Sun's CIO Talks Internal Experiences

daria42 writes "This is an interesting interview with Sun's chief information officer Bill Vass, about his experiences as the CIO of one of the world's best-known high-tech company. In particular, Vass talks about corporate blogging (and frustrated lawyers), problems providing IT support to finicky Sun engineers (who sometimes demand Indian help desk support knows kernel details), Sun's programs testing its software internally on employees before it goes out, and how ultimately, his job is like any other CIO's...just with some cool toys."

Comments

Sun is buying Novell!

[AKAImBatman]

For example, he said Sun president Jonathan Schwartz -- who keeps a public blog -- was frustrated when April Fool's day came around, because he couldn't use his blog to play a practical joke.

"A few times, he's said things like 'maybe we should acquire Novell', and it changed the stock price," Vass said of Schwartz's blog. "You have to be careful ... if ever he's writing anything controversial he has to get the lawyers to look at it."

Sun is buying Novell? Ack! I need to go call my stock broker!

One Point, One Big Problem

[teiresias]

Although Vass had no knowledge of this, he soon discovered the system in question was in fact the desktop machine of an engineer who had recently left the company. The desktop had been reformatted following his departure, cutting off 600 users who had over the last three years depended on it for network services.

Reminds me of a guy whose leaving our company right now. We're probably not going to delete his homespace since lord knows what will break if the things in there are gone.

It'll take us awhile to get that stuff into a common place. Probably took Sun a lot of time to get that one system back up and running.

Re:One Point, One Big Problem

[chill]

Reminds me of a guy whose leaving our company right now. We're probably not going to delete his homespace since lord knows what will break if the things in there are gone.

This is why workstations should be workstations and servers should be servers. Allowing users in a client-server environment to share resources from their workstations is bad network design/policy. Add a cheap server and give them space, but sharing should be disabled and disallowed on workstations.

-Charles

Re:One Point, One Big Problem

[Lumpy]

this problem is typically management's fault. or caused by management.

I am the guy who just replaced one of those engineering guru guys. he has crap EVERYWHERE running critical systems and data collection as well as processing. someone powered off his PC and crashed the billing system.

After digging in his notes and code as well as his old email I discovered that he wanted to do things right, he had a subversion server set up and a development as well as a production server in the server room.

But, management did not allow him to do his job right. I saw endless emails and messages about needing X Y or Z right now! did he finish Z yet? why is Y not in testing? who told you to stop working on X?

it was endless so the poor guy had to half ass everything because management refused to hire him any help, refused to accept realistic deadlines or adjust importance... everything was top super critical!

I was promoted to this position, I was able to find out most of this before accepting the promotion and told them that I work very differently. I use project management, refuse to work on 5 things at the same time as that creates 5 crappy, broken things as well as makes the process 10 times longer. I explained my concerns to the divisional VP that interviewed me and he agreed that that working atmosphere was not acceptable and told me that I have his authority to tell my superiors that they have to sort out priorities themselves and that EVERY new project request will come in at the bottom of the to-do list unless it has been signed off by the VP of operations to deserve to be escalated above everything else.

The origional mess was cause by management. and until someone in management gives a peon engineer or programmer the authority and protection to tell other management "nope, sorry." it will never get any better.

Herding Cats

[DanielMarkham]

While the CIO is more businesman than technical guy, his job has to be like herding cats. FTA

In another example, Vass received a mysterious note that a major system had been disabled and had stopped production on a hardware chip. Although Vass had no knowledge of this, he soon discovered the system in question was in fact the desktop machine of an engineer who had recently left the company. The desktop had been reformatted following his departure, cutting off 600 users who had over the last three years depended on it for network services.

I knew a major financial company, which will remain nameless, that rolled out a new customer product a couple years ago. When I was talking to the architect, it turns out the whole thing was running off a computer under his desk! He said that one day he accidentally kicked the power switch, and the whole place went beserk. I "encouraged" him to perhaps move it to the server farm, where it would be a little safer. He declined, saying he "wanted more control" over the application until it was stable enough. And this was on a production product.
I do NOT envy the job of CIO. Those guys have a tough row to hoe. BTW, if you ever want to know how the industry is being perceived by business, CIO magazine is a great read.(but expensive) It's real eye-opener to hear things from the other side of the tracks.

Moore's Law: Not the Only Game in Town

The dark side is tempting.

[jellomizer]

When you are CIO of a technical company it is tempting be lax with policy and give the employees more access then they should have, it seems like a decent policy, first you save money because the desktops that people use anyways are also the servers so you don't need expensive servers, the technical people can administer their own system, and whatever they are serving.

But being a CIO you need to be a Dick every once in a while and make sure the technical people have the only the access they need to do their work properly. Have the IT department put buisness level servers in the server room and have them properly managed.

While the first way seems quicker and easier and has less personal conflect. The second way is better to manage and reduces of mission critical mistakes. It also allows for proper upgrading for the future.

Sure the employess can do the work themselvs but they rairly consider the big picture and end up with a spread of services which are hard to track and manage. It also creates a situration where an employee cannot be moved to a different position because they have the information that others dont.

Re:The dark side is tempting.

[po_boy]

Stinginess with privileges is kindness in disguise.
-- Guide to VAX/VMS Security, 1984

Re:Sun lost its Sparc.

[AnalogBoy]

This is my newest pet peeve. Tech support, outsourced, gets a crash course it seems in provinding support. They never do it well. I've had the fortune of calling Microsoft's professional line several times, and i always get someone who is 1) difficult to understand, and 2) not any more knowledgable in the app than i am. I don't call tech support for the "Two heads are better than one" approach, i call tech support to hear "Yes, we've seen that before, here's how to fix it." Unfortunately i haven't heard something like that since my Sun days. And another thing - when they start troubleshooting at a step you tried 3 hours ago and say "we have to try this sir"... grrr.. i get angry *instantly* at that. 0 to pissed in one processor tick.

Disclaimer: I have nothing at all against Indians - however, i do believe if i call tech support i should be able to clearly understand you. I've worked in a call center before and clarity was an important benchmark - i guess if you can get people to work for small wages your standards go down a bit too. Unfortunately it looks like Outsorcing for tech support is here to stay, as unappealing as that may be. Sprint, Dell, Microsoft... grr. I call upon Shiva to bitch slap them all!