Recorded Test Steps

In my blog How To Make Your Team Hate You #3, I wrote about Barbara, a Tester who I used to work with that caused a lot of conflict and was constantly trying to get out of doing work, whilst taking credit for other people’s work.

Recently, when going through old chat logs, I found some brilliant “dirt”, which, in hindsight; I could have probably used to get her sacked because it was fairly strong evidence that – not only was she not doing work; she was falsely passing Test Cases. When you are paid to check if the software is behaving correctly, claiming you have tested it is very negligent.

When running test cases, if you pass each step separately, and haven’t disabled the recording feature, Microsoft Test Manager would record your clicks and add it as evidence to the test run.

I think the feature worked really well for web apps because it can easily grab the name of all the components you clicked, whereas on our desktop app, it mainly just logged when the app had focus and read your keystrokes.

The bad news for Barbara, is that she liked going on the internet for personal use, and liked chatting using instant messenger as we will see.

The Remedy

Type 'Hi Gavin. ' in 'Chat Input. Conversation with Gavin Ford' text box
Type 'Hi Gavin. I've been telling everyone about this concoction and it really worked wonders for everyone that's tried it, myself included. This is for cold, cough and general immunity. 1 cup of milk + 1 tablespoon honey + 1/4 teaspoon of turmeric - bring to a rolling boil. Add grated root ginger (2 teaspoons or 1 tablespoon) and let it boil for another 5 mins. Put thru sieve and discard root ginger bits (or drink it all up if you fancy), but drink it hot before you sleep every night and twice a day if symptoms are really bad. Hope you feel better soon. 🙂 ' in 'Chat Input.

Pumpkins & Tetris

Type 'Indian pumpkin growing{Enter}' in 'Address and search bar' text box
Type '{Left}{Left} {Right} {Left}{Left} {Up}{Up}{Up}{Up}{Up}{Up}{Left}{Left} {Up}{Up}{Up}{Right} {Up}{Up}{Left} {Right}{Right} {Up}{Right}{Left}{Left}{Left}{Left} {Right}{Up}{Left}{Left}' in '(1) Tetris Battle on Facebook - Google Chrome' document

Click 'Amazon.co.uk:Customer Reviews: 100ml Bergamot Pure...' label
Click 'Close' button
Click 'Essential-Oil-Blends_Chart.pdf' label
Click 'Checkout' label

3 days Small Regression Pack


Me 11:26:
Barbara has been doing the Assessment regression pack for 3 days
she says there is only a few left in this morning's standup. There's 15 left out of 27
Dan Woolley 11:28:
lol
Me 11:29:
I don't even think she is testing them either. It looks like she is dicking about then clicking pass
Click 'Inbox (2,249) - [Barbara@gmail.com]Barbara@gmail.com - Gmail' label
Click 'Taurus Horoscope for April 2017 - Page 4 of 4 - Su...' tab
Click 'Chrome Legacy Window' document
Click 'Chrome Legacy Window' document
Click 'Close' button
Click 'Paul' label in the window 'Paul'
Click image
Type 'Morning. ' in 'Chat Input. Conversation with Paul' text box
Type '{Enter}' in 'Chat Input. Conversation with Paul' text box
Step Completed : Repeat steps 6 to 19 using the Context Menu in the List Panel
End testing

Next Day

Me 12:42: Barbara said this morning that all the Assessments test cases need running. She has just removed them instead

Greek Salad

Type 'greek salad{Enter}' in 'Chrome Legacy Window' document
Type 'cous cous salad' in 'Chrome Legacy Window' document
Type 'carrots ' in 'couscous with lemon and coriander - Google Search ...' document
 
Click 'Vegetable Couscous Recipe | Taste of Home' tab
Click 'Woman Traumatized By Chimpanzee Attack Speaks Out ...' tab
 
Marshall 11:50:
oh damn haha
these are things that were inadvertently recorded?
Me 11:51:
yeah
Marshall 11:51:
ha you've stumbled upon a gold mine 
Me 11:53:
I don't think she is actually testing anything. I think she just completes a step now and then
the other day Rob went to PO approve an item and he couldn't see the changes because they hadn't even patched

Haven’t Been Testing From The Start

we are in Sprint 8 and Barbara suggested Matt does a demo on the project so we know how it works; it’s a right riot
Me. 4 months into a project

Bad Audits

I wonder if Barbara was inconsistent with how she ran the test cases, or realised by the end that it tracked you. So near the end of her time, she was just hitting the main Pass button rather than passing each individual step. Managers liked the step-by-step way because if you mark a step as failed, it is clearer what the problem is.

Me 16:15: 
Barbara called me. Matt is monitoring our testing! 
Dan Woolley 16:15: 
how?
Me 16:17: 
looking at the run history
she said he was complaining it wasn't clear which step failed because we were just using the main pass button, and also bugs weren't linked when they had been failed
I told Barbara I linked mine, then she checked and said it was Sam that didn't. I checked and saw it was Sam and Barbara
so only the developer did testing properly 😀
you just can't get the staff

Obviously The Wrong Message

Me 09:12: 
Bug 35824:Legal Basis text needs to be clear 
what's all that about?
Barbara Smith 09:12: 
Charlotte asked me to raise it for visibility 
We need to fix the text that appears on that tab 
Me 09:13: 
what's wrong with it?
Barbara Smith 09:21: 
It says that on the Bug LOL 
And with a screenshot (mm)
Me 09:22: 
it says "needs to be clear" and has a screenshot with a part of it underlined. But it doesn't say what the text should be instead.

She rarely logged bugs because she did minimal testing. Then when she did log something it didn’t have enough info to be useful.

Karma

Barbara got well conned in the end. She was gonna take the entire December off but delayed it for the end of the project and then she has been told she has lost her job, so they are telling her to take the holiday now. She had just bought a house so would be relying on the money for the mortgage payments. Luckily for her she got accepted for a new job, but she was looking for a brand new way of getting out of it, as we will see below.

