Scrummerfall....

...is now one of my favorite made up words. This interesting mash-up of Scrum and Waterfall was used in a conversation yesterday and it made me smile. It also got me thinking about how many conversations I've had with people about Agile, Scrum and the stories I hear about how these SDLC strategies are being used (and mis-used.)

If an organization is going to 'buy in' to SCRUM there are two fairly critical Agile principles they need to follow:

• "Build projects around motivated individuals. Give them the environment and support they need, and trust them to get the job done"
• "Business people and developers must work together daily throughout the project."

Sounds good, right? Give business a daily voice in development and give the technical team the resources they need to do the job.

So why can we relate to Scrummerfall?

Let's start with Agile. Like it's predecessor Waterfall, Agile is a general label. It's a foundation that has generated different ideas and styles along with new tools and technologies for delivering software.

Scrum, TDD / BDD / FDD, paired programming and other development strategies fall under the Agile "brand."  Tools such as JIRA & TFS, Selenium & Cucumber, Docker, & CruiseControl are just a handful of the hundreds of platforms available to deliver in an iterative and continuous fashion.

By definition, if they serve the underlying purpose of delivering software efficiently, you can mix and match these strategies. When you boil it all down Agile is simply finding a way for business and technology to work together to find a better way to put usable software to production. 

Scrum & Kanban have been mashed up into Scrumban so why not mash up Scrum and Waterfall? Some would argue DSDM could be branded Scrummerfall.

After all, Agile is not without it's foibles. Fifteen years after the manifesto was written organizations still struggle to implement an Agile strategy that works for everyone. This is especially true in large, established organizations where there are many impediments to large scale Agile adaptation.

Who knows, maybe in the next few years we'll see Scrummerfall (or a variant) pop up on the drop down in TFS. And that's the beauty of Agile.

What is a Recruiter?

Not all recruiters are just recruiters. Human Resources generalists are recruiters. Hiring managers are recruiters. CEO's are recruiters. If you've ever suggested someone apply for a job you are a recruiter.

Usually when the word "recruiter" is used the perception falls into one of two camps - the corporate recruiter (HR) and the agency recruiter (headhunter.) These roles can be very similar, but the job seeker "customer experience" can be very different. 

Corporate recruiters are almost universally attached to the Human Resources department. Along with the legal department part of  HR's responsibility is to protect the interests of the company so they follow set procedures. The corporate recruiter role is more all-encompassing, so training and experience is more diverse. 

Unfortunately, talent acquisition tasks are often overshadowed by tasks related to existing employees such as benefits, training, compensation, retention, employment law, and employee issues. If you'd like to read about challenges faced by someone who is not 100% dedicated to recruiting impacting experience with the process I posted "Should Human Resources be Recruiting?"

Even though they may not be dedicated to the recruiting process, they are on the "inside" which can be an advantage. If you're hitting a wall with a corporate recruiter understand their situation and continue to persist, just don't become a pest.

Agency recruiters are usually "compartmentalized" to a specific discipline - technology, medical, light industrial, finance & accounting, or clerical / administration are the major agency categories. Agencies are sales organizations so recruiter training and experience is much different and focused purely on talent acquisition.

Because they usually have a more sales-oriented mindset they can be a great resource tailoring your resume & cover and preparing you for an interview. They are not recruiting for one company which will give you more market coverage. If a job doesn't work out they can help you find another. Just because they're not on the "inside" doesn't mean an agency recruiter isn't your best angle to a corporate job. Sometimes internal hiring processes are "broken" at a company so the agency recruiter will be in a better position to get the decision maker's ear.

Remember that an agency recruiter is looking to fill jobs, and they may feel you are not their best candidate to accomplish that task. A good recruiter will be honest with you about their client relationship and the competition you face within the agency. If they have a candidate they feel is better suited for the job don't be offended - chances are pretty good at some point that will be you.

About Us

RiverPoint is the only IT Staffing Agency in Kansas City that offers a full time consulting employment model that includes a competitive compensation and benefits plan including paid bench time between client engagements.

Our client list includes industry leaders in the digital marketing space, insurance, retail, financial, and many other business verticals.  Several of our clients have been recognized as "Best Place to Work" by a number of different organizations because they view employee engagement and satisfaction as much more than bullet points on a mission statement. 

The technology market is hot right now, so if you'd like to consider options for 2016 give us a call.

Recruiters.....

2016 marks my sixteenth year in recruiting which means I’ve spent approximately 40,000 hours of my life helping thousands of people explore new career opportunities, and have placed hundreds of them in new careers. Malcolm Gladwell writes about the “10,000 Hour Rule” in his book Outliers. The rule states that if you spend 10,000 hours doing something correctly you’re going to build what Gladwell calls “world class expertise” in that field.

While I don’t claim to have “world class expertise,” I think my years in recruiting have taught me a thing or two about the business.

