Memories of India - The Office

Yesterday I received my introduction to working onsite in India and although I can't share all the details due to company policy there are personal pieces of the experience that are bloggable so here we go.

My colleague and I were picked up at the hotel by the director and his driver and delivered to campus around 9:30 in the morning. Both of us were provided with private offices as visiting guests. These offices look like small conference rooms so I suspect that's what they are normally used for, almost everyone else sits in cubicals including most of the people managers. My company has offshore facilities supporting a number of product development functions as well as IT. Their infrastructure is excellent, my laptop connected immediately to their wireless net without any tweaking. We were given a tour of campus and its an amazing complex. It has two gyms with a personal trainer, two cafeterias open 24 hrs a day, onsite health care and most of the usual things we're accustomed to in American tech companies like free drinks and onsite games. Ping pong and caroms are very popular here which was cool, I haven't seen or played caroms for many years. A few gaming consoles are also provided. There is an outside theatre in the round and they stage plays there as weather permits. The nice fountains and well landscaped grounds are well kept and attractive. They have a soccer field in the front that gets used in the evenings this time of year due to the heat, this is the Indian summer season. All in all a great place to work and relax which is the stated intent.

Our meetings were productive and everyone was fully engaged but they provided enough time between meetings for decompression and other work. This is very different from the home office where my meetings are often back to back on different topics. Although the hours here are somewhat longer on average the level of stress seems much less. There is also much less randomization, at least for us in this particular project. A good portion of the team is 100% devoted to this effort which will definitately contribute toward success. I'm learning some lessons here too.

Although most of the leaders here don't have the same level of experience as many of their counterparts onshore their level of concern for people seems much greater and this is explicitely stated by management. The director in particular has set himself about the task of creating a strong team that feels like family. Every week they meet for a half hour or so and introduce the entire team to all the new hires, and there are always quite a few. We got introduced as guests along with about six new faces. Each person was asked to give their name, what they did and one word that described them. It quickly became a joke fest with one tester saying he like to destroy things and describing himself as "destructive". Everyone was made to feel a welcome part of the team and barriers between disciplines were removed before they could create problems. When it was time for lunch and dinner my "recovery food" was arranged and delivered from the hotel so we could all eat together. The senior leadership here is doing a great job of team building.

I came here to give my knowledge to this team but I'm having to learn how to receive as well. Various team members seem pleased by the opportunity to serve, I'm finding this inspiring if a bit uncomfortable as an American. People here don't display the same sense of personal space as we do in the West and are incredibly gracious. I have yet to pay for a meal although I've had wallet in hand a number of times, it's a part of their culture I'd love to export.

We finished up and ate dinner together as a team, afterwards we were delivered back to the hotel and will be picked up again this morning. The doctor says I'm fine now so I had a hearty breakfast of various things I mostly didn't recognize. All of them were delicious, I'll pay more attention tomorrow for a better report. After my brief illness I'm past the time change due to all the extra sleep but my colleague isn't doing so well and crawled into his room immediately after we were delivered from campus. I'm sure we'll get some time to see the city in the next few nights. The test manager has a tiny car he drives like a sports car through Indian traffic and promised me his legendary thrill ride through Hyderabad. Fortunately they have good health care here....

More tomorrow, thanks for listening