With the global economy in shambles, the old-guard of industry on the rocks (Wall Street financial giants, Detroit Automakers, and all manner of “industry-leaders” in-between) and a new president taking office in a few weeks, the one thing you can say about the upcoming year is that things will change. Big time.

What’s interesting is that with this change, there will be lots of opportunities. Enterprising companies and individuals will jump into the fray, with innovative ideas and succeed. However, some sectors of our economy have gotten fat, happy, and stupid. Somehow “status quo” became a management goal in many tech companies. Marketing got shy and wanted to “protect the brand” rather than be remarkable. Middle Mangers have been trained to  “Manage Growth”, which is really just code for “let’s keep doing the same thing, but do it cheaper so we get more market share”. Senior managers have focused on short term profits while paying lip service innovation – it’s always slated for “Next Quarter”.

At some level, these groups honestly expected to remain leaders simply because they were leaders. They drank their own Kool-Aid. Just like the mortgage industry, “of course house prices will continue to go up”, and everyone knows how well that worked out.

Unfortunately, in exponential times, when competition and innovation comes form all corners of the world, this sort of complacently/incompetence will bite you in the ass. The economic downturn has simply increased the pace of change. The truth is that big companies don’t deserve to “live forever” anymore than new start ups. Innovation and flexibility are the key ingredients in times like these. If you are not being remarkable, then what are you? Following?

For companies that have been running lean, innovating, and “embracing change” as a way of doing business, things are really exciting. What’s better than having major competitors pushed out of a marketplace, basically by their own hubris?   By fighting for the status quo and stifling innovation for so long,  they are unable to make the huge evolutionary leaps needed to remain competitive. Cutting prices to rock-bottom levels may keep some business coming in the door, but how long can that last? Does the company really have enough cash reserves to ride out this downturn while taking losses on every transaction? (Think big-box electronics stores here). And suppose they do make it through, can they then raise the prices? How will their customers react to that? Right. Like it or not, the writing is on the wall, and it’s not good news. If you are not on the cutting edge, delivering remarkable products and services, embracing new media, and interacting with your customers, the next year or so is going to be really rough.

Getting Out

What if you happen to be in one of these organizations? You may want to start planning for a new future. Seth Godin and Guy Kawasaki have lots of ideas on how to breed innovation within yourself and within organizations. Once you know what you want to do, get out there and become the change we actually need.

Thoughts? What would you suggest to those in “less-than-leading” organizations?

Wow – time flies when you are having fun! Just over a year ago, my team and I joined Data Transfer Solutions and opened the Fort Collins office. I’m pleased to say that things are going really well. As I’ve posted in the past, we’ve got all the geek goodies – amazing workstations, great chairs, a sweet office, and a 60 inch flat-screen (no X-Box yet, but that will come)  

Since leaving, our team has switched from VB.NET to C#, from desktop based enterprise GIS systems to spatial web applications heavy on the javascript and Ajax. We’ve done a wide range of work, from Virtual Earth based visualization systems, to integrating ArcGIS Server and SAP, to some very shiny applications based on the ESRI Javascript and REST APIs (more on these in the coming weeks!). We are pushing forward with our vision of how software should be created – incrementally, in an agile process, backed by a pragmatic amount of automated unit testing and automated builds. Our entire team cares about “software”, and I think that shows through in our work. Consequently we are currently up to our ears in work, and having a blast.

As for the rest of the team, Mike Juniper has been really getting into the client side of things, cranking out great stuff with Dojo, OpenLayers, Virtual Earth, and the ESRI Javascript API, as well as writing the bulk of our first ASP.NET MVC application.

Jeff Germain got some bloody knuckles street-fighting with the Web ADF for the first half of the year, but once he’d won that battle, he’s jumped into the deep-end of the javascript pool with some great work with the ESRI Javascript API, and some custom Dijits. As always, he’s the king of server side development, building out the custom ArcGIS Server services that power a number of apps we shipped this year.

