Search results matching tags 'Concepts' and 'Career'

How Does the Cloud Change a Developer's Job?

BuckWoody — Tue, 12 Feb 2013 16:26:51 GMT

I've recently posted a blog on how cloud computing would change the Systems Architect’s role in an organization, another on how the cloud changes a Database Administrator's job, and the last post dealt with the Systems Administrator. In this post I'll cover the changes facing the Software Developer when using the cloud.

The software developer role was the earliest adopter of cloud computing. This makes perfect sense, because the software developer has always used computing "as a service" - they (most often) don't buy and configure servers, platforms and the like, they write code that runs on those platforms. And there's probably not a simpler definition of a software developer to be found, but as with all simple statements, you lose fidelity and detail. I'll offer a more complete list in a moment.

Because the software developer's process involves designing, testing and writing code locally and then migrating it to a production environment, all of the paradigms in cloud computing - from IaaS to PaaS to SaaS - come naturally.

The Software Developer's Role

The software developer has evolved since the earliest days of programming.The software developer not only "writes code" - there are far more tasks involved in modern systems development:

Assisting the Business Role(s) in developing software specifications
Planning software system components and modules
Designing system components
Working in teams writing classes, modules, interfaces and software endpoints
Designing data layouts, architectures, access and other data controls
Designing and implementing security, either programmatic, declarative, or referential
Mixing and matching various languages, scripting and other constructs within the system
Designing and implementing user and account security rights and restrictions
Designing various software code tests - unit, functional, fuzz, integration, regression, performance and others
Deploying systems
Managing and maintaining code updates and changes

Like most of the previous roles, those tasks also unpacks into a larger set of tasks, and no single developer has exactly that same list. And like the DBA, the role is often more, or less of that list based on where the developer works. Smaller companies may include the development platform in the duties so that a developer is also a systems administrator. In larger organizations I've seen developers that specialized on User Interfaces, Engine Components, Data Controls or other specific areas.

How the Cloud Changes Things

The software developer role obviously has the same concerns and impacts of "the cloud" as the Systems Architect. They need to educate themselves on the options within this new option (Knowledge), try a few test solutions out (Experience) and of course work with others on various parts of the implementation (Coordination).

The big changes for a developer include three major areas: Hybrid Software Design, Security, and Distributed Computing.

Hybrid Software Design

After the PC revolution, software developers designed systems that ran primarily on a single computer. From there the industry moved to "client/server", where most of the code still lived on the user's workstation, and various levels of state (such as the data layer) moved to a server over fast connected lines. After than followed the Internet phase, which had less to do with HTML coding than it did with state-less architectures. While no architecture is truly stateless, there are ways of allowing the client to be in a different state than the server of the application at any one time - this is the way the Web works.

Even so, the developer often simply moved one the primary layers (such as Model, View or Controller) to the server, using the User Interface merely as the View or Presentation layer. While technically stateless, this doesn't require a great deal of architecture change - there are various software modules that run on a server, and perhaps that connects to a remote data server. In the end, it's still a single paradigm.

We now have the ability to run IaaS (hardware abstraction), PaaS (hardware, operating system and runtime abstraction) and SaaS (everything abstracted, API calls only) in a single environment such as Windows Azure. A single application might have a Web-based Interface Server with federated processes (using a PaaS set of roles), a database service (using a SaaS provider such as Windows Azure SQL Database), a specialized process in Linux (using an IaaS role in Windows Azure) and a translator API (from the Windows Azure Marketplace). This example involves only one vendor - Microsoft. I've seen applications that use multiple vendors in this same way.

Thinking this way opens up a great deal of flexibility - and complexity. Complexity isn't evil; it's how complicated things get done many times. The modern developer needs to understand how to build hybrid software architectures.

Resources: Hybrid Architectures with step-by-step instructions and examples: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/hh871440.aspx and Windows Azure Hybrid Systems: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/hh871440.aspx?AnnouncementFeed

Security

Having a single security boundary, such as "everyone who works in my company", is a relatively simple problem to solve. Normally the System Administrators configure and control a security provider, such as Active Directory, and developers can access that security layer programmatically. That allows for good separation of duties and role-based control.

In modern applications, clients, managers, and users both internal and external need various levels of access to the same objects, code and data. A client should be able to enter an order, a store should be able to accept the order, the credit-card company should be able to check the order and authorize payment, and the managers should be able to report on the order or change it if needed. Using role-based security across multiple domains would be impossible to maintain.

Enter "claims-based" authentication. In this paradigm, the user logs in with whatever security they use - corporate or other Active Directory, Facebook, Google, whatever. The application (using Windows Identity Foundation or WIF) can accept a "claim" from that provider, and the developer can match whatever parts of that claim they wish to the objects, code and data. And example might be useful.

Buck logs in to his corporate Active Directory (AD), and attempts to use a program based in Windows Azure. Windows Azure rejects the login silently, and is configured to check with Buck's AD. Buck's AD says "yes, I know Buck, and he has been granted the following claims: "partner", "manager", "approver". The developer does not need to know about Buck's AD, Buck, his login, or anything else. She simply codes the proper data access to allow "approver" to approve a sale.

This allows a lot of control, at a very fine level, without having to get into the details of each security provider. .

Resources: Overview of using claims-based Azure Security: http://adnanboz.wordpress.com/2011/02/06/claims-based-access-and-windows-azure/

Distributed Computing

Is there a difference between stateless computing, or even the hybrid programming I mentioned earlier, and "Distributed Computing"? Yes - the primary difference is latency. Even stateless code can have too small a tolerance for latency.

Dealing with slow connectivity, or breaks in connections has many impacts. One method of dealing with this is to locate data and computing of that data as closely as possible, even if this means relaxing consistency or duplicating data. Another method is to go back to a great paradigm from the past that is possible underused today is a Service Oriented Architecture. The Windows Azure Service Bus is possibly one of the fastest and easiest way to adopt cloud computing without completely rearchitecting your application.

References: Great breakdown of the thought process around a distributed architecture: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/magazine/jj553517.aspx and using a Windows Azure Relay Service: http://www.windowsazure.com/en-us/develop/net/how-to-guides/service-bus-relay/

How Does the Cloud Change a Systems Administrator's Job?

BuckWoody — Tue, 05 Feb 2013 15:46:02 GMT

I recently posted a blog entry on how cloud computing would change the Systems Architect’s role in an organization, and another on how the cloud changes a database administrator's job. This time I'll cover a few of the changes the cloud brings for the Systems Administrator.

