Harnessing the Power of Mobile Devices in Business (via slashdot)

So many consumers have adopted better, faster smartphones and the latest tablets that business leaders are compelled to adopt enterprise mobility as the next big thing in the evolution of business technology. Most companies have invested heavily in enterprise technology and infrastructure that still…

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Some developers see technical interviews as just part of the process that they have to put up with when they’re looking for work. Others think they’re great, and a great deal more think they’re the worst thing to happen to programming since <insert most hated programming language here>. Cat explains why managers like them.

See more stories on coding interviews here.

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Have you ever asked your spouse if they would choose you again if they could do it all over? I have, but I have to be careful which day to ask. Likewise, have you ever wondered whether your client would hire you again? Was your performance such that they would want you? For most of us, I’m sure the answer is a resounding yes. But there are always those uncertain cases out there, some of them even beyond our control.

As a consulting engagement nears an end, it’s a good time to look back and consider whether you’ve served your client appropriately. Have you been professional, attentive, and available? If they could turn back the clock three months, six months, twelve months or whatever, would they choose you once more? And the next question to ask yourself should be, “What have I learned from this engagement that I can take to my next assignment?”

Personal Assessment

The first step to answering these questions is to do a personal assessment.  Before you ask your client for any feedback, think about it on your own. Be hard on yourself. If you’re going to bring yourself to the point of really asking your client point blank, be ready for the worst and be ready to address it.

So, where have you gone wrong? Where did you assume too much? Where were you not professional? Where did you leave the client hanging? Have you been organized? Have you been punctual? Have your deliverables been professionally presented? Have you been slacking – just phoning it in on certain days when you’re swamped with other business? Do you feel that anywhere along the way you may have made your client feel like you weren’t putting them first?

These are the tough questions but you have to face them if you want to be ready for a discussion with the client. And, they’re tough questions to address if you want to grow as a consultant. My motto is “You’re only as successful as your last customer thinks you are.” No matter how well you think things are going, if your client doesn’t share your opinion, then it’s not going well. Theirs is the only opinion that matters.

Client Opinion

So, now it’s time to ask the tough question of your client. How do they think it’s gone so far? Asking them now, rather than after the engagement is over, may seem like a difficult situation to put yourself in. However, doing it now rather than later could give you the opportunity to correct anything that’s amiss, fix the dissatisfaction, save the project and possibly turn this customer into a repeat customer. We’re in this business to make money, after all, and it’s always easier to do business for repeat customers than have to go out and find new clients every time.

Different Methods

This discussion with the client can take the form of a casual discussion if your comfort level with the customer is high. An alternate route is to ask your client to complete a prepared questionnaire before you sit down and have a more formal discussion.

Whichever route you choose, it’s also a good idea to incorporate periodic lessons learned discussions during the engagement. Performing these can help both sides to bring concerns to the forefront early on, before issues rise to the level of customer frustration. That can go a long way toward keeping the engagement moving successfully ahead

Brad Egeland is a Business Solution Designer and IT/PM consultant and author with over 25 years of software development, management, and project management experience leading initiatives in Manufacturing, Government Contracting, Gaming and Hospitality, Retail Operations, Aviation and Airline, Pharmaceutical, Start-ups, Healthcare, Higher Education, Non-profit, High-Tech, Engineering and general IT. Brad is married, a father of 9, and living in sunny Las Vegas, NV. Visit Brad’s site at http://www.bradegeland.com/.

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Last month, Nintendo surprised everyone with the news that they would not hold one of the traditional giant press conferences at E3. For many years the game industry’s major players have staged their own events, usually just before the show opens, to gloat about sales figures and to hype their upcoming products.

While Sony unwraps more details about Playstation 4 and Microsoft showcases the new Xbox, Nintendo is struggling against difficult and evolving market conditions. More and more, mobile devices threaten the traditional gaming market. On top of that, Nintendo’s Wii U was met with a lackluster reception when it launched in November and hasn’t gained much traction since then.

By not holding a press conference is Nintendo admitting that it won’t hold its own this year? Or will it instead earn attention in a more efficient manner, without all the glitz, glamor and money companies put into the normal E3 press event?

Last month, Nintendo President Satoru Iwata explained the new strategy. “As a brand new challenge, we are working to establish a new presentation style for E3,” he said. Its presence will be “specifically focused on our software lineup for the U.S. market.”

