Awesome Apps This week

I've been in India this week, and I've included a little of the Indian seasoning into my Awesome Apps roundup for this week:

• Flipkart - Amazon.com but India style!  Next day delivery if its in stock.  You see a lot of motorcycles flinging themselves around Bangalore doing deliveries for these guys.
• Mpowa - Mobile payments for SMEs - UK.  Little adaptor and you can take card transactions :)  Featured in Sunday times last week.  
• Yepme - Fashion, e-commerce - Indian style!  So similar to US and UK and yet so different!

The Indian start up market is going crazy.  E-commerce is being fuelled by a wonderful obsession with mobile devices - particularly android devices.  Access is easy and the physical infrastructure and location issues experienced sometimes in India are overcome by the mobile device.





More awesome apps next week :)

Awesome Apps this week - 07/08/12

Here are the three apps / sites that have tickled me this week, in the wibbly wobbly world that is testing, TCL and other stuff:

• Deliverance - a great app if you want take out in London.  It's not to be confused in any way with the movie!  Wonderful mobile version.  Interfaces with mobank for the payment.  Simple, easy and I love the bit on the site that tells you where your order is in the process.
• Rated People - find trades people.  Very handy way to get things done.  Nice interface on the rating side.  Makes life easy.
• Museum of Science - Love this place!  love this site!  Become a member and explore this museum more.  I go there every time we visit Boston.

That's my list for this week.  Hope that you enjoy visiting these as much as I have.  Look out for more Awesome Apps in future weeks.

3 Apps I think are great :)

With all the work we do at uTest UK, and with my general nature of wanting to try new things, I tend to see lots of interesting new apps as they come to the market.  Sometimes, of course, they have been there for a while and I've only just spotted them.  This is a frenetic market place that I don't think even the likes of Mashable can do much more than keep up with - let alone be ahead of.

This week, I've found / started using three apps which I think are great and wanted to share them with the world!
Here they are:
Ringgo - solving my parking needs and giving me a very nice PDF receipt that I don't lose and can pass on for expenses purposes.  As well as making the parking conundrum (do I have the change in the car, how long will I actually be here etc) much easier, it is also taking pain out of my world and putting money back in my wallet.  From me, you get 5 stars!!

Biximo - Started using this in Boston with regards to their Hubway bike system.   It also covers the Barclays bikes here in London.  Nice little app.  Works well.  Keeps things simple.  Shows you in easy graphical form which stations have bikes and which have spaces.  V Handy!

LoYakk - These guys have put together a really nice app, which recently won our Usability prize in the Race for Apps in Hackney.  Love their approach and the way they've made a way for people to collaborate and comment in streams around venues, that can be kept private to the venue or shared more widely.  We're working with them now to set up a special feed for our next event in September to enable real time collaboration between everyone at the event and also to make a record of all the collaborations that can be shared amongst everyone afterwards.

We're involved with Hackney House over the Olympics period and meeting lots of new startups, trying lots of apps and I'll post anything here that I find really cool.

Happy Wednesday! 

Transferring the Skills of a Tester into new roles

So, I've been in the field of testing since 1997, when I joined GEC Marconi CIS as a graduate.  It's a field I have enjoyed, and one that has used many of my skills developed in my Physics degrees.  It has also been a driver to learn new skills - formally and informally of all types.  I have not, however, always been in pure testing roles.  There have been many opportunities for me as a consultant, and as a business person, to try my hand at different things and what has been particularly interesting for me has been how consistently I have found the core skills, and thinking processes, of a tester to be relevant in these new roles.

So, what sort of roles have I been involved with?  Quite a few really......
I've been a Graduate Test Analyst, Test Analyst, Team Leader, Test Manager, Programme Test Manager, Business Analyst, Business Project Manager, Project Manager, Adviser, Subject Matter Expert, Infrastructure Manager, Head of HR, Operations Manager, Managing Director, Chairman of the Board, Non Executive Director and quite a few more besides!

With different roles I've been asked to go to different countries, and so far I've had the privilege to have the opportunities to work in the following: England, Scotland, Wales, France, Poland, Belgium, USA, Spain, Romania, Egypt, Israel, Switzerland & India.