Tax Fraud

Type 'what if I don't contact hrmc about my tax{Enter}' in 'Address and search bar' text box
Sam 11:23:
Ha ha
You are savage
Me 11:24:
she is gonna get jailed for tax evasion

Maternity Fraud

Click ‘How to get pregnant fast | BabyCenter’ tab

Going Green & Earth Day

Recently, my employer has been looking to analyse their impact on the environment and the aim is to become carbon-neutral. A group of people have taken ownership of this idea and call themselves “Green Champions”.

During the launch of our Sustainability Strategy, we announced our environmental goal: “Environmental sustainability is an integral part of our operations and value chain delivered through steady, measurable improvement”.

I find a few of their announcements a bit misleading, or fairly random with what they take issue with.

For example, someone requested a “sharable greeting card” idea. These would either be physical cards people can send, or something similar to email templates we can send to each other for events such as Christmas. This idea was declined.

“Due to the environmental impacts from sending mass communications through mail or email, this will not go ahead“

We keep hearing about how we need to cut down the number of emails we send because of how bad they are for the environment – but I don’t understand the logic.

Me:
Why are emails always said to be bad anyway? does sending a Slack message cause the ozone layer to deplete as well?
Can you architect me a Green Email system? think this is gonna be the next big idea
GreE-nm@il
The latest big tech company
 
Architect:
what a load of absolute bollocks!
just justifying not spending money
if emails are so expensive how much electricity is wasted by the "cameras-on policy"

So emails are bad. Instant messaging is fine. Video calls are encouraged.

Travel

Is that really what we should be focussing on anyway? Recently, the entire UK business travelled to one location for some presentations which we could have easily done remotely. Then a few months later, most of the directors and some senior leaders flew to India to do the same presentations. The amount of emissions caused by all the cars/coaches/planes etc, and all the money wasted on hotels and food expenses is surely a bigger problem than sending a few emails for special occasions.

Cars

We have also replaced all our company cars with electric ones. Discounts were available for people to personally purchase an electric car. We now have charging stations at the office, and it seemed a few people were quite eager to travel to work at the office just so they could charge their car for free. Isn’t that encouraging more unnecessary travel, and increasing the company electric bill?

Whose problem?

“our estate is now fully in the AWS cloud, a huge milestone on our road to net zero”
Green Champion

Isn’t that like dumping your rubbish in your neighbours garden?

This brings us to another point. If you have transferred a carbon footprint from one company/person to another, then the problem still exists. We claimed that moving our servers from on-premise to the cloud has reduced our carbon footprint. The servers are still there though, they just belong to a different company. There could be savings elsewhere though because our servers were on 24/7 but a big selling point of the cloud is that you can use auto-scaling (high demand uses more servers, low demand then uses fewer). Surely you can use this feature on your own servers though; it was just that we didn’t.

Are Electric Cars even environmentally friendly?

Let’s call upon AI to write part of the blog…

Electric vehicles (EVs) have been hailed as a cornerstone of the transition to a more sustainable future, promising a reduction in the carbon footprint associated with personal transportation. However, the environmental impact of EVs is a complex subject, with various factors that could potentially diminish their green credentials.

One of the primary concerns is the carbon emissions associated with the production of EVs, particularly the batteries. The manufacturing process for EV batteries is energy-intensive, often relying on electricity generated from fossil fuels. Studies suggest that the emissions from producing an electric car can be up to 70% higher than those from manufacturing a traditional petrol vehicle.

Another point of contention is the source of electricity used to charge EVs. In regions where renewable energy sources like wind or solar power are less prevalent, the advantages of EVs in reducing greenhouse gas emissions may not be as pronounced.

Furthermore, there is the issue of battery disposal and recycling. EV batteries contain hazardous materials, and improper disposal can lead to environmental contamination. While recycling programs are developing, the infrastructure is not yet widespread, and the process itself can be resource-intensive.

Earth Day Blog #1

A colleague posted an internal blog on what they did for Earth Day.

Here in my local town, they had an event at the Town Hall where lots of local groups gathered to raise awareness and share what they do in particular.

The Thirsk Wombles work tirelessly to clear rubbish from our town. I had no idea what a problem the disposable vape containers are. The Thirsk Wombles have collected a really big boxful in the first 20 days of April and the lady I talked to reckons they will be able to do that and more every month.

I then had a lovely long talk about "North Yorkshire Contented Bee Project" and bought some amazing local honey - very few food miles, masses of taste and it'll help with my hayfever.

Earth Day Blog #2

My personal passions are aligned with the department I work within.
I wanted to share today an aligned post for Stress Awareness Month and Earth Day next week about eco-anxiety.

Eco-anxiety (or climate anxiety) is a feeling of distress that comes from thinking about environmental breakdown, based on what we see happening around us.

It is impossible to ignore the information we receive via news, social media etc. that our planet earth is in trouble. We hear information that the planet is warming up, freak weather conditions, wildlife species declining and becoming extinct, overpopulation, deforestation and the list heartbreakingly continues.
The effect our modern lives are having on the planet is now catching up with us and it is hard to ignore the information we are seeing. So much is now being documented via TV programmes such as Planet Earth and the The Earthshot Prize initiative.

I, myself, hold my hand up and admit I have feelings of sadness and guilt about the impact modern life is having on the planet. Every day I make a conscious effort to review my recycling, plant more native biodiverse plants, use less aerosol products, review the products used in my home to reduce the amount of microplastics and chemicals down the drain, say no to fast fashion, reduce my heating by 1 degree and have No Meat Mondays.

Despite all this I know I can do more. But where do I start and do my small actions help?

To all of you reading today...every small action helps.
As the famous saying goes ….Knowledge is power. I have learnt so much through the Green Champions about what else can be done, alternative products and, more importantly, there is a group of people who have the same passions and feel the same. The Wellbeing Programme and Mental Health First Aiders invaluable content during Stress Awareness Month assists me in navigating through eco-anxiety.

