[OT] What happened to our industry?

[John Curley]

On the industry, I just don't get it:

a) it is hard to learn to program computers
b) there are only a relative handful of people who can do it
c) the hurdle to entry is high; it takes a lot of study, experience and
logic skills
d) without computers the great businesses of the world can not run

So I ask....

why are we treated with more and more disdain by business people and middle
management with each passing year? Without us, the world's businesses would
come to a screeching halt.

Programmers should unionize. If we did, I'm pretty sure we would all make
an average of $150,000 US.

 

[Virgil Green]

On the industry, I just don't get it:

a) it is hard to learn to program computers
b) there are only a relative handful of people who can do it
c) the hurdle to entry is high; it takes a lot of study, experience
and logic skills
d) without computers the great businesses of the world can not run

So I ask....

why are we treated with more and more disdain by business people and
middle management with each passing year? Without us, the world's
businesses would come to a screeching halt.

Programmers should unionize. If we did, I'm pretty sure we would all
make an average of $150,000 US.

Because IT is typically viewed as an expense rather than a strategic asset.
Also, when addressing design issues, we typically force people at those
levels to think about their business at a level of detail that exceeds their
normal interest. I've seen resentful attitudes when that happens, no matter
how delicately it is handled. Face it, it takes a unique person to be in IT.
We spend our careers developing an understanding of our own craft as well as
an understanding of the professions for whom we develop. Getting our clients
to take any level of interest in our profession the way we take an interest
in theirs is usually impossible. But I'm digressing. Expense versus asset
about sums it up.

 

[Roedy Green]

Programmers should unionize. If we did, I'm pretty sure we would all make
an average of $150,000 US.

Our problem is that the work is extremely labour intensive and
programmers have strongly resisted every effort to create code on an
assembly line or automate the process.

We are pretty well equal footing then with programmers in the third
world. If we unionise, then coding contracts will just go offshore
even faster.

To win we have to reduce the labour of coding so that the work is
primarily design which requires a lot of interaction with the users
and understanding their business.

 

[jan V]

So I ask....

why are we treated with more and more disdain by business people and middle
management with each passing year? Without us, the world's businesses would
come to a screeching halt.

Programmers should unionize. If we did, I'm pretty sure we would all make
an average of $150,000 US.

Supply and demand. Market forces. We get paid what we get paid (which I
agree seems a fairly meagre deal for the intellectual heights we scale)
because there are plenty of people out there to do these jobs, and there is
not a huge amount of demand... not compared to many other types of jobs.
Only medium-to-large companies have the financial clout to actually buy
custom software. Small companies and individuals can only dream of hiring
one, let alone a team of, software engineers for any length of time. So IT
is an elitist industry, unlike say, the construction (houses) industry.

 

[Darryl L. Pierce]

Programmers should unionize.

Why? Unions don't better the work environment, and introduce a whole
layer of political self-interest that would actually make the work place
*worse*.

 

[jan V]

Programmers should unionize.

Why? Unions don't better the work environment,

Utter rubbish ! Unions have always been a thorn in the side of employers in
part *because* they fight to constantly improve working conditions. It's
unions who pressure governments to pass legilsation to force employers to
take the health & safety of their employees seriously, etc.. etc...

and introduce a whole layer of political self-interest

That they do too... seems to go with the territory, no?

 

[Darryl L. Pierce]

Utter rubbish ! Unions have always been a thorn in the side of employers in
part *because* they fight to constantly improve working conditions. It's
unions who pressure governments to pass legilsation to force employers to
take the health & safety of their employees seriously, etc.. etc...

It's unions that cause workers to go on unpaid strikes while the union
negotiates better conditions for the *union*. It's unions that hold back
the workers that could excel in order to keep them "equal" with the ones
who are worse of the bunch. It's the union that guarantees that a
member, even if they're a poor worker, is given the same percentage
raise as the person who does outstanding work. Unions are a way of
bringing socialism to the workplace.

