Although there’s still trouble at home with the drainage system, at least here up North everything is going well. I’ve got confirmation that i’ll more likely be able to move into my own (company payed) appartment sometime next week. It isn’t huge but it’s more then big enough for me (with the option of entertaining guests) and it’s quite nicely decorated (all appliances present and brand sparkling new).

The project is nicely prodding along as well. As a lot of what we’re building has never been done before there’s a challenge to get people to understand what exactly it is we want to achieve. Today I had a very short but very effective session with one of the business information owners about how we should separate the realtime data with the data that is calculated and used for biling. The end result was a better understanding of how we expect the users to view the information and a structural decission on how to show stuff for all of this project’s deliverables. It feels good to have something that important out of the way.

It’s not an easy project. By no means. But this does help us in makeing the rest of the process easier. And I’m sure I’ll cover at least one more of those issues next week…..

The big project we’re working on at the moment has a lot of the signs of “classical” IT projects. There’s a lot of very defineable parts that can be specced out completely before building is started. Especially all the parts that include getting information from meters, calculating stuff about that information and then storing the values/making up the bills.
On the other hand there’s our part…. The portal that will serve as user interface for the information services…. These are quite a bit harder to define as look and feel has a bigger impact then the specific functionality.

So the overall project is running on a conventional waterfall method. Functional design, Technical design, Build, Test, Deploy. This is definately the way to go for all the backend logic as there are no variables. A lot of what is going on there is defined by legislation, the rest is all very defineable.

The portal subproject would much rather like to run on some form of agile method. The basic functions of the portal applications can easily be built in a short time and an agile method would give you the opportunity to make fancy stuff for those applicaitons that need it, after reviewing the basic functions.

So how does one combine those two then? The overall project needs specific points of integration testing to make sure any hurdles are recognized as early as possible but the timing of both methods isn’t really easy to allign.
So the definitive choice was to go for an amalgamation of both methods. There will be a waterfall method overall where Functional Design is done early and Technical design comes after that. The build process is, however, split into 4 time boxes. This allows for 4 specific points of integration testing, allows for the Portal part to be a bit more flexible (by doing basic design in the first iteration and then adapting where necessary) yet still offering the rigidity and planability of waterfall to the other subprojects.

I can easily say that this is the biggest challenge in projectleading I’ve had so far. I’m convinced we’ll be succesful but the road to that succes will not be an easy one.  Luckily I’m accompanied on my travels by good projectmanagers, a good mentor and a team of geniusses to do the real work

Gasunie is in the process of implementing new ways to make sure the tubes are filled (Gasunie manages the gas transport network of The Netherlands). This means all backend applications need to be rewritten. One of the choices was to remove all customer user interfaces from the backend systems and put them in a portal. This portal is set up using SAP Enterprise Portals.

All in all the ideal subproject for me to lead. I know stuff about the SAP portal and I know stuff about project management. Somehow that  combination isn’t all that common.

All fine and dandy but Groningen is about two and a half hours away. For the moment I’m sleeping in hotels during weekdays. It’s not eays, it’s not really all that restful either but it’s the only option. Today I’ll send my manager an EMail once more to ask if they can arrange an appartment or small house or something for me. I’d much rather have a place of my own then stay in hotels all the time.

Aside from the sleeping arrangements this really is my dream assignment. Finally I get to do some project management, the job Sogeti actually hired me for, instead of winging something I’m really not all that qualified for.

The new ideas of the Business architect not only require a change in systems architecture but a change in the organisation structure as well. Instead of focussing on the functions defined by the law they will now start to focus on the citizen at the other side of that law. This means that instead of one person in the company focussing on a specific law, he will now need to know a bit about all the laws they support and be able to easily access information based upon a specific person, covering all the applicable laws.

My main focus the last year was on making sure the architects know all they need about supporting legislation. Making sure we’d cover standards and principles defined by the legislators, unifying communications formats, checking privacy legislation and interaction with other government bodies like the tax service and the adress information store.

