It's the end of January..can I me'rambling'?

In theory..having someone (a buddy) to work along with you would actually lessen the number of responsibility…instead, this contributes to further extra responsibility….

Perhaps having someone new….who’s learning and coping would not count…well, I’ve said it (to my manager whilst they were on training) month ago that I was a little disappointed by their performance…frankly speaking, good on papers but not in real life…that’s the bottom line here….years of experience working in customer service field and what does that makes you? Ain’t you supposed to be someone of, a better customer support? Within over 5 years experience..what have you learned?

I’m just so tired and tired and busy and busy….with the present issue we’re having with one of our customer in Oz…it’s not going to be easy to baby-sit new colleagues….still, it’s my responsibility to ensure new colleagues able to work independently…or else, I would not be able to apply leave carelessly…The manager will be on leave for 2 weeks….my other successor is on leave next week…then I will be on leave the next after (Kinabalu Trip)..within this 2 weeks period….I’m hoping things will be alright…I’ve been given 2 days next week to train my buddy colleague of all the customization work for Oz’s customers….Invoice Claim Module (consist of 7 sub-modules), Pay Award Module, Customized Reports (7 reports), Export Module (2 sub-modules) and few more of work procedure practice..i.e.Software supervisor’s user name is admin in Oz but root in UK and etc….I took even almost half a year to really get to know all these customization and now I need to do a brief presentation on all these within 2 days? How’s that going to happen? I can briefly say that, this and that…. The objective is to ensure they get the information and understand them well up until they are able to guide and support the Oz's customers....I would not know how am I going to do this..I will think of something…and hopefully I would not be tied up with development work as well….

People tend to change their career from one company to another company with lots of excuses….from a smaller company to a bigger company or vice-versa….hoping to get some kind of a career boost…there have some people would blame the company for not taking care of their employees’ welfare…its management either at a department level or overall…some due to family commitment…but the most interesting excuse of all time would always be the money….yes! I would agree with this one but still…how can someone feel happy of getting better job offer when he/she’s not even near to that particular quality of performance….I would be happy for having a better job scheme; better pay..better welfare..better in every aspect you would dream of in your career..but I would not be happy if I knew that I would not be able to perform up to that standard yet..especially when I’m not even in a comfort zone with present company…a comfort zone where I confidently think that I have achieved the higher level of respect with vast knowledge in current work of line.... it is not a good move to jump from present company to another just because a better career enhancement….perhaps, your present company is not meant for you?Do you really believe this shit? And you really believe you were meant for something greater like becoming heroes? Well, perhaps your luck and your effort are not well received at your present company but that does not mean a STOP for your career there…I love to think that whenever I’ve made a mistake, I will apology and promise to myself that I’m not going to repeat the same mistake twice or more…I motivated myself to take it as a challenge that I can be someone who knows to deal the pressure, responsibility and work it out for my career improvement….and that’s one of a reason I’m sticking to this present company…I’m getting more pressure and responsibility, which made me to think that I’m gaining more benefits of enhancing my own skills within this small company…there’s plenty more I need to learn…

Career or Sex change?

I spoke to the Tech Director last night..he phoned in from his house just to catch up with the current progress of new colleagues and wanted to ask my view point of this particular Oz’s customer that causing pain in the ass earlier this year…he gave me several managerial advices before we ended the conversation…thanks and cheers!

Be responsible for the best...

Yesterday, when I came in to work early in the morning..I checked my email..there was one email coming from my Tech Director with "Works Order 2216" as the Subject...This WO was allocated to the recently married-man a.k.a developer ("Akad-nikah" was on Monday)...I thought he was asking me the details of the report that had been developed by Malaysian developer, instead he was asking if I can continue or try fixing the fault on the report...the idea was proposed by my manager as I've told him weeks ago that the report is quite straight forward and should have been developed and ready for shipping a week ago..unfortunately, the man who was supposed to provide the end result wasn't able to do so....main problem was...he wasn't focus (due to wedding preparation)..he wasn't aware of all the requirements given...and he wasn't responsible enough to make sure all his works are completed prior to his 2 weeks leave....

I had already developed the report earlier myself (2 weeks ago when the WO had just been allocated to me for Malaysian developers to look at) to determine how difficult it could be to work around its requirements..I came up with the expectation that the report should be ready for QA within 2 days at max for him with his skills...I wanted the report to be ready for shipping in 5 days..means that he had a week..but he wasn't able to achieve the decent target of 5 days..he spent 2 weeks until last Friday..still left in progress and he's already in his 2 weeks leave... My manager called me on Monday saying his worries that the developer would not be able to get any appraisal this year around due to his own attitude and performance...Sorry but it's a reality he has to accept!

Receiving the email from my TD was an opportunity for me...well when the HQ planned to hire Malaysian based developers (early 2007)..I was offered to be one of them and was interviewed (informal) by the TD himself during my appraisal....but due to lack of experience in development itself (For the record..I don't have a proper computing/programming skills as other who've graduated from Comp. Science School etc...)...furthermore, I've just started learning Crystal Report at that time...I was just a mere beginner who begins by exploring each tools..each icons by the help of the "Help" menu and some e-books downloaded via internet...further story and journey, I'm sure most of you knew already.....the TD advised me to improve my Crystal Report skills within the next 6 months....which I really did and on the 4th month of that period..I was appointed as the Team Leader of Malaysian Development team...I see what he was trying to do..

So, back to the email..the TD gave me a day to try have a look at the current state of the report...since I'm the Team Leader, I should and already knew about its current fault..my first impression looking at the present report was...it was a mess!!!..formulas fields all over the report and lots of formula fields were created but never been used..naming formula field is another issue...lets take a shot on this...requirement is to show the "total hours duration of confirmed visits" which it would help if we rename it as "TotalConfirmedHours"..instead he renamed it as "HoursDuration" then there was another one named as "VisitDuration"......I started by tackling the fault directly...get familiar with his formulas and after about an hour, it came out correctly but another fault appeared..darned it! I spent another an hour tracing what was causing the problem but failed...I ignored the report and continued QA'ing another custom report and testing the latest candidate release version...before lunch time..I managed to clear out my mind from 2 of my tasks for the day...then continued looking at the report....Yeah!! I found it!!!I was happy but again..life is never easy huh..ha.ha..another glitch appeared, inaccurate output for one of the hours for certain scenario..I really can't stand it anymore and decided to re-develop the report which I did in 2 hours...when trying to load the report...Authentication Login window was displayed (due to Windows and SQL login permission)..I really can't continue further..so I updated the WO with my progress and replied to the email of my attempt and went home..at home..I developed a new report using my own machine..and managed to get it all worked as required within 3.5 hours...see!!! It was that easy but that guy took 2 weeks and the TD wasn't really happy about that..I spent another couple of minutes performing unit/smoke tests and done..sent an email to the TD updating the out-of-hours progress..(we can check email from home) he was happy and delighted to hear the good news then suggested me to perform as much as QA at my end prior sending over to UK for another final QA as this would avoid bounce back and waste more time...Today, done all I can...tested all possible scenarios that customer could come up with when using this report...found several glitch and fixed them straight away (I'm the developer and the tester)...I was so happy that it has passed a QA at the UK an hour ago..I was monitoring the progress via email for more than 2 hours since my return from work to ensure my colleague performs a good QA at her end and she really did well...Thanks..

I always mention to people..whoever you're..what ever work you're doing...love your work and enjoy doing your job...if you can't then look for another job...most of all be the best as you can with what's been given as a responsibility to your job as well as to yourself...A good day at work...I'm a little concern what would the TD thinks about the developer but it was his own fault that he has to endure and get over with..grow up!