And in the midst of all this, I've found the following to be very helpful:

• Test to Prove Requirements - Knowing what you are expecting to see, looking for it, examining differences and looking for what's behind those differences.  As relevant in the board room, looking at governance, as it is in test execution.
• Root Cause Analysis - In fixing problems, you are most efficient and effective if you can find the root cause / first place of the issue and then correct from there.  This is a core component to governance, to business and systems analysis as much as it is to defect management on a software project
• Planning - As they say in Diving - Plan your Dive and then Dive your plan!  Test Plans are bread and butter to a good tester - even if those plans are on the back of an envelope, or a set of exploratory charters.  The skills to plan testing well, to look at Risk Based Testing and Failure Mode Analysis are all transferable into wider planning and strategic planning related to businesses or projects.

So, these are just three of the transferable skills - but they are very useful ones, and they've been helpful to me across many of my roles.  I had formed some seeds of these skills in my education and degree courses, but it was through my structured test training, conferences and on the job experience where I gained most of my insights and practical experience.  From there, I used these skills when faced with new challenges, and found that they worked!

Many people see Testing as a dead end.  Many people who go into testing do so out of 'fate' or 'luck' or just 'fell into it' as I did.  But what many people, as yet, don't recognise - either inside our industry or outside of it - is that it can and does provide opportunities, skills and experience that are fitting and indeed very useful for wider business roles.  It is rare for someone in a testing career to be promoted through to senior management and board directorship roles, and if they do so then it will be within a testing capacity.   This need not be the limit of our horizons!  Test professionals are more than capable of other things - my career to date is a case example. 

I plan to explore this area a little more and to find other examples of how professionals in our field have moved on to other and different roles.  It will be interesting to see what skills they have found transferable and what gaps they had to fill.

Farewell 2011 and welcome to 2012

As we come to the end of what has been a really wonderful 2011 for me personally, I wanted to take a moment to update my blog! There's not been much of this over the year, and I feel that I've missed out.

Sure, the Twitter and the facebook activity has been high, but the blogging is where I let my brain think through some more involved topics and I'm really not doing enough of that. Certainly not for my own liking and certainly not for a person who is in the role of a Chairman.

So, what has been keeping me so busy? On the personal front, the journey this year has included some very happy times:

• Graduated from the Exeter MBA course in January
• Got married in April
• Took a two month sabbatical over April and May - spending loads of lovely time in the US and Spain, with Lisa
• The arrival of our amazing daughter, Sofia, in September was a true blessing
• Finding, buying and now moving into our new family home in December :)

There's been quite a lot going on really! The business has also been exciting, and we've moved forward in all of the TCL entities this year. Engaging with new Clients, being involved in the exciting journey with uTest and growing as a group to more than 125 people. All brilliant stuff.

I'm just about to go into the final staff review of the year, but before I go I wanted to leave you with a link to the interview I did this year for Global Entrepreneurship week. I actually did the presentation for the University of Exeter via Skype, from the uTest offices in Boston. We put this film together ahead of the day just in case there were any connectivity issues. As it turns out it all went pretty well on the day, but I didn't want the film to go to waste and we've included it on our Youtube channel. Here you go:

And so, last things last.....sometimes people ask me what drives me, and what drives TCL. I don't always share things like this; it's part of my only child approach to communication I'm afraid, but I've been encouraged by others who are more adept in this field than me to 'let it out', and what better place to start than here.

For me, I have a very great passion for testing and for making it a much more professional discipline that it is currently. I believe in innovation & efficiencies, I believe and enjoy creativity and building things - despite my disruptive tendencies - and this brings me to what drives us:

"We want to take testing to a new level. A professional discipline that is consistently recognised for its value."

"Through our endeavours we will ensure that testing is no longer perceived to be the 'Poor Cousin' of the IT industry. It will have a genuine seat at the table."

And with that I want to wish you all a Merry Xmas, Happy Holidays and I look forward to being on here again soon. My topic for January will be: using testing skills in other areas. Some reflections on my work around strategies and board development - both at TCL and other companies.

