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• We're hiring in Calgary!

  August 17, 2010 Peter John McFarlane Business and Leadership

  Yes, we're hiring folks! Demand in the Calgary and Edmonton markets is only growing and Habañero has an imperitive to grow with it. If you are talented, highly-motivated, collaborative, and want to work at a company that expects you to deliver solutions that will delight clients, consider a career with Habañero. It is also really important that you like to have fun with the people you work with - both your clients and co-workers. The current openings we have in Calgary are: Interaction Designer Infrastructure Specialist  Senior Consultant Senior Dynamics AX Consultant  SharePoint Architect (job posting coming soon) Solution Specialist/Business Analyst  User Experience Developer  We have a lot of exciting opportunities with new and existing enterprise clients that continues to provide the challenge we are constantly striving for. Click here to find out more about what we do. If you're interested in any of these positions, feel free to contact me directly or to email careers@habaneros.com.

  Tags: Job Posting, Career, Calgary | Comments (0) | #

• Team GSD rocks the Habañero Cup!

  August 12, 2010 Jason McIntyre Business and Leadership

  If someone asked me 10 years ago where I would be in my career in August 2010 there is no chance I would have talked about what was going on today. See, the company I work with is extraordinary. We have an extraordinary spirit grounded in our values but borne of our collective passions and personalities. Out of this spirit comes some interesting and sometimes completely wack ideas that fire up the organization in interesting ways. Enter the Habañero Cup! The 'Cup' is modeled after our experiences in high school intramural teams. Everyone is assigned to a team and we are given a list of activities and associated points that we can earn by completing those tasks. Simple, right? Absolutely. There is brilliance baked into the activities focusing teams on a combination of individual and team activities. All of these activities make a meaningful contribution to Habañero: "getting things done" that we know we need to get done; promoting and enabling internal initiatives important to us right now; promoting and enabling market-facing initiatives important overall; getting us focused on the important but not-so-urgent things that often fall off the sides of our desk but are so critical to our long term success, and; having fun supporting team building and company pride. The real genius is in how this all comes together for Habañero. The teams are competing throughout Q3 and the awarding of the Habañero Cup will happen at a company-wide family picnic in Vancouver in the latter part of September. We bring together the entire company (and all of the people whom support us in what we do) to embrace and celebrate the larger concept of team at Habañero; the entire Habañero "family" which is all of us and our families. So ... what were we doing today? Today was all about team building and company pride. And it was brilliant! And that team name "GSD"? Well, that's an attitude we have in our Calgary office and Colin created a brilliant logo to represent the attitude.

  Tags: Habañero Cup, team, teamwork | Comments (2) | #

• The social web - a culture shock for IT organizations?

  July 29, 2010 Jason McIntyre Business and Leadership

  If Mitch Joel brought the reality check to "The Art of Marketing" event, Gary Vaynerchuk (Wikipedia / Blog / WineTV / Crush It!) brought the shock value. I couldn't honestly tell you if his talk had anything to do with his book ("Crush It! Why Now is the Time to Cash in on Your Passion") but his cutting critique of marketing professionals was compelling. The main points of Gary's talk were: Brands need to start caring. There is nowhere to hide so we need to start listening and communicating with our customers in the channels they choose. Get over it. The social web is driving major cultural shifts in business and it is only going to accelerate. You can choose to stand on the sideline in hopes it is a fad but you will just fall further and further behind. The tools have changed but this is no easy game. Taking advantage of the opportunities presented by the social web require the same principles that have always led to success; 10% inspiration and 90% perspiration. This is hard work. I've been in IT for a long time and few interactions with IT organizations reassured me that they were being run like a business. I am sure many are, and likely many of the ones I interacted with. However, the points noted above are just as important for IT organizations that are being run like a business and they should consider the impacts on customer relationships. What is the brand of your IT organization? As Jeff Bezos says, your brand is what people say about you when you aren't in the room. Do you know and care about what they are saying? Do you have a way to measure brand sentiment? What do you do with the information? Is your IT organization spending more time rationalizing, explaining, and defending than strategizing, collaborating, and solving? Your business users are savvy, time-constrained, and driven. Be assured they will find the shortest route to resolution and value, and it is your choice whether you are directing that journey. And if your barriers to competitive entry are forcing their hand, be aware users will work to go around and tear down those barriers even while working with you. The information, tools, and expertise is too readily available outside the office. Transforming (or fine tuning) your IT organization into a highly responsive, authentic, value-focused, and business metrics accountable organization is imperative. Start the change now. Follow Gary on Twitter @garyvee Previous TAOM blog posts: Enterprise 2.0 - there is no going back Do your systems fascinate users? The rational rider confronts the emotional elephant

