August 14, 2009

It is my sad duty to inform you all that TechnoPhobia and myself will be parting company after 12 years on Monday the 17th of August as they have made my role (and therefore myself) – redundant.

I’m told that the reasoning behind this is that:-

a) Due to the perceived change from a waterfall to agile production department, there is no longer a need for both a test manager and a production manager.
Testers will work more and more “hand in hand” with developers, and their work load will be managed by the production manager.

b) Quality Management, the three ISO’s are not seen as being profitable enough. In that – it is thought by SMT that the 2 – 2.5 days a week I spend on ISO’s does not bring in enough billable work to justify it being a full time role (I disagree with this statement – many tenders require these ISO’s as pre-qualifiers, and hey – I could be less efficient and stretch it out to 4 days…).

Accepting the above, it therefore follows that:-

1) TP do not want to employ me as a full time tester as (allegedly) they would not be able to pay me my current wage without the other testers feeling that this is unfair.

2) Someone else will have to pick up the ISO work if TP want to keep the accreditation (which I’m told they do – we’d be taking someone from IT doing security, someone form CSD doing quality & someone from Ops doing environment, but shhhh, they don’t know this yet…)

3) There is no other suitable position currently open to me – they didn’t think I was suitable to be a Technical Consultant, not technical enough allegedly (again – I disagree, I believe my skillset would be complimentary to the existing Consultants technical knowledge).

Make your own opinions about this, I’m sure some of you will.

On a personal level, I feel extremely strongly about this, I feel that TP are making a massive mistake losing my experience and knowledge that will be harmful to the future of the company. However, the decision has been made and it is out of my hands.

TechnoPhobia have however been very decent (ignoring they have made me redundant) in letting me make this post – venting some spleen, sorry – and hopefully, still maintaining my relationship with the company – I’m fairly sure that TP will need to ring me up a few times in the next couple or three months to ask me how something works, be it the wiki, a procedure, or who the auditor is and why have we failed it, or where the coffee is…

…we’ll talk numbers.

It has been 12 of the most interesting, entertaining and edifying years of my life, just over a quarter! There have been ups and downs, mostly ups, and I’ve seen quite a few people come and go before myself – and I know that they have all gone on to do great things, I can but try to follow.

TechnoPhobia has been one of the best companies I have ever worked for – there is not one individual here that I would not go for a pint with, not one person here whom I wouldn’t give my last Rolo to. But it is not the same company I joined. It is on a journey, as I am myself, Bon Voyage.

I love you all. Pax.

NB. The title of this post is from the Douglas Adams novels – Hitch Hikers Guide to the Galaxy, it is a quote made by the dolphins as they left the Earth…

… just before it was destroyed to make way for a hyperspace bypass…

Filed Under News 

Comments