Fools Rush In

My ex-boss in Dehel once gave a good advice. He said, when you receive an issue or email that is provocative in a manner or in other words; asking for a fight, take time to respond to the issue. Take time to reply the email. He said this will help you to be more objective and focus. He was right.

I have applied his advice in many, many ways and I thank God everytime that I did. When I take the time to respond, I have more clarity on the subject on hand. No matter how simple or stupid the issue might be. By doing so also, I was always able to refrain from being defensive. Most importantly, I manage not to blunder and make a fool of myself. On the plus and satisfying side though, the other party always blunder and make a fool of themselves. Eventhough they call themselves, experts. Heh. (Okay, I am being evil here...)

Today, I'm taking his advice again. As such, I am currently writing this post. At the same time my mind is finding the right words to put in the email.

Why do people get defensive? These reasons come to my mind:

• They do not want to appear foolish.
• They refuse to acknowledge that the ball is in their side of the court and they have to do something about it.
• They do not want to admit that they are not familiar or know nothing about the subject matter.
• They are embarrassed because they only realised there IS something they don't know about or not familiar with.
• They want the other party to appear foolish.
• They want someone else to be responsible for the issue and do something about it.

I guess, if I go on and on it will only be variations of the above. So I shall stop listing.

I know sometimes I repeat myself too many times too much it irks people. I have no intentions whatsoever to make the person feels as if he or she doesn't understand what I am saying. And please, do not debate with me when you know I AM RIGHT. Not only you're making yourself look foolish, you're also tripping over your own words. Just accept that it is something you have to do and if you need help ask for it. By signing your email with "Consultant" or "Analyst" or "Expert" or whatever else that shows the caste of your position, that does not by any means indicate that you know everything. Accept the fact that everyday is a learning process and you will encounter new things. Yes, I am being a bit bitter here.

Having said that, I am not in any way saying I know a lot of things. Far from it. That is why whenever new things come across my way, I ask a LOT of questions it made people around me suffering migraine. Ask anyone. They'll vouch for it.

It just happened this morning. I was saying that any application should control the session timeout and not relying on third party something-something to ensure that. It take programming logic to make something simple(word use by the other party) like this to happen. I know what needs to be done is simple, and hey, I can do it if I want to, but then, I'd be doing someone else's job. And I'm not the one who's getting paid by the hour here.

Remember the partner I was talking about in my previous post? Well, as customary, they brought in another vendor to do a little JSP page for login and calling of API. This vendor, represented by one ABAP Consultant (woohooooo) and J2EE Senior Developer (fuiyoooo) has been undermining my knowledge since day one. Oh, it's a girl, she definitely know nuts and gets the job because she's cute (thank you, I'm flattered). Everytime we meet, they are always asking if tomorrow it will be a different person working with them.

Now, I asked for web server log, in this case, since they are using NetWeaver EP, I'm expecting the portal server log to see the SSL handshake error message. They could not produce it. Whacked the server, came out with gibberish logs. I asked is there any other configuration to control SSL session that needs to be changed, they were confident they've done everything correctly. I have to ask these questions because I do not know SAP. I can only share with them my previous implementations and what configuration was done. They should be able to tell me how the same thing is done on their product, right?

Wrong. Instead they kept hinting that the failure is on my part where my components should be doing this and that. At the end of the day, of course, it's proven beyond reasonable doubt that they should have configured their settings. I kept mum, not saying or doing anything to pulangkan paku buah keras as the old Malay saying goes. Revenge best served cold.

Today, I went to meet up with them on session controls. An application should terminate SSL session, clear off any cookies or session tickets when a user log out. Well, they who confidently say that it was already done by their application, was proven wrong this morning. That is when the Senior Developer gets defensive. Of course with my obvious sarcastic charming self, we parted friends by the end of the session. He even walked me to the door! He he he...

What I need to do now is to write an email to the Consultant, as he wasn't present this morning, regarding the issues that I raised and discussed with the Senior Developer. Yesterday, the Consultant, in an attempt to cover his backside, replied to my Account Manager's email emotionally. Proving the fact that he should've waited, and took a deep breath before replying.

The long post today is my attempt to ensure my email will be assertive sounding and not condescending in any way. After all, I'm just a lowly engineer. *Snicker*