Brian Jack's Weblog

Coda Corp USA - J & R Consulting Strategic Alliance Announced

2009-12-02T15:05:58Z

Companies regulated under Title 21 who require project assistance are often confronted with growing complexity in their projects, needing multi-functional expertise from their service providers.

To offer maximum quality, efficiency, and productivity to our clients, Coda Corp USA and J&R Consulting are pleased to announce the formation of a strategic alliance. This synergistic relationship will allow each company to offer to its existing and potential clients an expanded pool of resources available form both areas of expertise; Title 21 compliant quality systems and enterprising global automation solutions.

Coda’s Executive Offices released the following statement:

"We here at Coda Corp USA are energized by the formation of this strategic relationship. The core beliefs of both companies have always resulted in a perfect union of professionalism, quality and service. We are excited to formally align with J & R Consulting."

J & R’s Executive Offices released the following statement:

"In today's marketplace, the surest path to success is focusing on quality. We are thrilled to work with another company like Coda Corp USA that demonstrates that philosophy."

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Coda Corp USA

Offers quality system implementation, regulatory compliance, validation, and lean six sigma consulting services to pharmaceutical, biologics and medical device manufacturers regulated by CFR Title 21.

Coda’s leadership has been trained by FDA trainers, the resident staff includes former FDA employees, and its principals represent over 60 combined years of industry experience.

The depth of Coda’s knowledge and expertise enables clients:

To simplify processes,
To optimize project and system quality and efficiency,
To comply with complex regulations, and
To support a lean manufacturing model

J&R Consulting

J&R Consulting was founded in 1999 and provides custom consulting services to assist leading companies in managing the implementation and integration of LIMS and laboratory automation systems.

With vast experience in both laboratories & information technology, our team of professionals is equipped with the skills necessary to deploy, configure, and support complex laboratory automation systems, such as LIMS, Environmental Monitoring and Chromatography.

Depth of experience, along with our commitment to technical excellence, has given us the ability to consistently deliver successful software integration projects to our clients.

J&R Consulting Certified SQL*LIMS Professional Services Partner

2009-05-10T12:42:31Z

Applied Biosystems, a division of Life Technologies Corporation, has signed an agreement with J&R Consulting, a leader in laboratory information management systems (LIMS) and quality systems implementation and integration services, to expand Applied Biosystems SQL*LIMS professional services offerings for existing and new customers. These offerings represent best-in-class services for LIMS users in the pharmaceutical and food & beverage industries, as well as other regulated and non-regulated markets.

Applied Biosystems SQL*LIMS Global Professional Services organization is a leader in LIMS solutions, which are designed to increase operational efficiency, simplify deployment and improve integration. J&R Consulting’s team of skilled consultants with decades of experience in the LIMS field complements Applied Biosystems team of LIMS experts, increasing scalability for large projects.

“Our relationship with J&R Consulting enhances our ability to respond more effectively to the rapidly evolving needs of our customers,” said Pat Pijanowski, General Manager of Applied Biosystems Business Unit. “We are now able to expand our professional service capabilities serving the LIMS market, yet with no sacrifice in quality of service.”

Brian Jack, Principal Consultant at J&R Consulting, added, “We believe that a close association with Applied Biosystems will strengthen our ability to provide exceptional services to our customers by ensuring access to state-of-the-art LIMS technology and service. Working with Applied Biosystems will also allow us to address a much larger and more diverse market. Our joint expertise gives customers the best that LIMS has to offer.”

Customer Service Is Not a Commodity

2007-03-10T20:08:12Z

I had the chance last week to see opposite ends of the customer service spectrum- both involving restaurants. The message in each experience extends beyond the restaurant business, however.

]]> On one end of the spectrum, I had the opportunity to dine at The Mainland Inn last week with some business associates. As usual, the meal was wonderful, but what really stood out was the outstanding service provided by our waiter. Upon seeing my associates, he said that he was glad to see them again; they had been to the restaurant for the first time the month prior. He was attentive to details of the meal as well as our needs at the table. His delivery was polite and effective. He did a beautiful job of describing the specials and complimented us on the selections we made. His good service became a topic of conversation at dinner. In short, we concluded that our waiter was a professional who took his job and our meal extremely personally. And we told many people about how good the meal and service was.

On the other end of the spectrum, I overheard a woman describe her experience at a McDonald's fast food restaurant the same week. According to her story, she drove past the restaurant every day and while driving past one night, she saw that the sign out front said 'Now Serving Shamrock Shakes', the season milkshake drink. Not normally disposed to order from McDonald's, she went through the drive-through and ordered a Shamrock Shake. "No ice cream" was the response from the drive through speaker. She indicated that she didn't want a ice cream; she ordered a shake. "NO ICE CREAM!", was the answer back again. Upset, she went inside the store to complain to the staff, only to be told by the drive-through manager that she was told there was no ice cream- why couldn't she understand that?

The lesson in these two experiences is that having a good quality product, whether a fine restaurant meal or fast food, is not enough if the customer doesn't get good customer satisfaction. Assuming that the quality of the product is good, good service will make a customer a raving fan, while bad service will cause them to crusade against the product or company - usually more vehemently than if they were a pleased customer. The woman who went to McDonald's told many more people about her negative experience than I told about my good one.

