Public health

Shit’s gettin’ real, folks.

At our regular business unit call on Tuesday, the SVP spoke about what you might call OPSEC around COVID-19. “The time to be making a plan for how you would handle a call from the office saying you’re being quarantined for 14 days because someone on another floor has tested positive for coronavirus is not when you get the call. It’s now.”

Evidently management were already thinking about this, because yesterday afternoon the VP came round and quietly told individuals and small groups that the Reston office is going totally remote, most likely as of today. We haven’t got an official email, but when I left in the evening, I did so with the expectation that I won’t be back for two weeks. 

(UPDATE: this morning the email from the CEO was in my queue. The WFH is global.)

Man, this is a strange feeling. On the one hand, it’s good to know my company takes things like this seriously, and (unlike, say, United Airlines) backs its “our employees are important to us” schtick with action. This also has to be a relief to parents with kids in Fairfax County public schools, which is making noises about shutting down pretty soon.

On the other hand, in the early afternoon I got an IM from someone (I’ll call her Sonia) in our company headquarters in the Silicon Valley, identifying herself as from health and safety. “I just got to know that you were not feeling well. Please let me know when you have time for a quick call.”

Now this, also, is a first. As bad as my coughing is, I do not believe that Sonia heard it 3000 miles away. Someone ratted me out. Now, it’s true that quite a number of people on various calls have indeed heard those coughs, but I was not aware that there was any kind of corporate plague-reporting hotline that you can use if you’re feeling unsafe around a colleague.

(It would also be a first if I’m going to be slapped down for coming into the office while not in tiptop condition. I mean, obviously I wasn’t in tiptop condition, but I did practice care in what I touched and I stayed a good distance from people, except in the very teeny-tiny conference room. I was in the office for parts of two days last week and ditto the week before; my contagion was perforce limited. Although, yes, I might have been endangering someone with underlying conditions.)

Still, the woman’s just doing her job. I replied that I have a cold, but that I’d be available to talk between 1445-1530 yesterday or sometime this morning. So she sent me a meeting request for 1445 today. (I do not know where her temporal skills are deficient, or she’s just bloody-minded, but I accepted.) Thus, I cannot report on the conversation.

However, we certainly live in interesting times.

Room with a view

I told you already about managing to book in to the Marriott Marquis, one of the hotels closest to RSA Conference; one night in a “view” room and the other three in a standard. (Cost delta: $100+) When I checked in on the first day, the guy at reception told me that he’d put me in a view room, and all I had to do was talk with someone else at reception sometime on the Tuesday and they’d re-key my room cards to reflect checking out/checking in.

Look—procedure.

Well, that seemed nice, but when I got to my room, I thought the “view” part was a little disappointing:

However, it improved at night:

I must say that I like a city view at night. And I’ve missed living in a city with a skyline.

Data integrity

As long as I’m ranting about United Airlines, here’s something else from them.

The other day I got an email inviting me to a survey about a flight I recently took. As it happens, it was the flight to RSA Conference on 24 February; nothing so far WRT the return flight on 28 February. I went through all the “did you love us” questions, broken down into pre-flight, flight and post-flight categories; generally gave them marks no higher than 4 out of 10 (I think a couple were 7, but that’s because the flight did, in fact, land at the correct destination without dropping any major aircraft parts); and then was passed on to a secondary questionnaire.

(Naturally, for any of the points where my score was below 4, they inquired solicitously how they could improve. One of my answers included the comment, “I suppose I should be grateful not to have been verbally assaulted by one of your flight attendants.” Because I’ve come to expect that from United.)

This part was to do with international flights, and it’s where the entire survey screwed the pooch. They asked how many such trips I’d taken in the previous year, and followed up with wanting to know how many of those trips involved Star Alliance partners. I answered honestly, which threw this error message:

WTAF?

I do not know what value they derive from building an answer set that requires delivering false data, but here we are.