  Tags: web 2.0 | Comments (0) | #

• My Day Eight Thoughts

  July 4, 2010 Steven Fitzgerald BC Bike Race

  The basic data from my bike computer says Rick and I rode around 350km over about 27.5hrs and climbed about 8200m (which, by the way, is dangerously close to the height of Everest). Missing from that data is fact that this was all done primarily on world-class single track that twisted, turned and rolled its way through some of BC’s most beautiful coastal landscapes. But the more subtle story is what the week meant to me. It was a week full of the incredible and the banal. It was a week loaded with carefully executed routine interspersed with disorienting surprises. It was a swirl of that insuppressible smile sort of fun and the occasional sinking feeling that I might just not be up to the task at hand. I know, perhaps a little melodramatic, but this last week—the week of the BC Bike Race—was all of the above to me and a lot more that I can't really describe yet. At this moment, nearing the end of the first day that I haven't been on a bike in what seems like a very long time, I guess the over ridding feeling I have is one of appreciation. It really hit me tonight how lucky I am to have opportunities to pursue endeavors the magnitude of this event. Getting a chance to prepare for and take a shot at this race was very personal and important to me and I feel most fortunate to have three key people that really understood why something like this would matter to me and were able to help make it happen. For starters, as this is a team event, it seems pretty obvious that having a good compatible partner is a requirement. Fortunately for me, Rick’s been a great deal more than just another rider to do the race with. He was there for countless hours of riding and planning, which was fantastic. This last week though, Rick really found another gear when it came to keeping our team focused on the right things. Races like this are ripe with opportunities to push too hard here or not hard enough there and Rick’s judgment and patience for his weaker partner was amazing. I’m super lucky to have been able to talk Rick into partnering up with me for this event—he was nothing short of inspiring to ride with. I talked about my wife Jen in an earlier post, but beyond helping me find ways to sneak the hundreds of hours of training in, Jen found ways to show me that she really believed in me and appreciated how important this was to me. Jen’s involvement has really made the experience feel complete. The third key team member was our friend and Microsoft associate, John Hitsman. John seemed to understand the passion Rick and I had for the BC Bike Race and took last week off work to support us along with his son Kale and my son Henry. John’s organizational skills are absolutely impressive, but what blew me away more was his appreciation for the little details that would make such a difference for Rick and me. It was more than just the daily rhythm of the post-race rotisserie chicken with the chocolate milk, Recoverite chaser. He was able to manage all the details—with the support of Kale and Henry—to the point that Rick and I could spend 24hrs a day thinking about the rides. To have a friend step in with such a monumental effort to help you realize something so important is really something incredible. It's something that to me is even more inspiring and motivating than our 500 or so riding cohorts that each have overcome a multitude of challenge to be able to make it through the seven days. I’m not sure how I’ll be able to thank Rick, Jen or John, but I do have some ideas on how to start. Speaking of thanks, there are a few others I want to shout out to: Yoshi the photojournalist from Japan that volunteered two bolts from the small chain ring on his bike to add to the one that came from rider 99-1’s spare bolt. This allowed me to get my bike back together in the middle of a big climb after I lost all but one bolt holding my small chain ring on. We had almost two hours left that day so the idea of single-speeding through all the steep climbs that lay ahead was almost too much to bear. I never did catch up with either Yoshi or rider 99-1, but I hope to be able to pay these favours forward in the future on the trail at some point. I also hope Yoshi made it out of the forest that day without a small chain ring. Andy Handford and Al Saunders for supreme coaching. Their perspectives formed a perfectly balanced view of the race. Heide Saunders and Greg Gjerdalen for just being awesome. Actually, the whole Gypsy group was fantastically entertaining. Kelly Vanry for her yummy race week nutritional supplements. Ciaran Hanrihan from Rocky Mountain nee Different Bikes for mechanical and dry cleaning support. Ciaran is the sort of person that always seems to be helping others and many riders have stories about how he’s done something extraordinary to keep them rolling. Jamie Armstrong for his great coaching and inspiration. Jamie’s off to the Penticton Iron Man this summer. All the people that came out and supported including Ryan Parsons, the whole Jensen family, Miles Federspiel and Paul Klawer, the Berkowitz/Pendry crew, my mother and father (Cathy and Ross) and, of course, Jen, Wyatt, Frances and Eddie complete with cowbells. What a beautiful sight to see in the last 100m of a long week. So, tonight I’m going to cut my wrist band off and work on changing my focus back on more career oriented matters. Thankfully, Habañero is also an exciting and challenging place so that transition will be smooth. I can’t say though that I won’t occasionally drift off a bit from time to time this week thinking about the amazing trails of the BC Bike Race.