I drew the following conclusions from the experiences, which are applicable across any business:

Good customer service is not a commodity. As a business, you can't simply spend money (whether it is for employees, outsourcing, technology) and expect to get good customer service from it. It must be a focus of the business, it must be a focus of the direct management, and it must be a focus of the customer service staff. Unless all of the parties work on it (and that costs money, resources, and caring), no business is going to be successful.
To give real service you must add something which cannot be bought or measured with money, and that is sincerity and integrity. - Donald A. Adams
To provide good service, the customer service representative must care about the experience at least as much as the customer does. When this happens, the customer senses it. They understand that the person cares that their experience is good and they will become a fan as a result.
You can't have good customer service with bad products or services. Good quality is the business' price of admission for good customer service. Customer service is cut from the same cloth as product quality. A balanced company does both well. Unbalanced companies don't and should be avoided. If the products or services are poor, spending money on customer service is a waste; all sides will end up disappointed.

By the time that most customer service takes place, the customer has decided to patronize the business. Good customer service is a leading factor for retaining that patronage and poor customer service drives it away.

Reader Mail I

2006-09-17T23:27:29Z

It doesn't happen very often, but every once in awhile, I get reader comments to my blogs. I am going to take the time to respond to two comments made in regards to blogs I have written.

]]> Virtualization in LIMS

Jason had the following comment about my Virtualization in LIMS blog.

Q: One hurdle that I can think of is the ability to validate the VMWare software. What validation approach would you envision for snapshot management?

A: I don't want to position myself as a validation expert, but here is my opinion. I do not believe that virtualization software would require a different strategy than would be normally used for validation.

Validation is performed on a processes- not on software itself. You would not be able to validate VMWare or any virtualization software, just like you can't validate Microsoft Word or Microsoft Excel. Instead, you can validate the process of using the LIMS (which would include the virtualization software).

So, to deal with specific functions of the virtualization software, you would have to:

Determine specifically how you would use the virtualization functionality in the context of using the LIMS software
Test that the software functionality performs as expected (according to specifications) in the OQ/PQ
Use the functionality within the bounds of testing.

In my opinion, this is the same strategy that you would use for any software or hardware component that is part of a LIMS.

Further, I believe that using virtualization software or hardware may actually make some elements of maintaining the validated state of the system easier, albeit at the expense of a little extra work up front. I believe this is possible because the use of virtualization software can obscure the specific hardware that is used in the LIMS system. Normally, you would expect that a change in the hardware used (replacing a motherboard or CPU, for example) would require re-qualification of the new hardware prior to use. If it can be established and qualified that the virtualization software works across different physical hardware, it is feasible that the LIMS would stay in a validated state in the midst of component changes.

I think the same can apply to the snapshot functionality you reference.

Zen and the Art of LIMS Troubleshooting

Joel Limbardo, who always has interesting commentary on the LIMS community, provided the following comment on my Zen and the Art of LIMS Troubleshooting Blog.

Q: Odd, I know individuals who have advanced degrees in chemistry that utilize the scientific method daily but cannot operate their computer for anything beyond simple e-mail. This article is nice, but did you consider that each and every support call costs money? The objective of a software engineer is to create software that produces virtually no need to call any type of support technician. I agree that a balanced, strategic approach to problem solving will aid the support professional, but the answer really is not the pure 'scientific method'. Instead, it is a combination of building robust software and running through a great many failure scenarios before that product hits production. The result of those failure dry-runs will be troubleshooting scripts that the support professional SHOULD USE to find and diagnose the problem according to the development specifications. Ask yourself this -- should your Xerox support tech. be using the scientific method? I thought not.

A: I agree with a lot of Joel's comment. Good engineering techniques should be used to reduce software defects, which reduces the load on a support desk. Further, dedicated support desks should be equipped with a knowledge base that allows them to resolve common issues quickly. I would even want that knowledge base to be available (at least partially) to customers so that they can solve some of their own issues. If a knowledge base or script reduces support costs, allowing customers to resolve some issues themselves saves even more money.

It is a mistake, however, to equate "support" and "troubleshooting" with "defects". Sure, diagnosing and repairing software defects is a big part of a Support desk, but it is only one part. Providing good support for a customer means helping the customer use their software or hardware effectively. Some companies regard Support desks as a way of building rapport with and loyalty from customers. In other words, instead of a group that focuses on problems, a Support group can be a group that focuses on customer support.

Regarding the Xerox support tech. that is servicing my equipment, allow me to ask Joel's question a different way: Should your Xerox tech. be able formulate a hypothesis, isolate variables, produce experiments, and draw valid conclusions about the way things are working or should they simply be only capable of following previously created troubleshooting scenarios without factoring in my unique situation? Well, the answer depends on what I want from the service provider. Do I want them to reduce their service costs to as close to zero as possible or do I want them to build a relationship with me so that they can help my business succeed.

My experience is that many LIMS vendors want the former (but say the latter) and most LIMS customers want (and pay for in service fees!) the later.

Virtualization in LIMS

2006-08-05T17:12:41Z

There is no denying that virtualization is a hot trend in IT. Intel and AMD are baking virtualization into the next generation of chips and VMWare and Microsoft are giving away their software virtualization products for Intel-based servers. Could this trend apply to the LIMS industry, too?

]]> VMWare particularly has built up an interesting concept of 'virtual appliances'. Virtual appliances are defined as:

A fully pre-installed and pre-configured application and operating system environment that runs on any standard x86 desktop or server in a self-contained, isolated environment known as a virtual machine.

VMWare has some of these appliances that can be downloaded as examples and to satisfy specific niche needs. For example, for a small company interested in exploring local PBX telecommunications, an Asterisk-based appliance can be downloaded that is fully installed and preconfigured.