Mate, I'm in the US and there's quite the cultural difference between
unions here and abroad.

 

[David Segall]

On the industry, I just don't get it:

a) it is hard to learn to program computers
b) there are only a relative handful of people who can do it
c) the hurdle to entry is high; it takes a lot of study, experience and
logic skills
d) without computers the great businesses of the world can not run

So I ask....

why are we treated with more and more disdain by business people and middle
management with each passing year? Without us, the world's businesses would
come to a screeching halt.

Programmers should unionize. If we did, I'm pretty sure we would all make
an average of $150,000 US.

 

[gerrards8]

why are we treated with more and more disdain by business people and middle
management with each passing year? Without us, the world's businesses would
come to a screeching halt.

Programmers should unionize. If we did, I'm pretty sure we would all make
an average of $150,000 US.

Putting the management criticism aside, it is about time for the
industry to organize. However, depending on what part of the world you
make your living, unions are definitely not the answer, and would be a
very bad idea at the present time for those in, say, the U.S.

There are few world class associations out there, such as the ACM and
the IEEE, that can serve as models for a more specialized type
organization for software programmers/developers/engineers. This
organization can then establish qualifications that a software
development professional should meet before practicing, publicize the
importance and necessity of qualified professionals in the industry,
evaluate, endorse or reject standards offered by corporations, and lobby
the governments to protect jobs as well as request funds for research
and development (formalization and funding of some open source software
as an example, and removing the influence of those few corporations that
now provide the funding).

Many corporations invent new standards, hype, buzz words & acronyms, xxx
certifications, etc. as a mean to market their products (sometimes, even
an old project they had invested in years ago) and maintain their sales
targets for some fiscal year. Fools out there subscribe to such hype and
become its self-proclaimed evangelists; their followers quickly jump on
the wagon and start pushing this latest hype in their organizations,
draining their employers' funds once again. To give just one example,
consider that *tiny* AWT Applets developed a decade ago outperform the
latest inventions of web application frameworks of 2005. Marketing
garbage such as “Smart Client” is one of the many symptoms of the
illness we suffer, and that is “lack of professionalism”.

Once professionalism is established legitimately, the problems described
above will quickly vanish.

 

[David Segall]

On the industry, I just don't get it:

a) it is hard to learn to program computers
b) there are only a relative handful of people who can do it
c) the hurdle to entry is high; it takes a lot of study, experience and
logic skills

The above are demonstrably false. If you have not had several
colleagues who have shown you this you have had an extremely fortunate
(or short) career. In addition you have probably never met those who
"program" in Microsoft Access or Excel.

d) without computers the great businesses of the world can not run

So I ask....

why are we treated with more and more disdain by business people and middle
management with each passing year?
Without us, the world's businesses would
come to a screeching halt.

Programmers should unionize. If we did, I'm pretty sure we would all make
an average of $150,000 US.

Forget it. In the unlikely event that you could persuade programmers
to go on strike for a month it would make no difference to a business.
Managers would be forced to use their almost forgotten programming
skills to maintain some critical programs. Programming projects would
just be delayed for a month and everybody is used to that.

 

[jan V]

Once professionalism is established legitimately, the problems described
above will quickly vanish.

But establishing professionalism in every nook and cranny will never be
possible. Look at doctors, lawyers, surveyors... you and I would probably
like those professions to be templates for control, legislation, etc.. of
our industry. But then you need to remind yourself how many incompetent,
mercenary lawyers and doctors practice with near impunity within their
highly-regulated "professional" universes.

To paraphrase Brooks "There's no silver bullet."

 

[gerrards8]

The above are demonstrably false. If you have not had several
colleagues who have shown you this you have had an extremely fortunate
(or short) career. In addition you have probably never met those who
"program" in Microsoft Access or Excel.