Stew

Long time no blogging!

Well, it's a Monday and I found a surprise gap in my schedule thanks to a lunch cancellation, so I've been looking around at a couple of things including my Blog, which let's face it hasn't been updated since October - and before that for quite a while too. Bad form!

So, what's been keeping it on the back burner? I guess it's bad planning, that's the real answer. I do have time in each week for discretionary stuff, and what I would see as lighter priorities away from the important and indeed the urgent that come along each day (note these are two categories, not one :) ), but these are often eaten up with things that are either a bit out of my control or indeed I choose not to control. As such, the blog never gets done.

Blogs are somewhat replaced in my world now too, with Twitter and Facebook, which get a little update most days. Twitter and Linkedin are nicely linked, so the updates go to both. Facebook I keep much more informal and with a much more social focus. The Blog is kept for indepth thinking, reflections and expressions of future ideas. All too often these types of mental gymnastics hit the skids when a new customer comes along or a new 'crisis' hits one of our operations, the market/environment or indeed one of those new Clients.

Here's a few of the things that have happened since October:

• Got engaged!
• Spent the first family xmas with new extended family
• Planned a wedding - in Boston
• Had a vacation, or two - both in the US
• Started a leadership exchange via London First, with the Met Police
• Graduated on my MBA course - After 5 years!!
  

Oh, yes, and I've been training quite a bit too. Having lost a reasonable bit of weight over the last two years, we are now - Ian, the trainer, and I - focussed on getting me ready for the Wedding in April. We've only 5 weeks to go, and there's a lot left to do! All going in the right direction though. Overall, since starting with him nearly 2 years ago I have lost around 60lbs. It's made a massive difference to how I feel each day and I am very thankful for all the help - including education and motivation - that Ian has been.

So, where does that leave us? No loose promises or wild sweeping statements, but I hope to be more blog active over the next 5 weeks before my sabbatical starts. Then, a gap of two months will hopefully see a lot more time for reflection, strategic analysis and thought along with time to visualise the future. With that will hopefully come a lot more blogging!

Star Testing - October 2010

Wow! What a fantastic event. Star Testing Oct '10 was even better than the previous ones.

Take a look at what Fred had to say about it, I think he's covered things pretty well: http://www.fredberinger.com/thanks-to-game-changers-software-testing-is-flying-high/

Three speakers this time, not just two - and a focus for the event around testing in the Cloud made a huge difference. I asked a lot of people what they thought on the day and the big things that they took away, but here are my thoughts.....

Testing is getting a bit funky! We have some game! It's not perfect but we seem, as an industry, to be evolving and innovating. Web and Mobile apps are asking new questions of us. Crowdsourcing cycles done over a weekend? On demand Cloud based performance testing available within 4 hours and ramping up to >= 1.1M virtual users. Where did these all come from? Brilliant, simply Brilliant!

I love working with uTest and SOASTA the are great companies with real imagination. They've helped us to deliver creatively and cost effectively for a number of our Clients already. I look forward to where things are going next.

MBA Dissertation : Being part of an Innovation Centre

I'm currently writing an MBA Dissertation on how being part of an Innovation Centre assists a business in its endeavours. It's a one company case study, of TCL and how we have worked with the Innovation Centre, and the University of Exeter, what we have got out of it, what we have given to it and what else we could have / should have done.
It looks at many aspects of things, including what the innovation centres are there for and how our business fits with that model, along with a perspective on how other businesses work with the innovation centre.
If you are reading this and your business is present in an innovation centre then I would very much welcome your views and response to this survey. All contributions gratefully received, particularly if you are part of the Innovation Centre in Exeter, but also if you are from elsewhere. The comparisons will be very interesting.

Note: The survey closes on Friday 06 November 2009.

NSPCC Annual Council Meeting

The NSPCC is one of the charities that TCL supports, and our support is more than just some donations of money. It's a charity that is very important to me personally, and one where we try to help them as much as we can. So this year I joined the Exeter Business Group, which helps the NSPCC to raise funds and network in the area. We've got some tough targets to meet, but it's going well. As part of my involvement I was lucky enough to be invited to attend the NSPCC Annual Council meeting in London. It gave me a chance to meet some people, see the launch of the strategy for the year and to get more of an understanding of how things work. It was a great experience.