One of the things that I’ve learned is not all recruiters are equal. Some are exceptional professionals who know how to cultivate relationships and leverage connections to the benefit of all. Others care more about hitting metrics than they do about the candidate. Believe it or not, some of them will lie to your face to get what they’re after.

Good recruiters are a valuable asset in a job search & can be worth their weight in gold. Bad recruiters can put you into a bad situation. Be discerning.

Another thing I’ve learned is not all candidates are equal. Many are exceptional professionals who make my job fun and make me look great to my clients. A few don’t appreciate the value a good recruiter brings to the table and can be demanding, unreasonable, and downright nasty. Believe it or not, some of them will lie to my face to get what they’re after.

I’ve interviewed thousands of job seekers – you can bet I’m discerning.

You want relationships with a recruiters in your field. You don’t need to be BFF’s with everyone, but you do need a few who you can consider “trusted advisers.” Someone you can turn to when your company merges with another and your position is eliminated. Someone that can help you get out of a jam when they make the jerk two cubes down your boss.

I would not be shocked if you’ve had a bad experience with a recruiter. If you’ve had enough exposure to recruiters I’d be shocked if you haven’t had a bad experience. Don’t let that bad apple spoil the bunch. There’s lots of great recruiters out there – make sure you have a few to lean on in bad times.

What Language Should I Learn?

As a technical recruiter I often am asked about what language is in demand among employers in the marketplace. The answer to this straight-forward question is complex and worth discussion.

The short answer is "lots of them." The long answer starts with an understanding of trends in technology and how business is "consuming' technical services. To do that, I'll unpack the question beyond "what language" into a handful of categories that hit both core knowledge and trends in today's technology landscape.

Application Development

If you plan on developing applications you need to know an object oriented language. Software is not built in a vacuum so you need to understand design patterns, composition, inheritance, and delegation principles, polymorphism, class and object development and so much more. Some Computer Science programs still teach C++, but at this point C++ has more academic than enterprise value. Java & C# are the most prevalent "low level" OO languages in the marketplace today. I say "today" because Python, Swift, PHP, Objective-C, and even JavaScript support OO design & development principles.

Bottom line? Learn object oriented design & development principles and it will be easier to explore different languages and platforms

Mobile First Development

Earlier this year the number of "mobile only" internet users surpassed the number of "desktop only" users. We are not connecting to the internet via a desktop / laptop anymore. We've had smart phones and tablets for nearly a decade now, but mobile is reaching well beyond our phones. Watches, televisions, and a whole host of other "internet enabled" devices (including our homes, cars, and appliances) are hitting the market at an astounding rate.

Developers MUST learn mobile first development strategies and the core HTML5 / CSS3 /JavaScript tools that make this possible. Today angular.js, node.js, Bootstrap, LESS, SASS, and a host of other technologies are in the marketplace.

If you're familiar with the Gartner Hype Cycle you know there's a never-ending cycle to supplement (if not outright replace) these tools. Keep an eye on what Google, Amazon, Twitter, and other technology leaders are doing in this space.

Bottom Line? You need to know how to develop applications using a mobile first strategy, and you need to stay on top of the technology & tools that enable mobile first development.

Service Oriented Development

Why re-invent the wheel over and over? Service Oriented Architecture allows developers to take advantage of systems and data that is already in place. Developers need to be versed in web services and service oriented architecture within the ecosystem of an individual company.

In addition, developers need to follow IaaS and PaaS trends (ahh, the "cloud.") Amazon has a complete development platform where processing power and storage can be turned on and off with the flip of a switch. Microsoft has Azure, Google has their cloud. More and more enterprises will be moving to these platforms as processing power becomes cheaper and human capital to run the infrastructure and platforms becomes more expensive.

Bottom Line? Traditional means of developing and delivering software are changing dramatically & software developers need to be on top of it.

Data Development

Data is the lifeblood of business. Decisions are based on "the numbers." The technical team is expected to store & retrieve, manipulate & move, scrub & clean, slice & dice, and present data to the user via desktop apps, browser, Excel & Access, phone/tablet, and coming soon to a refrigerator (you know some mucky-muck C level guy is going to look at that screen and wonder how they can get the day's sales forecast delivered to the Viking double door.)

Traditional RDBMS platforms (SQL Server, Oracle, MySQL, PostgreSQL, etc...) aren't going anywhere - it's especially important for everyone developing software to understand basic relational data structure. However, today's technology has opened a floodgate of tools business has embraced to leverage their data. There's a plethora of EDW / Business Intelligence tools (OBIEE, MSBI, Informatica, SAPBI, etc...) and the currently very hot "BIG DATA" / NoSQL movements (Mongo, Hadoop, Gemstone, HBase, etc...) What language should you learn? SQL. What else do you need to know? Depends on where you want to specialize. It would take a lifetime to become an expert in all areas of data development. Find something you enjoy and specialize.