Today, anyone can claim to be a programmer, or an expert of any tool
(Access, Excel, etc.) out there. It's what s/he does with it that
matters, and I believe that's what John is referring to. it would be
improper to value the credentials of a programmer based on the tool s/he
uses for a certain task provided the tool is sufficient. That would be
"Branding", and it's by far the worst decision rookie managers make when
they're hiring.

Forget it. In the unlikely event that you could persuade programmers
to go on strike for a month it would make no difference to a business.
Managers would be forced to use their almost forgotten programming
skills to maintain some critical programs. Programming projects would
just be delayed for a month and everybody is used to that.

No, it's not that simple. However, employers do have many alternatives,
including a global reach to get the work done. This is just one more
reason why unions are a very bad idea.

 

[David Segall]

No, it's not that simple. What is the "complication"?
However, employers do have many alternatives,
including a global reach to get the work done. This is just one more
reason why unions are a very bad idea.

On the contrary, unions are a very good idea for employees. The only
evidence you need for this is the vehemence with which employers and
conservative and communist governments oppose them. The strategy of
exporting jobs to thwart unions is an example and it is gratifying to
see the more progressive unions responding by helping the workers in
foreign countries.

 

[gerrards8]

above will quickly vanish.

But establishing professionalism in every nook and cranny will never be
possible. Look at doctors, lawyers, surveyors... you and I would probably
like those professions to be templates for control, legislation, etc.. of
our industry. But then you need to remind yourself how many incompetent,
mercenary lawyers and doctors practice with near impunity within their
highly-regulated "professional" universes.

To paraphrase Brooks "There's no silver bullet."

We already have what's so called certified professionals (take Java
certifications, or those MSCx for examples) that are incompetent; plain
and simple. I don't see a net loss by establishing professional
standards in the industry from this perspective. But requiring a
programmer to demonstrate a thorough understanding of the computing
environment would help eliminate a lot of the incompetency we currently see.

You have described exactly why government regulations would be a very
useless option (doctors, lawyers, etc.). I am no fan of regulations,
but no fan of corporations dictating standards and tools either. If
developers were to belong to, be certified and accredited by an
independent organization recognized worldwide, and adhere to the
acceptable practices set by such an organization, the role of the
software developer within an organization (government or corporate)
would be legitimized and managers (executives!) can establish a higher
level of confidence in their software team. This would push the
industry several steps forward, and eliminate a good chunk of the
garbage floating around, whether frameworks, products or people.

 

[gerrards8]

"John Curley" <[email protected]> wrote:

[snip]

Programmers should unionize. If we did, I'm pretty sure we would all make
an average of $150,000 US.

Forget it. In the unlikely event that you could persuade programmers
to go on strike for a month it would make no difference to a business.
Managers would be forced to use their almost forgotten programming
skills to maintain some critical programs. Programming projects would
just be delayed for a month and everybody is used to that.

No, it's not that simple.

What is the "complication"?

Using your words, “maintain some critical programs” by someone/people
lacking the thorough understanding of the project, not to mention the
skills on the specific tools implemented, is simply suicide. When it
takes months if not years for a project to develop, and weeks of
training to use its dependent products, one month delay would be the
least of the problems management would have to deal with.

On the contrary, unions are a very good idea for employees. The only
evidence you need for this is the vehemence with which employers and
conservative and communist governments oppose them. The strategy of
exporting jobs to thwart unions is an example and it is gratifying to
see the more progressive unions responding by helping the workers in
foreign countries.

No disagreement here. The employer moves the job to a foreign country,
and hopefully fight the the more progressive unions there.

But what about those whose jobs were lost? What is their net gain?

I believe alternate solutions would be much more viable than unions,
specially if the problem can be avoided to begin with.

 

[Virgil Green]

Our problem is that the work is extremely labour intensive and
programmers have strongly resisted every effort to create code on an
assembly line or automate the process.

I've worked with code generators and 4GL design tools for years and think
very highly of them. Unfortunately, I find a lot of resistance from other
developers because they still want to view software development, even for
business systems, as an art rather than a craft.