In previous years, Nintendo’s presentations have tended to be targeted to an international audience. Even though the show is held in Los Angeles, Nintendo had Japanese developers such as Mario-creator Shigeru Miyamoto take the stage to talk about upcoming games in Japanese. Though a translator was provided, the focus was hardly on the U.S. Iwata says Nintendo will now focus on each market individually by using a series of Nintendo Directs – a news video from the company’s headquarters — designed for specific regions.

One of the major reasons that Nintendo chose to not take the stage is to avoid the massive war that Sony and Microsoft will be waging with their respective console releases. Nintendo’s hardware is already available, so this year’s focus will be on software. While that’s obviously an integral part of the gaming industry, let’s face it: New hardware announcements will rule the headlines from the show. Instead of battling for attention, Nintendo’s decided to remove itself from this particular battlefield and direct its message to the people interested in titles and tools.

When it comes to franchise software titles, Nintendo has no equal. Its party games are enough reason for many gamers to buy one of its consoles in the first place. Because of this, Nintendo will emphasize hands-on time with media outlets as much as possible during the show in the hopes of getting journalists excited so, it hopes, they’ll share that excitement with their readers.

It’s hard to say whether Nintendo’s decision to pass on a dazzling press conference will be the right move. Smaller, more intimate meetings with media outlets and bloggers, along with more educative Nintendo Direct videos, sounds like great ideas. But those ideas may only impact gamers who are already Nintendo fans. By skipping the bigger, more general presentation, it may be missing a chance to win over the rest of the gaming market.

At the same time, it’s rumored that Nintendo will bring a slew of its leading in franchises to the Wii U this year, including new Zelda and Super Mario games. Those two titles alone could be enough to move Wii U consoles, so a software-focused E3 may be the perfect move for Nintendo after all.

Scott Bowers is an avid gamer, blogger and Senior Service Desk Technician at Dice.

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The Indian business newspaper Mint says the move is intended to tamp down criticism of the company for sending work offshore, though rising Indian labor and infrastructure costs are playing a part as well. “There’s a growing feeling that not all work should be moved offshore,” one unnamed source told the newspaper. “Many companies are starting to believe that not all work should be going to a talent factory.”

Last year, General Motors began a program to insource nearly all of its technology work. There’s no indication that BofA will follow a similar course. However Ben Trowbridge, chief executive of outsourcing advisory firm Alsbridge Inc., noted that the financial services company has been advertising to hire more technology professionals within the United States.

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“Although online courses have been around since the 1960s, the differentiation for our program is its low cost and the platform we use,” says Zvi Galil, Dean of Georgia Tech’s College of Computing.

Georgia Tech’s program will be delivered using a massive open online course (MOOC) platform, an interactive way of delivering instruction. Galil expects a couple of other universities to follow in Georgia Tech’s footsteps within its first year, but noted that most schools will likely wait for its program to be fully battle tested before jumping in.

“A lot of universities have told us they think this is a bold and innovative program, but it’s still a risk,” Galil says. “We still need those students to come, so there is a risk. But we were willing to be a leader.”

Georgia Tech’s online computer science master’s program is expected to launch in January with four courses. And over the next few years, the university expects to build up its course load to 18 to 20 courses for the master’s program. Georgia Tech requires 12 courses be completed for its master’s degree program and it expects to offer that many by Fall 2014.

Master’s Degree or Certification?

With the cost of Georgia Tech’s program comparable, or even cheaper, than some certification programs and IT boot camps, many tech professionals may opt to get a master’s degree first. Computer science graduates, after all, are among the people many companies are trying to find to fill open tech positions.

But CompTIA, one of the largest certification organizations, argues that certifications will remain as valuable as before. The organization’s CompTIA A+ certification is aimed at beginners, where as its CompTIA Network+ and CompTIA Security+ are designed for people with five to 10 years of experience.

In contrast, Georgia Tech’s online program is aimed at more seasoned professionals. As a result, this segment of the tech population would likely be weighing whether to take CompTIA’s more advanced certifications or obtain a master’s degree.

I can’t say whether one is better than the other. I think there is room for both certifications and master’s degrees,” says Steven Ostrowski, a CompTia spokesman.

Ostrowski also notes that employers frequently tell the trade association that while college degrees are great, they’d prefer candidates have training in specific skills.

Colleges’ Morphing Online Model

Georgia Tech’s not the first university to offer online master’s programs in computer science. Stanford University offers a program through its Stanford Center for Professional Development. It costs $60,300, the same as its on-campus program. Whether Stanford will eventually lower its cost remains to be seen.

