[ale] IT moving offshore

[Geoffrey]

Jeff Hubbs wrote:
> This begs the question of why any Americans should bother going to
> school to learn how to write software, as horrible as that sounds.

This will probably come across as a racial/prejudice statment, but it is 
based on personal experiences.  For those of you who feel it comes 
across that way, all I can say is I'm as open minded as anyone can be I 
assure you.

I've worked with various ethnic groups over the years.  The number of 
overseas IT folks is growing both internally and overseas.  The greatest 
problem I find is communication.  Many of these folks may well be able 
to write the code, but they have learned to code before mastering the 
language that is most prevalent in the US.  These issues include both 
written and oral communications.  I currently work with a very fine 
gentleman who I only communicate via email/phone as I work remote from 
the team.  Regardless of his primary language, he does not have a good 
command of the english language.  Combine that with the facts that I 
have some hearing loss and he has a strong accent, makes it virutally 
impossible to communicate with him via phone.  We do email and that 
appears to work, but when we have a conference call with the full team, 
I just can't understand what he says.  Further, holding a discussion via 
email just doesn't work as well as a real interactive exchange.  I guess 
we could look at some IM stuff, but corporate doesn't support it at this 
time.

Again, I've worked with folks from all over the world.  Many are very 
good at what they do.  My personal experiences seems to to indicate that 
the new wave of programmers from overseas do not have proper training 
either.  I find their code very difficult to follow.  There are no 
comments, whether that's because of their background or grasp of the 
language, I don't know.  The code is rarely properly formatted.  I've 
been working with C that was almost completely written by such an 
individual (a very fine fellow and a friend of mine) and there is 
absolutely no rhyme or reason to the format.  Some code is indented 
other sections are not.  I've recently changed assignments within the 
group and now have inherited a large amount of Java and perl.  Same 
problem, created by a different person, yet the format is random.  For 
example, you might be following code that has been indented a couple of 
tabs, then suddenly you'll find a few statements that start in column 1. 
  Who knows what they're thinking.

Now, that being said, I will say the worst programmer I ever had to work 
with was a product of the US of A.  Graduated at the top of his class, 
4.0 the whole bit.  He wrote the worse code I ever have had to deal 
with.  This was compound by the fact that he had absolutely no personal 
skills, got along with no one.  Could not hold a conversation with a dog.

The way I look at it, it's all cyclic.  The overseas folks will take a 
certain amount of the work.  Being overseas will cause problems, it 
already does.  There will be a loss of opportunity here in the states 
for a while, then things will balance out.  It's really not a pretty 
sight though.  I'm one of those fortunate ones that is closing in on the 
end of my primary career, so I can only hope I'll get my last 4.5 years 
in and secure my benefits.  From there I guess we all look at just 
sharpening our skills and proving that we are better then they are.  $$$ 
often win out over expertise, but not always.

Okay, let me step down off this soap box before I fall....


-- 
Until later: Geoffrey		esoteric at 3times25.net

I didn't have to buy my radio from a specific company to listen
to FM, why doesn't that apply to the Internet (anymore...)?


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