Company Manager

Software Engineering (SE) 603. The reason behind one of the happiest moments of my life — if not “the” happiest moment of my life.

Let me quickly introduce some prerequisites. Usually when we work on projects it would be in groups of 2, maybe 3 on some occasions, to deliver the final outcome. Which varies. We may work on a circuit which we work on for 2 hours and that’s it, or we may work on a databases project which may take up to 72 hours of work or thereabouts. But usually it’s more about the outcome or the content of the project. Because if you look at it from a relative point of view, working in groups of 2 isn’t really considered team work — just doesn’t sound right. Consequently there are like 50 projects altogether.

Now SE is different. Let me start first by explaining we have three computer science tutorials (each with abouts 25 people) and I think three business informatics tutorials (each with about the same amount, maybe a little less, not sure.) The difference is mainly the fact you work with your entire tutorial group! In our case that’s 25 team members (24 other than oneself)! Now THAT’S a team project! Needless to say, since there are only 6 projects altogether (or 8, somewhere around this many), the competition is at its peak! And it’s fun. Really really fun. It feels like you’re racing other companies (that’s what we call each a tutorial group — a company) as to who finishes a weeks task first, how properly each task is performed, and so forth.

With this large of an organization some sort of management hierarchy has to be enforced. Each company is divided into 5 components, each component with an elected team lead, and one of the 5 leads is elected as company manager. Fortunately enough, I was elected as company manager. (The election was actually the moment I mentioned earlier on.) We, as managers, don’t really have much authority except that we have the word in most issues, and of course the one big bulk of a task of making sure everything (and everyone) is under control.

Before I get into the actual problem, I need to mention that lots of new technologies are being forced onto us. SVN (which luckily I already am familiar with), Eclipse (everyone finally has to use it), usage of a Java web framework, and uhmm.. SCRUM. This much isn’t really much trouble to most, since we already are open to learning the most during our academic lives. However..

The problem.

This is still a course. Some people are not used to working with others, and taking responsibility for their actions. Some people do not comprehend that their performance has a direct effect on the performance of others. And both fortunately and unfortunately for me, I have to handle it and make sure it doesn’t get in the way of our company’s progress.

Suggestions welcome.