If I may pass on any nuggets of inspiration to you today, it is that you are not alone in any types of stress or anxiety felt. I assure you many people feel the same and change is possible and 100% can be achieved.

Fear of Climate Change
- Climate change and the state of nature is having an impact on mental health
- Watching the world change sometimes combines with feelings of personal guilt.
- Witnessing climate indifference may evoke feelings of anger, powerlessness and hopelessness.
Leading to being uncomfortable and overwhelmed
- Aligns with Stress Awareness Month and Earth Day
- Speak up and seek support. Take action — even the smallest contributions make a difference.
- Your feelings are a healthy response to this topic. Our MHFAs are 100% available to
talk to.
- You are not alone

Closing Thoughts

Eco-anxiety sounds very problematic. How can you live life with that much worry? It’s really not a healthy mindset to have. There’s loads of other issues in the world too. Does she spend all her time crying when she sees food due to child poverty which she has no control over? How many things does she do that are actually bad for the environment but is unaware of? Does she drive an electric car, thinking it is 100% eco friendly?

King of All Excuses: Part 3

I’ve written blogs about an employee which I referred to as Beavis, due to his grunt laugh. He is a complete liability and I don’t know why we didn’t sack him ages ago. His constant excuses why he cannot work are obvious lies. He came up with loads when we worked in the office but then when we started worked from home during lockdown, he had a whole new set to go through.

I understand some people can have some bad luck or them or their family members can have health issues, but is it possible for him to be hit with such frequent illnesses and issues?

Check out Part 1 and Part 2.

Here’s around 3 months of excuses.

Mobile phone has problems so can’t use authenticator to connect to VPN
Broadband is too slow
Needs to take his wife’s car for an MOT
Laptop broke
Antibiotics for his dog
Drove down to the village to see the extent of the floods
Optician appointment
Broadband not working
Cracked Laptop Screen
Oven repair
Daughter’s sports day
BT Broadband outage
BT Broadband outage again, and phone tethering won’t work either.
Builder is looking at some “snagging issues”
Throat glands have all swollen up and I’ve lost my voice
Emergency dentist work
Check up following dentist work. Will take an hour total travel, waiting, then dentist time. So at least 2 hours.

A colleague was saying that his line manager isn’t very active so therefore he can send him a message saying that he isn’t coming in, then Nigel won’t have replied to accept his request.

“he uses Nigel’s inability to reply to his advantage”

Isobel: "I have been in contact with Beavis who did the work but he has had to take the day off unexpectedly"
Andy: "is it actually unexpected at this point?"

Other People’s Excuses:

“randomly I’ve just got to move some bales of straw. back soon”

Zoe

(one of the top manager’s wife, so gets a bit of leeway to do what she wants):

cleaning dining table
having a shower
in garden having beers

Derek

(also notorious for slacking. I suspected the occasional lie from him too):

I’ll be working from home today, a leaky shower box is causing an unintended indoor water feature, so I’m hanging around for a plumber. Don’t forget to skype me for the stand-up 😉

I’m working from home today. Sorry I haven’t emailed sooner, I had some problems initially remoting in as my computer at work had a dicky fit.

International Women’s Day

In recent years, we have been progressively highlighting social justice topics at work. With our recent takeover with American owners, they have said it is one of our company objectives to be more Diverse, so expect more over the coming years.

I’ve stated in other blogs that if there is actually a problem to solve, then I am all for it. As far as I am aware, there is no problem with Diversity/Sexism etc where I work.

In Software Development, the demographics is male-dominated in the UK. However, I have found when we have hired women, they might only stay for a few years before leaving, or want to switch to management. I’m tempted to say women seem to be favoured for promotions and requests to change contract (reduced days or working hours). When it comes to Software Testing, it seemed fairly balanced between men and women. Management level seemed predominantly women.

In our India office, women are much better represented in all areas. Not sure of the exact breakdowns but it could be like 5% female developers in the UK, but 35% women in India.

Our head office in the UK is next to a predominantly Asian city so we have a high amount of Asian staff.

So with the new American owners, their constant claims that we need to improve diversity makes them seem foolish and makes me worry they might start making negative changes and introduce new problems. Constantly telling people we need to make things “equitable” and “inclusive”, and questioning how we are supporting certain groups of people – just creates a victim mindset. Spotlighting a certain group is also divisive if you think about it…

Today, on International Women’s Day, we take time out to celebrate the incredible women we work alongside and their achievements. Our commitment to the UN Sustainable Development Goal of Gender Equality is shown through the value we place on the incredible women employed here and their impact, as well as the hugely positive influence we all have on women’s experiences.

This is a place where women have long, successful careers, and with that in mind, I want to inspire women and advocates by spotlighting women’s careers. I am delighted to share their views and experiences in this video and the images below, with even more great content and stories featured here on Sharepoint. Whilst you watch, I’d like everyone to think about what part you play in shaping our industry to be an equitable, inclusive space for all. How do you support women in the industry? In your department? In your team? It's up to us all to challenge gender stereotypes, call out discrimination, draw attention to bias, and seek out inclusion.

International Women’s Day is about raising awareness for gender parity, however you identify, and it’s an opportunity to put a spotlight on the successful contributions women make in our business.

Isn’t the entire post hypocritical? It opens saying how we have incredible women here, they have long, successful careers, then switches tone and implies that we aren’t supporting women and there’s discrimination!

Question: where have you seen the positive impact?

“it’s happening right now. The CEO is inspiring”
Director of Business Operations

In the video, we saw our female CTO who was talking about the company we merged with, also led by a female CTO. We then heard from the “Director of Business Operations” (who I think has been promoted every 2-3 years since she joined), then finally someone slightly lower down the hierarchy, a “Principal Software Engineer”.