Typically, the VMWare appliances involve Linux based distributions and open source software, but increasingly, customers have been asking proprietary software vendors that produce highly complex software to distribute their software as an appliance.

There are some hurdles to overcome in order for LIMS systems to be distributed via virtual appliances. Among these are:

Operating System choices: Many larger LIMS implementations use a high-end database server (in other words, not Windows or Linux based) that are not compatible with products like VMWare or Virtual Server.
Performance: Necessarily any virtual machine will operate less efficiently than if run on native hardware, although the performance capabilities of some virtual machines is amazing and approaches native performance levels. When fully integrated with the hardware chips, this will become much less of an issue.
Licensing: When copies of the fully functioning software can be copied and used so easily, software licensing issues exist. This is true of both vendor software and operating systems.

With that being said, there would be immediate and substantial benefits to LIMS customers if virtual appliances of LIMS systems were produced, including:

Reduced time installing and configuring LIMS. If databases and LIMS tiers can be bundled and delivered on one or more virtual machines, installation and configuration could be reduced to deploying a small number of files on a server and starting the virtual machine.
Reduced IQ cost and complexity. When a vendor provides a ready to use system with no significant installation time, Installation Qualification becomes significantly easier for the customer since installation and configuration steps are reduced. Truly vendors will be able to offload much of this work from the end customer. Final responsibility for all qualifications will remain with the customer, of course.
Disaster Recovery and Failover. With virtual appliances, disaster recovery from one physical machine to another at the time of failure can become automatic, depending on configuration. For example, a company can deploy a virtual appliance on a network storage shared by 2 physical machines. If one fails, the other picks up the virtual appliance immediately and service is not interrupted (possibly with the second machine already running its own virtual machine.)
Ability to move a virtual machine around to different physical machines without having to reinstall. As new hardware technology becomes available, the upgrade of a virtual machine could be as easy as moving the virtual machine appliance to a new host. No aspects of the virtual machine would necessarily have to change: virtual machine name, IP address, etc.
Snapshots: Software virtual machines software support the ideas of snapshots - point in time copies of the OS that can be restored at a later point in time. Snapshots can be used to restore software to a known good state at any time, a process that could be ideal for a change management system.
Increased hardware utilization: A single server could accommodate multiple appliances, allowing the hardware to be utilized to its full potential.

The benefits of utilizing virtual machine appliances are obvious to customers and would apply well to the LIMS industry. Vendors must take the next step and overcome the barriers to producing virtual appliances in the LIMS industry in order for customers to see the benefits come to pass.

Are there any hurdles or benefits that I have missed?

Hello, my name is Brian and I did not plan

2005-10-02T02:12:52Z

Last week was a tough week. The week started off with me reading Bryan's first article for us: The Art of Planning. I thought it was a great article and a good way to kick off his series of insights for us. I just didn't know that it was going to be a foreshadow for the week.

]]> This past week was pretty typical of the last 8 or so: complete chaos. For about the last 2 months, I have been working on several projects at once. We are blessed to be very busy right now and because of that, many of us at J&R have been working on multiple projects at once out of necessity. We do it because it helps our customers (at least in the short term). I hate doing it, though. I hate it because when I work on multiple projects at the same time, the absolute first thing that I sacrifice in order to make progress with each thread on which I work is my planning. I end up being so spread out that I jump in and handle the urgent issue du jour. As I write this (and probably as you read this), it is blazingly obvious that it is a mistake. For the last 2 months I have been worrying about the short-term urgency and neglecting the long-term big picture.

Then, on Thursday, my mistake hit me in the face. I was about to attend a status meeting for a project in which I was expected to be a key player. Not only did I not have any status to report on my assigned tasks, I didn't really know what they were or where they fit into the grand scheme of the whole project. I had ignored emails about the project for the last 2 months because it never made it to the radar of the day's emergencies. I didn't even realize that I didn't know any of this until Jeff told me this was case and snapped me out of my fog (I hope).

On Thursday, it all hit me at once; I have sacrificed what is most important for what is least. I am thankful that Jeff was there to gently remind me of that (more gently than I deserved, to be honest). I let the pressures of my "important" projects cause me to forget the simplest of project management principles: plan. And I realized I was doing it even after reading Bryan's piece and thinking about how good his advice was!

As you can imagine, this is embarrassing for me. For many of the projects I am involved with, I am one of the project leaders. I also subscribe heavily to Stephen Covey's 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. In fact, in the last 2 weeks, I provided this book to 2 consultants in my group and I read it again myself! So many themes in that book are relevant:

Never let what matters most be at the mercy of what matters least
Life is a program, and I am the programmer.
Be proactive
Begin with the End in Mind
Put First Things First

In Covey's parlance, I let tasks that were urgent but unimportant trump tasks that were important but not urgent. The result is that for a few weeks, I was able to make progress on some urgent work, but I ended up neglecting other work that had to be done (including writing blogs!).

The resolution is crystal clear for me: I need to be in charge of my schedule. I need to schedule my planning activities in advance and follow-through on the plans that I make. Covey recommends doing this in week-long blocks so that when the inevitable unexpected issues come along, you can still achieve your plans. He also recommends having integrity at the time of decision, meaning that when the urgent but unimportant tasks come at you, you have to have the integrity to stand by your plans and not get derailed. That is my goal going forward.

So, thank you Bryan and thank you Jeff for reminding me about the first step towards success.