So, this annual council thing. What is it? It's like a company AGM (annual general meeting). They vote in the new officers. They hear about the performance and successes last year and they hear about the strategy for the year ahead. Members get to vote on things, and there is open floor debate on any issues required. Quite a PLC AGM type thing. There is a huge difference though - it's not about money when you come to the NSPCC, it's about the very deeply held beliefs, values and vision of a huge number of people who believe that cruelty to children isn't right and can be stopped. This is a passion. This is a hugely driving force. It is quite something to see 400+ people in a room with such a passion. It got them from all corners of the UK to a council session in London. It provides them with the inspiration for the fundraising, and the work with children that many of them do. It's quite something to see.

As an observer I was given a brown ticket. This was important because if you have a green ticket - a member of the council - you can vote on stuff. As an observer I could speak if I wanted to - pose questions to the top team etc, but not vote. A weird experience for me - not having the ability to make a decision in the room!

The day was well structured. It had a clear agenda. It's production value and organisation was a little questionable at time - note to TCL team : we do a better job of organising our parties :). It had a diverse group of people presenting including the NSPCC Top Team, The Talk to Trustees group (young people from around the country who are directly engaged at the top level to provide insights) and guest speakers such as Floella Benjamin.

So, here's the top 5 things I learnt on the day:

• Purpose - the common purpose that binds the NSPCC is quite something. The behaviours it brings out in people are amazing. The passion and compassion that binds such a large group together is remarkable and quite inspiring to experience. While a great many people are paid to work as part of the NSPCC a lot also do things for free and happily donate of their time and energies to further a cause in which they strongly believe.
• There's not enough money - £160million is what the NSPCC raised last year. A lot of cash. The UK government spend >£6BN on child services each year though, and that shows how little the NSPCC can do with their £160million. Most importantly both lots added together, along with all the money spent by other childrens charities, is still not getting the job done, and everyone agrees they don't know what it would take to do it all. All they do know is that they can make a difference for some people and some children with what they do, and so they get on with it.
• Charity vs Business - The NSPCC seems to be very well run, and a high percentage of its money goes directly into work that helps children. They run it like a business and have a high calibre top team to keep it under control. Interestingly, the top team are all equally passionate about the work of the charity.
• Floella Benjamin is a legend - Giving the closing address Floella was an absolute legend. Employing all her skills and training as an actress she commanded a room of 400+ people with emotion and energy. No notes for the talk that lasted about 20 mins. It was told as all good presentations should be, in the format of a story - with a begining, a middle and an end. But Wow! what impact! Everyone left the room engaged and inspired and amazed. I was lucky enough to meet up with her a few days ago here at the University and was able to tell her how cool I thought the presentation was.
• We can do more - there's a lot we can't do for the NSPCC here at TCL. We aren't trained counsellors for instance, and indeed some of us couldn't or wouldn't enjoy that kind of task. We can do more though. We can donate some time to help them with IT issues. We can go to more events and raise more money. We can volunteer to help at different things and we can, as they encourage us to do, take personal accountability and if and when we see things like cruelty to children we can report it and we can help stop it.

The most difficult part of the day for me was in listening to the new strategy for the NSPCC for the year. They said it like any business would....they said ' we recognise that we can't do everything and that we have a cause we believe in. We therefore want to do the most with what we have available to us, and to that end we recognise that some of our services and operations are not efficient enough, and by changing what we do, removing some services and re-organising the way we operate we can have more impact. So, next year we are closing or relocating some centres, phasing out some services and diverting our resources to several key campaigns. We are going to concentrate on awareness and education, and removing the root causes of child cruelty.'

So, I'm sitting there and I hear this, and I am split. One part of me - the businessman - thinks this is all very reasonable and the right thing to do. It will achieve greater results and that is very valuable. The other part - let's call him the human being - thinks this is not good enough.

