomenally well. My next years' 360s came back exemplary. I successfully overcame the negative perceptions. If it wasn't for hard feedback, I never would have made it.

The author gave me hard feedback in the peer review, but I know his intent is to help me succeed. He thought there might some conflict of interest between books he's written and mine. I don't believe so because my book is very different from anything out there. He absolutely did not like using the term "10 Commandments" in the title. He had a lot to say about that, but the editor had already made the point clear. His conclusion, "the author seems to be a good enough writer to go forward." Thank you for your gift of feedback!

The Book Proposal

For the bulk of 2009, I researched IT industry best practices to write my former company's System Development Life Cycle (SDLC). As a fairly young IT organization, the company does not have many documented standard procedures. I only know of two, their computer use policy and the change control procedures. There were no standards for system development. I delivered the SDLC to the organization on Nov. 24th. It is the result of 8 months of research, presentations and vetting with approximately 50 people. The result is what the company considers a best of breed SDLC model that complements the IT governance process. Two weeks and a day after delivering the document, I was laid off. Before leaving the organization, I discussed the possibility with my CIO of capitalizing on the research I had done and turning it into a book for the masses. He thinks the idea is great. Personally, I've never seen anything like what I am proposing anywhere in the marketplace. What I've done is unique. He encouraged me to reach out and contact a very well-known and significant publisher who shall remain nameless at this point. He published a book with them and couldn't speak more highly of their editorial staff. On Friday, December 18th, I spent the entire day, almost 12 hours, writing an 18-page book proposal. I submitted it to the publisher at about 7:20 pm Eastern time. I prayed and began to hold my breath. I am not new to publishing. Over the years I've written many technical and emergency medical related articles, as well as op-ed pieces that have been published in a variety of newspapers and magazines. I haven't done this for over 7 years, however. I wasn't inspired to write while I was serving as an IT Director. I know from my magazine writing days, that it can take quite awhile to hear back from an editor, even if you discover later that they are very excited over your work. What's new to me is book publishing. I don't know what to expect here. I don't know if editors get back to you quickly or if the process can be lengthy as with magazines. About 2:30 in the afternoon on Monday the 21st, I received an email from the editor acknowledging the receipt of the proposal and saying that she would review it. It seemed to me to be a standard polite response. But wow, did I get surprised the following day! On December 22nd, she sent me a second email stating the book is very interesting to her. She asked my permission to send the proposal out for peer review. I readily agreed, not having the foggiest idea what she meant by "peer review." Did she mean peers of hers as in other editors, or did she mean peers of mine as in other authors? Whatever she meant, she had my consent to do it. I was very excited to hear back so quickly. She offered some suggestions on how to make the book more marketable. She asked me to be flexible with the title. To give you a little background, after I left the company for whom I wrote the SDLC, I really started thinking about how I can transform the research into a book without duplicating what I wrote for them. I don't want to go back and seek permission to use anything I wrote, if at all possible. It's a work product of my employment. It doesn't belong to me. I had to develop a new approach for my writing. I came up with the idea to encapsulate my research into 10 foundational principles and build the chapters around them. The working title I proposed was "The 10 Commandments of a System Development Life Cycle." Rather than provide further explanation, here's what she said regarding the working title: "The religious connotation in the title may be off-putting in the marketplace, especially the global marketplace. I am aware this is a foundational piece organizationally, but are you open to reconsidering?" Of course, I'm open to reconsidering! Writing a book is all about selling the book. With her vast experience in the global marketplace, it only makes sense to take heed of her advice. I let her know that I bow to her expertise and yes, I'll consider a new title. She said, "Thank you for being flexible on the titling. I’ve been publishing IT books for 20 years now, and I’ve learned about some issues surrounding potentially charged titles, especially as we attempt to sell our books into emerging markets like the middle east, etc.. I appreciate that." The newest title I propose is "Principles for Maturing your System Development Life Cycle." I'm not sure if I want to include the number 10 in the title or not, as in "10 Principles" because there are probably going to be more principles I'll come with as I write the chapters.

Gearing Up for the Job Search

I didn't waste any time gearing up for the forthcoming job search. It's not easy finding a new position at my level. I have to be aggressive. I'm a Senior IT Executive with 25 years' experience. During my career, I've literally done it all. I've been involved with entrepreneurial ventures and start-ups, owned a retail computer operation, consulted for 13 years, owned a custom software house that produced one commercial vertical product for the legal industry and worked my way forward in corporate management and leadership, starting as a technical manager and progressing through roles of increasing influence, responsibility, scope and stewardship. I don't know where I'm going to end up, but I am excited about the prospects. Maybe I'll take advantage of my time off to write a book! This is a good time for personal reflection and when I look back over all of the industries I've had my hands in over the span of my career, I am sorely amazed. At Bayonne Computer Center, my retail store, we provided hardware, software, and services for accountants, doctors, lawyers, retail operations, construction companies and the military; and I mean the whole gamut of services, too. I provided software installation and setup, training, custom applications, hardware repairs and installation, and Tier I support. As a consultant I wrote custom applications for real-time currency trading, independent distributor vehicle insurance program management, engineering project accounting, asset management and tracking, compensation cycle management, legal recruiting, document management and issue tracking. These are the areas I can think of right now. I'm certain there are a lot of other little projects I worked on that I'm just not recalling at the moment. When I wasn't busy coding, I was always busy teaching classes somewhere. For the bulk of my corporate life, I supported Human Resources, payroll, compensation, and benefits, first with PeopleSoft, then later with Oracle HRMS. I rolled out employee and manager self-service applications three times, once with voice response features. At Pfizer pharmaceuticals, I became an enterprise architect serving on the corporate architecture council and an information security officer serving on the corporate information security council. These two roles broadened the scope of my experience substantially and allowed me to gain a high level of knowledge in supply chain, manufacturing, corporate IT governance, software validation, learning management and finance. Working for CARQUEST, I learned about distribution and wrote their System Development Life Cycle. Overall, this experience is diverse and global in nature. The applications I've been responsible for producing or supporting have been deployed to over 70 countries, in the Americas, EMEA, Far East, and Australia. So what's next? I only wish I knew. All I know is that it's time for the job hunt again. I updated my resume and leadership framework. I built a simple spreadsheet for tracking the job hunt activities and expenses for tax purposes. I joined ExecuNet and attended my first ExecuNet Raleigh meeting in December. I'll be attending the largest job seeker networking group in the RTP area at Colonial Baptist Church in Cary, NC every Monday morning at 8:00am starting Jan. 4th. I'm building my network on Linkedin and currently have almost 900 direct contacts with over 1,000 outstanding invitations to go. I've joined a whole bunch of Linkedin groups that I believe are relative. So far, in the one week before the holidays began, I sent out 45 resumes, 41 emails, made 5 calls, had 2 face-to-face meetings, and applied for 7 jobs. The holidays of course, slow things down, but I'll be picking up in earnest next week. And oh yes, I've applied for unemployment.