Blogs That I Read

2005-06-19T12:28:53Z

When I came out of college as a chemist, I had a good understanding of computers, having used them practically my whole life growing up. But, I didn't have a handle on PC technology that was current at the time. Both IBM PC compatibles and Macs were foreign to me. I was amazed to see both types being used effectively in business upon starting my first job, so I resolved to learn as much about how they really worked as possible.

]]> This started a trend of research that led me to LIMS and then to consulting. One of my favorite research mechanisms was and is reading enthusiast magazines and I have subscribed to several over the years. Many have transitioned from true enthusiast magazines to "computers in business" magazines. That is precisely how my interests have transitioned too, so I have not been disappointed.

Whenever I would get a new issue, invariably the first thing that I would do would be to go to the opinion columns and read them. In the good, long-standing computer magazines, these articles tend to either draw controversial conclusions (Dvorak, for example) or have some sort of detailed analysis of trends.

In fact, I would subscribe to trade magazines like InfoWorld just to get the opinion columns. Some of the columns were available on the web, but I never felt comfortable with the idea of going to get the page I wanted. I liked it being delivered to me.

My interest in analysis and opinion in the IT industry is the basis of why I love reading blogs that deal with IT. The blogs that I read are a mixture of professional journalists and pundits as well as software and IT craftsman that have opinions that are valuable to me. Many of the professional blogs that I read now replace my magazine subscriptions- at least the ones I had just to read the opinion columns. My RSS reader satisfies my opinion fix when it notifies me that one of my favorite authors has published an article that is delivered directly to me.

I like reading blogs so much more than email newsletters even though they are similar to each other. An email newsletter makes me send my address to someone who then has to push the content to me. I get it whether I want it or not- and that is the point of why people create them. A blog is a more laid back approach. A blogger puts something "out there" on the Internet without knowing if anyone will actually read it. If people want it, they will come and get it.

Here are the blogs that I read regularly and why:

Software Development Blogs - A large part of what we do at J&R Consulting is software development. I like to understand the current trends and the best practices from the field.

Larkware News, http://www.larkware.com/larkware2.xml, Mike Gunderloy, author of Coder to Developer, culls together links from all over the internet and provides both general and Windows/.NET specific reviews and commentary. I have found many other relevant bloggers by reading this blog.
Joel On Software, http://www.joelonsoftware.com/rss.xml, Joel Spolsky produces a famous blog on software development. There haven't been many relevant posts recently, but historically, this has had many articles that really capture the essence of development and provide great insight.
Project Aardvark, http://www.projectaardvark.com/rss.xml, Joel Spolsky has interns creating a "secret" project that they plan on shipping. I am a sucker for immense and irrational hype.
ChristopherHawkins.com Blog, http://www.christopherhawkins.com/clhrss.xml, Christopher Hawkins is a consultant/software developer who gives opinions on the craft of software development. He often indicates that software developers need to improve their craft and provides ways to do it. I just started reading this one and I like it a lot; Hawkins provides some valuable criticisms.
Jon's Radio, http://weblog.infoworld.com/udell/rss.xml, Jon Udell, a columnist for InfoWorld, often blogs about cutting edge web technology.
Eric.Weblog(), http://software.ericsink.com/rss.xml, Eric Sink, principal of SourceGear, writes about configuration management (code repositories) and the business of being an Independent Software Vendor (ISV).

J&R Consulting Blogs - maybe someday this category will be LIMS industry blogs, but I haven't found any others yet. For now, these are the blogs of my J&R colleagues.

Jason Boyd's Weblog, http://www.jandrconsult.com/blogs/jason/index.xml
John Buletza's Weblog, http://www.jandrconsult.com/blogs/john/index.xml
Rob Sullivan's Weblog, http://www.jandrconsult.com/blogs/rob/index.xml
Jeff Vannest's Weblog, http://www.jandrconsult.com/blogs/jeff/index.xml

IT Blogs - These blogs are about Information Technology in General. As peculiar as LIMS or Quality software development is, it is still part of IT work and it is good to get the perspective of the IT Executives.

Chad Dickerson: CTO Connection, http://weblog.infoworld.com/dickerson/rss.xml, Chad Dickerson is the CTO of InfoWorld and publishes a weekly opinion column in the magazine that is also sent out in blog format. Chad experiments with podcasting and uses his blog to post quick notes outside of his weekly column. His blogs are usually pragmatic and present good business justification for IT moves.
InfoWorld: Columnists, http://www.infoworld.com/rss/columnists.xml, All of the print opinion columns and some of the online only InfoWorld opinion columns are available via this feed that has updated columns each work day. The columns cover the gamut from testing and development to storage.
Advice Line by Bob Lewis, http://weblog.infoworld.com/lewis/rss.xml, Bob Lewis is a former columnist for InfoWorld print magazine and former employee of Perot Systems. Now he heads IT Catalysts (www.itcatalysts.com). All of the posts to this blog are answers to questions that someone has posted. Some of the questions come from InfoWorld discussion board topics. Others come from Lewis' email newsletter (see below). Lewis is the author of Leading IT: The Toughest Job in the World and has a deep insight into IT Leadership.

Misc Blog - I only have one Miscellaneous blog (to share) that is not really relevant to work, but it is cool anyway.

Cool Tools, http://www.kk.org/cooltools/index.xml, Kevin Kelley is the former editor of Wired magazine. Kelley organizes, well, Cool Tools. It is an interesting grouping of items. Most are not technology based, but the collection is something the tech people can appreciate.

