I just finished a course on ITIL v3 foundation. Interesting but I still have a headache from all the definitions and concepts. Highly theoretical and the teacher certainly mentioned many times that this was a certification boot camp and reality had little to do with it.
At one point the teacher explained that the time spent on doing the proper testing for a change (part of change management) was less than cleanup the mess if you did a change unprepared. It sounds logical and a very good justification if you are an IT chicken.
That said I have to admit that many of the framework ideas have great value. I think the value is clearer the more people you have on your team. If you have a few cowboys that randomly do things it is difficult to see the effect right away. With tracking you at least can learn from these events.
There is little room for anything else in our current situation since we have to be compliant to get certain types of customers. ITIL will be more and more present and we will have to document everything before and after any action.
The future is great for the IT chicken.
Thursday, October 16, 2008
Monday, September 29, 2008
Reprimand
This is the killer word of the day: reprimand.
When your manager tells you that any change has to be approved by him or that lack of following this new procedure will result in an instant reprimand.
This type of statement will bring the best chicken in you. You should have seen the emails that were coming out after to ask for permissions. People suddenly prefer to be safe than sorry.
I understand the reason for this reaction but as any knee jerk action I am not sure that the manager was expecting the opposite reaction. I am not sure that the manager planned to freeze the team like this.
When your manager tells you that any change has to be approved by him or that lack of following this new procedure will result in an instant reprimand.
This type of statement will bring the best chicken in you. You should have seen the emails that were coming out after to ask for permissions. People suddenly prefer to be safe than sorry.
I understand the reason for this reaction but as any knee jerk action I am not sure that the manager was expecting the opposite reaction. I am not sure that the manager planned to freeze the team like this.
Saturday, September 27, 2008
The network is laughing at us
We have network issues that are quite serious and we are closing in on the solution but it took us 2 weeks to get to understand what kind of beast we were dealing with. We worked on this issue for the entire week and that means during the day we would try to understand and at night we would try to fix.
I slept only 1 night this week and that is because I was getting too chicken to try anything. As much as I can rationalize that it was good to do nothing for 1 night and sleep, the reality is that we could have tested a few things to better understand how things worked together. I was seriously scared of changing anything because we were causing big problems every time we adjusted anything.
I think that even when it is difficult, if you know that you need to do something you can't just hope that it will fix itself or go away. You have to take your courage and go for it.
Last night gave us some good results so I am less chicken tonight :-)
I slept only 1 night this week and that is because I was getting too chicken to try anything. As much as I can rationalize that it was good to do nothing for 1 night and sleep, the reality is that we could have tested a few things to better understand how things worked together. I was seriously scared of changing anything because we were causing big problems every time we adjusted anything.
I think that even when it is difficult, if you know that you need to do something you can't just hope that it will fix itself or go away. You have to take your courage and go for it.
Last night gave us some good results so I am less chicken tonight :-)
Thursday, August 7, 2008
Nap Time
I am reading this great book called Brain Rules (http://www.brainrules.net/). I just finished the chapter on sleep and I am day dreaming big on this one.
The chapter shows how we need sleep to learn. It shows how sleep deprivation prevents us from working efficiently. When the author, John Medina, talks about the nap time that we should all take in the afternoon to be more productive I can only relate and start day dreaming.
How do you propose this to your company? Everyone should take a nap time in the afternoon for 30 to 45 minutes. Imagine being a consultant and selling this concept to companies. Helping them put this in place the proper facilities for a nap but also helping them see the benefits.
Since I currently work at a place where numbers are very important, I have been thinking on what you need to measure to show the results. Not very easy but certainly doable.
Will I ever take the risk to propose such an idea? What is the title of this blog again? I hate not taking chances sometimes. I may not be a sleep expert but I am convinced that napping would benefit companies so much that I will day dream on this one for a few days.
The chapter shows how we need sleep to learn. It shows how sleep deprivation prevents us from working efficiently. When the author, John Medina, talks about the nap time that we should all take in the afternoon to be more productive I can only relate and start day dreaming.
How do you propose this to your company? Everyone should take a nap time in the afternoon for 30 to 45 minutes. Imagine being a consultant and selling this concept to companies. Helping them put this in place the proper facilities for a nap but also helping them see the benefits.
Since I currently work at a place where numbers are very important, I have been thinking on what you need to measure to show the results. Not very easy but certainly doable.
Will I ever take the risk to propose such an idea? What is the title of this blog again? I hate not taking chances sometimes. I may not be a sleep expert but I am convinced that napping would benefit companies so much that I will day dream on this one for a few days.
Friday, August 1, 2008
First
After you start a blog about something you want to blog about all sort of other things so you start other blogs.
This one is a bit different because it is the opposite of an other blog I have. This blog will be the opposite of http://www.IamanITCowboy.com/
As much as I want to say that I am a Cowboy and that I take risks there are more occasions where I am so careful that I barely move. I think that I have to laugh at these moments where I am petrified to do anything.
I am sure that you are more than willing to laugh at me so we will start shortly.
This one is a bit different because it is the opposite of an other blog I have. This blog will be the opposite of http://www.IamanITCowboy.com/
As much as I want to say that I am a Cowboy and that I take risks there are more occasions where I am so careful that I barely move. I think that I have to laugh at these moments where I am petrified to do anything.
I am sure that you are more than willing to laugh at me so we will start shortly.
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