If there is one place you should be able to do everything it should be when it comes to protecting children. Removing services leaves kids at risk and can lead to disasters. Closing down centres takes vital volunteers out of the loop and asking people to do more than they are already doing is probably going to prove to be difficult. I want them to seek out the wrong, and to shed light into the darkness for children who can't stop what is affecting them, and to do so with infinite vigilance and infinite capacity. But it just can't be that way.

So, I am left with a dilema. I finally see a charity running itself very professionally, but it doesnt make me feel good to see what it has to do to achieve that!

Then comes the engagement. The open panel of the top team. The open debate. The voicing of concerns. You start to appreciate that these decisions have genuinely been hard. That people feel the same anxiety that I had done. That the top team had felt the same anxiety too. But they could see that to do more with what they had was better than doing the same, or in believing that it would get better without them changing. They knew how far they could stretch £160million and they knew how much of a gap it left. They had found what was realistic for them to achieve. It was a very good session. I still didnt 100% feel comfortable with it all, but I did clearly recognise the value they were trying to create and that their intentions were good.

And so where does this leave me? I've come from the annual council meeting inspired to help them more. In understanding their needs and vision for the NSPCC I have seen ways in which I, TCL and indeed everyone can help them and I intend that we do so.

I've already engaged with someone to join our team to specifically own and drive new initiatives with the NSPCC and St Michaels Small School and I've stepped up my committments in 2010 to helping them raise funds. Part of the new Charities Officer role that Cheree O'Melia will be taking on will be to engage more with both the charities and everyone in TCL and to facilitate more endeavours across the organisation that support the works of the charities. She'll also be getting more information out to everyone and publicising more of what we do, and the benefits it brings. I hope too that by the start of next year we will also have updated our policy on Corporate Social Responsibility.

I hope that when reading this you recognise some ways in which you too can help, and look forward to speaking with you about those. I'd like to thank those of you that have already signed up for events like the Great West Run, and also to those who have expressed interest in getting involved next year. It is much appreciated.

Crowdsourcing Success stories in the UK

There's a growing trend of crowdsourcing, in all sorts of creative and productive spaces such as translation, design, development and software testing. We've brought this crowdsourcing into the PEST events with some 'software smackdown' sessions using the utest portal as the focus and it's been great fun.

Two websites have been very open minded and introduced their latest releases to a software smackdown session at PEST, and received a very intense and focussed three hour crowdsource experience as a result. They've interacted with the team in real time, and signed off the defects as we go. This gives great feedback (both ways) during the testing, and enables the pace of things to be quite amazing.

Huge kudos and thanks go to trustedlets.co.uk and iwoot.com for taking part and providing the opportunity for us to see the power of crowdsourcing. Of particular note was that the sessions not only found lots of great defects which needed fixing but also some real consumer style feedback which helps the companies to improve the customer experience on the sites.

Don't take my word for it! Here's what trustedlets.co.uk had to say..........

"After a year of successful operation with our launch site, we carried out a major refresh and wanted to test this. We carried out traditional systematic User Acceptance Testing, however decided to incorporate the techniques of PEST as part of the testing. We found the process very valuable as a means of getting a significant number of very capable people to interact with the site.

We received excellent feedback that not only covered design and technology issues, but also gave us some great ideas in how to develop the commercial and business aspects of the site."

Charles Peak-Smylie, trustedlets.co.uk

Holidays are good!

Well, I'm nearing the end of my first week back, after a lovely two week vacation in Cyprus. All I can say is: Holidays are good!

At Xmas, I made some reflections on the year and recognised that there hadn't been enough breaks last year, and that when they arrived they weren't when I needed them e.g. they were reactive rather than proactive. When the holiday started I was very tired, and the entire trip was about recovery rather than relaxation and recharging and fun!

So this year the plan is different. Three vacations were booked before January had even started -> one every three months. March saw a trip to Portugal. June a trip to Cyprus and September sees a trip to Spain. The benefits are already showing. The trip to Cyprus came at the right time for me. I was able to enjoy it all the more because I was less tired, and even in returning to work I know the next break is only 12 weeks away.