So we have examples of women that have had no trouble being promoted. We are led by women, the Human Resources department is 80% women. If we do have a gender pay-gap, or if women struggle to get promoted, then whose fault is it?

One manager replied to the post and used similar statements implying that there is a problem with sexism here.

Woo! Some amazing women right here and across the business, feel so lucky to work alongside some incredible women and for a company that is striving to tackle inequality and find new ways to support women in the workplace!
Manager

So much inequality here. If there is so much, then why aren’t they suing. It’s against the law isn’t it?

Neurodiversity Celebration Week

In recent years, my employer has been progressively promoting more “woke” issues, as well as some health-related content. Our recent internal blogs on Viva Engage have been about Neurodiversity Celebration Week.

“This week is Neurodiversity Celebration Week; a worldwide initiative that aims to challenge stereotypes and misconceptions about neurological differences. We want to use this opportunity to raise awareness of the experiences of neurodivergent employees, highlight the value of neurodiversity in the workplace, and provide tools and guidance to help all our people create an inclusive environment where diverse minds can thrive.”

I think it is a good idea to remind people that some people think differently. I’m unaware if I have anything like autism but I do often struggle when posed questions that are phrased in certain ways. When we first learned about Agile development, and started doing “Retrospectives”, some of the initial ones had obscure questions like “if the last 2 weeks were a chocolate bar, what would it be?”. My mind is just like “wut”, whereas everyone else on the team came up with an answer, even if they just chose their favourite chocolate bar and forced certain elements into it. “There were some really smart solutions to problems so I chose Smarties”. When I failed to answer many questions over the months, some people moaned that I wasn’t participating, but I just got frustrated with that line of questioning.

“These blogs perfectly highlight the fact that everybody, and how we each experience the world, is different. Depending on how our brains are wired, we think, move, process information and communicate in different ways. We all have a responsibility to create an inclusive working environment where diverse minds can thrive. Everybody should feel safe, supported, and able to perform at their best. Therefore, it is important that we firstly recognise an individual’s differences, and work to harness their strengths and talents whilst minimising the challenges they may experience”

I think some conditions do have strengths and weaknesses. As far as I know, certain types of autism can lead to some great ideas since they have a different way of thinking, but then can be awkward in different social situations. One person wrote a blog on their life and observations with autism.

Here are some key takeaways from their blog:

Autism is a spectrum, which means that everyone who is autistic can have a wide variety of signs and symptoms, and how it impacts individuals can differ greatly.
Everyone uses phrases that have subtle implied meanings. For people with Autism, the implied elements simply disappear, and everything can be taken at face value. So an example they gave was if they put a jumper on, and someone asks “Are you cold?” they would answer “no” because they are now warmer.
Their responses to questions can often seem rude or abrasive, yet they were only literally answering the question they were presented.
If you ask many questions quickly, they will then present an answer to each in the order you gave them. They are insistent in processing all information sequentially, and will want to answer all of them.
Sensory overload: They despise being touched, they feel overloaded by background sounds, and will need to be alone to recharge after a long period of social interaction.
They often talk over people

I was looking on our Sharepoint for the additional neurodivergent resources. I came across some strange statements:

“Most neurodiverse conditions are classified as disabilities, but it is important to note that not every neurodivergent person identifies with a disability, to avoid stigma and isolation.”

Is it really possible to “identify” with a disability? Like the autism blog described, they didn’t want people to treat them differently but they acknowledge their social awkwardness, and understand others need to be aware of their traits in order to not be offended, or to try and adapt their line of questioning. I assume that is the point the statement was trying to make.

“Diversity is important for any organisation to develop, and understanding neurodiversity comes with huge benefits.”

That’s another one that needs more explanation. I think some people can come up with interesting ideas if they have something similar to autism, but a lot of other neurodiverse conditions are only negative. The way you “benefit” is to try to reduce the impact of the negatives. The statement by itself sounds like it is only positive to hire neurodiverse people, when that is not the case.

I saw a recent BBC article where the caption claimed that Down’s Syndrome is “an ability not a disability”. I get the sentiment, and that people often misunderstand the condition, but I don’t think anyone really believes it is an ability. I’ve seen a lot of this reframing in recent years: Things that were considered “mental health” conditions are now framed as normalised/part of someone’s identity, so is a positive thing that should be celebrated. Then not only is this mentality being pushed by mainstream media, it’s now being pushed from inside company culture under the guise of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion.

Quiet Quitting

Early on during lockdown, a new term seemed to be trending in articles. I don’t even think it was lockdown-specific, so the timing was probably a coincidence. The term was “Quiet Quitting”.

One interpretation of this buzzword is when an employee deliberately gives the minimum effort in order to avoid being fired. Another interpretation is when an employee is more focussed on avoiding burnout (balancing their work with other interests).

The Coasting Definition

Doing the minimum is not a new concept since there’s always people looking to get out of work – be it: casually browsing the internet, taking breaks away from the desk, talking to colleagues, dragging out tasks for longer than expected, and more. Terms get thrown around like “slacking”, “goofing off”, “coasting”, “cruising”, “staying under the radar”.

Avoiding Burnout Definition

For the second definition, you could interpret that to mean they still care about their job, but are more focussed on consistent performance over time; therefore Quiet Quitting doesn’t really apply.

Quitting at 5pm

I never know what is real or fake on the internet these days . I saw a post apparently from a CEO saying they have a group of colleagues that are good but refuse to do, or think about work after 5pm – so he was asking what can be done about it. It seems ridiculous to have the expectation that employees should want to work outside the terms you pay them for, but it does happen. I’ve had a manager say to me I was overlooked for a promotion because I never did overtime. Yet the reason was that I did my work during work hours, and it was others that were basically “quiet quitting”, then asking for more money to complete the tasks they were already paid to do.