  Tags: team, BCBR, teamwork, bc bike race | Comments (1) | #

• Last man standing?

  July 3, 2010 Rick Martin BC Bike Race

  We had an awesome ride yesterday in Squamish. The race started and finished at Brennan Park Rec Centre in Squamish. We headed out along the Test of Metal route, up to the Mashiter trail, then via Tracks of Hell to the Bob MacIntosh Memorial trail, into End of the Line and then the New Rock and Roll. A brief but fun descent down Rob’s Corners had us heading back to Squamish’s new and outstanding pump track/trail Half Nelson. There after we hit up Pseudo Tsuga, the Powerhouse Plunge and then Hoods in the Woods, and finally Crumpet Woods with a Seven Stiches kicker. We’re feeling tired but ready for Day 7 – we’re in 13th place in our Veterans Over 80 category. The 14th team is 13 minutes behind us, and the 12th team is 27 minutes ahead of us overall.

  Tags: BCBR | Comments (0) | #

• The race doesn't end at the finish line

  July 1, 2010 Kris Anderson BC Bike Race

  I spoke with Scott Hedlund today, a friend of Steven and Rick, about the seven day BC Bike Race and what Team Habañero can expect as the end of the race draws near. Scott did the BCBR in 2007, the first year of the race. According to Scott, by days three and four you get better at listening to your body when it’s telling you to slow down, and you can recognize the same in your teammate. Each day it’s critical to save some fuel and not burn out. Interestingly, Scott said that he actually felt stronger with each passing day of the race. Steven and Rick trained and prepared a lot for this race, as Scott did in 2007. When I asked Scott how he felt when the race was over he said “I felt drained and exhilarated at the same time.” There was a lot of emotion with finishing the race, but he said he wasn’t prepared for the psychological low that followed. When Scott mentioned this I realized that this bike race is a lot like working in our industry. A team in the bike race is like a project team at Habañero. As a project moves ahead often the work becomes more intense and all-consuming. Team members may end up spending more time working together than with their own families. When the project finish line is close, but still out of sight, it can feel like there was no before, and it’s hard to conceive of what will come after. When the project is done, or in Steven and Rick’s case, the race is over, it can take an unexpected emotional toll. Scott described this paradoxical psychological phenomenon as the Day 8 Let Down. The Day 8 Let Down is inevitable, either in a grueling physical competition like the BC Bike Race or in completing a major project. Habañero team members approach their work with the same team spirit and dedication to success that Steven and Rick will have put into this race. Scott said that the Day 8 Let Down eventually passed and he was left with a lasting sense of accomplishment and the feeling that he could conquer anything. So I guess the message to Steven and Rick, and everyone at Habañero really, is be proud of your Day 8 Let Downs.