Malcolm is very fond of saying: "breaks help you go faster", and he's right. (How fast would you drive a car without brakes???) I feel that I've achieved a lot more in the first quarter of the business year, and have greater clarity of mind and purpose. I do hope that it continues into the next quarter too!

Holidays are good!

Donating Time to the Innovation Centre in Exeter

Since 2001 TCL has had a presence at the Innovation Centre at the University of Exeter. Great place for us to work. Amazing campus and of course fantastic links and relationships with the University.

Exeter was the place that we started our scholarship programmes from, and where we have worked the most in terms of join ups with any institution. In addition to our academic scholarship programmes we are also involved in a sports scholarship programme. We have several members of our team on MBA courses with the University and we are active participants in student projects, placements and knowledge transfer exercises.

Today, I will start my first of a series of engagements with the Innovation Centre. I've 'donated' a 1/2 day session every month for the centre to use as they wish. For mentoring and support of young entrepreneurs, for presentations, for business planning, for bringing together different groups or just as a sounding board. I'm very much looking forward to it, and the new challenges it may bring.

The dreams and aspirations I have for my future are around entrepreneurship and helping people to start, and bring, businesses to the South West. This feels like another step on that journey.

Like Minded People V Event 17th April 2009

In May 2008 I took a couple of people to lunch with a view of networking them with each other.  They were (and indeed still are) entrepreneurs, they all worked in or near Exeter and none of them knew each other before the lunch.  I thought it would be beneficial to each of them that they met.  It was a bit of an inspiration to bring them together, but it seemed like the right thing to do and so I gave it a shot.

The session went well.  The 6 of us had lunch together, and then after a couple of hours I left them to it.  Several stayed on for another couple of hours and some new contacts and even friendships were formed.  I named the event 'Like Minded People' and we agreed to meet up again in a few months and where possible to bring a buddy, with a similarly entrepreneurial mind, along.

Our 6 became 14, and the lunch went on for quite some time.  I left them to it again after a couple of hours, and I think several people stayed for another 3+ hours.  The dialogue was quite far reaching, as you might expect from such a diverse and interesting bunch of people.

So, feeling that something was really starting to develop, we agreed to give it another try and this time we used the Bristol Golf club, and invited some people from different walks of life, and different markets, all with that entrepreneurial spirit.  The original 6 became 25 and when Simon Fox did his (shortish) presentation on TBI Connect we found that the group openly had ideas and inspiration for him, along with contacts and help.  Not only did this help TBI but it gave Simon some personal inspiration and it gave me a big lift that these people, these entrepreneurs, were in it to help each other too.  Rare in such a 'dog eat dog' world and rare amongst people who had all achieved so much.

Like Minded People IV was different again, with a much large contingent wanting to get involved, a donation of venue from the Innovation Centre at the University of Exeter and some sponsorship and contributions from members of the network to help pay for everything.  Our 'show and tell' session had someone looking for funding, an announcement of a joint venture from two of the members and a very interesting 'apprentice' idea from Henry at Circle Recruitment.  Some 35 people came along, and it all seemed very different to the 6 people out for a quiet lunch that happened at LMP I.  We pulled in some group activities at the end of the lunch for those that wanted to stay, and had some external hosting for some Action Learning Sets.  Many people got a great deal from the adventure, and indeed it is now something that I have incorporated into the Management Development of our Senior Team at TCL.

And now to 17 April 2009, when we will be holding our fifth event, in Exeter at the Innovation Centre.  Robin Jackson has kindly provided the venue for us in his sponsorship of entrepreneurs in the south west.  The event is being organised by Vicky Sheppard, out of our Exeter office, and so if you are interested in coming along please book your place with her on +44 (0) 845 869 6070.  Numbers are limited this time, so its first come first served.  Ideally all attendees will have come through by referral, and the key prerequisite is that each person is entrepreneurial by nature e.g. started a company or running a division or venture in a way that requires entrepreneurialism.

The agenda for the session will be simpler this time.  Networking, Lunch, 'Show and Tell' and exit.  Starting around 11:30am and going on formally until about 2.30, informally for as long as people want.

