July 20, 2011 at 9:47 am
sturner (7/20/2011)
anelson 66875 (7/20/2011)
"Training" is dead - for IT jobs anyway. Training, as in getting somebody up to speed on a routine repeatable task like, say, machining an engine valve, is a 20th-century concept oriented toward assembly-line work, and a complete waste of money in the 21st century IT shop where the goal is to get ALL such repeatable tasks as automated as possible.The only investment in employee smarts that makes sense today is not "training" but rather "education." That is, getting us employees to the point where we're self-training, and willing/able to look at a problem, analyze it, and automate it. That is, to figure out:
- what can be pared away or done once and never/rarely touched again,
- what necessary, repetitious tasks can be factored out and coded up, and
- what choices will always require a brain in the loop, and how/who should decide.
This kind of education is, to be brutally honest, FAR beyond the capability of most business organizations. Maybe Google or Amazon could swing it, but I wouldn't bet my career on it.
The days when a company could expect to profit/survive by getting people "trained up" on maintenance procedures every couple of years... those days are long gone. Those of us who want long, satisfying IT careers are best advised to get motivated and figure out how to self-educate (if your schooling didn't already give you that), because anybody willing to take you by the hand and lead you to all the skills/tools you need, isn't going to be profitable enough to keep doing it very long.
Sorry.
Very well stated Sir.
+10
July 20, 2011 at 10:06 am
anelson 66875 (7/20/2011)
"Training" is dead - for IT jobs anyway. Training, as in getting somebody up to speed on a routine repeatable task like, say, machining an engine valve, is a 20th-century concept oriented toward assembly-line work, and a complete waste of money in the 21st century IT shop where the goal is to get ALL such repeatable tasks as automated as possible.The only investment in employee smarts that makes sense today is not "training" but rather "education." That is, getting us employees to the point where we're self-training, and willing/able to look at a problem, analyze it, and automate it. That is, to figure out:
- what can be pared away or done once and never/rarely touched again,
- what necessary, repetitious tasks can be factored out and coded up, and
- what choices will always require a brain in the loop, and how/who should decide.
This kind of education is, to be brutally honest, FAR beyond the capability of most business organizations. Maybe Google or Amazon could swing it, but I wouldn't bet my career on it.
The days when a company could expect to profit/survive by getting people "trained up" on maintenance procedures every couple of years... those days are long gone. Those of us who want long, satisfying IT careers are best advised to get motivated and figure out how to self-educate (if your schooling didn't already give you that), because anybody willing to take you by the hand and lead you to all the skills/tools you need, isn't going to be profitable enough to keep doing it very long.
Sorry.
I don't disagree - but this STILL doesn't put the company off the hook for helping/enabling/pomoting this. It changes the nature of what's needed, but the bottom line still needs to be a cooperative effort.
Putting the burden on only one side of the fence is short-sighted. After all - I self-train, but if I don't know what is needed by my employer in 9 months, I can't be ready for them. Similarly training takes time, so accomodations would have to be made (possibly on both sides).
Technology worker are assets for good companies, not just drones to push buttons. Assets of all shape require a continuous commitment to maintenance so you can continue to reap the future benefits.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Your lack of planning does not constitute an emergency on my part...unless you're my manager...or a director and above...or a really loud-spoken end-user..All right - what was my emergency again?
July 20, 2011 at 10:10 am
bopeavy (7/20/2011)
SteveI believe most technology people are interested in what they do, like to learn new skills, and more importantly, like to solve problems.
Care to expand on this what you actually consider "technology people".
I was thinking anyone in the IT groups, so sysadmin, Exchange admin, SAN, network, develop, DBA, basically the people who make the computers work so other people can use them to accomplish something.
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July 20, 2011 at 10:12 am
cengland0 (7/20/2011)
blandry (7/20/2011)
Since Microsoft and most other software vendors change their systems every 6-18 monthsYes but how often does your company update their software?
I'd tend to agree here. Lots of companies stick with the "every-other-version" approach. My wife just moved to Win7/Office2K10 after being on XP for 6-7 years.
I think a 5-10 year time frame makes sense for most pieces of software. However for the IT people, it becomes more challenging since I think that "new" systems often move ahead of other things, so we might end up supporting 2-3 versions of some software in the MS space.