(Also interesting that United are not listed as a Star Alliance airline; they certainly are.)

I went back to see who’d designed the survey, because recently I took something run by Medallia, which is a top-notch voice-of-the-customer outfit; nope, this was some company called MarketMind, based in Austria. (Ah, ha! Just realized the Medallia survey was for my stay at the Marriott Marquis during RSA. Now, I did get a giggle about the questions on whether I thought the hotel bar was trendy enough, but the survey as a whole was very professional.)

Well, I know nothing about these MarketMind folks, but this kind of thing is bad survey design and bad research practice. So I lied my way through the rest of the questionnaire and filed it away for a post here. I’m curious as to whether UAL will send me another survey for the return flight.

Fly the friendly lies

This showed up in my queue last week from United Airlines CEO Oscar Muñoz:

Right from the start, it got up my nose.

Consider me or any other customer “part of our United family”? Really? My or any other customer’s safety is their “highest priority”? Seriously—do not make me laugh. It triggers a coughing fit. More like the security of my payments—including all the nickel-and-dime add-ons—is UAL’s highest priority.

The last graf of the above crop indicates their idea of flexibility—they are graciously condescending to allow paying customers to rebook flights paid for during the window of 7 March (the day it appeared) to 31 March—for free!—within the next 12 months. You don’t get your money back; they’re holding on to that like a toddler clutching her Woobie. They just won’t charge their customary usurious “rebooking” fee. But if you bought your tickets anytime before 7 March, you’re stuffed, Jack.

(WRT the no-charge rebooking, it’s almost like the model they used about three decades ago was actually customer-friendly. Gonif.)

Well, then my Uncle Oscar (well, I’m part of the family, no?) goes on to talk about their corporate sanitary practices.

That bit about industrial hygienists wiping down hard surfaces in aircraft is just bonkers. When, precisely, does this heavy-duty disinfecting process take place? In the 30 minutes between the plane arriving (45 minutes late) at the gate and the start of boarding the next load of passengers into the tube? Seriously? These crews don’t have time to pull out any rubbish left at seats (not that they care about that); there’s barely enough time to replenish the toilet paper in the loos. So the notion of them meticulously wiping down all the tray tables is patently ludicrous.

Does Uncle Oscar think we haven’t flown in ten years?

The reference to in-flight service was risible. Yes, UAL is definitely keeping our safety a priority when their flight attendants’ role is limited to tossing out a choice of cello-wrapped dry biscuits or mini-packets of pretzels. I expect the announcement any moment that they’re suspending serving even those and the “complimentary” beverages out of concern for our health. They won’t ever resume.

Oscar closes out strong, though.

I do indeed believe their commitment to customers is the same it’s always been: give us the cash; now shut up.

Gratitude Monday: surviving the common cold

It’s not covid-19, but since 1 March, I’ve been laid low. I know it’s not the coronavirus because I have only one of the three symptoms—but, man, that one has been a corker. Not the worst cough in my life, inasmuch as I haven’t torn any interstitial rib muscles, but my abs are going to be sore for a while. It’s also not the flu—no aches, no fever; just the bloody cough. And eventually some extra snot.

I went to work on Monday because it was the first day after attending RSA Conference. I left early and did something I’ve not done in years: I fell asleep in the afternoon. Missed the team meeting because I didn’t come to for a couple of hours. I worked from home Tuesday and went back in on Wednesday because there were some meetings where I wanted to see people’s faces while we were discussing issues. But again, around 1430, I deflated like a day-old balloon, and went home. Worked from home Thursday and basically was just sick on Friday.

Saturday I hardly moved, even though the cough was abating. It took me several hours to do two loads of laundry. Making my bed with fresh sheets was so exhausting, when I was 80% done, I crawled in and stayed there for a couple of hours.