Unfortunately, two of our original team have moved on – Vish left to join the Timmons Group in Virginia. I’m really glad Vish is still blogging, because this way I still get to learn a ton of stuff from him. After a long courtship, Rally finally made Chris Spagnuolo and offer he could not refuse, and now he’s a full-time agile evangelist / trainer.

While I would not say we’ve managed to “replace” Chris and Vish, as that would be impossible, we have added two more exceptional developers to the Fort Collins team.

Mike Hayden brings us some mad javascript chops and a background in PHP and MySQL. He’s been working with us for a few months now, and he’s really getting into Dojo and has an uncanny ability to hunt down those little nitty cross-browser bugs that always crop up with web development. He’s also threatening to start blogging.

Brian Noyle has returned to our team (he worked with us while at our previous employer, but left a year before the mass exodus). He’s working on software and system architecture, some project management, and like all of us, slings a lot of code.

Have we achieved nirvana? Maybe not, but we’re all having a lot of fun. We’re winning great contracts, making friends and contributing to the company and the community – not sure how much more we could ask for.

Do you have solid ASP.NET, Ajax, Javascript, and CSS skills? Are you a web development guru? If you are, this might be your workstation. Data Transfer Solutions is hiring in our Fort Collins Colorado office, and we need someone who can do some serious web development. We’re an agile development shop and we’re looking for a web developer that will fit well with our existing team. Experience with agile development practices and geographic information systems are a plus but are not a prerequisite. If you’re a web developer and you’re looking for a new place to sit, drop me an email using the Contact link above.

Yesterday we sent out a press release via Chris Spagnuolo’s GeoScrum blog. Thus, I think it’s now ok to say that my entire team and I are now with Data Transfer Solutions.

The team is super excited about the new opportunities this change brings (the blazing workstations, “green” servers and build out, IKEA workstations, great chairs, and a strong interest in adopting agile methods doesn’t hurt either!).

On the technology front, we are still sticking with .NET and ESRI for the most part. We expect to be doing much more web work than in the past, and with the release of Visual Studio 2008 and .NET 3.5 this will be very cool. I expect we’ll be working with ArcGIS Server / tile caches on the back end, as well as Virtual Earth and Open Layers for the client UI. Mix in some unit testing, and it should be lots of fun.

We’re also going to be adding some new capabilities – specifically Agile Consulting and Coaching. This is still in the early stages so I’ll be posting more about it as things develop, but I’m very excited about some things we have planned, and the opportunity to share our experiences, methodologies and practices with others.

I’ll wrap this up by saying that I’m also very excited to work with the existing DTS development team. Although I’ve only met a few of them, and only very briefly, but their depth and breadth of skills are pretty amazing – I heard that someone wrote some ArcGIS Desktop tools using Boo (scratching your head – here’s a hint: Boo is a Python-like scripting language for the ECMA CLR implementations such as .NET and Mono.)  I think they will be keeping us on our toes!

I’ll be posting more about starting up an office, and getting things rolling over the next few weeks. Some tasks on our current backlog - order & setup some servers, get a firewall (advice welcomed!), move out of Chris’s living room into our “temp” space, finalize the build out plans for our “real” space… fun!

The Sanborn GIS Development Team is expanding!

At this time, we are looking for two full-time ArcObjects developers to help us build enterprise GIS systems. These are entry to mid-level positions, with plenty of opportunity for growth. You’ll be working with a relaxed team of professional developers who strive to build the best damn GIS software solutions out there. These positions will be working on both desktop customizations and back-end ArcGIS Server
component development. Current projects include an ecosystem managment
toolset for the Marine Corps (ArcGIS 9.1 + .NET 2.0), and a state wide
forest managment system for Pennsylvania (ArcGIS 9.2 Desktop &
Server + .NET 2.0).

What is the job?
Developing enterprise scale applications with ArcGIS and .NET – these are end-to-end systems, typically involving multiple technologies – ArcMap, ArcGIS Server, ArcSDE, ArcIMS, smart client, winforms, web forms. 

