Tuesday, April 24, 2012

TO: gunther@corp.com
FROM: auntie@corp.com
SUBJECT: Some improvement

What a clever boy!

You managed to really turn around a potentially tragic situation! After your last policy changes, the Director (not unexpectedly) started to get complaints about these draconian requirements. From both your last letter and from my dear confidant Mr. Headcheese, I understand that you gave the Director some 'ammunition' to fight off these complaints. Your advice to him is truly inspired by the most crafty of our kind. To have the complaints of these efforts responded to empty rhetoric such as "We all value Quality", "Quality is Job 1" and "Quality is Everyone's Responsibility" without any meaningful changes to process is truly epic!

I should warn you, lest your head get too big for your shoulders, that this too may only quell the masses for a short time. Be on guard for those that attempt to bypass your policies and start to put their own good practices in place.

Your Biggest Fan,
Auntie Cueway

Saturday, April 14, 2012

TO: gunther@corp.com
FROM: auntie@corp.com
SUBJECT: Some improvement

Sweet Gunther,
I must say that I am impressed with your latest coup. In the chaos of the loss of your best tester, you planted seeds of project management hell in the Director's mind and he took it to heart. My good friend Mr. Headcheese says that all projects are now required to account for all their time in 5 minute increments throughout the day.

I can't tell you how much I've tittered just thinking about all the overhead this must be causing.  Then I think of the additional overhead you've inflicted on the whole team by insisting that all requirements documents be corrected of grammar and spelling before they can be reviewed! Fortunately, you had your head about you when the project manager started to be concerned about the additional overhead caused by this and you suggested that the company 'minimize' the overhead by buying a tool. And my little Gunther remembered that this purchase will also result in additional kickbacks for me.

I do appreciate this nod to my rank and position and I will remember this.

Your dearest Auntie Cueway


Thursday, April 12, 2012

TO: gunther@corp.com
FROM: auntie@corp.com
SUBJECT: Apparently, I've overestimated you

My poor little Gunther,

Did you believe that you could have taken a break after your previous work disrupting your team? I must apologize for giving you too much credit. I should have guided you to maintain your level of chaos as long as possible. Instead, you allowed the remaining members of your team to band together and pick up the work left by the tester who left.

You are in a tight spot now, you have a team that has discovered their true capabilities and are running high on their recent successes at taking on the various testing tasks left behind. I must give this some thought on how best to get your team off-balance.

I do not like having to do your job for you.

Crossly,
Your Auntie Cueway


Wednesday, April 11, 2012

TO: gunther@corp.com
FROM: auntie@corp.com
SUBJECT: You ARE an enterprising young man after all!

Sweetest Gunther,

You certainly have shown that my teachings haven't been completely wasted! Mr. Headcheese informs me that you have managed to 'kill two birds with one stone' so-to-speak. I had no idea you had this level of devious behavior in you.

You can only imagine my surprise as Mr. Headcheese tells me how you slowly got your most talented tester to take on more and more responsibilities by convincing her that she was the only one capable of doing these things. Then, the auditors somehow came to strongly suggest that the in-house server room be relocated immediately to an out-of-state location. I'm still not sure how you were able to destabilize the power grid for your side of town, but that certainly did the trick! My favorite part was how you convinced the project manager in charge of the move to a ridiculous alternate plan. Oh, if could have only been a spider on the wall to listen to how you soothed his fears that the move wouldn't go well.

I hear that the tester is on long-term disability for PTSD and that your team is now in such chaos since nobody knows how to do what she had been doing.

I can only say that, if you continue on this path, you will certainly be properly recognized for your efforts. Needless to say, the kickbacks I get for the tools your team uses remains as secure as ever, thanks to your clever work.

Auntie Cueway


Saturday, April 7, 2012

TO: gunther@corp.com
FROM: auntie@corp.com
SUBJECT: Portioning out Credit

Guther My Dear,

From your last letter, I would have been given the impression that the events that unfolded recently were all your own doing. There is no denying the fact that the Director sees you in a better light now and has highlighted your work in the quarterly team report. You seem to have forgotten that my dear friend Mr. Headcheese was able to plant the idea in the Director's head that distracting his own boss's attention away from the actual quality issues with the absurd notion that more testing is the same as higher quality.

