Fully Integrated Tech Professional
#20-12-04-06: Why Are You A Technologist?
Why be a Technologist?
”What made you choose to be a technical professional?”
Posted by Steven Cerri on Monday, December 4, 2006
Good evening!
Do you believe in accidents? Do you believe in choice? When you go to an ice cream store, (assuming you like a particular ice cream) do you always select the same flavor? Do you really select that “favorite ice cream (or food) or does it select you? Does your physiology begin the cascade of chemicals as soon as you see that favorite flavor and does your body begin preparing you to select it? Is this really choice or just the allusion of choice?
Did you select your career or did your career select you?For some of you reading this right now you are probably wondering what part of what planet I must be from. How can a career select us?
Look at it this way. Let’s break this career topic into two major groups; the world of apparent and seemingly provable order and the world of apparent disorder. And in the world of apparent order lets put all engineering, scientific, and technical disciplines. In the world of apparent disorder lets put all marketing, inter-personal human interaction and communication, social, and psychological disciplines.
I don’t have to work very hard to convince most of you that the disciplines of marketing, inter-personal human interaction and communication, social, and physiological are areas that we don’t understand well enough to even come close to having a cause-and-effect relationship between the various known parameters. In fact, to most of us, these “human” disciplines are completely “unknowable”. They depend on “people”. They seem to be independent of rational thought or analysis. They seem to be more dependent on blood sugar levels and moon cycles than on identifiable and predictable laws of the universe. Interacting with other people can be as unpredictable as tossing a coin.
On the other hand, F=ma, E=IR, Bernoulli’s equation, computer coding, and the first, second, and third laws of thermodynamics, are trustworthy laws and processes that allow us to build bridges, put humans on the moon, develop electric motors and do the million and one things that allow us to create an ever advancing world. That’s the key isn’t it? These predictable laws allow us to create. Predictable laws of the universe allow us to create something new in that universe.
Now, I can guarantee you that those people who have selected inter-personal human interaction and communication, marketing, and psychology believe they are creating their worlds as well. Only they don’t have to create that world from a predictable set of laws and cause-and-effect relationships. They are willing to live with the seeming uncertainty that comes from working without “concrete” laws.
Therefore, to choose a career in technology instead of a career in marketing or human development is not so much to choose a career, it is rather to choose a way of moving through the world. It is a choice about how much “certainty” you want in the world and how you want to deal with the uncertainty in it. In one career we attempt to diminish the uncertainty in order to create something. In the other, we are willing to live with the uncertainty in order to create something, as well. Both careers create, one with laws that attempt to reduce variability, the other within the dynamics of the variability.
To become an engineer or a scientist is to make a statement to the world something like: “I don’t particularly like uncertainty, and I’m going to do two things; first, I’m going to create what I can using those things I know to be certain in the world; and second, I’m going to do what I can to illuminate what looks like uncertainty and attempt to show that there is actually something certain about what appears to be uncertain. (This, of course, is what Chaos Theory is all about, isn’t it?)
Therefore, for those of us who have chosen the career of technology, (I’m included) we have done so because we want to understand and create order out of the seeming disorder all around us. And the biggest arena of disorder that we see is associated with people (just look at the current international world stage!).
Therefore, as a technologist, when you are tapped to move into technology management, and when you begin down the technology management path, you are making not only a career change, but also a fundamental shift in the way you are choosing to move through the world.
The reason most technical professionals fail to become good technical managers, or the reason they fail to even make the transition, is that they are being asked to completely shift their concept of world. They are being asked to shift form an appreciation of certainty and an understanding of a seemingly predictable world to an acceptance of the unpredictability and seeming chaos of the human world. They are ultimately being asked to leave the world of technology were cause-and-effect rule for the dynamic and variable world of human interaction of human inter-personal communication, motivation, management and leadership.
Is it any wonder this is such a difficult shift to make? Most technical professionals don’t even know they are being asked to take on a new career! Think of it that way, and you begin to understand why I think preparation for this shift is so important. From technologist to technical manager is, for most, a new career.
The transition can be made. It is actually a very enjoyable transition. But it is best made with your eyes wide open and with an understanding of what you are really being asked to do.
Be well
Steven Cerri
Posted by Steven Cerri on 12/04 at 11:03 PM Engineer to Technical Manager • Leadership • Management • Fully Integrated Tech Professional • (0) Comments • Permalink
#9-10-09-06: Your Only Tool Is…
Your Only Tools Is…
Communication
Posted by Steven Cerri on Monday, October 9, 2006
Good evening!
Today I conducted a training class at a customer site. The topic focused on being a technical individual contributor and a technical manager at the same time. This is typically what happens when a technical person is promoted to management of a small team or a small project. In most cases a technical person is simultaneously a part-time technical individual contributor and a part-time technical manager.
During the class a discussion occurred about the tools that managers can use to do their job. When I asked the class what the most important tool was at the disposal of a manager, I got several answers, including, “listening” and “the people”. I have always taken the position that the only tool of real significance that a technical manager has is “communication”.
There is no doubt that listening skills are important. There is no doubt that the people on the team are important. There is no doubt that there are other “tools” that are important as well. But I believe that all of them rely, at their foundation, on communication to be effective. Listening is about communication. People are motivated and inspired by communication. Everything we do as managers comes down to one fundamental capability, communication.