Two bottom lines here.

One: Software developers need to know how to get at the data they need which means they need to know how to write SQL triggers & packages, complex queries, and maybe even some stored procedures.

Two: If you're going to eat, sleep, and breathe in the data you need to focus your attention on a piece of the puzzle - when your employer has petabytes of data you can't do it all.

Simple question. Complex answer, so complex one post can't cover it all (ERP for example.)

Bottom Line? Languages are important to understand, but understanding trends in technology is how you will move your career forward.

Tolstoy never wrote a resume

I received a 10 page resume today. While not unprecedented, it is unusual. I get 6+ page resumes at least once a week, but pushing into the double-digits is something that happens only once or twice every three months. The worst offender in my 15 year recruiting career was a 26 page resume complete with a Table of Contents.

I have to review dozens of resumes a day. Without getting into the finer points of how to get my attention, I will tell you a 10 page resume gets enough attention to deserve a Top Ten Resume tips post.

One: A resume is designed to spark interest and studies have shown you have six seconds. Get the reader's attention with information relevant to the job at the very top of your resume. Short and impactful statements to earn you more than six seconds.

Two: A resume is not going to get you a job so you don't regurgitate every experience you've had since you were in junior high school. Targeted, relevant information for the reader is all you need.

Three: Hotlink to your LinkedIn Profile which is more powerful than your resume and gives you more "creative license" to tell your story. 

Four: If you're a fresh college grad your resume will have a different "voice" than if you have 20 years of experience.

Five: Most resumes are a recitation of tasks. I'm more interested in what you can do for us.

Six: Ditch the objective. They all sound like "Desire to use (talent / skills / background) to (add value / advance at / benefit) my next employer."

Seven: If you can't say what you need to say in 2 pages or less I'm out.

Eight: Ditch the business speak and use some of your creative writing ability. Read every sentence aloud - if it sounds off in the natural course of speech re-visit how you're expressing your thought on paper.

Nine: Spell check doesn't catch they're / their / there type grammar issues. Proof read it, have someone else proof read it, then proof read it again.

Ten: Challenge yourself to get a job without using a traditional resume. There's no rule that says you must have a Word document at the ready or there is no job for you.

Send a well thought-out and written one to two page resume targeted to the specific job and employer and you'll be amazed at the results.

KCDC, Hack the Midwest, and other event rantings.....

When I say "rantings" I really mean "ravings." I said rantings to get you to click (and it apparently worked.) There's no rant here - quite the opposite - our tech community is booming!

I was encouraged by the response of the development community at last month's KCDC. I don't know the final tally, but it seemed there were at least a thousand people who attended. I'm excited to see so many people engaged in the local dev scene outside their employers.

If you're not already aware, KCITP's "Hack the Midwest" starts a week from this coming Saturday. It's your chance to drink a gallon's worth of soda, coffee, or energy drink and stay up all night to take a great idea and turn it into a great product. Who knows - you might even make a lot of money or change your life.

This year I've been on a mission to bring new faces to the KC Java User Group. We have a fantastic series starting this week on the OGSI / Felix / Jackrabbit CMS stack presented by Bryan Stopp at VML. I suspect the series will run over the next 3-4 months. We'd love to have you join us for one (or all) of these great presentations!

For those of you who aren't into Java, there's plenty of opportunity to plug into the tech community outside of your cube. I keep an up-to-date listing of goings-on around the KC metro at the RiverPoint LinkedIn Group. Ruby, .NET, Mobile, SharePoint, Data, DevOps... you name it there's probably a group for it. Sure, you could go to MeetUp, EventBrite, and other places on the intrawebs to figure out what's happening, but why would you do that when I've put it all in ONE place for you? 

By the way, if you are the organizer of one of these groups and is looking for a partner to help you build a bigger audience let me know. We're always willing to sponsor, but this goes well beyond bringing pizzas and a dog and pony show. With our constant outreach to the developer community I can help you find people to present as well as new people to impact. 

If you don't have a MeetUp we'll pick up the tab. If you do have a MeetUp we'll pick up the tab next year. If you don't want to use MeetUp we'll help with whatever format you'd like to use to promote your group. Need a place to hold your meeting? We'll help find one. Want to start a new group? I want to help. The KC Java mission goes beyond KC Java - I want to help our community connect so we can learn and grow with one another.

Thanks for reading the raves - have a great week!

Move to KC if you want to be happy. I'm Serious.

Kansas City ranked Number Two on Glassdoor's 25 Best Cities for Jobs.

Cities ranking LOWER than KC on the list:

Austin (4th)
Seattle (5th)
San Jose (7th)
San Francisco (12th)
Los Angeles (No where to be found, this shocks no one in KC)

"A key takeaway for job seekers is that a bigger city doesn’t always mean better when it comes to finding a job, being satisfied in that job and affording a mortgage."

We're gunning for you Raleigh!