Thinking about work 24/7 probably ain’t healthy, and I find you can be more productive by having free time. Working long hours one day, then being productive for the very next 9-5 day seems impossible to me. So what’s the point working longer to make up time, when you lose time the next day?

There’s been times I have worked hard and didn’t even get a rise to match inflation which is basically a paycut. I’ve then proceeded to do the bare minimum, even cut corners because I’m just doing the job they are paying me to do at the current rate. There’s no point maintaining performance “above and beyond” when they aren’t paying for that level.

Even though you could say your effort is an investment and you will be rewarded in future; in reality – it doesn’t always work that way. I wrote plenty of blogs about Derek who was clearly incompetent and was constantly slacking, often only working half the day – and he got promoted a couple of years before I did.

Creating Healthy Engagement

In recent years, the executives would use terms and phrases like “caring about employees”, “work life balance”, “mental health awareness”. But then when it comes down to it, it might not be reflected in all manager’s opinions.

Where I work, I don’t think it is actually bad – just the occasional moment, or occasional comment from certain managers, and often hints of payrises in the next quarter that never materialise.

I think some people just see the job as a means to earn money, and I’m not sure you can do that much to change their attitude.

Removing stressful elements, overtime culture, and trusting employees to do their jobs could create a culture of “healthy engagement”. If employees see a consistent approach in payrises and promotions, then that can also motivate people to engage and improve. If there’s not much incentive to grow your career from the job you have, then it’s more beneficial to “Quiet Quit” rather than perform high.

There’s going to be times where overtime is required when deadlines loom, or there is “Red Flag” and an urgent fix is required. But regardless of why the overtime is needed, it’s probably better just rewarding the employee with an extra day holiday. As discussed earlier, offering additional money rewards people that create the need for overtime.

References:

Spotify – https://hrblog.spotify.com/2022/09/22/how-to-fight-quiet-quitting-by-creating-healthy-engagement/

Joshua Fluke –

The Transparent Placation of the Employee Forum

A few years ago, the directors announced they were starting a Programme to improve the company culture, and act upon feedback we had recently given them via an “Employee Forum“.

I do think due to working at home, there isn’t the same togetherness there used to be. Years ago, we seemed a close-knit bunch, but these days, I get the impression people just want to do their work and go home…although they are already home.

We were asked to give initial feedback from the scheme, and one colleague made a somewhat epically-written post, which ended up being his last.

“This “programme” is an exercise in indulging in the same old political rhetoric and transparent placation many of us have grown all too familiar with. Perhaps I have simply grown jaded and cynical, but we have corporate correspondence envisioning a future where all feel valued, and yet casual communication engenders entirely the opposite. To, on the one hand, read statements such as the above and then be told such things as “if you want better pay, get another job”, is insulting to the intelligence and dedication of employees. This, “programme”, is in fact a desperate response to the abysmal employer image the company has cultivated for years; to this day exhibiting a callous disregard for even its most dedicated employees – you reap what you sow.

In short, this isn’t a question of “focus”; rather, it’s a question of chasing each of these lofty goals with equal levels of tenacity, integrity, and humility. This “programme” is years too late and, despite a ledger demonstrating the contrary, the company has only ever proven itself to be more than “a dollar short”.

The goals outlined as part of this programme infer/suppose a complete lack of humanism in company culture and are a tacit admission of gross negligence when it comes to employees; the shoulders upon which the company stands.”
Rodger

The directors responded with predictable responses:

“this does not reflect everyone’s view of our business”

“this isn’t the right platform to raise these issues”

“we value colleagues feedback and encourage great constructive conversations”

“I can assure you that the people on the programme are thoroughly committed to making a positive difference in our dedicated areas.”

“judge at the end and not at the start”
Various Managers

I understand both sides here, they did ask for feedback and they got it. However, they don’t want something so scathing to be publicly aired. It’s a tough one though because such statements could cause people to be more confident in airing their views (which is what they claim to want), but firing him like they did will suppress people from giving true feedback.

The usual process is probably to go to your line manager, but they don’t always raise it with their line manager. Then since it has to go up a few levels of the hierarchy; the message is probably going to get lost. If you suspect that happening, do you bypass them and go higher up the chain?

It was also written a bit too poetically which meant it was hard to understand some of the points. I think there is a specific and recent issue which he was referring to, and in the following days, I did learn that an employee that had been around for 20 years or so and been forced out. I didn’t learn the reason, but that was being referenced with “exhibiting a callous disregard for even its most dedicated employees“. So I think it was coming from a place of witnessing instances of toxic behaviour and calling it out, and it wasn’t even a personal grievance; he is sticking up for fellow employees.

The obvious (or maybe I should say “predictable”) response was to sack him, which they did. But you could have actually gone the opposite way and actually let him participate in making the changes to improve the culture. I only interacted with him a few times, but he always came across as knowledgeable and dedicated.

He goes on to say others keep quiet because they need their job, although it is low paid compared to industry standards. Many roles are overworked due to restructuring and merging roles together. Managers were ignoring the problems when raised. Proposed changes in Support were predicted by many to end in failure, but managers dismissed their concerns. I have seen similar comments on Glassdoor, which is where you don’t want the feedback, since that is on a public forum, and posted after an employee has left the business.

On a quest to get some juicy content for my blog, I managed to contact him before he got deactivated:

[Yesterday 15:07] Me
have you resigned. That post is epic

[Yesterday 15:07] Rodger
No. But don't plan on sticking around long haha

[Yesterday 15:08] Me
haven't you just started in development though? or did they do the classic "we will give you half pay until you prove yourself"

[Yesterday 15:14] Rodger
Sad but true

[Yesterday 15:20] Me
They are putting my notice period up from 1 month to 3. I made the point that this is contrary to the Employee of Choice which is supposed to be improving our conditions!

[Yesterday 15:20] Rodger
Good lord, that's rough...
And yeah, certainly feels that way

[Yesterday 15:21] Me
can't remember who was in charge at the time, but he put it down from 3 to 1, stating they wanted to improve things, and now we are undoing it. Apparently Experts and Managers are on like 6 months which just seems insane.