The systems administrator shares some similarity with the database administrator, in that it's rare to find a single job description that fits all people in that role. There are some basic similarities among various organizations, so I'll use those as a starting point.

The Systems Administrator Role

The systems administrator role is perhaps one of the earliest in technology, at least as far as the implementation of a system goes. In the earliest days of computing, electronic technical professionals built prototype computers, and newly minted "programmers" wrote logical instructions for these systems. In time, the systems administration role owned the installation, configuration, operation and tuning of these systems once they went into production and use on a larger scale. A few of the tasks associated with the role are:

Planning, installing and configuring systems
Planning, designing and creating storage, networking and other system components
Planning, designing and implementing High Availability and Disaster Recovery for each system
Maintaining and monitoring systems
Implementing performance tuning systems based on monitoring
Re-balancing workloads across servers based on monitoring
Securing systems, networks and individual computers based on requirements and implementation
Planning, implementing and controlling user and account security rights and restrictions

Like the DBA, that’s just a short list, and each of those tasks also unpacks into a larger set of tasks. And like the DBA, the role is often more, or less of that list based on where the system administrator works. In smaller companies I've been a "systems administrator" that also ran the database and mail servers, web systems, front-line end-user support and made the coffee. In larger organization I was only able to spend the day on one or two parts of that list, since there were so many systems and they interacted with so many other systems.

Systems administrators often deal with multiple operating systems. In one company where I was a system administrator, I worked with no less than six operating systems from mainframes to PC servers, two of them highly specialized to the hardware.

How the Cloud Changes Things

The systems administrator has the same concerns and impacts of "the cloud" as the DBA and the Systems Architect. They need to educate themselves on the options within this new option (Knowledge), try a few test solutions out (Experience) and of course work with others on various parts of the implementation (Coordination).

I've mentioned the three big buckets of cloud computing, dealing with Virtual Machines (IaaS) writing code (PaaS) and using software that’s already written and being delivered via an Application Programming Interface (API). In my experience, the systems administrator role normally tackles the first "bucket" most often - IaaS, which has at its base the technology of virtualization.

Virtualization

One of the first areas the systems administrator is involved with "the cloud" is in the area of virtualization. This technology isn't new - in fact, I worked on Virtual Machines (VM's) way back in my mainframe days. It's the process of using software to emulate hardware - which has implications far beyond that simple sentence.

Virtualization is normally a standard on-premises process. When you take Virtual Machines and host them in another location, this is called Co-Location, or CoLo. Personally, I don't define either of these activities as "Cloud" computing - it's simply virtualization. Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) normally involves several more components, at the very least being able to set up the systems (provision) and deploy them in a standard, automated way. It also involves (at a minimum) the ability to monitor, move and alter the systems using a prescribed methodology. There are other parts of IaaS to be sure, but this level above simply scripting installations or virtualizing a machine is where the system administrator becomes involved in this new "cloud computing" paradigm.

There are multiple VM technologies available, from the hypervisor that is built-in to the Windows operating system (Hyper-V) to third-party alternatives such as VMWare. The choice of cloud provider often dictates the selection of hypervisor. Windows Azure uses Hyper-V, and allows you to move systems from the cloud to the desktop and back again. Other providers use VMWare, or a proprietary format. Some allow you to push or pull images from the cloud service, others do not. The systems administrator must educate themselves on the business need and then select the cloud provider that best fits the requirements for a workload. It's also common to use several cloud providers within a single company.

Resources: Windows Azure Virtual Machines: http://www.windowsazure.com/en-us/manage/windows/tutorials/virtual-machine-from-gallery/ and System Center: http://blogs.technet.com/b/server-cloud/archive/2011/12/01/managing-and-monitoring-windows-azure-applications-with-system-center-2012.aspx

Cloud Computing Architecture - Private, Public and Hybrid

It's important to note that IaaS can be on-premises, at another facility, or both. The first is called "private cloud", the second "public cloud", and the third "hybrid cloud". Yes, these are marketing terms, but they are useful in describing where the decisions are for deploying a system. If data security is paramount, then private cloud may be the right choice for a given workload. If agility or cost is an issue, public cloud may be the right answer for another workload. And in many cases - perhaps most - using both architectures is the right way to split the workload.

The key is to understand the workload well. In the past the system administrator needed to know the component requirements, such as how much memory, CPU, network and storage a workload needed. In cloud computing, these are also concerns, but you need to add in the questions of cost, business use, location of users, security and other vectors. These concerns bring the systems administrator closer to the business and its goals.

Resources: Windows Azure Hybrid Systems: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/hh871440.aspx?AnnouncementFeed

DevOps

One new term introduced into cloud computing is "DevOps" - short for Developer Operations. Not everyone agrees that this is even a real "thing" - that it's a made-up term by cloud vendors. Regardless, there is a new set of tasks that the cloud brings that may sit within the purview of the system administrator.

Basically it involves the administration needed at the PaaS or SaaS level. The IaaS function of cloud computing holds most of the same characteristics as an on-premises system, defined the in the first list I mentioned above. But when the organization uses Platform as a Service, the operating system, much of the security, scale and other components of infrastructure are abstracted into the platform, and are often even controlled by the developer.

But once the application "goes live", there are a host of billing, controlling, scaling and other security questions that developers aren't equipped to handle. Who takes care of those? As companies are finding out, they need to appoint someone to cover these overlapped areas between developers and administrators.

References: How DevOps brings order: http://searchcloudcomputing.techtarget.com/feature/How-DevOps-brings-order-to-a-cloud-oriented-world and Managing Windows Azure: http://www.windowsazure.com/en-us/manage/overview/

How Does the Cloud Change a Database Administrator’s Job?

BuckWoody — Tue, 29 Jan 2013 15:08:32 GMT

I recently posted a blog entry on how cloud computing would change the Systems Architect’s role in an organization. In a way, the Systems Architect has the easiest transition to a new way of using computing technologies. In fact, that’s actually part of the job description. I mentioned that a Systems Architect has three primary vectors to think about for cloud computing, as it applies to what they should do:

Knowledge - Which options are available to solve problems, and what are their strengths and weaknesses.
Experience - What has the System Architect seen and worked with in the past.
Coordination - A system design is based on multiple factors, and one person can't make all the choices. There will need to be others involved at every level of the solution, and the Systems Architect will need to know who those people are and how to work with them.