We are pretty well equal footing then with programmers in the third
world. If we unionise, then coding contracts will just go offshore
even faster.

To win we have to reduce the labour of coding so that the work is
primarily design which requires a lot of interaction with the users
and understanding their business.

High level design tools and generated code. I've had to assure more than one
manager that the coding phase would be quite short if they would just let us
finish the design correctly. It works.

 

[Virgil Green]

It's unions that cause workers to go on unpaid strikes while the union
negotiates better conditions for the *union*. It's unions that hold
back the workers that could excel in order to keep them "equal" with
the ones who are worse of the bunch. It's the union that guarantees
that a member, even if they're a poor worker, is given the same
percentage raise as the person who does outstanding work. Unions are
a way of bringing socialism to the workplace.

Agreed.

 

[David Segall]

David Segall wrote:

[snip]

Programmers should unionize. If we did, I'm pretty sure we would all make
an average of $150,000 US.

Forget it. In the unlikely event that you could persuade programmers
to go on strike for a month it would make no difference to a business.
Managers would be forced to use their almost forgotten programming
skills to maintain some critical programs. Programming projects would
just be delayed for a month and everybody is used to that.


No, it's not that simple.

What is the "complication"?

Using your words, “maintain some critical programs” by someone/people
lacking the thorough understanding of the project, not to mention the
skills on the specific tools implemented, is simply suicide.

Perhaps you have avoided the woes of being a maintenance programmer.
When some idiot uses a fixed length array that inevitably becomes too
small I, like every other maintenance programmer, have doubled the
size of the array so that the program can be run now. Almost anybody
can "fix" a problem so that the program will keep running for another
month. It's not suicide, although it may be murder. My point was that
the computer system would live beyond the programmers' union
industrial action.

When it
takes months if not years for a project to develop, and weeks of
training to use its dependent products, one month delay would be the
least of the problems management would have to deal with.


No disagreement here. The employer moves the job to a foreign country,
and hopefully fight the the more progressive unions there.

But what about those whose jobs were lost? What is their net gain?

There is none but I cannot think of a convincing argument as to why my
job is more important than someone else's. However, I think it should
be illegal for a company to directly or indirectly employ people
overseas in conditions that would be illegal at home. Only a "global"
union may be able to enforce that.

I believe alternate solutions would be much more viable than unions, What are they?
specially if the problem can be avoided to begin with.

How?

 

[gerrards8]

What are they?


How?

Licensing, either by (1) a worldwide (or even local) independent
institution, or (2) government if needed, or even both.

If you're seeking quality (employer's perspective), option 1 will do the
job, where the “professional” is responsible to perform according to
well defined practices, maintain the required standards of skills and
continuous education/training.

If you're afraid of losing jobs to foreign or “wanna be” workers
(employee's view), then have the government mandate that employers can
only hire licensed individuals (# 2), and fine those who violate this
rule. They do that in many other industries, public health related or
not. Even hair stylists and taxi drivers have to be licensed where I
live. A medical doctor or lawyer in the U.S. can only practice in the
state where s/he's licensed, where a hair dresser can only practice in
the county where licensed. It's a softer implementation of
protectionism, minus the downside of unions. As an added benefit, in the
case of doctors or lawyers, the government guarantees that at least they
earned a degree from an accredited medical school (not much more than
that!).

 

[Monique Y. Mudama]

There is none but I cannot think of a convincing argument as to why
my job is more important than someone else's.

I absolutely understand your point, but IIRC you were suggesting that
US devs unionize. It's hard to imagine everyone leaping to unionize
if the likely result is the loss of their job. I may not be able to
claim that my having a job is more important than someone else having
a job, but I sure as heck can't come up with a reason that someone
else having a job is more important than me having a job!

However, I think it should be illegal for a company to directly or
indirectly employ people overseas in conditions that would be illegal
at home. Only a "global" union may be able to enforce that.

Sounds good, but then wouldn't companies just incorporate in a country
that doesn't have these laws?