[Yesterday 15:22] Rodger
6 months. That's ridiculous, what company would be willing to wait that long for a new employee...

[Yesterday 15:23] Me
I don't see the point of changing the notice periods. Don't people just hand over their work in 1-2 weeks, take annual leave, then mess about for the rest of it
paying an unproductive employee who doesn't want to work there is just crazy. Even if they are moving for other reasons like leaving the country, it seems like you have to then leave on bad terms. Just let them go. 1 month is enough to deal with

[Yesterday 15:25] Rodger
Indeed. Don't get the mentality at all

[Yesterday 15:26] Me
anyway, I asked Jeannette to raise it in the Employee Forum. I reckon they will just say something like "its inline with industry standards" or some corporate statement

[Yesterday 15:27] Rodger
Oh aye, wasn't expecting a response.
Just wanted the catharsis of saying it all
Thanks regardless, though

[Yesterday 15:28] Me
they will probably delete your post and not try and address it. Reminds me of the negative glassdoor reviews then Jacqui says "this doesn't reflect my experience at all"
and I think, "how do you know what those jobs are like? you are on the big bucks, probably in your own office by yourself"

[12:05] Me
I couldn't resist responding [my post was about lines of communication, and trying to start a discussion with others around Rodger’s points to try and diffuse the argument]

[12:05] Rodger
Thanks haha

[12:07] Me
have they actually said anything to you directly? It's good that they didn't delete your post but then I was worried they would just sack you for these outbursts. I do think you might be a bit too (passive?) aggressive, but then I reckon you do have some good underlying points that they should listen to

[12:08] Rodger
Any aggressiveness, passive or otherwise, is only because the responses to my post have demonstrated a lack of understanding and contempt.
My initial post is nowhere near anything combative...
And, no. No one has spoken to me directly. People have spoken to my Manager and others around me though...

You've raised the right questions here.
Where can one speak about these things

[12:11] Me
I think someone did say (via a question) on our Departmental Meetings that the whole "we will take it offline" response just causes these problems. If there is an official response to it, everyone doesn't hear it because it was addressed one-on-one. Then I think that's what you are also calling out, because these Senior Managers are basically implying to contact them directly, rather than post in an open forum.

[12:12] Rodger
Aye

[12:13] Me
in my standup, one guy said he had to get a dictionary out to try and understand your points. It is super poetic. It makes it funnier but I do think it probably detracts from your points

[12:15] Rodger
Fair, but it's genuinely the way I speak and I thought it best to be as erudite as possible when articulating it all; in an effort to not just be dismissed as a dribbling idiot or fool, etc.

[12:27] Me
This does sound a bit extreme to me. Then that would be perceived to be an attack on the SLT
"The goals outlined as part of this programme infer/suppose a complete lack of humanism in company culture and are a tacit admission of gross negligence when it comes to employees; the shoulders upon which the company stands."

[12:31] Rodger
It certainly is a criticism.
The company admits that its staff don't feel; rewarded, included, valued, etc. (as inferred by the programme itself).
Is that not gross negligence?
I am perhaps opining there, but it doesn't seem to me to be an unreasonable statement and I would be happy to discuss the matter if literally anyone else was...

[12:35] Me
It can be a tough one because I think most people will complain about pay regardless of how much they actually get. Then if they don't get an inflation rise, they will moan about that but they might have been overpaid. So when people do complain, it might not be a valid point. but then I have been a victim of being underpaid

I think a common problem we have is that managers see us all as interchangeable. I have only been on this project a few months but we are gonna get our 3rd PO, and we have switched architects, and there was talk about moving one of our testers to another team. How can you be productive when that happens? can't build up knowledge or team chemistry. They still see us as "resources" they can move about. Probably doesn't help if a department is called Human Resources.

[12:38] Rodger
Indeed

[12:38] Me
I find it interesting how people like me moan, but yet stay here years so we must secretly like it

[12:39] Rodger
haha

[12:40] Me
I think it is actually a low stress job, and when I've known so many people leave and then come back, it does make you think it's not always greener on the other side. I also think other jobs will give you more responsibility. So I think it is comfortable here

do you find development stressful, or were your comments about your previous role?

[12:46] Rodger
I guess I'm in something of a unique position.
My comments were about my previous role, how things are now for me (which ain't "bad", just insanely busy), and everything I've heard and seen from elsewhere in the business

Conclusion

I think the lesson here is that if you really want to make changes to culture, then you need to be open to listening to “hard truths”. So if there was a problematic manager – if an employee openly reports the problem, it shouldn’t be the case that managers stick together. The claims should be investigated and if the manager is problematic, then they should be fired and not the employee.

I think we lost a couple of good and very dedicated employees here, and yet managers were pretending everything was perfectly fine.

Pride At Work

During Pride month, there were a few Yammer (now known as Viva Engage) posts about LGBT issues. One guy made a blog post about how gay people were denied the opportunity of blood transfusions until recently. It was informative but I did think it was a weird thing to post at work – given the word-count of the word “sex” reached double figures and contained the phrase “anal sex” along with other sexual references.

If you take that out of the context of “pride”, wouldn’t discussing or writing about sex at work result in you being on a call with a member of HR?

I discussed it with a few of my colleagues. One guy said he thought he “had crossed the line with his phrasing and could have easily worded it in a less explicit way”. Another colleague stated that “although I support Pride, I don’t feel I should be reading about it at work“. That is actually a good point. Although there can be important social issues in the world, if it has nothing to do with work, then why are we reading or talking about it when we should be working? I’m sure there was even some policy we had to agree to – that said you couldn’t discuss religion and politics because if someone had different beliefs to you, then they may feel excluded.