The Database Administrator Role

But a Database Administrator (DBA) is probably one of the harder roles to think about when it comes to cloud computing. First, let’s define what a Database Administrator usually thinks about as part of their job:

Planning, Installing and Configuring a Database Platform
Planning, designing and creating databases
Planning, designing and implementing High Availability and Disaster Recovery for each database (HADR) based on requirements for its workload
Maintaining and monitoring the database platform
Implementing performance tuning on the databases based on monitoring
Re-balancing workloads across database servers based on monitoring
Securing databases platforms and individual databases based on requirements and implementation

That’s just a short list, and each of those unpacks into a larger set of tasks.

The issue is that I’ve never actually met a DBA that does all of those things, or just all of those things. Many times they do much more, sometimes the systems are so large they specialize on just a few of them.

And as you can see from the list, some of these areas are shared with other roles. For instance, in some shops, the DBA plans, purchases, sets up and configures the hardware for database servers. In others that’s done
by the Infrastructure Team. In some shops the DBA designs databases from software requirements, and in others the developers do that – or perhaps it’s done as a joint effort. The same holds true for database code – sometimes the
DBA does it, other times the developer, and still others it’s a shared task.

In fact, you could argue that there are few other roles in IT where the roles are so intermixed. Also, the DBA works with software the company develops, and software the company buys. They work with hardware, networking, security and software. There are certain aspects of design and tuning that are outside the purview of some of those things, and inside the others.

With all of these variables, simply telling a DBA that they should “use the cloud” is not the proper approach.

How the Cloud Changes Things

To be sure, the DBA has the same vectors as the Systems Architect. They need to educate themselves on the options within this new option (Knowledge), try a few test solutions out (Experience) and of course work with others on various parts of the implementation (Coordination). But it goes beyond that.

There are three big buckets of cloud computing, dealing with simply using a Virtual Machine (IaaS) to writing code without worrying about the virtualization or even the operating system (PaaS) and using software that’s already written and being delivered via an Application Programming Interface (API). Each of these has so many options and configurations that it’s often better to think about the problem you’re trying to solve rather than all of the technology within a given area - although some of that is certainly necessary anyway.

Database Platform Architecture

I’ll start with when the DBA should even consider cloud computing for a solution. Once again, it’s not an “all or nothing” paradigm, where you either run something on premises or in the cloud – it’s often a matter of selecting the right components to solve a problem. In my design sessions with DBA’s I break these down into three big areas where they might want to consider the cloud –and then we talk about how to implement each one:

Audiences
HADR
Data Services

Audiences

If the users of your database systems all sit in the same facility, you own the servers and networking, and the application servers are separate from the database server, it doesn’t usually make sense to take that database workload and place it on Windows Azure – or any other cloud provider. The latency alone prevents a satisfactory performance profile, and in some cases won’t work at all. It doesn’t matter if the cloud solution is cheaper or easier – if you’re moving a lot of data every second between an on-premises system and the cloud it won’t work well.

However – if your users are in multiple locations, especially globally, or you have a mix of company and external customer users, it might make sense to evaluate a shared data location. You still need to consider the implications of how much data the application server pushes back and forth, but you may be able to locate both the application server and SQL Server in an IaaS role. Assuming the data sent to the final client will work across public Internet channels, there may be a fit. There are security implications, but unless you have point-to-point connections for your current solution you’re faced with the same security questions on both options.

Your audience might also be developers looking for a way to quickly spin up a server and then turn it down when they are done, paying for the time and not the hardware or licenses. This is also a prime case for evaluating IaaS. And there are others that you'll find in your own organization as you work through the requirements you have.

Resources: Windows Azure Virtual Machines: http://www.windowsazure.com/en-us/manage/windows/tutorials/virtual-machine-from-gallery/ and Windows Azure SQL Server Virtual Machines: http://www.windowsazure.com/en-us/manage/windows/common-tasks/install-sql-server/

HADR

The next possible place to consider using cloud computing with SQL Server is as a part of your High Availability and Disaster Recovery plans. In fact, this is the most common use I see for cloud computing and the Database Administrator. The key is the Recovery Point Objective (RPO) and Recovery Time Objective (RTO). Based on each application’s requirements, you may find that using Windows Azure or even supplementing your current plan is
the right place to evaluate options. I’ve covered this use-case in more detail in another article.

References: SQL Server High Availability and Disaster Recovery options with Windows Azure: http://blogs.msdn.com/b/buckwoody/archive/2013/01/08/microsoft-windows-azure-disaster-recovery-options-for-on-premises-sql-server.aspx

Data Services

Windows Azure, along with other cloud providers, offers another way to design, create and consume data. In this use-case, however, the tasks DBA’s normally perform for sizing, ordering and configuring a system don’t apply.

With Windows Azure SQL Databases (the artist formerly known as SQL Azure), you can simply create a database and begin using it. There are places where this fits and others where it doesn’t, and there are differences, limitations and enhancements, so it isn’t meant as replacement for what you could do with “Full-up” SQL Server on a Windows Azure Virtual Machine or an on-premises Instance. If a developer needs an Relational Database Management
(RDBMS) data store for a web-based application, then this might be a perfect fit.

But there is more to data services than Windows Azure SQL Databases. Windows Azure also offers MySQL as a service, RIAK and MongoDB (among others) and even Hadoop for larger distributed data sets. In addition you can use Windows Azure Reporting Services, and also tap into datasets and data functions in the Windows Azure Marketplace.

The key for the DBA with this option is that you will have to do a little investigation this time, and potentially without a specific workload in mind this time. I think that’s acceptable thing to ask – DBA’s constantly keep up with data processing trends, and most will consider different ways to solve a problem.

References:

Windows Azure SQL Databases: http://www.windowsazure.com/en-us/home/features/data-management/

Windows Azure Reporting Services: http://www.windowsazure.com/en-us/manage/services/other/sql-reporting/

HDInsight Service (Hadoop on Azure): https://www.hadooponazure.com/

MongoDB Offerings on Windows Azure: http://www.windowsazure.com/en-us/manage/linux/common-tasks/mongodb-on-a-linux-vm/

Windows Azure Marketplace: http://www.windowsazure.com/en-us/store/overview/

How Does the Cloud Change a Systems Architect’s Job?