When I look at positions, one thing that I always ask about is the tools, so here’s what you’ll be working with:

• Microsoft Team System – Source control  project managment
• ArcSDE on Microsoft SQL Server and Oracle
• Visual Studio 2005 – VB.NET or C#
• MSDN subscription
• ESRI EDN Subscription
• Dual flat-screen workstation (3+GB RAM, 3+Ghz CPU)
• Citrix farm for client test access
• Good desk and chair – sorry no aerons. (yet!)

Who will fill it?
Are you the go-to person on your team? Are you sick of the general ‘hacking’ nature of GIS development? Do you know ArcObjects like the back of your hand? Interested in a more ‘agile’ approach to development? Can you whip out winforms apps? Dig web services and smart client applications?  Are you applying Unit Testing to your GIS applications? We want to hear from you!

Regardless of the laundry lists of skills in the formal postings, we are really looking for quick learning, self directed team players who really give a rip about producing quality software, and staying on the leading edge of software development. And if you blog, all the better!

Where is it?
These positions are located in sunny Fort Collins, Colorado – I’ve been here 10 years, and love it, but don’t just take my word for it -this year Money Magazine rated it the #1 place to live in the US.

When can I start?
We are looking to fill one position by early November, and the second by early January. Check out the detailed position descriptions and then email me (dbouwman AT sanborn DOT com) your resume.

While catching up on my blog reading, I ran across a series of articles by Joel Spolsky that talk about

• “Finding
  Great Developers”,
• “A
  Field Guide to Developers”
• “Sorting
  Resumes”
  

These are very timely articles, as we are about to open
two “GIS Software Engineer” positions (I’ll post more details when the positions are formally
“open”), and it’s always been a challenge to locate top talent.

Joel argues (and I’d tend to agree) that “great developers”, the cream of the crop, just are not out in the marketplace. This is because their employers recognize this, and do what it takes to make sure they don’t even think about looking for another job.

On top of this, the market is pretty tight these days. A quick search for “software engineer” at
ESRI’s careers site lists 59 openings.
Just here in Fort Collins, Miner & Miner have at least one developer position
open, Riverside Technologies is looking for an ArcIMS developer,
and I’m sure that the various other staffing agencies which service the USDA are also
looking for people. Add to this the high-growth rate
of the geospatial industry, and it’s clearly not an easy task to find
experienced geospatial developers.

Which leads to the question of how to get
top talent?

In his “Field
Guide to Developers” article, Joel lists a number of things he believes
developers care about at a job:

• Private Offices
• Good Chairs
• Great Computers
• Being treated well within the company
• Not being micro-managed
• Lack of useless office politics
• Working on cool projects with cool technology

At the end of his
list, he states that compensation – as long as it’s on par with
industry standards – is less important than these other factors. Here’s the actual quote – which I think
is brilliant.

That doesnt mean you can underpay people, because they do care
about justice, and they will get infuriated if they find out that different
people are getting different salaries for the same work, or that everyone in
your shop is making 20% less than an otherwise identical shop down the road, and
suddenly money will be a big issue. You do have to pay competitively, but all
said, of all the things that programmers look at in deciding where to work, as
long as the salaries are basically fair, they will be surprisingly low on their
list of considerations, and offering high salaries is a surprisingly ineffective
tool in overcoming problems like the fact that programmers get 15″ monitors and
salespeople yell at them all the time and the job involves making nuclear
weapons out of baby seals

So assuming reasonable pay – what else
would draw you to an organization?

• Opportunity to use different tools/technologies (i.e ArcGIS Server 9.2)?
• A Herman Miller Aeron chair?
• Working with people who are passionate about what they are doing?
• Stock options?
• Working on a large scale, multi-user system? 
• Opporunity to hone / expand your skill set? 
• Quad-screen, 2x dual-core system with 4GB or RAM?
• A chance to make a difference?
• Location?
• Opportunities for career advancement?

Other ideas? What brought you to your current job? What keeps you there?