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Yesterday I attended the Software Craftsmansip Summit hosted by 8th Light.  I'm still processing everything we did and talked about, so I thought I would write down some of my initial impressions.  One of the questions I had in the back of my mind was "what is the summit trying to accomplish?"  Paul Pagel's open invitation to the summit talked about finding a consensus about what software craftsmanship means, and then creating a guild or organization to represent the ideals of software craftsmanship.  But the question that Corey Haines and I brought up toward the end of the day is "what problem are we trying to solve?"  It was exciting to be a part of this group of people who all shared many common passions about quality, learning, and mentoring.  It was tempting to imagine that we might be at an historic gathering, which happened to include a couple of the authors of the Agile Manifesto.  But as the day went on, I became increasingly skeptical about why software craftsmanship would need anything similar to the Agile Manifesto or the Agile Alliance.  I'm not saying that I don't want to be convinced otherwise. Nor would I mind at all if the rough draft of values and principles we sketched at the end of the day evolved into a significant document.  I'm just struggling to see what value that document is going to provide.

I was thrilled to see us spend quite a lot of time talking about apprenticeship.  We actually spent the first half of the day telling our own apprenticeship stories and looking for common themes.  This was a little nerve-wracking for me since I'm done writing (this edition of) the book, so if any themes were identified that contradicted the Apprenticeship Patterns, I'd be in a tough spot.  Thankfully, I found myself in familiar territory, and I had to bite my tongue to not call out the different pattern names as people were describing them.  David Chelimsky even quoted Pat Metheny's seminal Be the Worst statement, and I didn't even say a word. :)  As I was driving back home, carpooling with Jake Scruggs and Joseph Leddy, we discussed that one of the benefits of a software craftsmanship organization would be that it may be able to spread the word about apprenticeships.  This aspect of the day is sticking with me most, and I'm hoping it's not just because I've invested so much of myself into "apprenticeship" and therefore I have a vested interest in seeing apprenticeships more widely adopted.  I'm hoping it's sticking with me because apprenticeships are good for our industry, and therefore they're ultimately good for our customers and end users.

So, right now, my takeaway from the summit is a question. Why aren't there more apprenticeship programs out there?  Or if there are, why are we not hearing about them?  I suppose this is the problem that I'm most interested in helping to solve.  My Call for Apprenticeship from 16 months ago is still on my mind quite a bit, and I'm disappointed I haven't seen more movement in the right direction.  I'm hoping that as the apprentices that come out of Obtiva's and 8th Light's apprenticeship programs make their own waves that it will open people's eyes to the power of a strong(er) apprenticeship.

I attended my local Ruby Brigade on Monday and listened to Chris Hicks talk about sneaking Ruby into a Fortune 500 company. It was an interesting talk and I was impressed by Chris's ability to learn Ruby (his first programming language) over the course of a few months, and then present his experiences to a bunch of experienced Rubyists.  Afterward, a bunch of us grabbed some beers at a local pub and I had the pleasure of talking to Paul Pagel of 8th Light about apprenticeship.  Paul recently started mentoring an apprentice, so we had a lot to talk about.

I've thought about our conversation ever since and the different approaches that Obtiva and 8th Light are taking with their apprenticeship programs.

Obtiva hires apprentices into our Software Studio where apprentices are somewhat insulated from our clients and therefore have a relatively safe environment for learning.  The apprentices aren't assigned to a specific mentor, it's the Software Studio team's responsibility to ensure that apprentices are making progress and getting enough mentoring.  Sometimes we've failed to ensure that this happens as we balance client needs and team growth and the correct ratio of apprentices to more senior developers.

8th Light hires apprentices and attaches that apprentice to a mentor.  The apprentice shadows that mentor every day.  The mentor is responsible for finding and hiring the apprentice.  It's a more traditional approach to apprenticeship, and I assume that it's done in the context of on-site consulting work rather than in a remote environment like Obtiva's Software Studio.

It occurred to me this morning that while there are some business reasons for our different approaches, there is also some biographical reasons: my apprenticeship was less traditional than Paul's.  When I first met Paul, he was an intern at Object Mentor, a company led by Bob Martin, a long-time proponent of software craftsmanship.  Paul went on to work for Object Mentor and then moved onto 8th Light.  I, on the other hand, had a much bumpier (and perhaps typical) journey through several different companies, none of which emphasized apprenticeship.  I had to create my own apprenticeship in less than ideal circumstances (which is really what this book is all about).  My hope for Obtiva's apprentices is that they find themselves in much more ideal circumstances: within a culture of learning, a place to be mentored, and a place to stretch your skills.  Yet Obtiva's approach is closer to my own apprenticeship experience than Paul's.  At Obtiva, the quality of one's apprenticeship is largely in the hands of the apprentice, who will hopefully apply the Apprenticeship Patterns to maximize their experience.  Perhaps that's true of apprentices at 8th Light as well, though with a more traditional apprenticeship it would be easier to put the responsibility on the mentor.

I'll be interested to watch both Obtiva's and 8th Light's apprenticeship programs evolve in the coming years.  I'd like to see Obtiva's program take some steps toward becoming more traditional.