So even hire and fire authority doesn’t amount to much in the final analysis. The power and impact of hire and fire authority are only transmitted through communication. And so, ultimately, communication is the only tool that any technical professional or technical manager has to do their job.
Many technical professionals who become even part-time managers worry that if they don’t have hire and fire authority over people they won’t be able to manage them. The typical new manager has often not cultivated the communication skills necessary to be successful. Rather they are often looking for their “authority” to help make their management function easier.
Certainly, hire and fire authority makes management seem easier. However, throughout my career, I would guess that only half the time did I have hire and fire authority over the people who I needed to work with. I would guess that half the time I got my projects done by utilizing people who worked with me only because they wanted to and were willing to help me out. Even as a product manager, I relied on departments and people within those departments over whom I had no real authority. They put my project tasks in their schedules as they saw fit. I got my tasks moved to the front of the task list only because they wanted to help me get my product out the door.
This is the difference between formal and informal authority. Formal authority is authority that is given to you by your position, your title. It is less related to you as a person, and more related to your position. Formal authority is clearly tied to the formal organizational structure.
Informal authority is a function of your personality and your force of will. Informal authority is given to you by who you are and not by what your title is. If your informal authority is high, people work with you because they want to. They assist you because they want to. Informal authority is a function of your ability to build positive relationships with people. In my career, even when I had formal authority over people, I used it very sparingly. I would rather motivate people through informal authority than through formal authority even in those cases where I had the formal authority.
So as a technical professional or a technical manager, it is important to understand that the power of your communication, the power of your ability to communicate well and effectively, the power to use communication at the level of informal authority to motivate people, is most important to your success.
Motivating people through hire and fire authority has an underlying motivational process that is based on fear. Motivating people through a desire to assist you is motivating them through a willingness and desire to cooperate. I’ll take motivating people to want to assist me over motivating people to fear me any day.
Be well
Steven Cerri
Posted by Steven Cerri on 10/09 at 08:51 PM Inter-Personal People Skills • Communication for engineers • Soft Skills for engineers • Soft Skills for Technologists • Fully Integrated Tech Professional • (0) Comments • Permalink
#2-09/14/06: Using Your Skills?
Are you using all your skills at work?
Most technical professionals aren’t.
Posted by Steven Cerri on Thursday, September 14, 2006
Hello,
I want to introduce you to what is probably a new concept for you. The name of the concept is, “The Fully Integrated Technical Professional©”. I’ll explain what that means in this blog.
You go to college to learn your trade. You learn how to be an “individual contributor”, a technical professional who can solve specific technical problems. That’s all well and good.
Then you work at a company for a number of years and slowly or perhaps not so slowly you are given greater responsibility, especially responsibility for the management of projects and the management of a small team. You are expected to contribute positively to the team and maybe even display a little leadership in meetings. You are expected to be able to compromise and find the most effective solution in collaboration with your colleagues, those down the hall and those halfway around the world. You are expected to communicate and communicate well with a wide variety of people.
And from this situation there are two possible paths your career can take. You either do all this well and you succeed and therefore move along a path to management, or you don’t succeed, you crash, and you get relegated to doing “technical work” only. Now don’t get me wrong, you may choose to be the manager or you may choose to remain completely focused on the technical work.
The operative word here is “choose”. If you choose the path you want, fine. But many technical professionals, who get relegated to the technical world after attempting the management path, don’t get to choose. They find they haven’t measured up and they are disappointed, frustrated, and bitter. In fact, it’s mostly for this reason that many companies have developed the “dual-track” for those technical professionals who want to stay technical and those who want to become managers. The dual track allows technical people to “stay technical” throughout their careers, and while some choose this path, some end up there because they didn’t know how to make the successful transition to management.
Here is my position; let’s throw this whole concept of two paths and failing on any one of them out the window. Let’s make what we do with our careers a choice… a conscious choice, made because we understand what we want to do and what we are best suited to do.
That means that when you graduate from college and enter the work force as a technical professional you have one of two major paths to take; either you remain primarily technical or you move into technical management. However, whatever path you take you will contribute ALL of your capabilities. Regardless of whether you stay technical or you become a manager you will develop your skills at communicating with anyone in any situation. You will develop your ability to manage and lead be it in a meeting or with a company wide project. You will learn how to think systemically. You will learn how to vary your communication style so that you can motivate people whether in a small meeting down the hall or when talking to an auditorium full of your employees.
This then is what it is to be a Fully Integrated Technical Professional. It is to be a fully developed contributor to your organization either as a technologist or as a technical manager. It’s to continue your personal development process after college. It’s to be able to live your professional career from a position of choice not from of position of limitation. The Fully Integrated Technical Professional is a technical professional first. It’s someone who understands to varying degrees technology, its implications, and its capabilities. And it is someone who can also communicate and interact with, understand, and motivate people and situations so that things can get done, not just by one person, but also by many people. Remember, the days of living in the corner lab and working alone to accomplish what needs to be done are mostly gone. Look around. Nothing of significance gets done anymore without the contributions of many people. To me, the Fully Integrated Technical Professional is the only way to be a technical person in the 21st century. Like I often say, the Fully Integrated Technical Professional is a technical professional who is more than technical.
Be well
Steven Cerri
Posted by Steven Cerri on 09/15 at 10:25 AM Inter-Personal People Skills • Fully Integrated Tech Professional • (0) Comments • Permalink