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July 20, 2011 at 10:21 am
sturner (7/20/2011)
I believe it is an individuals responsibility to stay up to speed on the latest technology in their chosen field. If an employer is willing to pay for some courses for me along the way that is icing on the cake; an indication that I work for a pretty good employer who values me and my personal professional development. Is the employer obligated to do so? NO. I was hired for my expertise to do a specific job and the employer has a right to assume I will continue to be able to perform at that level if he is to continue to pay me.Unfortunately the mentality in this country has evolved to a point where employees are led to believe that it is the employer's (or the the government's) responsibility to retrain them if their job goes away because technology or markets have changed. That's a very sad state of dependency which seems geared more toward treating people as victims instead of individuals capable of determining their own successes or failures.
I mostly agree with this. It's the employer's option to provide training, not an entitlement. However expecting an employee to learn everything on their own, as technology changes, is a recipe for poor employees and a lack of retention.
I think employees should invest in themselves, and show the employer they are willing to do that, and when that's done, the employer should do that as well, show some willingness to invest in the employee.
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July 20, 2011 at 10:24 am
Steve Jones - SSC Editor (7/20/2011)
cengland0 (7/20/2011)
blandry (7/20/2011)
Since Microsoft and most other software vendors change their systems every 6-18 monthsYes but how often does your company update their software?
I'd tend to agree here. Lots of companies stick with the "every-other-version" approach. My wife just moved to Win7/Office2K10 after being on XP for 6-7 years.
I think a 5-10 year time frame makes sense for most pieces of software. However for the IT people, it becomes more challenging since I think that "new" systems often move ahead of other things, so we might end up supporting 2-3 versions of some software in the MS space.
For my daily work, Windows is just a shell for running Outlook, SSMS, IE, and Visual Studio. Off the top of my head, I can't think of any Windows GUI related enhancment made since XP that resulted in an improvement to my productivity, and that's why I stuck with XP for so long. The only reason I use Windows 7 on my work PC is that the motherboard on my old PC died, and I was told by IT support that they weren't installing XP on any new PCs.
"Do not seek to follow in the footsteps of the wise. Instead, seek what they sought." - Matsuo Basho
July 20, 2011 at 10:26 am
Rod at work (7/20/2011)
I appreciate this article, Steve, as it's something I have faced for the last 3 years. No training, no conferences, etc. However, in my situation it isn't so much the IT management who are against it; they're all for it. My manager would love to send each of his direct reports to some training. The problem is upper management who are dead set against it. The phrased used by upper management is, "just be thankful you've got a job". Given the fact that at the end of June we had a 25% RIF, you bet I'm thankful to still be employed. Up to that point I have been trying to do the job of 2 people; now it's going to be more like 2 1/4, maybe 2 1/2 people.
You are welcome, and I hate situations like that. I think in these cases you really have to show you're making an effort and then make targeted asks for training. Pick something related to your job, maybe offer to split costs or add an agreement to stay employed for xx months. I think you can make it work, but it's a coin flip. Make a good case, and show some ROI.
Worth trying a few times. The worst thing that happens is they say no.
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July 20, 2011 at 10:31 am
anelson 66875 (7/20/2011)
"Training" is dead - for IT jobs anyway. Training, as in getting somebody up to speed on a routine repeatable task like, say, machining an engine valve, is a 20th-century concept oriented toward assembly-line work, and a complete waste of money in the 21st century IT shop where the goal is to get ALL such repeatable tasks as automated as possible.
Yes and no. We know how to automate many things, and I think a lot of the wins in IT these days aren't automation, but more improvement and value add from increasing the ability of someone to glean knowledge, or make better decisions, even in things as small as choosing when to order more widgets or even alter a workflow.
However the IT people need training as technology changes, which is mostly syntactical or assembly changes. That can be self-taught, but that can also be a time waster in and of itself. Guiding someone along the path to learn a new technology makes some sense.
That being said, I think many courses, especially those geared towards certifications, are a waste of time. A better method of training, IMHO, would be a twice a week course for 6 weeks that used perhaps half days to instruct on a topic and a half day to help the people develop some skill in the use of the tools as well as some education in how to think about using the tools to solve problems.
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July 20, 2011 at 10:33 am
I like the part about examining culture of the job on the part of the managers. Regardless of perceived morale issues - this should be an ongoing effort on the part of managers. They need to be tapped into the culture of the team and understand the disease points and the healthy points of the team.
Jason...AKA CirqueDeSQLeil
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July 20, 2011 at 10:36 am
Eric M Russell (7/20/2011)
For my daily work, Windows is just a shell for running Outlook, SSMS, IE, and Visual Studio. Off the top of my head, I can't think of any Windows GUI related enhancment made since XP that resulted in an improvement to my productivity, and that's why I stuck with XP for so long. The only reason I use Windows 7 on my work PC is that the motherboard on my old PC died, and I was told by IT support that they weren't installing XP on any new PCs.