Email Lists - I prefer blogs to email lists as I stated above, but there are three main email newsletters to which I subscribe that I read regularly.

Keep The Joint Running, http://www.issurvivor.com/, Bob Lewis sends out a weekly email about managing IT.
Out on a LIMS, http://www.geometrick.com/, Gloria Metrick of GeoMetrickEnterprises, produces a monthly email pointing to a LIMS specific article on the website.
Windows Secrets, http://windowssecrets.com, Brian Livingston, the former InfoWorld columnist, is the editor for this newsletter that provides insight into Windows. On more than one occasion, I have used problem workarounds described in this newsletter to solve work issues. There is a free version and paid version that provides more content.

I think staying informed on what is going on in the rest of the industry is important to learning. I am happy with the sampling of opinions and information that I get from my list, but I am also always looking for another good source of information. If anyone has found a relevant information source, I would love to hear about it.

Follow-up: Where Does Quality Come From?

2005-05-28T22:42:58Z

Over the last couple of weeks, there have been several blog posts from my colleagues that I have wanted to comment upon with more than just an on site comment. My next several blogs will comment on these past articles. Where Does Quality Come From by Jeff Vannest

]]> As Jeff continues with the stunning conclusion to this series of blogs, what have we learned so far?

1. I can't hold a metaphysical candle to Jeff when it comes to arguing philosophy.
2. The philosophy of Quality can be summarized as "Quality is in the eye of the beholder".

There has to be a way of measuring or defining "quality" (lowercase q) even if we can't measure or define "Quality" (uppercase q). Take two characteristics that are similar to quality: beauty and taste. Beauty is the quintessential characteristic of personal preference. We know that we all see different things as being beautiful. Yet, industry makes billions and billions of dollars selling and capitalizing on beauty. If beauty is truly in the eye of a beholder, how do magazine editors know who to put on the cover of a magazine? They know as we do, that while beauty is a personal judgment, if enough people think the same thing is beautiful, then it is beautiful. The same can be said of taste. We all have different food tastes, yet the "best" restaurants are always full. I know that these restaurants are best because they are full. I may not like everything on the menu at a restaurant, but enough people do so that I can extrapolate that the food tastes good. I can recognize that something has beauty even if I don't find it personally appealing. Surely we can say the same thing about quality, can't we? While I will grant that personal preference and style enter into the decision of what has quality when we are talking about quality in the sense of the industry, we really aren't talking about personal choice (Quality), but the accepted consensus of the group or authority figure (quality). And, this type of quality can be specified and measured. We can use empirical observation to determine what has the best quality and we can create Editor's Choices in our magazines to show readers what is best. In the final article of his series, Jeff makes the point that individuals can raise the quality of their environment. That is a hard point to argue against since I agree with this. A person can make the conscious choice to raise the quality of their environment. But sometimes, quality doesn't mean enhancing output or an environment, but merely adhering to an established standard. For example, there are Generally Accepted Accounting Practices in use by companies to report financial information. I will be the first to say that some of the accounting practices are just bad - especially the way that the accounting practices value (or don't) people. But the quality that the generally accepted practices offer is that everyone does it the same way. When someone deviates (see Enron scandal), we can say that there was a distinct lack of quality in the accounting output, no matter how creative and brilliant it was. So, perhaps this is a semantic issue. Perhaps when I hear the word "quality", I think about the whole and when Jeff hears the word "quality", he thinks about the individual. Maybe that is the only difference between our concepts. I think both have merit.

Follow-up: Decisions and Opinions

2005-05-28T19:54:34Z

]]> In his blog, Jason captured how we handle decisions at J&R- someone is in charge of making the decision. That person generally listens to all opinions and then makes the decision based on what they feel is the best course of action. This kind of decision-making respects everyone, but still forces a single person to choose a course of action. When I started in management, I struggled a lot with the level of input to accept from people. On one hand, I wanted to appear to be a strong leader, so I was willing to make decisions based on my own opinion. On the other hand, I wanted everyone to accept the choices made, so I looked for a consensus. I am sure that this frustrated people who were affected by my decisions. Over time, I came to the conclusion that the process that Jason describes is the right approach for myself and the company. Recently, I read a book called Leading IT: The Toughest Job In The World, by Bob Lewis. Lewis is a noted columnist for InfoWorld and has a weekly email newsletter called Keep the Joint Running. Both the column and the newsletter deal with IT and IT management. Chapter 3 in Leading IT is called "Making Decisions". In this chapter, Lewis states that making decisions is the central aspect of being a leader. He describes 5 types of decision making processes:

Authoritarianism - The leader decides what to do solely

Consensus - The leader makes all stakeholders uniformly agree with the decision

Consultation - The leader consults with stakeholders and then makes a decision

Delegation - The leader delegates the decision to someone else

Democracy - The leader choose the most popular decision from the stakeholders

Lewis describes the pros and cons for each of these, but comes to the conclusion that the one that scores the highest in terms of Speed, Buy-in, Cost, and Quality is Consultation, which is the technique that we use at J&R. From my experience, I think that Lewis is right on. And so is Jason.

Follow-up: Java Stored Procedures

2005-05-28T18:02:38Z

Java Stored Procedures in a LIMS Environment by Rob Sullivan

]]> In his blog, Rob did a good job of explaining the benefits of writing Java in an Oracle database. In the case study he mentions, the use of Java code was absolutely necessary. Without using Java, the code ran so slowly that it could not have been used in production. By rewriting large parts in Java, the developed product was able to be effectively used by the client. It is clear that having Java run in the database in a JVM (Java Virtual Machine) is a valuable feature of the Oracle database. Java has a place in the Oracle developer toolbox right next to PL/SQL.