It made me think that – because LGBT is the current hot-topic, then it trumps all existing work policies, and you aren’t allowed to say anything against it. This is even more contentious when this particular topic could be against someone’s religious beliefs (we do employ a significant number of Muslims, and a certain number of colleagues could have opposing views regardless of religion).

To conclude Pride month, a member of HR posted the following:

“Lots of events take place throughout June every year to celebrate the LGBTQ+ community and all the progress that has been made across legislation, attitudes and behaviours.
Personally, one reason I find these events so wonderful is because they bring together people of all ages and I see so many families attending together with children – what better way to encourage change than to teach children about positive attitudes and behaviours and set a great example for them.”
HR staff member

I laughed out loud when I read that. I really wanted to respond, but thought I’d end up being unfairly sacked. So I wrote this blog instead.

Maybe the average person hasn’t heard about all the controversies this year, but recently, I’ve spent a lot of time on Twitter and been watching a lot of Daily Wire content. I suppose the more stuff you view on Twitter, the more it recommends the content, and so if you have any hint of an opinion, then it becomes stronger with “confirmation bias”. I’ve generally been interested in conspiracy theories and hot debates, so Twitter has pushed a lot of this content to my feed.

Don’t get me wrong here, I’m not against LGBT in general, but am opposed to it being directed at kids (which a lot of people from the likes against Daily Wire are making content about), and Twitter seemed to like showing me everything that Gays Against Groomers were Tweeting, and that’s their purpose.

oh, won't somebody please think of the children - The Simpson's meme

So let’s go through some examples of what I am referring to here. If I remember correctly, the first controversy was a “family-friendly” Pride event where gay people in fetish gear were being whipped on top of an open-car. The next was a photograph of a curious girl about 6 years old who had approached 2 guys who were wearing that dog-themed leather bondage gear. A point here is – this content should only be known about if you go out of your way on an 18-rated website. Instead, people are in a public event where they knew that kids would be at, dressing up and even simulating these acts.

I actually only came across that particular fetish due to a colleague mentioning that a former male colleague had an OnlyFans with his boyfriend, and it was the company’s discovery of this fact that had forced him to leave the business. Given that the colleague that was telling me this had a reputation for exaggerating and lying, I asked him to prove it, and he linked me to his pages. He was telling the truth 😱😳

If my employer really is fine with this gay fetish aspect, then why was our former colleague sacked? Probably some hypocrisy there.

So I only learned about this fetish attire by going out of my way of the dark side of the internet, and here we have the likes of members of our HR department stating “I find these events so wonderful is because they bring together people of all ages and I see so many families attending together with children – what better way to encourage change than to teach children“. I find this sentiment being echoed among many that are presumably scared to be labelled a bigot for speaking out about it.

Some YouTubers stated that when they made content using such Pride footage, they were labelled as “adult content”. How can a “Family-friendly” event be adult content? Oh because it is adult content!

It’s considered a faux-pas to criticise Pride, but yet, if this same thing happened outside the context of Pride, people would call these people a “nonce”/”sex offender” and demand they be locked up for public indecency. This is what the group Gays Against Groomers stands for. They are against grooming kids. They are against exposing children to 18-rated content. Yet, they posted videos of their van parked at a Pride event and people were coming up to it and spitting on it. That’s right, people are openly fine with grooming kids these days. We used to want to protect kids at all costs, and we seem to have lost that over the last few years in pursuit of wokeness.

There was even the controversy with the Twitch Streamer NickMercs who Tweeted “They should leave little children alone. That’s the real issue” (it was in the context of a vote to celebrate Pride at a school), then Activision removed his character “skin” from the game “Call of Duty: Modern Warfare II | Warzone”. This then resulted in a minor boycott/review bomb, and people mocked Activision with the phrase “Call of Groomers“. How far has society fallen if stating “leave little children alone” is considered a controversial statement?

To go back to the first thing the HR staff member said “Lots of events take place throughout June every year to celebrate the LGBTQ+ community and all the progress that has been made across legislation, attitudes and behaviours.“. Progress made? So in addition to the examples of Pride becoming fetishized, you also had the transwoman that exposed their breasts at the White House, Puberty blockers banned in the UK , the boycott of Bud Light in the US due to the promotion with Dylan Mulvaney, the boycott of Target due to stocking chest binders which tanked their share price, the banning of Drag Queen events, men identifying as women to avoid Men’s prison, and more people speaking out against Transwomen in sports. So the Trans community has taken hits in their PR in this Pride month.

There was also the incident with Billboard Chris, where he was speaking to someone about how it is wrong to give puberty blockers to children, when a transwoman began screaming obscenities repeatedly in his face. Chris did his best to ignore her, until he got punched in the face. Despite having several police as witnesses, and having the event caught on camera, the police refused to prosecute the assault, and blamed Chris for being antagonistic. Pride Month ain’t it – Commit all the crimes you like.

So I’d say the LGBT movement had gained more and more support over time, but this year, it took a massive step back. I wouldn’t be surprised if further controversies were more widely publicised in future.

I think issues should be raised and discussed with logic, and not dealt with whilst being blinded by wokeness and hypocrisy. People need to take a step back, clear their minds and really decide what they actually believe in.

Assault is wrong. Grooming kids is wrong. Sex shouldn’t be discussed at work. I hope we can agree with that.

Managers visiting India

In recent times, our HR Director reiterated that for UK workers, there are no plans to return to the office and we will continue to work at home. However, our Indian workforce will be. It sounded like it was some government-mandated thing.

I suppose it is great news for managers and directors because they love making any excuse to go over there for a week for “work” then post about the sights and local cuisine.

Days after the HR Director had spoken about how “home-working was the way forward for the company”:

“Caroline and I had a long chat when we were back at the hotel and talked about what we had learnt so far this week. We both concluded we need to have more fun at work, see people face-to-face more often and continue to have new experiences as that helps with personal growth.”
HR Director

How does she not realise the hypocrisy of her statement? It wouldn’t surprise me if she u-turned and told us to go back to the office.