BuckWoody — Tue, 22 Jan 2013 15:43:59 GMT

I know - I said I didn't like the "cloud" term, but my better-phrased "Distributed Systems" moniker just never took off like I had hoped. So I'll stick with the "c" word for now, at least until the search engines catch up with my more accurate term.

I thought I might spend a little time on how the cloud affects the way we work - from Systems Architects to Database Administrators and Developers, and Systems Administrators - a group often referred to as "IT Pro's". But each role within these groups have different aspects when using cloud computing. In this post we'll take a look at the role of the Systems Architect, and in the posts that follow I'll talk more about the other roles in the IT Pro area.

The Systems Architect Role

What does a "Systems Architect" do? Like most IT roles, it depends on the company or organization where they work. In fact, the term isn't even specific to technology, but I'll use it in that context here. In general, a Systems Architect takes the requirements for a given system, and assembles the relevant technology areas that best fulfill those requirements. That's a single-sentence explanation, and needs further unpacking.

As an example, a Systems Architect at a medical firm is presented with a set of requirements for tracking a patient through the entire care cycle. The Systems Architect first looks at all of the requirements for the data that needs to be collected based on business, financial, regulations, and other requirements, and then how that data needs to flow from one system to another. They check the security requirements, performance, location and other aspects of the system. They then check to see which options are available for processing that data, and which parts they should "build or buy".

For instance, the requirements might be so specific that only custom code is the proper solution - but even there, choices still exist, such as which language(s) to use, what type of data persistence (a Relational Database Management System or or other data storage and processing) will be used, what talent within the company is available for the system and a myriad of other decision.

All of this boils down to three primary vectors:

Knowledge - Which options are available to solve problems, and what are their strengths and weaknesses.
Experience - What has the System Architect seen and worked with in the past.
Coordination - A system design is based on multiple factors, and one person can't make all the choices. There will need to be others involved at every level of the solution, and the Systems Architect will need to know who those people are and how to work with them.

How the Cloud Changes Things

From the outset, it doesn't seem that using a distributed system would change anything in the Systems Architect role. Isn't the cloud simply another option that the Systems Architect needs to learn and apply? Yes, that is true - but it goes a bit deeper. Let's return to those vectors a moment to see what a Systems Architect needs to take into account.

Knowledge

The first and probably most obvious impact is learning about cloud technologies. But the important part of that knowledge is to learn when and where to use each service. It's a common misconception that the cloud should be an "all or nothing" approach. That's just not true - every Windows Azure project I work on has some element of on-premises interaction, and in some cases only one small part of a solution is placed on the Windows Azure architecture. Since Windows Azure contains IaaS (VM's) PaaS (you write code, we run it) and even SaaS (Such as Hadoop or Media Services), a given architecture can use multiple components even within just one provider. And I've worked on several projects where the customer used not only Windows Azure and On-Premises environments, but also components from other providers. That's not only acceptable, but often the best way to solve a given problem.

As part of the learning experience, it's vital to keep in mind what you need to pick as key decision points. In your organization, cost could be ranked higher than performance, or perhaps security is the highest decision point.

To stay educated, there are various journals, websites and conferences that Systems Architects use to keep current. Almost all of those are talking about "cloud" - but there is no substitute for learning from the vendor about their solution. I'm speaking here of the technical information, not the marketing information. The marketing information is also useful, at least from a familiarity standpoint, but the technical information is what you need.

Resource: For Windows Azure, the Systems Architect can start here: http://blogs.msdn.com/b/buckwoody/archive/2012/06/13/windows-azure-write-run-or-use-software.aspx

Experience

Cloud computing is relatively new - it's only been out a few years, and the main competitors are only now settling in to their respective areas. It might not be common for a Systems Architect to have a lot of hands-on experience with cloud projects.

Even so, there are ways to leverage the experience of others, such as direct contact or even attending conferences where customers present findings from their experiences.

You can also gain hands-on experience by setting up pilots and proof-of-concept projects yourself. Most all vendors - Microsoft included - have free time available on their systems. The key to an experiment like this is choosing some problem you are familiar with that exercises as many features in the platform as possible. There is no substitute for working with a platform when you want to design a solution.

Coordination

Probably one of the largest changes in the Systems Architect role that the cloud brings is in the area of coordination. When a Systems Architect deals with the business and other technical professionals, there is a 20+ year history of technology that we are all familiar with. When you mention "the cloud", those audiences may not have spent the time you have in understanding what that means - and often they think it means the "all or nothing" approach I mentioned earlier.

I've found that a series of "lunch and learns" for the technical staff is useful to explain to each role-group how the cloud is used in their area is useful. In the posts that follow this one, I'll give you some material for those. For managers and business professionals, you'll want to go a different route. I've found that an "Executive Briefing" e-mail, consisting of about a page, with headings that are applicable to your audience.

Resource: Writing Executive Summaries: http://writing.colostate.edu/guides/guide.cfm?guideid=76

How I Work– Working From Home

BuckWoody — Tue, 17 Jul 2012 13:54:24 GMT

I work from home – and I would find it difficult to work any other way. For decades I’ve worked in traditional offices, cubicle-farms, and open-plan work areas. I find them too bright, too loud, too distracting, and in some cases, too depressing to be effective. Working from home offers me a zero-commute, largely stress-free way of working that I really like. I just find it one of the most effective, efficient and enjoyable ways to work.

But there are some caveats.

I’ve read a lot of blogs that talk about how difficult it is to work from home, articles that explain how ineffective home workers are, and how it’s difficult to monitor and manage remote workers. I find those interesting, since I’ve not experienced that. I thought I might take a few moments to explain how I work at home, and the attributes that make this style of working most effective. Every person is different, so perhaps it’s a combination of factors that make working remotely successful for one person and not another.

Personal Work Style

I am a very self-motivated person. I am goal-oriented, which means that when I’m given an assignment, I start a work-back schedule and immediate sort out my time and start working the tasks to get to the goal. And I don’t have to be given a specific goal – if my company gives me the direction they want to go, I’ll make goals that take us both in that direction. That’s a large part of working remotely – you have to be self-motivated.

I also like to focus during certain periods of time. No music, no talking, no e-mail, twitter, or Facebook; no interruptions, just an hour or so of “heads-down” work. I don’t work like that all the time, but when I do, I want that extreme focus available. Working remotely allows me to control the environment enough to do that.

In fact, I don’t like having set tasks to do each day. I can certainly do that kind of work, but I’d much rather work towards a goal, and set up my own tasks.

