I know! I love the title too.

One evening I reviewed an email from Bob Pritchet, founder of Logos Research Systems.   After picking my jaw up from the desk, I started to form my response.  In the short time of research I put into his name, I realized he was an author, and the book looked quit compelling.  Fire Someone Today is a book I will read every two years from now on.  It’s so insightful, and easily worth my cash.

Such clarity.  I certainly appreciate the fact that he is a successful business man, since many times authors are only able to tell you what should work.  He’s clearly not trying to use fancy lingo and impress the M.B.A. audience.  There wasn’t a single term that I wasn’t familiar with.

The concepts….beautiful!  My favorite is the quality,price,service triad.  What a wake up call.  A young punk like myself thinks he can prioritize all of these at the same time, but Bob’s point was clear:  draw a triangle with each of those at a point.  You can only go one direction.  Maybe that direction is smack dab between two (quality and price for Bixly), but it certainly can’t be for all three.  You would be spinning in circles.

What’s more, it validates a lot of other reading I have done.  I love objectivity.

Thanks so much Bob for an excellent read.

The book in question is a classic.  It was filled with subject matter that certainly is important to me in many ways.  I do have to admit though, I really didn’t enjoy reading it.  It wasn’t filled with tactical insight on how to engineer a great company, at least not directly.  Also, it was a book I knew that I just wouldn’t get by reading a summary.  I am talking about How To Win Friends and Influence People.

Regardless of how pompous or self serving the title seems, it was filled with great insight on how to treat people. In fact, many people I have looked up to in my life certainly practiced the book.

Lo’ it was boring for me.  Lo’ I needed the help it gave me.

Rather than sharing my personalized notes on the book, here is a simple summary.

Just recently I was reminded how “personal” software engineering education has been for the unschooled.  Sadly, the basics are sweapt aside and in their place are “how to get it done” techniques that make everybody look bad in the long run.

On my quest for a good engineering education, I have stumbled upon this great explanation of when to form a class, and when you are NOT supposed to form a class. For example, the rule of one property states:

IF a noun has only one property to remember

THEN it is an attribute of another class

ELSE it is a class

Example: If we need to remember only city name, city will be an attribute ofanother class. If we need to remember city name, the type of city, the state itbelongs to, then city should be modeled as a class.

See the page here.