From hoco@stroid.timefold.com Fri Nov 22 11:43:32 1996
Date: Fri, 22 Nov 1996 11:07:33 -0800
From: hoco@stroid.timefold.com (Howard Cohen)
To: cciug@atria.com
Subject: [cciug] what to do when you can't hire a CC engineer
Cc: hoco@stroid.timefold.com

I get so many calls for CC engineers from exasperated headhunters and
corporate recruiters that I thought I'd present a strategy companies can
use to staff up a CM department.  Maybe this will help.

Step 1: Abandon the notion that you're going to hire a team off the street.

Step 2: Hire or internally transfer talented engineers yearning for a stellar
	career path.  Their first assignment is to read *all* the CC
	manuals -- every page.  They don't need to know anything about CM,
	but they must be competent engineers who have written quality 
	software.  They *will* have to write very high quality software in
	their new position.  They must know perl or be ready to learn it.

Step 3: Hire one or two CC consultants to help get things started.  Hire them
	based on their willingness and ability to teach other members of
	the team as well as their own CC experience.

Step 4: At some point you can phase out the consultants and let your new
	CM team handle the CM workload.  You may need the consultant back
	occasionally for short periods but decreasingly so over time.

Step 5: Reward the new CM team with bonuses and raises so they don't want
	to jump ship.  People like a job where they were given a chance to
	learn something valuable and are then valued for it.  You can't buy
	loyalty, but you can earn it by giving people an honest chance at
	something better.

Well, that's it.  I think it would work.  But instead of this I find that
a lot of companies just want a quick fix.  Then they are dismayed when their
recently acquired bright CM star leaves for a better paying position or
less annoying company.

Of course, bright CM stars have also been known to annoy the bright 
programming stars, so pick people who can "get along" when building your
own CM team.  "People skills" are very important for a CM engineer in my
opinion.

[ revised 1/20/99 ]
	Need a way to train your engineers to use ClearCase?
	Check out the Timefold Online Education Services web site at:

		http://www.snapsite.com/guests/timefold

Regards,

	Howard Cohen
	hoco@timefold.com
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