Meanwhile the CTO finally realises developers are actually important (whilst sampling the local cuisine, of course):

“One of the highlights of my trip was getting to know the team on a more personal level, through lunches, dinners, and working sessions. I have come away from the trip with a newfound appreciation for the vital role that our developers play in our company’s success, and for the amazing work that they do every day.”
CTO

How can you be one of the leads for the Development department and not realise that software developers are the key part of a company that sells software?

I’m sure they mean well, but the more you think about it, the worse it seems. It also seems like he appreciates the Indian workforce more than the English ones.

Colin: How was their visit?
Jeeva: "They are very busy, we got 6 minutes of their time”.

Why so specific? I wonder if that is a cultural thing. Indian’s seem to do it with job experience. Us English just round up or down to the nearest half-year, but they like saying they have “2.2 years of C# experience”.

Employee of Choice: Culture

Intro

Last year, my employer announced an “Employee of Choice” scheme. It wasn’t clear if this was an official award or a self-awarded title. Essentially, they want to improve a few key aspects so that current employees would recommend working here.

I had previously written about the survey and the results.

There were a few key pillars: Culture, Leadership, Employee Rewards and Terms, Work Environment, Processes, and Branding. Many people were sceptical that there would be any meaningful improvements.

Discussion

I discussed the topic of Culture with a few colleagues. The discussion was triggered by me saying that: I was intrigued what they would come up with to improve culture – since the term is a vague concept. Is “culture” just a naturally-occurring subconscious thing that happens? Or is it something you consciously try to create?

One colleague said he perceived it to be more about the working environment. People always loved the job despite the lower comparative wages because of the perceived positive culture. He said most people worked closely, and that meant people went from colleagues to friends. The “breakout” room, where people can go have a break or have lunch, encourages people to talk as friends. The addition of the canteen had similar benefits and gave a great option to purchase good food. The office was located near a park which was also great to go for a lunchtime walk. So it seems his perception is about how you perceive your colleagues and your ability to relax.

However, he said now we work at home “All those have gone. All that’s left is the work friends but it is diluted.” (many have since left and you don’t get to see the remaining people without a lot of effort.)

Another colleague said “it’s hard to change the culture because it’s so ingrained“, which sounds like it’s more like emergent behaviour.

Culture Manager

After a few months, we heard from the manager who is leading the “Culture pillar”. He admitted that he has actually been thinking of what “culture” actually means. I think it might have been helpful for him to question that on Day 1, rather than after a few months. Better late than never, I suppose.

You hear about “toxic” cultures, and sometimes about inspiring cultures (sometimes you just hear of positive aspects of the big tech companies, like Google having a slide for a bit of fun). Culture is not a tangible thing like an employee benefit – culture is something that only lives in our heads.
Culture Manager

He goes on to say that what people perceive to be “culture” is “hard to quantify, evidence and even explain“. Some people may write it off as “corporate jargon“, yet others deem it as important. Since it can mean different things to different people, how can he even begin to improve it?

I guess another point is: if we did a survey scoring the culture, and people have wildly different interpretations – then how do you even interpret a rating out of 5, and can you trust it at all?

He then ends the post by asking us what we interpret as culture? but also shifts the perceived poor culture onto the general staff by saying

a positive and progressive culture is on us as individuals – our culture is what we make it and believe it to be.
Culture Manager

We were told that the managers of each of these key pillars of the “Employee of Choice” have been busy making meaningful changes, but this post really sounds like: after months of work, the Culture Manager has decided he has nothing to do; and if there is a poor culture – it is our fault.

Employee Responses

A few employees responded to his post.

“Culture is the sum of a number of things which are driven by actions and good decisions, both individually and also from managers. Individuals have to all travel in the same, right direction and leaders and managers have to set the direction clearly and drive everyone towards it.”
Employee

Another employee stated that managers put the onus on individuals by reiterating the company’s “values”, but culture is mainly driven from the managers showing those values:

“The company’s values represent its ambition to have a positive culture, but don’t do much to enable it on their own. Even if individual employees want to behave in ways that represent those values, corporate culture has a lot of momentum which is almost impossible for individuals to affect much unless they’re in a position of power.”
Employee 2

I liked those 2 responses, because they are basically telling the Culture Manager “YOU ARE WRONG!”

Another gave a more modern, woke response:

“To me, a good, progressive and welcoming culture should be inclusive and celebrate diversity (of individuals, ideas and ways of working)”.
Employee 3

Jessie Marsch’s Spieler Rat

I came across the following quote from ex-Leeds United manager Jessie Marsch.

Note: The “fine system” he mentions is when players have to pay a monetary fine for breaking some rule. Some of the rules can be humorous (wearing flip-flops in the shower) but others are important aspects like not being late to training. The fine system can set the standard for professionalism but also allow for a bit of fun too.

“I have a leadership council everywhere I go. In Germany it’s called the Spieler Rat, the leader group. I ask them things like, how do we want to travel? What do we want to wear? Have them make the fine system, you know. But then I go deeper. What do they think of our tactics? You know, I ask them about match plans. I’ll ask them about training, about video, about everything. And I want them to be fully engaged at all moments. And typically, if a player comes to me and has something important that he believes in, then I will almost always include it in what we do, almost always. Because if I really am asking them to commit themselves, and give of themselves, then I have to give room for that to take place. I mean, I could give you a lot of different examples of that.”

He is talking about his leadership style which I think sets the scene to what the culture is under his management. You could manage as an authoritarian or be more open like a democracy. It sounds like the greater vision is provided by Jessie, but instead of micro-managing, he delegates that to his leadership group. I think his approach will make the players feel valued and more open to contribute ideas.

Conclusion

I still think Culture is quite hard to define, but it does seem like it’s the collective mood; driven by managerial decisions, and the physical environment employees are in.