I’ve learned a lot from the senior architect that was added to the project later. He showed me how to divide the entire architecture picture up into small chunks so they are more accessible, then take each chunk and write it out in more detail.

All in all it was a good experience for me. I’m looking forward to my next assigment in hopes that it’ll be just as good!

First stop is, of course, the Honda Netherlands website. And lo and behold there’s a link to a special Honda Insight page. The first thought in my head was “Hey! A new Prius!”. As far as I can see they took the current Prius design and added a couple of sharp edges where there were round ones…. I am a bit disappointed as the current Honda Hybrid (called “Civic” but resembling the Accord more then the Civic) looks like a pretty normal car where the Prius looks like a lunchbox.

As far as specifications go Honda isn’t telling us much yet. The Honda website itself doesn’t say anything but a little scrounging tells us there will be a 1.4 liter 98 horsepower engine (a bit more powerful then the Prius and the current Honda), an automatic CVT gearbox (although the EX version comes with “Paddle shifters” mounted to the steering wheel. What are they going to shift then?) and a very spartan interior on the basic model. No price information is available yet although my current thoughts are that it will not change the current Hybrid market much except for the fact that the Insight looks to have more interior space when compared to the Civic Hybrid.

All in all I’m not sure what to think of this car yet. When ordering my current car the main reason to choose the Prius over the Honda was the interior space of the Prius and the accesories (Civic does not have the option for an integrated navigation system). It does look like Honda has addressed these albeit at the cost of being just as ugly as the Prius is.

Somehow I’ve still got hopes that I can post a bit more regularly… I’ll do my best.

During my absence it seems the Business/Information architecture document was “finished”. I doublequote that because in my opinion it still needs work. It needs disambiguation, translation from Consultantspeak to Dutch, removal of some stuff that goes too deep into technical stuff and clarification of some stuff that doesn’t go deep enough in my opinion. Independant of that I will, however, start work on the documents that Application Development need to go ahead.

Currently there will be a three-way approach to this.
On the one hand I will go top-down, working from the bussiness/information architecture and drawing up an ideal systems architecture picture. This will most likely end up as some kind of website (preferably wiki) for ease of access.
On the other hand there will be a bottom-up approach, drawing up what the systems currently look like. I hope to be able to delegate this to the team leaders.
The third prong of the fork is the way the department operates. To be able to get to the point they want to be (both architecture and development-maturity wise), the department will need to be completely restructured.

All in all it won’t be an easy task. And with the health-struggle it will be a challenge. But challenges are good. Challenges keep the inspiration flowing, the brain active and the blood pumping. Challenges is what keep me from going even more insance then I am

I’m having good days and bad days. Today is one of the best since ages, not really feeling all that tired and I’m getting a lot of stuff done for the WoW guild that needed to be sorted for a long time already. Last sunday, the day after Linda’s birthday party, was the worst since ages. I think I must have slept about 18 hours that day.

All in all I wanna go back to work. I think I’ll take a trip to The Hague and/or Amsterdam early next week to see how the driving affects me. I hope I can get back to 2 days a week or so, maybe do some stuff from home. We’ll see what happens.

The doctor tells me my bloodpressure is too high. He’s ordered some bloodtests and an ECG and I’m scheduled for a 24-hour bloodpressure observation. When that is done there should be some more information on what it can be.

Going to the doctor was a relief in itself. At least he thinks there are some leads as to what is wrong. Strangely enough as time goes on that relief becomes less. I still don’t have a clue what it is or, more importantly, how to remedy it. I’m afraid waiting is all I can do.

Every morning now I get up with the idea that it is going better. This morning I did some rearranging of the living room cupboards, changed some of the doors to get it all a bit more childproof. After doing that I had to sleep again. It’s not getting any better really….

So until the Doc comes up with something I’m afraid all I can do is just see how it goes and hope for the best. Not really a problem; I’m quite good at hoping for the best