I'd agree. The only things I saw working well in Win7 were solid 64bit versions (good for moving to 8GB or 16GB RAM), better security integration with Win2K8 (if you need it), and better performance on hardware.
I only moved to Win 7 when I changed laptops. Otherwise I'd still be on XP
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July 20, 2011 at 10:43 am
Eric M Russell (7/20/2011)
I can't think of any Windows GUI related enhancment made since XP that resulted in an improvement to my productivity, and that's why I stuck with XP for so long.
I would continue to stick with XP but companies are forced to upgrade because Microsoft will eventually stop supporting older applications/operating systems. For XP, this date is April 8, 2014. According to Microsoft, "Without Microsoft support, you will no longer receive security updates that can help protect your PC from harmful viruses, spyware, and other malicious software that can steal your personal information."
http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/products/lifecycle
Our company will not use a non-supported application -- ever! We do use some open source but we can support that internally since we have the source code.
July 20, 2011 at 11:17 am
Steve Jones - SSC Editor (7/20/2011)
That being said, I think many courses, especially those geared towards certifications, are a waste of time. A better method of training, IMHO, would be a twice a week course for 6 weeks that used perhaps half days to instruct on a topic and a half day to help the people develop some skill in the use of the tools as well as some education in how to think about using the tools to solve problems.
Agreed. I also think some (or maybe a lot) of this training can be done in house... directly from senior guys who have become experts in their own right. Other than occasional one on one assistance to people who work directly with me on something, my 25+ years of experience is maintained exclusively inside my head. It is unleashed with great enthusiasm on projects that are designed, tested and put into production with minimum effort on my part (which makes it look deceptively easy).
I would be happy to provide some training for the less experienced developers here and share some of my knowledge and experience with them. This thought apparently never occurs to those above my pay grade who are capable of allocating the time and resources (like an empty room and a few hours per month). Too bad, because unless this concept is embraced, encouraged and time made available for personnel that would benefit, this sort of thing it won't ever happen.
The probability of survival is inversely proportional to the angle of arrival.
July 20, 2011 at 1:19 pm
Steve Jones - SSC Editor (7/20/2011)
Rod at work (7/20/2011)
I appreciate this article, Steve, as it's something I have faced for the last 3 years. No training, no conferences, etc. However, in my situation it isn't so much the IT management who are against it; they're all for it. My manager would love to send each of his direct reports to some training. The problem is upper management who are dead set against it. The phrased used by upper management is, "just be thankful you've got a job". Given the fact that at the end of June we had a 25% RIF, you bet I'm thankful to still be employed. Up to that point I have been trying to do the job of 2 people; now it's going to be more like 2 1/4, maybe 2 1/2 people.You are welcome, and I hate situations like that. I think in these cases you really have to show you're making an effort and then make targeted asks for training. Pick something related to your job, maybe offer to split costs or add an agreement to stay employed for xx months. I think you can make it work, but it's a coin flip. Make a good case, and show some ROI.
Worth trying a few times. The worst thing that happens is they say no.
I hadn't thought of some of the ideas you suggested here (trying to split costs, for example). I'll think of how I might be able to do that.
Kindest Regards, Rod Connect with me on LinkedIn.
July 20, 2011 at 2:42 pm
Its not about wanting "stupid" employees.
Retention is a concern, but I think moreso for certification of existing skills than training in new ones.
To me, the problem is in explaining to the decision maker the value and need for the training. Many IT costs are fixed (licenses, support, salaries), and people doing budgets love to axe costs. So the low hanging fruit becomes the training budget because the rest is fairly inflexible.
In addition, the IT teams I have been on have been so good at adapting to new technology without new training that management thinks it "just happens". Someone needs to take the case to them that every machine and most of the code in use in the company will be obsolete within 5 years, and that no one there is yet trained in the technologies that will replace them.
July 20, 2011 at 3:03 pm
The skillset for database development and administration, specifically SQL, tends to hold it's value longer relative to other IT skills like web or mobile device development. New features like analytical functions and datatypes are added with each major release, but they are for the most part extensions, nothing that would render obsolete the SQL or database that was well designed to begin with. Going from SQL Server 2000 to 2005 was an exception, but that was six years ago and the next release is not something that would leave 2005 and 2008 users feeling lost or antiquated.
"Do not seek to follow in the footsteps of the wise. Instead, seek what they sought." - Matsuo Basho
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