Ok- So It’s Not All “Rosy” At My CDSS Gig
I just spoke with “W” - the project manager on my old “Mall” project and told him how impressed I was with this governement agencies’ ability to develop and deploy large applications, and he asked about how the project managemer was- to which I replied “there is NO project manager”….
I generally have no use for project managers in software development- I’ve worked at too many companies- large commercial software vendors- where the attitude is “it will get done when it’s done”- and nothing will change that- no amount of meetings or xchedules, etc.
But W is truely a different breed of project manager- the best I’ve ever worked with- a great interface or “buffer” between management, the user community, and the developers. And he knows how to motivate people. He actually became my best friend which was cool because I wanted to work that much harder and do a better job FOR HIM.
So as this relates to my new contract- I was given a sh*t load of documents that outlined Use Case scenarios and workflow diagrams for the sub-system I am tasked to build. They are all dated MAY 2009!!! But they are written and diagramed so well that they are completely relavant 2 years later- something I never saw at the “Mall” company.
On a geeky side note- much of the work I will be doing will actually be done in Microsoft Visual Studio as it requires heavy customization to MS Outlook’s Calendaring system- based on events in the Notes application Tasks will be added and removed from the user’s calendar and since they share calendars the managers will always be able to see where a particular analyst is on a given day. This will be fun for me as it will add a lot of value for the users.
I really do wish we had a person like W to add more of a framework to the various projects we are working on- I’m sure he’d like to work in an environment where people do what they say they are going to do and that “go live” dates don’t slip by years… (love ya big W!)