Understand the commercial platform September 23, 2007
Posted by Saravanan in Programming.add a comment
Though the developers consider commercial platform while developing the application, the knowledge of the environment is minimal as the operations take care the bulk of the activities. When I say the knowledge is minimal, it is more on how the different applications co-exist in the commercial platform than how they are integrated at the lower level especially at the network layer. Though the developers need not worry about them, they will run into trouble when there is an integration issue.
Since the application has passed through different phases (like test, beta), the chance of application issue is remote (though cannot be written off). Most likely reasons can be network configurations, firewall rules, NAT entries etc. These can be identified only with a good understanding of the commercial platform.
This knowledge becomes critical when you are a non computer science graduate ventured into software development. Pick some books on network basics, routing rules and understand your commercial platform with the help of operations team.
Leadership Checklist September 14, 2007
Posted by Saravanan in Leadership.add a comment
Rediff has published an excellent article on Team Leadership. This article is an excerpt of the book ‘ What Type Of Leader Are You? by Ginger Lapid-Bogda‘. The essentials of the leadership are given excellently and the following are listed in the article.
- Provide Team Leadership
- Create a team vision
- Attract and develop Team Talent
- Design a Team Architecture
- Establish Effective Team Processes
- Build a Team Culture
- Assure Quality products and services
These competencies are identified carefully and this covers all spheres of leadership. If a leader plans the activities to ensure his tasks falls under these list, he can grow as a excellent leader. This is one of the checklist I am using now to plan my activities to ensure that I do not fall under the category of bad leaders 