To work remotely, you’ll need to be self-motivated as well. In many cases, those who work remotely don’t have a daily stand-up meeting or scrum that they are part of. That means no one is watching to see if they are on-task – and for some folks, that allows them not to be as focused as having that pressure of knowing they are being tracked.

You’ll need to be able to stay focused on the work you need to do. It is incredibly easy to be sidetracked when you work remotely. You have to be ruthless about looking forward to the goal, creating a schedule and staying on that schedule. I live and die by my Outlook Tasks. Every e-mail I get is turned into a task if there is anything needed from me. I make those tasks visible to my boss, so he knows at all times what I’m up to without bothering me for status. When I finish the work, I close the task.

You’ll need to be able to be “compartmentalized”. When you’re at work, be at work. When you’re done, shut it off. When you’re working at home, it’s far too easy for those lines to become blurred, and for your home and work life to mix. Some of that is unavoidable, but I minimize it as much as I can. Even my family helps – they know that when I’m in my room that serves as my office with the door closed, I’m not home. I’m at work. Unless it’s an emergency, they treat it as if I’ve left the house.

That doesn’t mean I work 9-5 – far from it. I get up very early, and make coffee, open up the house, and turn on the laptop. I check e-mail (but I don’t answer them yet) social networks, and my RSS feeds (I have several hundred I glance through). When my family wakes up a few minutes later, I stop work, we go for a walk around a pond near our home (about a half-a mile) rain or snow. We come back, I get back to work on the day’s tasks. I stop again, we eat breakfast together, and then my wife is off to work and my daughter is off to school. I’m now ready to start phone calls, client visits, or work on architectures and solutions. When I can I eat lunch, take the dog for another walk, and get back to work. My daughter comes home from school, and I stop and chat with her about her day. She goes off to do her homework, and I get back to work. When my wife gets home in the evenings, I stop work, cook dinner, and then read most nights when I’m not teaching college. On the weekends we go various places around Washington and Oregon, and on Sundays I go to church. I do have to work a weekend here or there, but I don’t work on Sunday – or even open the laptop very often – unless I have to. That’s my schedule, and it suits me not to have to sit in traffic or deal with office politics. I’m most effective this way.

Work

Not every job can be done remotely.

I chose the Role I have at Microsoft carefully, and in the largest part because it allows me to work remotely. My job is to support customers when they are investigating using our technologies to solve a problem. It’s at various parts of the sales cycle, but I’m assigned a territory (the entire Pacific Northwest of the U.S.) to work directly with our clients and whatever team at Microsoft is helping them at the moment. I currently work with Windows Azure, specializing in things like architecting systems, data systems, and security. That means I’m either on a web-conference, at the client’s office, or working architecture designs. That lends itself well to working remotely.

So your work needs to be able to be done remotely. If you’re able to use e-mail and the phone/webcam to communicate, if your work doesn’t require a lot of in-person meetings, and if you’re able to work independently and then submit your part of the work to a larger group using a computer network, then you’re probably able to work remotely. Also, if your work involves visiting clients often you’re not in the office most of the time anyway – so you could probably work remotely then as well.

Environment

Having the location and tools to work remotely is essential to success. First, you need a place where you can work. I have a home office, a dedicated room in the house that I use for work. It has a door, and when I close that I can isolate myself for calls, web broadcasts, collaboration and to focus. For me, a specific, private room or place in the house is very important.

That being said, I very often take my office with me to another location. When the family leaves for the day, I can pick up my laptop (I use a Lenovo X220 with SSD’s and a lot of RAM, with Windows 8 and Microsoft Office) and head outside when the weather is nice. I grab a cup of coffee, head to the porch, and stay heads-down on the work. Sometimes I go to a coffee shop, sometimes I go to the Public Library, a University of Washington location, or just by a lake or stream. When I am remote I take my phone with me.

You’ll need a fast Internet connection – business class if you can get it – if you’re doing web conferences. You want to remain professional, and nothing says “I’m an amateur” faster than a spotty network connection, especially if you use an IP phone. My company doesn’t pay for the connection, I just treat it as my commute-money. It’s worth it. And you’ll need a backup. I do have a MiFi device in case I’m by that pond or mountain or when the Internet goes out – I don’t rely on public Internet when I’m out. And I try to be on my business class Internet when I’m on a call or web conference. If I have to I’ll drive in to a Microsoft office to use a dedicated connection if the one at home is out. I won’t compromise the client’s experience on my convenience.

I have an inexpensive server in the house, where I run Windows 2008 R2 Server. I have several VM’s there that I remote into, and those are my demo machines, development workstations and so on. I back that up to an external drive which I keep at a friend’s house. I also make sure all of my critical work files are kept in Windows Azure storage for a remote backup.

I use my regular laptop for just a few tools:

OneNote – For everything. I use it for typing, a light spreadsheet and math tool, graphics, presenting (yup, that’s what I use), whiteboarding, everything. I use my Windows Live SkyDrive for all my notebooks, and then I open them using the local OneNote tool. That way I have the rich tool interface, backups of all my data, and when needed I can use the web OneNote to do my work on any computer connected to the Internet. I can even share out the NoteBooks (I do this all the time) and work with clients or internal teams real-time. It’s a one-product SharePoint, at least for me.
Outlook – From e-mail to RSS feeds to calendar and tasks, I live and die on Outlook. Once again I use the “fat” client for almost everything local, but connected over the web interface whenever I need to, and of course that’s backed up on corporate.
PowerPoint – don’t be a hater. I love PowerPoint. In fact, every time (every single time) I’ve seen someone whining about how bad PowerPoint is I find out they stink at using PowerPoint. If you take the time to learn it, you can do everything from presentations to simple designs, whiteboarding and even full on training sessions using it. I also store the Presos on my Skydrive, and I can (and have) presented from Office Live Apps.
Visual Studio – I do all my coding, database and data work, and design work in VS. I check all my code into GIT or VSTS, depending on the client.
Lync – One of the best communication tools I’ve used. It’s my IP phone, internal chat, internal groups, webcam presentation, and a really nice collaborative whiteboard tool. I do entire design sessions using only Lync.

You’ll have to decide whether you like a noisy, busy environment, or a quiet, serene one. I like both, depending on what I’m doing. I normally work mostly here at home listing to music, but from time to time I’ll get out where there are more people I can interact with.