  | Comments (1) | #

• Hump Day

  June 30, 2010 Steven Fitzgerald BC Bike Race

  Rick and I completed one of the bigger days of the BCBR today. It ran from Earl’s Cove to Sechelt on the Sunshine Coast. Yesterday’s ride in Powell River wore us down so we developed a strategy of starting easy today and saving some gas to have a good finish. The logic being that we needed to keep some gas in the tank for the remaining three days (thus the slower pace at the start) and we are really keen on ending our days strong as opposed to dragging ourselves across the line. It’s sort of like ending with a great desert—it can really make up for a mediocre main course. Today’s course really suited this strategy as most of the first three quarters of the race was climbing and most of the great single track didn’t come until the end. What’s really interesting about the last two days is that the Powell River run was 14k shorter and almost 800m less climbing than today’s Earl’s Cove to Sechelt race. Psychologically though I found the Powell River terrain made it very hard to get any flow, which frankly got pretty demoralizing. Without flow, time drags on and riding can turn from fun to work. It’s times like this when it’s powerful to be riding on a team rather than by one’s self. We were each able to gut it out at different times to keep the other going. (Truth be known, Rick kept me going a great deal more than I kept him going!) It’s a different sort of motivation than I’ve experienced riding solo and it’s a great way to experience an epic like the BCBR. Today, we both felt a great deal better although I went through a tough patch for an hour or so and, again, it was great to have that teammate support along on the trail. We finished today at around 5 hours, 22 minutes, which was a little off the pace from where we’ve been for the first half of the week. Our plan is to take tomorrow a little easier too and great ready for harder, faster rides in Squamish and Whistler. We still have a great deal of riding left!

  Tags: team, BCBR, teamwork, bc bike race | Comments (1) | #

• Enterprise 2.0 - there is no going back

  June 29, 2010 Jason McIntyre Business and Leadership

  Continuing my blog series from "The Art of Marketing" event, Mitch Joel (Wikipedia / Twist Image) shared some very thought provoking perspectives and information from his book "Six Pixels of Separation". Joel's presentation is undoubtedly a wake-up call for the marketing industry. His examples are rich in information and experience and show how the emergence of social networks and communities are shaping a new landscape for the marketing industry. His message is also a powerful and timely one for IT organizations. Just recently a business stakeholder of one of our clients referred to IT as the "business prevention organization". As an IT professional this was a very disheartening comment to hear, but is indicative of a far-too-prevalent sentiment: IT is doing more to hinder business than to enable it. The reality for all of us in IT and especially in IT organizations is that the game has changed. We are Internet consumers and what it offers outside of our work comes with us to the office every day in the form of experience and growing expectations. Those expectations aren't going away; they are accelerating as the tools available to us online become more ubiquitous, more powerful, simpler to use, and easier to consume. I want to focus on two social network impacts that IT is dealing with today. Eliminating the technology literacy gap An interesting side effect of the social web is that we as consumers know more about what we can and should expect from technology than ever before. I'm not saying that all of us are now masters of "IT speak", but we certainly are exposed to, aware of, and possibly users of a broad cross-section of technologies. Fundamentally, we are able to consume valuable services for a specific need, and for most of us, the behind the scenes technology is unimportant. We know what the technology does for us and what it can enable us to do. A richer understanding of applications, technologies, and opportunities creates higher standards for what we expect in the workplace. Given my experience I can respect the objectives and challenges IT organizations have in meeting these new demands, but the reality is that our business customers care even less about IT's technology challenges as they see the immediacy of value that can be had from Internet tools. Value networks I still marvel at the fact that I receive real-time tweets from Lance Armstrong. I read his book It's Not About the Bike after losing my aunt to cancer and it inspired me to think about the disease in a new light ... and I have been an avid fan of his ever since. Before Twitter the closest I came to Lance was paying a large sum of money to attend a fund-raising dinner where he was the keynote speaker. With Twitter I follow Lance all over world and feel oddly connected to him as he tweets about riding his bike or dinner with his family. This is the value of Twitter ... connecting people to other people in a very real and meaningful way. Now I don't look for Lance to provide insights into the best patterns for mapping capability models, but I do also follow business architecture thought leaders on Twitter. And this gives me real-time access to what they feel is valuable to know about business architecture today. Social networks provide all of us with access to communities of knowledge, thought leaders, experts, and the collective wisdom and experience of far more people than those within our own organizations. IT organizations, and their stakeholders, that limit or restrict access to social networks are limiting the flow of value in the form of ideas, answers, insights, and wisdom into their organization. Dare I say they are potentially hindering innovation, productivity, competitive advantage, and value generation for "the many" in the name of restricting the behaviour of "the few" (and I can guarantee you that abuse will be the domain of the few in your organization). Social collaboration is not a fad. It is time for a reboot inside IT organizations everywhere. Hit Ctrl-Alt-Del and focus your efforts on producing remarkable business outcomes through the use of all the technology, and means, you have available to you. Break down the barriers of control that restrict your agility and embrace a new way of producing business value through technology. Follow Joel on Twitter @mitchjoel Follow Joel's blog Previous TAOM blog posts:  Do your systems fascinate users? The rational rider confronts the emotional elephant

