For the last few months I haven’t been working hands-on on software development projects. Its been a nice break that has forced me to get outside my comfort zone in some respects, but at the same time I do miss working with software teams. Everything changed three weeks ago when I started two new projects in the same week. This is why my blog posts have fallen off as well as my reading!

In the first project I’m an engagement manager for a .NET development of a SaaS for a non-profit client. I’m taking over for someone who recently left our company and in doing so have inherited a system and development team. I’m coming up to speed on the application and working to secure some work building new features the client has requested. This project is a bit of a departure for me in that I’m purposely not hands-on with the code.

[Aside: After eight years of Java and the last few dabbling with Ruby, I made a personal decision two years ago to not learn .NET. Although much of the software my company develops for clients is .NET, and I think that .NET is a decent-enough technology, for me I saw little value in ramping up in a new language and platform that was, IMO, nothing really new or interesting. I know plenty of smart people inside and outside my company who are passionate about .NET, but it’s just not for me. I think this stems in part from the early years of the Internet when I saw Microsoft eschew standards, open-source and take an our-way-or-the-highway approach to working with others.]

The second project is far different - I’m leading a small team developing a high-level plan and business case for a client who wants to make enhancements to their real-time marketing platform (ironically, also developed with .NET). I’ve been involved with this company for over two years, on and off, and they’ve been extremely successful. I think I’m most proud of the fact that we introduced Scrum to them when they were a small start-up and now after two years of growth they’re still succeeding with Scrum. They still use cards on the wall, daily stand-ups, burndown charts and the works. Even their marketing and analytics teams use Scrum.

After initial success with their platform they want to grow revenues by $150M by 2015 and are looking for new capabilities that will enable them to do this (along with go-to-market costs). Our charter, from the CEO, is to “get from 30,000 feet down to 10,000 feet” in 4 weeks. Our team consists of myself, who knows the domain and can assess the technical impacts, and two colleagues who have expertise in finance and operational processes.

After our last interview today we headed out to grab a few beers and my friend Jimmy asked Ryan and myself, “What do you think you could be world class at?” It’s an interesting question that I must admit I’ve thought about before, but never discussed with others. My answer was that I thought I could be world class with solving complex problems, especially those involving teams designing and building software systems. Jimmy followed up and said, “So what are you doing now to be world class with this?” I didn’t have a good answer.

On the drive home and later this evening I find myself coming back to this question again and again. I’m not sure if my answer is right, but I am sure that I don’t ask myself this question enough nor do I share my thoughts with others about it.

While most of my blog posts are informative on some topic, this one is more of a reminder for you to spend some time reflecting on what could you be world class at and what are you doing now to make this happen? Give it some thought and if you’re not on the right path, figure out what it’ll take to get there.