Communication

You’ll find that working at home can be very solitary. The whole point of being away from everyone is that you’re away from everyone – but this can be a problem. You need periodic interaction. I have regular staff meetings online with my team, I stay connected and chat often using Lync, and I do visit client and Microsoft offices from time to time.

And I use social media. Twitter I use for general chatter, and I do this throughout the day when I’m waiting for a compile or some other task to finish. Facebook is where I post more family or longer interactions. LinkedIn, which I use a great deal, is for only work-related information, chats, groups and so on. Can these be time-wasters, or not be useful? Of course. That’s where the self-discipline comes in. I put into those networks exactly what I want out of them, and when I’m busy, I shut them off.

I don’t like e-mail. I get tons of it – but I try to use the phone whenever I can. I think that’s especially important for a remote worker. I also make sure my boss knows what I’m up to. I want to make sure come promotion time that he knows I’m effective, efficient, and valuable. That means chatting with him on a weekly basis, and letting him know my successes and challenges. I don’t want our first conversation to be at review time.

And I go to in-person events as often as I can. From PASS to SQL Saturdays, user groups, anything I can make time for. These are not part of my job – I’m not paid to do public speaking, nor is it a requirement of my job – but I’ll volunteer to speak so that I can go to an event.

The key is to develop your lines of peer-to-peer contacts with whatever tools you like so that you’re not an island. I use Lync, internal groups at Microsoft, and LinkedIn to stay up to date with my industry peers. There’s a lot of chaff in all of those, but I put the work in to make them effective for me.

Company

Your company has to buy in to all this.

If they simply allow you (begrudgingly) to work at home, you’re doomed to fail. You’ll be left out of the loop, not invited to meetings, forgotten, and your professional brand will slowly wither and die. You have to get your manager and your company to see the value in your not taking up space in their building. You have to sell it.

Microsoft is very remote-worker friendly. They have an entire set of tools to make us successful. We have training for working remotely, and our managers are trained to have remote workers. Some do that well, others don’t. I don’t work for the managers that aren’t good at managing remote workers.

So it seems that there are a lot of factors that go into making a successful remote worker – it’s not just staying at home in your pajamas, checking e-mails now and again. It’s a combination of how you work, what the work is, how well you can stay connected, and the level your company supports you.

And I love it.

Book Review (Book 11) - Applied Architecture Patterns on the Microsoft Platform

BuckWoody — Tue, 15 May 2012 16:50:34 GMT

This is a continuation of the books I challenged myself to read to help my career - one a month, for year. You can read my first book review here, and the entire list is here. The book I chose for April 2012 was: Applied Architecture Patterns on the Microsoft Platform. I was traveling at the end of last month so I’m a bit late posting this review here.

Why I chose this book:

I actually know a few of the authors on this book, so when they told me about it I wanted to check it out. The premise of the book is exactly as it states in the title - to learn how to solve a problem using products from Microsoft.

What I learned:

I liked the book - a lot. They've arranged the content in a "Solution Decision Framework", that presents a few elements to help you identify a need and then propose alternate solutions to solve them, and then the rationale for the choice. But the payoff is that the authors then walk through the solution they implement and what they ran into doing it.

I really liked this approach. It's not a huge book, but one I've referred to again since I've read it. It's fairly comprehensive, and includes server-oriented products, not things like Microsoft Office or other client-side tools. In fact, I would LOVE to have a work like this for Open Source and other vendors as well - would make for a great library for a Systems Architect. This one is unashamedly aimed at the Microsoft products, and even if I didn't work here, I'd be fine with that. As I said, it would be interesting to see some books on other platforms like this, but I haven't run across something that presents other systems in quite this way.

And that brings up an interesting point - This book is aimed at folks who create solutions within an organization. It's not aimed at Administrators, DBA's, Developers or the like, although I think all of those audiences could benefit from reading it. The solutions are made up, and not to a huge level of depth - nor should they be. It's a great exercise in thinking these kinds of things through in a structured way.

The information is a bit dated, especially for Windows and SQL Azure. While the general concepts hold, the cloud platform from Microsoft is evolving so quickly that any printed book finds it hard to keep up with the improvements.

I do have one quibble with the text - the chapters are a bit uneven. This is always a danger with multiple authors, but it shows up in a couple of chapters. I winced at one of the chapters that tried to take a more conversational, humorous style. This kind of academic work doesn't lend itself to that style.

I recommend you get the book - and use it. I hope they keep it updated - I'll be a frequent customer. :)

The Data Scientist

BuckWoody — Tue, 15 Nov 2011 15:00:18 GMT

A new term - well, perhaps not that new - has come up and I’m actually very excited about it. The term is Data Scientist, and since it’s new, it’s fairly undefined. I’ll explain what I think it means, and why I’m excited about it.

In general, I’ve found the term deals at its most basic with analyzing data. Of course, we all do that, and the term itself in that definition is redundant. There is no science that I know of that does not work with analyzing lots of data. But the term seems to refer to more than the common practices of looking at data visually, putting it in a spreadsheet or report, or even using simple coding to examine data sets.

The term Data Scientist (as far as I can make out this early in it’s use) is someone who has a strong understanding of data sources, relevance (statistical and otherwise) and processing methods as well as front-end displays of large sets of complicated data. Some - but not all - Business Intelligence professionals have these skills. In other cases, senior developers, database architects or others fill these needs, but in my experience, many lack the strong mathematical skills needed to make these choices properly.

I’ve divided the knowledge base for someone that would wear this title into three large segments. It remains to be seen if a given Data Scientist would be responsible for knowing all these areas or would specialize. There are pretty high requirements on the math side, specifically in graduate-degree level statistics, but in my experience a company will only have a few of these folks, so they are expected to know quite a bit in each of these areas.

Persistence

The first area is finding, cleaning and storing the data. In some cases, no cleaning is done prior to storage - it’s just identified and the cleansing is done in a later step. This area is where the professional would be able to tell if a particular data set should be stored in a Relational Database Management System (RDBMS), across a set of key/value pair storage (NoSQL) or in a file system like HDFS (part of the Hadoop landscape) or other methods. Or do you examine the stream of data without storing it in another system at all?

This is an important decision - it’s a foundation choice that deals not only with a lot of expense of purchasing systems or even using Cloud Computing (PaaS, SaaS or IaaS) to source it, but also the skillsets and other resources needed to care and feed the system for a long time. The Data Scientist sets something into motion that will probably outlast his or her career at a company or organization.

