"If I Only Changed The Software ...."

Recently I finished reading the book, "If I Only Changed The Software, Why Is The Phone On Fire?", by Lisa Simone. The book narrates the story of a team developing embedded software.

What Resonated (a very small selection)

1.  Li Mei’s systematic recording of lessons learned and Josie’s insistence on dissemination (page 262-263). That is what creates a learning organization. While an oral tradition is important, it is only documents that transcend space and time.

2.  Pg 261. “ … as long as you put a descriptive comment block above it…”

3.  Pg 261. “... not well architected … you have to wonder what other time bombs …” In other words a Bhoot Bangla

4.  Pg2. “… customer, who pulled one out of the box, turned it on and found the failure.” This is what I call RM’s extension to Murphy’s Law: If anything can fail, it will. And it will happen when the customer is watching.

5.  Pg 240. “… with out realizing there was another one in a different function?” Our Japanese customer taught us this was SUHEI TENKAI.

6.  Pg 141. “The sense of hearing …” Many years ago, when I was young engineering officer in the Indian Air Force, I remember a wizened Warrant Officer telling me, “Sir, these test equipment will tell you a lot, but your five senses will give you your first indication that something is wrong. And in most cases they also tell you what is wrong.” Of course nothing known as embedded those days no digital too (in India).

A must read for embedded software developers. I hope the book comes out in an inexpensive Indian edition.

What is The Hard Part in Your Venture?

Finding and doing the hard part in your start-up is critical. It is leading from the front.

The trouble with leading from the front is knowing where the front is. The added problem is that the front keeps shifting. It is not just fighting fires. "Fire-fighting" gives an adrenaline rush. It can be addictive. You have to lead. But you have to also do the hard part, and that is putting "fire-prevention", "fire-detecting" and "fire-fighting" processes in place.

The hard part at any given time could be quality, productivity, raising financing, sales, seeing reality and changing the business strategy, people, ... Whatever it is, it has first to be identified. It is about spotting broken windows. And there could be more than one broken window.

In my view, getting the right people on the bus, and keeping them on it, and getting the wrong people off it, is always a hard part.

Can one person do it? Highly improbable. But a team with shared values, mutual respect, and interlocking skills, can.

At acmet we did not have such a leadership team.

Maintaining Software

Lack of maintenance results in a "Bhoot Bangla".

So too for software: RENOVATE it or demolish it. Do not carrying on living with it (or in it).

Jugaad - Is it Good?

Two weeks ago Swaminomics talked of Jugaad as as our most precious resource. However, I do not think he is right about the origins of the term. I think it predates the appearance of tractors on the fields of the Punjab.

Jugaad rightly means a workaround - a term familiar to software wallahs (at least the ones who worked in acmet's Tools BU:-). In the workshops around Delhi it means the same - a workaround. If a piece of work cannot be held by a machine tool a "Jugaad" is quckly put together. Mechanical engineers study the subject under "Jigs and Fixtures". A jig or fixture, not build on solid mechanical engineering practices, is a jugaad. It will do the job today. But what of tomorrow? It will break after the first few parts are made and  kill or maim the machine operator. What of the tolerance limits of the parts? Will it be the same on the tenth part as on the first? Twenty years ago, I met a young mechanical engineer. Just after college, he had been working for couple of years in Delhi and was now preparing to go to Singapore. He said he was leaving as what you got in Delhi was expeience on Jugaad engineering.

Working around inconvenient laws of the land is also Jugaad. And Mr. Swaminathan Aiyar thinks that it is something that we should be proud of.

Jugaad is neither responsible engineering nor is it responsible citizenship.

Swapan Dasgupta in today's ToI has a rebuttal. I particulary liked the following :

"It has prompted a celebration of expediency, shortcuts and shoddiness. It has created a penchant for taking a winding course where a straight road should suffice. Once the escape route from hell, jugaad has now become an obstacle to India realizing its true potential."

The words remind me where we once were in the Tools BU.

Jugaad is papering up a broken window.

Jugaad, and any workaround, is a wolf in a sheep's clothing.

Deepwater Horizon Oil Rig, "Bhoot Banglas" & Wolves in Sheep's Clothing

Deepwater Horizon, the oil rig in the Gulf of Mexico that blew up was a "Bhoot Bangla". 

This Bhoot Bangla was not created overnight. There were a series of broken windows that no one attended to.

(see more on this)

Why did no one attend to the broken windows? I quote from the article: "... drilling priorities taking precedence over planned maintenance". That was the wolf in sheep's clothing. And there was no process shepherd.

(PS: I apologize for the mixed metaphors:-)