Last year, in a move to reshape its engineering concentrations, Stanford’s school of engineering named Electrical Engineering Professor Bernd Girod to the newly created position of Senior Associate Dean for Online Learning and Professional Development.

Other top universities that offer online computer-related master’s degrees include Johns Hopkins University, the University of Michigan, the University of Southern California and Purdue.

For Georgia Tech, the cost to develop the program was an estimated $300,000 per course. But the university received a $2 million gift from AT&T to develop a pilot program. One question about Georgia Tech’s impact is whether other universities will be willing to absorb the costs of creating their own MOOC programs.

MOOC Students

Each of Georgia Tech’s courses will accommodate 250 to 300 students, far more than the usual classroom size. The school plans to soft launch the program by recruiting students from its corporate affiliate partners and military personnel stationed in Georgia. By the summer of 2014, the school expects to open the program to the public.

Students who are seeking a master’s degree will be required to pass two required core computer classes with a B or better grade. The admissions process will be more rigorous than that of Georgia Tech’s traditional computer science master’s program.

Other students may take the courses for the purpose of obtaining a certificate for every four courses that they pass. Students may also sign up for free courses through Georgia Tech’s MOOC platform provider Udacity, but they will not receive course credits or certifications.

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You may think producing games would be a blast, fitting right in with your addiction. But the truth is, you may be better off sticking to the joystick. Creating games, after all, is a job and much like any other job it comes with a lot of drawbacks — especially when you’re working for a bigger company.

Competition to break into the industry is fierce not because there are so many qualified candidates, but because there are too many candidates. Game companies want people with the skills to make games, not create game ideas, and being a fan isn’t a useful talent. If you’re an artist with a unique skill set, or a programmer with the specific skills needed for a particular project, you may get a foot in the door. But the question is: Would you want to?

We spoke with two mid-level employees at well-known game studios, one is on the East Coast and one is on the West Coast. Let’s call them Engineer 1 and Engineer 2. Between them they have five years of experience. Both are ready to bug out, hence the anonymity. After three years on the job, one of them was lauded for being the longest lasting, non-management staff member in his group.

Here’s why they don’t recommend finding a job in games.

Kiss Your Personal Life Goodbye

Engineer 1:

“You bust your ass for six months until release. We kill ourselves for months and it only gets worse. Once a game comes out, there’s a brief lull in the storm and then things blow up again with all the downloadable content extras.”

“For nearly two years, I’ve been working almost every weekend and for the next six months, I’ll work at least three out of four weekends a month. I can’t remember the last time I left at a reasonable hour. I can’t schedule anything. My hours are at the whim of higher ups in the food chain. When I see my friends they’re always like “where have you been?” But I have no real control over my life. I’m at the beck and call of the office.”

The Money Isn’t What You Think It Is

Engineer 2:

“If I made a significantly larger salary, I would be able to deal with the norm of 60 + hour weeks. On the surface it looks good but when it comes down to rough numbers, I make approximately $11 an hour. The irony is that I work for a company that makes a stupid amount of money. Comparable compensation for my time would help me feel better but that’s not likely to happen.”

Free Dinners, Cappuccino Carts, Ping Pong Tables and State-of-the-Art Gyms Aren’t Really Benefits

Engineer 1:

“I was into the reimbursement for my gym membership, but I can count the times on one hand that I’ve been to the gym since I started working here.”

Engineer 2:  

“If they didn’t feed me dinner: I’d expire at my desk. The novelty ran out pretty quickly on the free coffee, too. They used to have an ice cream sundae truck pull up every night. We all got fat.”

Management Can Be Mercurial

Engineer 1:

“Criticism can come from way up on the food chain. They’re not in the trenches and don’t always understand what’s happening. There’s a lot of miscommunication and it wastes time. We may be told that it all sucks and we have to redo something and then we’ll find out that the work we did was never what they wanted in the first place. It’s in pieces when it needs to be seamless. The brass once pulled the rug right out from under us two days before the deadline. What we do is never enough.”

Engineer 2:

“The people on my team are great but I’m nervous around the guys who started the company. They seem to know who I am but I keep my head down, which is the antithesis of my style when I’m not working. I’d rather not engage in the office. I’ve heard way too much screaming in meetings. It can be incredibly stressful and draining.”

It’s worth noting that both our engineers are very proud of the work they do and often find it challenging — as well as occasionally mind numbing — but the relentless grind, sometimes toxic work environment and lack of adequate pay has finally gotten the better of them. Both are seriously considering leaving the industry all together.

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“If you’re not familiar with it, you probably don’t realize how technologically advanced retail is,” says Jerry Sheldon, retail analyst with IHL Consulting Group.

