Back in May 2008, I started an internal company blog to talk about software quality and development tools. I was reviewing the posts and noticed I haven't contributed anything to that blog for awhile and was undecided what to do next. After giving it some thought and talking to folks I met in conferences and meetings, I thought I would bring it out into the public and open it up more to my new role of overseeing the centralized R&D tools for the various development groups we support.
So, what is the significance of the blog title "Just Don't Call It a Center of Excellence"? That was the original title of a presentation I gave at HP Software Universe in 2009, but when the HP editors got a hold of it, they changed it to "Offering Common Tools Doesn't Require a One-Size-Fits-All Mindset". To this day I don't think the new title did my presentation justice. First, the whole "Center of Excellence"(COE) thing is kind of scary to people, because it implies consolidating work and eliminating positions, and no one likes that, so it is best not to even mention those words. Also, the point wasn't about being flexible in deploying a common tool set, as much as it was about not forcing a standard on groups. Instead, provide good tools that people believe in and can adapt to their development methodologies, so they eventually gravitate to a common tool set even though nothing was advertised as a COE.
So what will I write about in this blog? I've got some ideas, but mostly I will write about the trends and topics I see in the various Software Development Lifecycle (SDLC) methodologies and processes and the Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) tools that support development. I will also expound on the short takes I post on Twitter or anything I read or hear which may be interesting to most of the folks I know. I'm not saying this will be the definitive take on software development or ALM tools, but will give you an idea of what is happening in my world in case you are looking for another view.
I look forward to writing again and I hope you enjoy it...
Todd, John Faughnan here from the old country. I've subscribed per your announcement and will follow you here.
ReplyDeleteThere's a lot to be said for generalizing these conversations. It's disappointing that we don't have a good solution for communications that are truly internal.