So far the event has proven to be fun, useful, stimulating and a learning experience.  I had never expected it to take on such a life of its own, but it is great to see how it has.  The network will continue as long as people get so much from it, and it supports itself as it has been doing.  So, if you want to be part of it in April, please give Vicky a call ASAP.  I look forward to seeing you there. 

James Whittaker - 19th & 20th March 2009

We're just putting some of the finishing touches to the plans, but I am able to confirm that James Whittaker will be visiting TCL on the week of 19th March, 2009.

As part of his trip, James will be doing two events with TCL:

• Thursday 19th March 2009, Harrison Building, University of Exeter -> public forum, all welcome
• Friday 20th March 2009, Hotel du Vin, Bristol -> Private function. Invitation only.

These are both great opportunities to hear James speak, and I believe his topic will be a Testers view on the future of software.

I personally find James to be a very inspiring speaker, and I'm very much looking forward to seeing him again.

I'm particularly passionate about what we are trying to do with the Thursday event at the University. We've invited some local schools as well as the University and of course local businesses and people we know that will be interested. This should hopefully give a great spectrum of perspectives.

If you want to be involved in either of these events then please drop me a note, or speak with our lead organiser: Clare Batter on +44 (0) 845 869 6070.

Is Citizenship dead?

From the business world I have read a number of articles about corporations being the 'new religion'. These articles propose that for a large portion of the western world religion is no longer what keeps the fabric of our society together. They surmise that corporations now take this space and that corporate & social responsibility is all about companies being active participants in the community and bringing benefits and taking responsibility for what they do.

Jack Welch, the former GE Chairman and CEO states a very clear case for the benefits that successful companies bring to society - and in his drive and ambition there seems to be a great deal of personal commitment to this, even when making redundancies and closing factories. His belief is that to be successful brings more benefits than perhaps a more 'European socialist model' that might favour 100% unemployment regardless of productivity. (Jack Welch)

Plastered across the news though are plenty of examples of bribery, corruption and fraud. People and corporations exploiting opportunities for individual gain and significant cost to others.

Weak enforcement of regulation and controls around these sorts of activities have enabled things like the Parmalat scandal, ENRON, the
recent issues with a fund managed as a kind of pyramid scheme with hundreds of millions being plundered. Articles like: bbc news really bring it home.

So what would it mean to be more of a citizen? Our friend wikipedia gives us some insights: Citizenship and of course also a bit of a role model.
"Active citizenship" is the philosophy that citizens should work towards the betterment of their community through economic participation, public service, volunteer work, and other such efforts to improve life for all citizens.

I think that the key thing to emphasise there is to improve life for all citzens.

I take a look around TCL and I see some great citizens of the company and I see people that are great citizens in general (usually the same people). But I look further afield and I see a lot that doesn't look like citizenship, a lot that isn't helping everyone, a lot that isn't giving back and a lot that is just plundering.

If corporations are the 'new religion', this doesn't look so great. It makes me wonder: is citizenship dead, dying or maybe just not getting all the press it deserves?

***** Post comment Video *****

Happy New Year & Welcome to 2009

Happy New Year to everyone :)
Hope that you have had a super Xmas vacation and have enjoyed yourselves.

With our New Year first days back came a chance to pull together a short movie/introduction to TCL.

Take a look at:


Well done to Clare for pulling this together.

Stew

P.E.S.T. is moving

Our peer sharing forum PEST has a portal for the community to share ideas and thoughts on, and this is now moving to be part of the LinkedIN platform.
You can get access to it, and information about the events, at the following link: http://www.linkedin.com/e/gis/1214687

We originally developed the portal as part of an internship project and it has served us well up to now - helping to develop the community and provide a neutral space for testers - not just TCL people - to share ideas and grow new thoughts.

The decision to move was not taken easily, but we recognise the need for the peer sharing side of things to get a life of its own, and to do this it needs to be a bit more independent and open to all. The linkedin platform provides such a space and the recent changes to linkedin have improved the site incredibly - it now does all that we were doing with our own bespoke portal - and even more.