It would do you well to remember those around you who are acting on your behalf. You would also do well to try to help yourself more often and rely less on my good will to keep you in line.

Sincerely,
Your Loving Auntie Cueway

Thursday, April 5, 2012


TO: gunther@corp.com
FROM: auntie@corp.com
SUBJECT: Not your best work

My little Gunther,

I'm not sure why you have disregarded my previous warnings about the director. I'm hearing rumors that he's beginning to reconsider your appointment. You realize that if you fail me, these lucrative kickbacks will stop and you will be out of a job!

I have always provided you with a good position and have led the way for you to rise within Corp's ranks while being able to keep my own involvement a secret. This is how you repay me? Your father tried to warn me when I wanted to hire you. He said you were not up to the task, but I stood by you. My only hope now is that you can show enough improvements in your team to head off a disaster.

It's clear that you are unable to think of these things yourself, so here is what you need to do. You need to push your team to write and run as many tests as they can, regardless of their value. Then, you need to write as many bug reports as possible. Take that notebook you've been keeping on system quirks and write up a half dozen bug reports for each of these. Now pay attention, this next part is critical. For each bug, you must follow your bug reporting guidelines perfectly. There should be no question that each bug report is well-written and represents a true quirk. You should give each version of these bugs a wide range of priorities so not to draw attention to what you are actually doing. Hopefully, with this explosion of new tests and defect reports, the Director will ease his suspicions.

Your Loving Auntie Cueway


TO: gunther@corp.com
FROM: auntie@corp.com
SUBJECT: Automation

My Darling Gunther,

From what I hear from the developers, your test automation strategy is coming along nicely. The tests are just unstable enough to often work, but not so unstable to warrant a re-write. They still require lots of manual intervention to start and then to review results. My favorite part is that you were able to convince the director that the work needed to automatically put the results into the test management system are so onerous, that it's not really worth the effort. If my calculations are correct, the automation is twice as time consuming as if you were running the tests manually. This is quite an achievement and will ensure that our test tool licenses will continue to be funded (along with my kickbacks).

But I do have a word of warning, the director is not so simple-minded as to be fooled for long. You must be able to quickly show improvements in the automation so that he doesn't bring in a consultant or hire someone that can see through your ruse.

Always your servant,
Auntie Cueway


TO: gunther@corp.com
FROM: auntie@corp.com
SUBJECT: Metrics

Gunther,

I was looking over the proposed Metrics Standards document you drafted and am very disappointed. It's all very well to require five pages of metrics each week for each team, but you must be more careful in picking your metrics.

Since I know you will be unable to figure this out on your own, let me be blunt. Take out the Defect Detection Percentage and the whole section on test requirement coverage. These are far too helpful for the director and the other metrics are seemingly helpful enough that he won't complain about the content. If he does, you need to be sure to speak to him as if he were a fool and suggest that if he doesn't understand these metrics, maybe he's not suitable for his position. That may be a bit risky, but if you use the right nuance, then he will internalize the comment as if he had come to that conclusion himself.

Affectionately,
Your deovted Auntie Cueway

TO: gunther@corp.com
FROM: auntie@corp.com
SUBJECT: Congratulations!

My Dearest Gunther,

Congratulations on your new role as team lead! It took quite a bit of patience and effort on my part to get the director to believe it was his idea to put you in charge of the team after your previous manager's 'accident'.  It's now your turn to put in the work we've been planning. Even you should be able to understand how important the kickbacks I get for our current test tool licenses are, so be on your toes.

Signed,
Your loving Auntie Cueway

The Beginning



From time to time, people send me things to further my education, to bring a laugh to my day or to generally improve my moral standing. I've started getting these letters anonymously that seem to be from a 'Auntie Cueway' to what appears to be someone she is mentoring. She speaks as if she is mentoring a nephew, but I'm not entirely sure if this is accurate or not.

Rather than give you my impressions of these letters, I will reproduce them here and let you decide.

P.S. Apologies to C.S. Lewis. Any resemblance to 'The Screwtape Letters' may be intentional...