But the same case study that Rob mentioned also exposes one of the weaknesses of running Java code in the database. After a period of use in production, users discovered that under certain circumstances the developed solution would generate an error message and the code would cease to function. After investigation, we determined that the problem was not with the code that was written, but instead was with the Java Virtual Machine installed in the database.

Java is designed to be a language that can be written once and executed on any platform that has a JVM installed. The JVM provides a consistent environment for the code to run regardless of what platform the JVM is installed. For example, Java code running inside a JVM on a Windows platform will theoretically run the same as Java code running inside a JVM on a Linux platform - as long as the Java code was written to be compatible with the version of JVM installed on both platforms.

The same principle works with the Oracle database JVM. The Oracle database JVM can execute code just as a Windows platform JVM does. In our case study, we discovered a problem with the Oracle JVM. The resolution to the problem was obvious. We needed to have an updated JVM installed in the database.

With JVM environments outside of a database, this is fairly routine. Sun (and others) produce JVM versions on a regular basis. Installing the JVM is as easy as installing any other software on the system. And because multiple versions of the JVM can be installed on the same machine, installing an updated JVM will not necessarily affect other Java applications.

The same cannot be said about the Oracle JVM. The Oracle JVM cannot be updated independent of the database being upgraded. Oracle produces the JVM that the database uses. In fact, the way to update the Oracle JVM is to upgrade or patch the database as a whole. In a regulated environment, this is not as easy a task as upgrading a JVM that exists outside of a database. In addition, because of validation effort and because many vendors develop applications dependent on specific versions of Oracle, some pharmaceutical companies are bound by which version of the database they can run. Upgrading the database may not be an option, which means that updating the JVM may not be an option. It is possible to be stuck with an older version of the JVM.

This situation isn't really that different from the situation with other proprietary database languages. They do not get updated either unless the database gets a new revision. The difference with Java is that Java is designed to be platform independent and to have the JVM be easily upgraded. That is not always the case when running Java in an Oracle database.

Java is still a good option for certain computational tasks running in the database, but the reality is that it is not always as easy as taking external java code and running it effectively in the Oracle database. Because of the way that the Oracle database environment is set, developers may be using outdated JVM environments for development.

Milestones and Celebrations

2005-05-15T00:59:51Z

I attended a college graduation ceremony for one of my young cousins today. Barely into the 4 hour ceremony, I asked myself why we go through "Pomp and Circumstance" when we graduate from school. This is the same question I asked myself at my own graduation years ago. I decided then that it was silly. I didn't even want to attend, to be honest. I knew the graduation represented a celebration of an accomplishment (earning a degree), but I just wanted to get on the other side of the ceremony to the part where I start making money. In thinking about this today, I recognized that ceremonies like the one I attended are important, but not just for the obvious reason.

]]> I attended a college graduation ceremony for one of my young cousins today. Barely into the 4 hour ceremony, I asked myself why we go through "Pomp and Circumstance" when we graduate from school. This is the same question I asked myself at my own graduation years ago. I decided then that it was silly. I didn't even want to attend, to be honest. I knew the graduation represented a celebration of an accomplishment (earning a degree), but I just wanted to get on the other side of the ceremony to the part where I start making money. In thinking about this today, I recognized that ceremonies like the one I attended are important, but not just for the obvious reason.

Sure, graduating from college with a degree is an accomplishment. Even if hard work wasn't present, endurance surely was. At my graduation, I didn't consider it much of an accomplishment, so I downplayed the celebration. But remove the accomplishment from the equation and minimally, graduating from college is a life milestone. Forgetting all of the minor milestones on a project plan for a minute, true milestones in life don't come very often- maybe just a handful in a lifetime: graduation, marriage, parenthood, promotions, etc. are few and far between. Yet each mark a significant point in life when change occurs. It is the change that we should be celebrating and these milestones should be cherished.

Recently, I have been reading two books by Jack Welch, the 20 year former CEO of General Electric. Jack: Straight from the Gut and Winning both press the message that companies need to celebrate success more. His premise in both books is that we identify so much with our jobs that when we struggle to succeed at work, we need to celebrate the accomplishments aggressively. After all, we don't expect our favorite football team to win the Super Bowl and then not spray champagne on each other. The ability to celebrate with work teammates is one of the keys to a winning organization that Welch presents in Winning.

For the same reasons Jack Welch points out, the struggles and transitions that graduating from college represent are enough to make a celebration necessary, even if that means wearing a silly costume and getting a bunch of pictures taken. Reasons to celebrate milestones come too infrequently to pass up the chance.

As of this writing, the newest member of our J&R Consulting staff, Chris Boyd, will be graduating from Xavier tomorrow with a degree in Computer Science. Although this message will be late for Chris' big day, my advice to him is to savor the day. Savor the ceremony, the pictures, the speeches, the hugs, the tears, and the dopes who write messages on their caps. Savor it all and recognize the milestone that this represents in your life. Soon enough, you will be in the daily grind and your project managers will forget to give you time to celebrate. Take the chance to do it now. I regret now that I didn't do the same at my own graduation.

