tim ferro
ramblings of a code monkey, fanboy, and uber-geek

I needed to write some code so I put on the high energy tunes of Dropkick Murphys and Flogging Molly. Now I am listening to the new album by Foxboro Hottubs which is a side project of Green Day.

I was reading The Office Newb’s blog post about intra-company SLA’s and I could not agree more. One of the biggest gripes at my last company was that human resources was completely inept. It would take multiple emails and phone calls to just get an address changed. I once had to bring the issue to a company VP just to get some results. It was during these experiences that I was involved in a group that was helping to make the company a better place to work. One of our main ideas was to institute a service level agreement between the employees and the human resources department with measurable metrics to then evaluate their service. This is not a post to complain about human resources as there are plenty of good ones, my current company is wonderful, but more to bring this issue to attention for all internal company departments. Leave comments about how to help others address this issue at their places of work.

– Tim Ferro

“All Sides is the sixth album from the accomplished tour veterans and instrumentalists in O.A.R. The Maryland group earned its wings playing jam-oriented roots rock for years and has now emerged as its own entity, on thatcan keep the crowd on their feet and yet duck into the studio to craft some finely honed alt-pop.” - iTunes

“The Best Firefox Yet

With more than 15,000 improvements, Firefox 3 is faster, safer and smarter than ever before.” - Source

“The Wine team is proud to announce that Wine 1.0 is now available.
This is the first stable release of Wine after 15 years of development
and beta testing. Many thanks to everybody who helped us along that
long road!

While compatibility is not perfect yet, thousands of applications have
been reported to work very well. Check http://appdb.winehq.org to see
the details for your favorite applications.” - Source

ComNetSlash has the 2nd X-Files Movie Trailer!

An eclectic collection of new Weezer and Mariah Carey, combined with the classic Lauryn Hill and White Zombie!

Nadira A. Hira’s article over on CNN Money got me fired up! Not only do I completely agree with her assessment of the current situation in corporate America but I have more to add to it.

When shown “true” loyalty from a company, not only Gen Y but all employees, will show loyalty back. The problem is that it is rare when a company is truly loyal. Bottom lines are the way of business and they aren’t loyal. This is why we job hop and hopefully this will cause enough of an issue that companies will wake up to this reality.

We don’t mean to be revolutionaries but it is much easier for Gen Yers to job hop because we have little roots in anywhere we go. Usually we don’t have kids and a lot of us don’t have mortgages.

So here are a few tips to companies who want to know what loyalty is to Gen Y.

• If the employee is doing their job well, a raise should be cost of living plus a percentage based on evaluation.
• Pay employees what they are worth. Being underpaid is a sign of disloyalty from the company.
• The employee needs to know that they have a future with the company and a plan to achieve it.
• Annual reviews should mean something.
• Training and certifications should be encouraged.
• Bonus Points for companies who ask Gen Yers about how they can better be utilized within the company.

–Tim Ferro