With the extension of PEST into the next BCS SIGIST event on the 9th December we wanted to ensure that we had a suitable and appropriate platform for people to collaborate on. Our peer sharing is about developing knowledge - and opening it up to everyone who is interested.

Look forward to seeing you at PEST soon

The Sports Scholarship Scheme

Last week we were invited to attend the Exeter University Varsity Rugby match, which this year was against the Cardiff Medics. (http://xmedia.ex.ac.uk/sport/2008/10/29/exeter-cruise-to-victory-over-a-lighter-cardiff)

The invite for TCL came as a result of our involvement with the sports scholarship scheme at the University. It was a fun event, and what seemed to be an easy win for a strong Exeter side, but most importantly for us there was an opportunity for us to meet our scholar for this year.

TCL has been involved with this programme for the last three years, and in that time we have sponsored a young Rugby player, a Tennis Player and now a Beach Volleyball player. Over the years we have got increasingly involved with this programme and got to know and understand our scholars more - involving them in company functions and including them in our company newsletters etc.

Many people ask me why we would be involved with the sports scholarship stuff, and what the point of it all is. For my part, I have a great passion for people who aspire to be great at what they do. The scholarship programme enables people with this kind of aspiration and talent to get facilities and coaching and opportunities that they might not otherwise have had. It helps them to grow and to reach their full potential.

There is more information on the programme at: http://www.sport.ex.ac.uk/index.cfm?fuseaction=c_pages.showPage&pageID=33

Getting involved with this stuff has been great fun and very rewarding and its done something which I hadnt expected. It's broadened my horizons. Learning from sport and applying to business is a bit of a cliche - but there are lessons to learn, and there is a spirit & drive to atheletes of this kind of standard that is a model to us all. They choose their sport, they dream their dreams and they chase them as hard as they can. The ones that succeed are the ones that don't give up and despite failures and set backs continue to chase with all the passion and enthusiasm they can muster.

Do you read books?

Sounds like a dumb question, doesnt it? "Do you read books?". But it's my observation that people can surprise you.

Over the last few months I have been interacting with a wider and wider circle of people through my professional engagements and its been an interesting benchmark question - to ask them what they are reading. Some of the people I hadn't expected to be doing so where not only reading something very interesting, but something I was also interested in - and nothing related to software or testing! Some of the people I had expected to be on the case and reading something quite refreshing were nowhere need anything like literature.

So, does it make someone a bad person because they aren't reading books? No! But they are missing out, I feel.

As professionals, there is a requirement on us to stay current. We can do this through many e-sources, but the paper based, and the book based should not be ignored. There is absolute gold in some of the books written to date and ignore them at your peril that's what I say.

As both professionals and explorers of our profession there is also a requirement on us to extend the knowledge of our profession and to help others to do the same. A first step on this journey is gaining an understanding of what has come before us.

Lee Copeland has reminded us time and time again about the nine forgettings and the amount of times he has been asked to present this talk, and the number of hits his google video gets, tell us that people are keen to know - but do they learn! Do we as a profession move forward?

It seems like a dumb question - " do you read books" - but do you? And if you do - how can you help yourself, your colleagues and your profession to gain from this knowledge?

Why don't we?

Who is the smartest person you know? Who is the smartest person you know that does what you do for a living? How much time do you spend with them? How much time could you spend with them? Why don't you spend more time with them?

From our very earliest learnings we pick up things from the people around us. From our parents, our siblings and our peers and yet when we come along to our work environment we forget that and look for knowledge in other sources.

How does it stack up if you compare the number of days you have spent on training courses, e-learning or reading journals in the last year with the number of days you have spent being mentored or mentoring others?

Personally, I feel that sharing information is essential and I encourage it everywhere I can. The most powerful expression of this sharing (for me) is mentoring and my experiences to date have included some amazing mentors who have accelerated and opened my thinking, my networks and my career.

If you don't have a mentor at the moment, I encourage you to look for one. Take a stroll around your organisation and seek out the smartest person you can find in what you do or what you want to do and then ask them to be your mentor. You'll be amazed how keen some people are to take on that role and also the results that a great mentor can help you to achieve.