Quality, Models, and Statistics (and even a dash of football)

2005-05-14T01:14:49Z

When I read Jeff's latest blog about Quality, I had the same reaction as when I read Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance. Reading both, I could almost hear myself say out loud, "What do you mean, you can't define quality? I can define quality; surely you can!". After all, I worked as a chemist in a quality control laboratory. I know what quality is. I made sure drug products had it before being shipped! I can define it. Anyone who worked in a QC or QA unit knows the correct definition of quality: adherence to specifications. If your specifications are met, you have a quality product. Think about it: if you have no defects, you have quality. If you consistently do what you set out to do, you are producing a quality service. Easy.

]]> As I write this, I can imagine Jeff stating, "So," pausing for dramatic effect, "if I make magic consultant juice and I say that there is somewhere between 0% and 100% magic included, as long as I am within my stated specifications, I have a quality product, right?"

Well, maybe there is more to quality than I first thought. How do the specifications get set? Don't they contribute to overall quality? I apparently know one of the important parameters of quality (adherence to specifications), but I am clearly missing the whole picture. This is a common mistake. People love to create simple models of complex systems in hopes of someday being able to describe the complex with only a single 'statistic'. I wanted to describe the complex using the simple and it didn't fully work for my definition of quality.

This wasn't my first foray into simple models for complex systems. I have been doing this my whole life in one way or another. In my early career, part of my job as a pharmaceutical stability chemist was to trend stability study results over time. I could do wonders with a regression line! When I started studying statistics formally, I learned the science of reducing large data sets (i.e. the world) into a small number of descriptors. I thought that this was the most powerful scientific tool available until I walked to my boss' desk and saw a quote on his desk.

"There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics" - Benjamin Disraeli

Later in my career, I had the "privilege" of studying accounting around the same time as the WorldCom and Enron situations. Accounting always seemed like a generally accepted method of fitting a square peg in a round hole, and the happenings at the time surely didn't lend credibility to the accounting model. On top of that, I learned in my accounting class that employees are an expense for a company. That helped explain why the company that I worked for at the time was reducing employees (layoffs) due to stock prices falling. Of course, the stock went up after a 10% workforce reduction. Based on my simple understanding of the accounting model, I deduced that by reducing all expenses (i.e. getting rid of all workers), the company could make that much more money. They didn't try that, though. Maybe the accounting model doesn't factor people in correctly.

Finally, from my earliest memories, I have been trying to discuss and analyze the performance of athletes using simple statistics. Hmmm, if a running back gains 4 yards per carry and a team has 4 downs to gain 10 yards, why doesn't the team run the ball every single time? By that statistic of running efficiency, they can't lose, right? No, there is more to the performance of a team than the statistical performance of an individual.

Trying to reduce a complex system down to a single representation sometimes skews the real picture, I guess. But, like Jeff, I have been unable to explain quality. Thank goodness he will set me straight in next week's blog!

I don't like writing blogs. That's why I do it.

2005-05-12T02:26:31Z

Ok, this is kind of like cheating - writing a blog about writing blogs. But since I hope there is a 'payload' somewhere in here, I think it still counts. I don't like writing blogs. It is hard - at least the kind of blogs that we write here. Here are the reasons I don't like it:

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In order to write a regular blog, I have to plan my time and activities in advance. I can't usually just sit down and write one. Except this one. I just sat down and wrote it.

I have to think of something to say. Usually this means either brainstorming many ideas way in advance or spending each day thinking a little about the big picture of the industry and my job.

I have to write my thoughts down in a way that makes sense and which can be communicated to someone else. I am not a natural writer. Creatively writing something adds stress to my life.

I have to put aside my fear of rejection. My blogs tend to have opinions in them (something to do with being a consultant, I think). Putting something out there on the Internet where many people theoretically could see it is scary. I don't want to poorly represent myself or the company.

So, writing this blog on a weekly basis makes me feel uncomfortable, and that is precisely why I know I have to do it. Writing the blog makes me uncomfortable because it is stretching me in ways that I obviously need to be stretched.

To be the best consultant that I can be:

I should be planning out my time more effectively. I work on multiple projects at a time and help support many other consultants. Blogging doesn't mean that my time is scheduled effectively, but practicing good time management helps me in all parts of my life.
I need to know more about this industry. When I started blogging, I had a number of ideas that I brought to the project. But since then, I have done research on books, management styles, and the industry in general in order to find topics to write about. We all can benefit from thinking more about our job and place in the industry.
I need to improve my writing. At this point in my career, I do more technical writing than coding. The coders in our group are thankful for that, even if the technical writers are not. I am convinced that effective business communication is as important in my job as any other single skill. Every time that I write something is another chance to express thoughts (sometimes complex, sometimes not) in a way that can be understood. This forum also forces me to write in a different style from time to time. The informal tone and subject matter of a blog forces me to change up styles every once in a while. Again, this only helps my writing.
I need to be more fearless. A fearful consultant is not doing justice to the client. I need to give honest opinion and direction. By throwing my thoughts out to the Internet, I am making myself vulnerable, which in turn makes me stronger and braver. Every time I write one of these, it makes me less afraid to do the next (even when I am writing about a subject like this).

Writing blogs is hard and makes me feel uncomfortable and, along with other aspects of the job that stretch me, it causes me to be a better consultant. I take comfort in that.

Project Management by Executive Meeting

2005-05-04T02:11:02Z

I was reminded again this week about my favorite project management technique for bringing a project that is starting to slip back on-track. The scenario goes like this: a project is defined by the business, and the management sets a deadline for the project. The project team creates a project plan around the deadline (not around the realistic and achievable end date), but because the project plan was forced to fit into the schedule, there is no contingency for tasks slipping. Invariably because of complex factors that the project team understands but management doesn't, the project starts to fall behind. The "solution": have executive management conduct daily meetings to pressure the project team to report that it is on-track.