Indeed, the National Retail Federation has launched a “This is Retail” campaign to highlight and raise awareness of career opportunities.

Overall, the industry spends around 1 percent of revenue on IT, among the lowest of any industry sector. That can mean constrained budgets may hamper companies’ ability to land top talent, Sheldon says. Those aggressively pursuing technology, however, are raising the amount they spend to 2 to 5 percent of their revenue.

“Note that retail tech investments are made in the millions of dollars with a capital M,” Gartner observes. “Amazon’s tech investments are made in the billions of dollars with a capital B.”

As with any industry, IT workers with experience in rolling out emerging technologies — like, say, the use of iPads in stores — will find their market value enhanced, notes Joe Skorupa, editor-in-chief of RIS (Retail Info Systems) News, which published the report with Gartner.

The Innovation Leaders

When asked to name the five leaders in retail tech innovation, Skorupa chose Nordstrom, Urban Outfitters, Macy’s, Amazon and Apple. For his part, Sheldon said he couldn’t cull his list to five. He chose Amazon, Apple, eBay, Macy’s, Walmart, Build-A-Bear, Starbucks and REI.

Build-A-Bear seems a surprising choice, one Sheldon describes as “doing phenomenal things with customer engagement — especially in figuring out how to engage with a small child.” It’s adding Microsoft Kinect technology and Surface tables to create a half-shopping/half-theme-park experience in stores. In building a bear, the child can place a heart on the table, then select “characteristics” they want the bear to have, as well as a customized sound chip and even scents such as chocolate chip or cotton candy. The store staff can pick up on these choices to better engage with the child during the purchase, and information collected is used for engagement after the sale, Sheldon says.

Other innovations:

• Use of mobile devices in stores, by both by staff and by customers: “Once you roll these things out, they’re not one-trick ponies,” observes Skorupa. They’re used for checkout — as pioneered by Apple — but also “look books” and displays of product information. They also may have the ability to go online. “They may tap into the [company’s] website, but go beyond that as well,” Skorupa says. Urban Outfitters associates use them to make returns quick and painless and also to order out-of-stock items from elsewhere in the chain.

• Omnichannel: Walmart, Target, Nordstrom, Macy’s and Urban Outfitters are among the retailers whose financial results show they’ve found successful formulas to seamlessly integrate the shopping experience between mobile devices, the Web and stores, Gartner says. Sheldon also points to back-end systems at Amazon and eBay that make Web shopping so easy.

• RFID: Macy’s is attaching a chip to each item, enabling the company to do inventory daily or hourly, if it chooses, rather than just twice a year.

• Real-Time Data Mining: As data analytics becomes more predictive, stores can respond more quickly. Say a celebrity mentions a certain handbag on Twitter. By monitoring social media and gauging the bag’s popularity, stores can quickly ship stock from other areas, or place rush orders to the factory.

The Outlook for You

Gartner says interest in developing software in-house has declined since last year, in large part because of the growing availability of mature packaged solutions. On the other hands, “Some retailers view IT as part of their ‘secret sauce’ and prefer to keep things really close to the vest,” says Sheldon. “Others don’t want to be an IT house and prefer that work be done out-of-house. They don’t view IT as a core competency. It really boils down to what fits them best strategically and what’s most cost-effective. Best Buy may have very different drivers versus Home Depot versus Macy’s.”

Many companies, however, prefer to keep systems integration work in-house, he adds.

The report cites these among retailers’ top technologies for 2013:

• Campaign analysis and forecasting
• Standard forecasting and planning
• Mobile POS (point-of-sale)
• Predictive analytics
• In-store return and pickup of Web orders

And these are among their biggest challenges:

• Retiring legacy systems
• Developing applications to satisfy empowered customers
• Application integration
• Managing big data
• BYOD
• Updating store bandwidth and infrastructure

A key skill for IT pros, Sheldon says, is the ability to understand how humans interact with technology in an effort to keep it as simple as possible. With a turnover rate in stores of 200 to 250 percent per year, the technology has to be obviously easy to use.

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The Development Environment

The Development environment should have only one server, even if your production SharePoint farm has multiple servers. The reason for this is simple: Visual Studio does not play nice when debugging a multiple-server farm. If you want to attach to the ASP worker process, or any other process used by SharePoint and your code, you should avoid having multiple servers.

Additionally, when you have Visual Studio set up with the SharePoint Community Kit (a must-have for SharePoint development, IMO) you can only automatically deploy to a single-server farm. Automatic deployment saves an enormous amount of time over the course of development.