  Tags: web 2.0, IT transformation, social collaboration | Comments (0) | #

• Take the “a” and “c” out of race…

  June 29, 2010 Rick Martin BC Bike Race

  28th June, 2010 – BC Ferries Queen of Burnaby from Little River, Comox to Powell River Al Saunders gave us some excellent advice during our prep for the race. Take the “a” and “c” out of race, said Al, and replace it with “i” and “d”. In a stroke, our race turned into a ride, and our legs got a break - hopefully they're not one hit wonders. During Day One we were certainly closer to riding than racing. Today felt like we edged closer to racing, but were still in the riding category. We kicked it up with some roadies at the start of the day for the first 20 kms, and then let them drop us on the major climb of the day. (We caught them just before the bottom of the single track descent). As the week progresses, I’d like to edge closer to racing, but still leave plenty in the tank each day so that we finish strong and happy. We’ve just finished an outstanding Day Two in Cumberland. Check out the video from the day. As the week is progressing, we are settling into our placing in our race category. We’re recognizing people that we need and want to be riding/racing with during the day and people that we should not be riding/racing with (either because they’re too fast or too slow).

  Tags: Bike Race, BCBR | Comments (1) | #

• Day One is in the Bag

  June 27, 2010 Steven Fitzgerald BC Bike Race

  Rick and I finished day one of the BCBR today in Nanaimo. It was an amazing course with fantastic single track—the people in Nanaimo did an incredible job. There are a huge number of racers here from all over the globe so it makes me pretty proud hearing the out of province riders going on about how amazing the riding is here. Rick’s ridden a fair amount in Nanaimo in the past so he had the home town advantage going. It gave him some real flow—particularly early in the race—and it was great for me to hang on to his wheel. I think it’s the sign of a good partnership when you get energy and flow from your team mate when they are rocking. A lot of times in races like this, people are more likely to be deflated by others riding strong. That’s the great thing about this being a team event (with a great partner). One other small item to note about today’s ride: we finished strong with a decent into town and a final lap around the track in the back field of the school that I went to high school at (many, many years ago). Track and field was a big part of my life growing up so it was pretty cool ending at the track. I managed to pull off a classic sling-shot on the final corner to nip the peloton of 5 riders I was with and crossed the line only to see my father and mother standing on the side of the track. It was just like old times! Today’s ride was 60k and took us 4hrs and around 40 minutes to complete. Tomorrow we are in Cumberland for a 59k leg that should be a little quicker than todays. Fingers crossed.

  Tags: team, BCBR, teamwork, bc bike race | Comments (1) | #

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