]]> Almost every successfully run project has one major characteristic in common: it was planned well from the beginning and anticipated issues up front. Once a plan starts falling behind, it is extremely hard to try to bring it in on-time. Yet, one approach often used is to have the executive management conduct meetings with the project team in order to "resolve" issues. Outside management acts as if the project team members and project managers were goofing off during the project and it is their job to refocus everyone and lead them to success.
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In the short-term, this kind of strategy always seems to work. Some people on the project team get the picture- work harder or face the prospect of being eliminated. "This is a career limiting project". Of course, putting undue pressure on the project team does nothing to actually bring the project in within the defined parameters of quality and cost. It only forces people to exaggerate the truth about tasks or to temporarily work faster. It can't last. And team morale certainly takes a hit.

The shame of it is that this kind of pressure is well-intentioned (sort of). Management wants to help the project finish on-time. They want to lend their abilities to making the project a success. The problem is that experienced managers aren't used to helping a project leader succeed, especially if they are below them in the organizational chart. Managers are used to leading. So, these meetings invariably cause the project manager to have to report to an extra level of management that is trying to micro-manage the project. So, more time is wasted trying to bring the new leadership up to speed on the analysis work that the project team has done.

In reality, when management detects a project slippage, they can really help the situation. They can simply let the project manager know that management and management resources are at the project manager's disposal. With the extra resources at their disposal, the project manager is free to tackle the issues at hand. This illustrates the project’s importance and the confidence in the project management that true leaders ought to have.

Of course, management can also help by allowing the project team to set realistic end dates, but that is another story.

Peopleware

2005-04-27T04:03:31Z

How many times have you been involved in a conversation with a LIMS project stakeholder where the talk eventually gets to the question, "If I can build a building in 4 months, why does it take 2 years to put a LIMS in?" I have heard this question a half dozen times. Of course, anyone involved in IT projects in general knows that there is no simple answer and that trying to explain that can be an exercise in futility. Ultimately, it comes down to the fact that constructing buildings has been done for millennia; humans get the basic principles of that. IT projects are relatively new and each one requires a lot of human capital and a lot of knowledge invested in that human capital in order to actually pull it off.

]]> It follows, then, that the best way of having success in an LIMS project is to make sure that the right people are put in a situation to succeed. Without that basis, there is little chance of the project succeeding.

This is the basic premise of one of my favorite books on IT projects: Peopleware: Productive Projects and Teams, by Tom DeMarco and Timothy Lister. This book, first published in 1987, is hardly new. Yet the lessons contained within it are as applicable today as they were 20 years ago. A 2nd edition of the book was released in 1999 that updates some of the original topics contained within. I highly recommend this edition; if you work on projects that implement software, read it.

From a project perspective, several of the topics in the book strike home and apply to almost every project I have seen. Following are two of the book's premises.

1) Work Environment Matters for Knowledge Workers
If it is true that people implement systems (and I haven't seen a LIMS system yet that implements itself), then people that have a good work environment do a better job of implementing systems than those that do not.

DeMarco and Lister go into great detail about productivity gains available by putting knowledge workers in the proper environment. They also do a good job of mocking the furniture police that decide which is the best half-cubicle wall for the most important project resources to sit behind.

As a consultant, I have the opportunity to see the working environment of many companies. On the last three major projects I worked, the consulting resources had the following working environments:

a) a large "room" with 6 consultants in it. The walls to the "room" did not go up to the ceiling, it had no door, and it was next to the conference room (which also did not have walls that went to the ceiling). If anyone on the floor breathed, everyone heard it.

b) a cube farm in a room that seated about 60 people. The acoustics of the room allowed a person at one end to hear the phone conversations taking place on the other end. Of course conference rooms were converted to temporary work areas, so workers had speakerphone telecons in their cubes. Again, every sound and phone call was heard by everyone. Both this and the environment above required knowledgeable workers to put headphones on just to try to concentrate on work.

c) no place for consultants to sit at all. Each week, every consultant tried to find a full-time person's desk that was not around that week. They would then stake that out for the week. Some weeks when not enough people were out sick, it was two to a desk. Luckily at this place, it was rare for people to not be out sick.

Each project wanted the consultants to be on-site as much as possible to boot. If you use consultants or contractors on your project, take note: putting multiple people together in a room does not foster communication; it fosters distraction. I recognize that these work environments are not the domain of consultants only. Full-time employees work in these conditions. Accepting these types of environments guarantees inefficiency and delays.

2) Part of the manager's (project or organizational) job is to allow project members to get into a creative zone instead of being constantly interrupted.

The authors of the book describe that in order to do really productive work, a person has to get into a ' creative zone'. Anyone familiar with sports or who has been engrossed in a development project at 2:00 am will register with the idea of a time when they were ultra-productive for a period of time. According to the book, it takes a person a significant amount of time to build up the concentration to get into a zone. Every phone call, email, and instant message can interrupt the concentration and prevent a person from getting into their ultra-productive time. In my opinion, it is part of a project manager's job to make sure that team members are allowed to go interrupt-free as often as possible in order to be productive. The opposite (constant meetings, emails, and phone calls) simply causes so many distractions in a day that nothing ever gets done.

Peopleware has many more incredibly relevant points that I haven't touched here and I have many more stories from projects that did not follow the basic tenets of the book - but that is a future blog…