Each developer should have their own development virtual server. This will give them the ability to create or restore development environments on a whim, which greatly eases the development process and can speed up delivery.

Testing

Next, you should have a test environment. This is the shared environment for a team or project where you assure that the code works in a near-production environment. This environment should roughly match the farm you have in production.

This environment doesn’t have to be on the same patch level as production, nor does it need to have all of the solutions and customizations. It should not, however, be a single-server farm. SharePoint solutions should be tested for multiple-server farms, even if your production environment is currently a single-server farm.

The problem with having a single-server farm as a test environment is that you may run into issues down the road when you scale out production by adding additional servers. You want to assure that the solution you are developing is scalable and will grow with your SharePoint farm. Test environments can be shared across multiple projects or created for each project.

Staging

The third environment is for staging. This is the environment that should match production in as many ways as possible. It’s not for testing out code, but is used as a final validation point for completed solutions. Its function is to assure that deploying new code to production will not cause problems to existing functionality. It’s also meant to assure that the deployment steps for the solution will work smoothly in production.

This environment is shared across all SharePoint development projects and development teams. It’s also utilized by the architecture/infrastructure team to validate patches and hot fixes before they are pushed to Production. Therefore, this environment should have strict change management processes. This environment should be periodically recreated from production.

Production

Finally, we have production. For custom-coded solutions, best practices dictate that no development should ever occur in production. This is the environment where users work. It is where your business operates and therefore it is business critical. Any downtime here can result in lost revenue and missed opportunities.

These environments constitute the components of a well-oiled SharePoint implementation. With the proper change management, this model gives the developer the most flexibility and power possible. It stays in line with the majority of governance models, and safeguards the SharePoint production environments from preventable downtime and errors. As every developer knows, code that is still in development can cause unexpected problems. Using the model outlined here can prevent issues from ever affecting your company’s bottom line. It will protect people’s bonuses and jobs.

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With immigration reform being a central topic in Washington, there’s talk of reforming the H-1B program, possibly increasing the number of visas made available each year. Dice asked me to share some of my thoughts about the program, hence this article. I’m here in the U.S. on an H-1B, currently working as a senior database developer.

Why come to the U.S.?

Many people wonder what prompts individuals to apply for H-1Bs. For me, and most others in the tech industry, the overarching reason is career growth. The United States is still is the best place to work if you’re a software developer, period. I didn’t intend to settle here at the start and I’m still not sure I’ll remain, even though my green card is in-process. My thinking has only been aggravated by the H-1B program’s rules.

Let me start by pointing out some lesser-known facts:

• First, the visa is granted based on the needs of a specific company, not any one individual. Basically, the company says, “I need this dude, so please grant him a visa.” The problem for the visa holder is that if the company fires you, the visa becomes invalid.
• If that happens, you have 15 days to find another job. If you don’t, you’re required to return to your native country.

The Special Report:

• How 800,000 H-1B Workers Came to the U.S.
• The Picture in Washington
• Current Laws and Policies
• Programmers Guild: The American Worker Needs Protection  
• Industry Group: More STEM Grads, But H-1B Reform, Too  
• The Corporate Perspective: Intel’s Approach to H-1Bs 
• The Opponent: H-1Bs Pressure U.S. Wages  
• The Economist: H-1Bs Are Important to the Economy  
• A Guest Worker’s Perspective on H-1Bs
  

As you already know, it’s practically impossible to find a job in 15 days. Even if the gods smile on you and you’re successful, you can’t just walk in and start working. The new employer has to file an “H-1B transfer” petition, so your visa can be linked with the new company. This process can take up to three months. For a $1,500 fee – paid either by the guest worker or the employer — the case will be adjudicated within 15 days.

On top of that, if the USCIS decides that your case needs further scrutiny, even more time can pass before you’re fully approved to start.

Think about it. You have a stellar skill set and you can get right to work, but the company may find out three months later that its petition has been denied. What business wants to take that kind of risk? As for you, if the transfer is denied you have to leave the country immediately.

I have personally seen what people in such a situation have to go through – my friend from college was laid off in 2008 from his company. He was desperate to find a job, but was obviously unable to find anything within 15 days. Luckily, his wife was also working on an H-1B, and he was able to obtain a “dependent” H4 visa. He couldn’t work on a dependent visa, but at least he was able to stay in the country with his family.