Often these choices are made by senior developers, database administrators or architects in a company. But sometimes each of these has a certain bias towards making a decision one way or another. The Data Scientist would examine these choices in light of the data itself, starting perhaps even before the business requirements are created. The business may not even be aware of all the strategic and tactical data sources that they have access to.

Processing

Once the decision is made to store the data, the next set of decisions are based around how to process the data. An RDBMS scales well to a certain level, and provides a high degree of ACID compliance as well as offering a well-known set-based language to work with this data. In other cases, scale should be spread among multiple nodes (as in the case of Hadoop landscapes or NoSQL offerings) or even across a Cloud provider like Windows Azure Table Storage. In fact, in many cases - most of the ones I’m dealing with lately - the data should be split among multiple types of processing environments. This is a newer idea. Many data professionals simply pick a methodology (RDBMS with Star Schemas, NoSQL, etc.) and put all data there, regardless of its shape, processing needs and so on.

A Data Scientist is familiar not only with the various processing methods, but how they work, so that they can choose the right one for a given need. This is a huge time commitment, hence the need for a dedicated title like this one.

Presentation

This is where the need for a Data Scientist is most often already being filled, sometimes with more or less success. The latest Business Intelligence systems are quite good at allowing you to create amazing graphics - but it’s the data behind the graphics that are the most important component of truly effective displays.

This is where the mathematics requirement of the Data Scientist title is the most unforgiving. In fact, someone without a good foundation in statistics is not a good candidate for creating reports. Even a basic level of statistics can be dangerous. Anyone who works in analyzing data will tell you that there are multiple errors possible when data just seems right - and basic statistics bears out that you’re on the right track - that are only solvable when you understanding why the statistical formula works the way it does.

And there are lots of ways of presenting data. Sometimes all you need is a “yes” or “no” answer that can only come after heavy analysis work. In that case, a simple e-mail might be all the reporting you need. In others, complex relationships and multiple components require a deep understanding of the various graphical methods of presenting data. Knowing which kind of chart, color, graphic or shape conveys a particular datum best is essential knowledge for the Data Scientist.

Why I’m excited

I love this area of study. I like math, stats, and computing technologies, but it goes beyond that. I love what data can do - how it can help an organization. I’ve been fortunate enough in my professional career these past two decades to work with lots of folks who perform this role at companies from aerospace to medical firms, from manufacturing to retail.

Interestingly, the size of the company really isn’t germane here. I worked with one very small bio-tech (cryogenics) company that worked deeply with analysis of complex interrelated data.

So watch this space. No, I’m not leaving Azure or distributed computing or Microsoft. In fact, I think I’m perfectly situated to investigate this role further. We have a huge set of tools, from RDBMS to Hadoop to allow me to explore. And I’m happy to share what I learn along the way.

Big Data and the Cloud - More Hype or a Real Workload?

BuckWoody — Tue, 18 Oct 2011 13:57:36 GMT

Last week Microsoft announced several new offerings for “Big Data” - and since I’m a stickler for definitions, I wanted to make sure I understood what that really means. What is “Big Data”? What size hard drive is that? After all, my laptop has 1TB of storage - is my laptop “Big Data”?

There are actually a few definitions for this term, most notably those involving the “Four V’s” Volume, Velocity, Variety and Variability. Others disagree with this definition. I tend to try and get things into their simplest form, so I’m using this definition for myself:

Big data is defined as a large set of computationally expensive data that is worked on simultaneously.

Let me flesh that out a little. To be sure, “Big Data” has a larger size than say a few megabytes. The reason this is important is that it takes special hardware to be able to move large sets of data around, store it, process it and so on. (large set)

If you store a LOT of data, but only use a small portion of it at a time, that really isn’t super-hard to do. It’s mainly a storage issue at that point. But, if you do need to work with a large portion of the data at one time, then the memory, CPU and transfer components of the system have to adapt to be responsive - new ways to work with that data (game theory, knot-algorithms, map-reduce, etc.) need to be brought into play. (computationally expensive)

Once that data is loaded into the processing area (memory or whatever other mechanism is used) it must be worked on in parallel to come back in a reasonable time. You have two options here - you can scale the system up with more internal hardware (CPU’s, memory and so on) or you can scale it out to have multiple systems work on it at the same time using paradigms such as map/reduce and so on. Actually, when you lay this out in an architecture diagram, scale up or out doesn’t actually change the logical structure of the process - in scale out the network becomes the bus, and the nodes become more RAM and computing power. Of course, there are changes in code for how you stitch the workload back together. (worked on simultaneously)

So back to the original question. Is Big Data, as I have defined it here, a workload for Windows and SQL Azure? Absolutely! In fact, it’s probably one of the main workloads, and I believe it represents the latest, and perhaps also the earliest frontier of computing. Jim Gray, a former researcher here at Microsoft and a hero of mine, was working on this very topic. I believe as he did - all computing is simply an interface over data.

Microsoft has multiple offerings on the topic of Big Data. In posts that follow from myself and my co-workers, we’ll explore when and where you use each one. Whether you are a data professional or a developer, this is the new frontier - don’t wait to educate yourself on how to leverage Big Data for your organization.

Hadoop on Windows Azure and SQL Server - Microsoft’s partnership to include Hadoop workloads on Windows Azure and SQL Server/Parallel Data Warehouse (PDW)

LINQ to HPC - Microsoft’s High-Performance Computing SKU of HPC is now in Azure

Windows Azure Table Storage - A key/value pair type storage with full partitioning that is immediately consistent, able to handle huge loads of data and works with any REST-compatible language

Other offerings - Including the new Data Explorer, Project Daytona (with a Big Data Toolkit for Scientists and researchers), Power View and more.

The era of Big Data is here. And you can use Windows and SQL Azure to bring it to your organization.

Computer books are dead. Well, some of them, anyway.

BuckWoody — Tue, 10 May 2011 13:58:23 GMT

I read a lot. I mean a LOT. It seems that computer professionals have much in common with medical professionals – we have to read in order to stay on top of our game. For me, this used to mean web sites, magazines, and other print medium, and of course lots of books. I’ve even written several computer books myself and had them published.

Whenever I teach a class, do a presentation, or hold an architectural design session on a new (or new to that person) technology, they usually follow up with “what’s a good book for learning X technology?” This happens so often that I have a list I keep of the titles I like for a particular subject – you probably have similar book lists.

Windows, SQL Server, and other Microsoft products change on an average of around three or four year cycles. That’s enough time to play with a beta product, wait until it releases, and write a solid book about it, and have that in a decent market for sales, and allow people to read and recommend it.

Enter “the Cloud” – Distributed Computing.

Windows Azure and SQL Azure don’t release every three years. Changes – some of them dramatic – release every three or four months. You can’t even write a book that fast, much less update it that quickly and re-sell it. So what is a technical professional to do?

Well, although I really like a couple of books I’ve read so far (especially this one, print and e-book version here), they are out of date almost by the time they publish. Instead, I rely on blogs, the web, documentation from the vendor and how-to articles published online. Many of these, ironically, are stored, hosted or delivered using – wait for it – Windows Azure. That’s interesting because it’s a medium that describes itself – “reflection”, anyone?

This brings up an interesting conundrum. Books have a version, are arranged, thought-out and categorized. Since I’m now getting information off of the web, it’s difficult to figure out whether that material is correct at the time, what level it’s aimed at – and forget about any coherent structure. It’s topic-by-topic.

So, like most of you, I use links and favorites to arrange things. And I found myself making “virtual books” by essentially creating my own Table-Of-Contents. I’ve shared some of those, such as my Windows and SQL Azure Learning Plan. The key is that I have to update that to ensure that the latest information is there – otherwise it becomes an organized list that is not authoritative.

Don’t get me wrong – I still have tons of (e-book format) books, especially on “conceptual” topics like development paradigms and so on. But when it comes to specifics and how-to’s – electronic medium is best for me. It’s more current, adaptable, searchable, interactive and immersive than books. But how long will I retain regular print-type books? We’ll see. Times, they are a changing – fast.

The Top-Five Most Valuable Development Team Positions

BuckWoody — Tue, 30 Nov 2010 14:34:00 GMT

In many organizations, there’s a push to save cost. “Cost” is an integral part of a profit-and-loss statement in the organization. Even if you work in a non-profit organization, cost control is central. Of course, you can take cost-control too far. You could, for instance, remove the shipping costs from your company, but if you happen to be an online retailer, removing the ability to ship your product would eventually doom your company. So there’s obviously a spectrum of necessary cost and wasteful costs.

People are a large part of the cost of any company - in some cases the highest cost. So it stands to reason that there’s a natural tension between paying well to find good people, and the need to lower the cost of those resources. In the rush to save costs, we’ve all seen people let go that really shouldn’t have been – and in other cases some folks stick around that need to go. How do you make those choices? Well, there are a lot of factors to consider, but if your firm has an IT focus, meaning that you sell software or develop software that is core to your organization’s business strategy, then certain positions can actually save or make you money – even when they are very expensive.

There are a few caveats here -

The first is that I’m assuming that every resource here is the best they can possibly be. By “best”, I mean that they know their craft inside and out, are recognized as an expert, and that they are continually improving themselves. Also, I realize there are lots of definitions for these roles, but I’m taking the minimalist approach. The role is what the title says.

The second caveat is that you actually have a team with these positions. You might have a smaller or different team that doesn’t include the position. And keep in mind, I’m talking development teams here. No mention of operations, like sysadmins or platform administrators, networking professionals, nothing like that.

The third caveat is that this is *my* list. You’ll probably have a different one, and good on you if you do. I’m not saying that you should make more or less money, that you’re not important, or that you’re not a good person. I’m sure you are. This list is strictly confined to making and saving money for an organization or company. If you disagree with my list, post your comments – with one requirement: include your logic.

On with the list. In descending order, the top five money makers for your IT development shop are:

Number Five: Developer

It stands to reason that a good developer is faster, makes less mistakes and is generally more efficient than a poor one. But the developer will also save money for the entire organization when the code they write runs faster, and with fewer errors. That means even after a software project is complete, the good developer saves you money every time their code runs.

Number Four: Tester

But code has errors. All code, from everyone. And studies show that every error that gets out with deployed code costs up to four times more to fix than having a tester catch it before it hits the field. So it follows that a tester – a really good one – has a bigger cost/profit impact than a good developer alone.

Number Three: Lead Developer

Software is complicated. Keeping a development team on track, and keeping the work “pipelined” is also a key to utilizing those developer and tester resources at as close to %100 as possible. Every dev or tester that sits around, or writes code that isn’t needed or eventually is thrown away, is a waste of resources. A good Lead Developer keeps that from happening. Oh, and don’t forget who hires those developers and testers and assembles them into a team. Done properly, the Lead Developer handles that, so they have a direct impact on the prior two positions, making them more valuable. When there’s no lead developer, a power vacuum forms and the loudest voices win. And heaven help you if you have the misfortune of an overbearing, micro-manager in one of the so-called “Agile” environments. You’ll lose good people faster than the U.S. Government spends money.

Number Two: Project Manager

Really? In some companies I’ve worked at, the Project Manager is not viewed as a more valuable resource than a lead developer, but if you think about it, they have an incredible impact on cost (and subsequently, profit). How many projects have you seen that were scoped incorrectly? If the organization had a good PM, they would have had a better estimate or work and schedule – and perhaps have made a choice to implement or not implement a feature. Both of those choices have vast cost implications. Make something you shouldn’t, and the whole thing is wasted, don’t make something you should, and you lose opportunity costs.

Add to the scope question the ability to properly lay out time and resources, and the PM can make or break the budget on not just one but multiple projects.

Number One: Architect

In many firms, the title “Architect” is sorely mis-used, handed out with little definition. What an architect should do is understand the business and mission of the organization, and thoroughly understand multiple technologies. I’ve seen lead devs play this role, and in my opinion that’s hard to pull off successfully. In some companies, the IT Director, CTO or even CIO act as the Architect, and in my mind those roles have too many HR and Budget duties to be effective as an Architect.

An Architect is a single role that is allowed to focus on the marriage between business and technology strategies. Even if they are a “Data Architect” or a “Software Architect”, they need to know security, hardware, networking, the Cloud, whatever. That’s their job – to “know”. All areas inter-mingle at this level.

So why does this knowledge make them the most important resource in an IT-centric company? Because innovation, market applications, and general business strategy are where the architect can have the most impact. Decisions for technology strategies affect every single person not only at the company, but shareholders and the public as well. If – and these are a big deal – they are valued, competent, can communicate that strategy and are listened to by leadership.