Others might not be so lucky. Another ex-colleague had bought a house while here on an H-1B. When our company started laying off employees, he sold off the house in a panic, fearing that he might have to leave the country. Though in the end he kept his job, he had already suffered thousands of dollars of losses by selling his house well below market price.

It boils down to this: An H-1B who’s laid off will very likely have to head home. It won’t matter if you bought a house or have kids who are U.S. citizens. This fear forces many H-1Bs to compromise on their career choices, settling for lower salaries and working for the same employer even when it would be smarter to move.

Cheap Labor

Many people believe H-1Bs earn less money than their American-born counterparts. In my experience, this isn’t always true. Many of my visa-holding friends are paid handsomely. However, they got better pay packages only when they were able to leave underpaying employers, which, as we’ve seen, is a risky and complicated process.

That doesn’t mean underpayment doesn’t happen. I blame this on the “bonded labor” nature of the visa: You can’t leave your employer, but your employer can leave you. This means the employee has no choice but to accept the salary being offered.

Getting a Green Card

Most H-1B workers look forward to getting their green card – some friends tell me that you feel like you’re let out of a cage once you do. And not without reason. The green card provides freedom from all the headaches of the H-1B. For example, you can work wherever you want, for whomever you want.

However, getting there is tough, especially for people from China, India and Mexico. There are only a handful of green cards issued every year, on a per-country basis. Since there are so many people here from these three countries, the backlog is huge: It can take up to 10 years to get the documents. Again, this is extremely disadvantageous for employees. Those whose companies sponsored their green card in 2004 are most likely still working for the same employer, often at the same designation and pay scale. Imagine that — nine years at the same place with no promotion and hardly any pay hike.

On top of this, the wait time has no relation to your skillset, education level or experience. You could be a Ph.D., or a co-founder of the next big Internet company. You’ll still need to wait in the same line as everyone else.

Starting a Company

I’ve always wanted to start a company, but because of my visa status I can’t move forward. Technically I can, but the company I start couldn’t hold my visa. So, essentially, I’d have to work simultaneously for my own company and the employer that holds my visa. Combine that with the nine-year wait for a green card, and it’s hard to imagine I can ever achieve my dreams here. Given that the U.S. is the hotbed of entrepreneurship, it’s ironic that the hardest thing for an immigrant to do is start a business.

Is It Worth It?

For H1-1Bs, the program is a mixed bag. You get to work on cool stuff for good money, but you can’t easily move on to the next cool thing and earn more. You get to settle here for six years, buy a house, etc., but it’s a pain to get a green card and permanently settle here if you want to. You get to learn the ins-and-outs of a business, but you can’t start your own. Some of my friends who got their green card back in the 90s, when it took them just a year, are happily settled here and say it was all worth it. Others waited in line for several years, got frustrated and went back home for a job or to start a business. Most others, like me, think it will be worth it and want to further their careers here, but are hampered until the government’s final decisions are made.

What’s the Solution?

Personally, I don’t believe increasing the number of visas is going to benefit employees, though obviously it will help the sponsoring companies. From my point of view, H-1B workers should have the flexibility of working where they want to. The direct effect would be that employers would no longer be able to underpay or exploit guest workers. And, they’d no longer have financial incentives to replace Americans with H-1Bs. It really would become all about filling the skills gaps.

Actually, I don’t think a visa should be linked to a particular company at all. It should be an individual visa, linked to the person not the business interest. To be eligible, individuals should have to meet specific requirements, such as having a job offer from a U.S. company, or at least two years of work experience in a niche field or with an in-demand skill, like Hadoop or Android. Or, they should be experts in their field, recognized via technical publications, patents and the like. Or, a company’s senior executives should certify that you’d be an indispensable asset. Finally, the visa processing time should be shortened to less than a week, so that the individual can start working for the company immediately.

To keep individuals from exploiting the program, the visa fees should be set relatively high and the requirements for listed jobs should be quantified with certifications, salary requirements, years of experience, academic levels and the like. Visas should be granted for six years, during which time the visa holder can work for a company, start their own business or even change professions. After that, they should be required to demonstrate how they’ve excelled in their field by submitting certifications, recommendations and other measurable information. If they succeed, they should get a green card immediately. I think this sort of flexible, individual-based approach would address many of the issues that weigh down the current system.

Summary

The H-1B program is often derided as unfair to American workers, but it’s also not an easy path for those who seek to live and work in — and contribute to – the United States. Only thoughtful reform will address the concerns of both sides.

Samwise is a database developer and H-1B worker for a major company in New York. He asked to use his Dice pseudonym in order to speak freely on the topic of H-1Bs.

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