I had to force myself to drink sparkling water; it was hard to gag down anything. Over the course of seven days, I dropped about ten pounds. I’m most concerned about dehydration, so I’m pushing the water, even if it’s just a few sips at a time. Yesterday I had a few spoonfuls of Greek yoghurt across a couple of hours.

I’ve experienced some degree of hallucinatory effects—twice while dozing I’ve dreamt of two cats who crossed the Rainbow Bridge long ago. I was so happy to see them, I woke up crying. (Also, interestingly, it turns out that you can have a coughing fit so sustained that it causes tears to seep out the sides of your eyes. I did not know that.) Occasionally, I’ve been a little dizzy, possibly from the food/water issue. And I shall be very happy when the intermittent buzzing sound in my head dissipates.

Starting yesterday, I’ve begun to feel almost humanoid. I’m working from home at least today and probably tomorrow. If I have to lie down between meetings, I can do that. My employer does not subscribe to the work-yourself-to-death labor practice. They also expect staff to use the brains for which they were hired when it comes to knowing when to call it a day. I’m grateful for that. I’ve worked for companies that expected you to work every minute that you weren’t actually under anaesthesia for thoracic surgery.

I’m also grateful that this is just a cold, as miserable as it’s been. That I do not need to be paying a visit to an ER. That my PCP issued a prescription for cough syrup with codeine (which is the only thing that’s ever abated the coughs I get) just on me describing my symptoms online and asking what my options were. That I didn’t have to take Metro into her DC office to have her confirm my assessment. (I am not grateful to Cigna for not paying for it or to CVS in Reston Town Center for not bothering to fill it or tell me about that until I was in their store and coughing on their counter. I am grateful that it still only cost about $15 and that I can afford that.)

I have a lot of work to do this week, and I’m grateful for that, too. That I have something worthwhile to accomplish. I have to figure out what’s absolutely necessary and basically postpone or jettison what’s not so I can get it done. I realize that hundreds of thousands of people don’t have that luxury in this health crisis that our government is completely mismanaging because it is of no interest to the Kleptocrat. I’m lucky, and I know it.

Blast from the past

Here’s something I noticed while at RSAC—Moscone Center opened in 1981, and Moscone West (where this photo was shot) opened in 2003.

It’s kind of cute that even in this century, the architects and designers thought pay phones would continue to be so necessary that you could make the signs as permanent as those for the loos and the elevators.

For the what?

This year, stress balls were big in RSAC swag. In addition to clouds, polar bears and other manifestations, there were these sumo wrestlers:

Rhinos:

And fat lederhosen-clad guys:

I did not understand what was up with that—but it turns out baramundi is a software management company headquartered in Augsburg, not the barramundi fish. (They claim the lowercase all one word name is derived from the Spanish "para el mundo", "for the world". Even so, it’s a reach.)

I didn’t even want one, but it was the last day of expo, and companies absolutely toss their swag at you on that day so they don’t have to pay to schlep it home, so I took the two the guy at the booth pushed at me.

And I’ve already been spammed by them.

Adjective AF

One of the things I enjoy about conferences—especially those with expos—is observing how companies choose to present themselves. This is particularly true of tech companies.

So, amidst a sea of “we cool—look at us” booths, this one stood out:

I did not even notice who they were; it’s only in this photo that I see the company name. But their carnival barker speaker was hitting home the “AF” part. AF punctuated every line of his spiel.

I have to say that I personally found it a little trying-too-hard-to-be-edgy lame. Along the lines of:

And I have no idea if it worked. I only know that, because I paused to fish around in my bag for my camera, one of the booth babes scanned my badge and foisted one of their totes on me. I’ll be getting their spam shortly. That will be fun AF.

Herbs and spices

You know you’re in the Golden State when the benches outside Moscone Center have this notice on them:

Man, I do miss that kind of thing.

(Thankfully, I didn’t really notice many vapers. I swear SF was at the epicenter of that trend about six years ago. I did catch a whiff of marijuana as I was walking past Yerba Buena Park one mid-day. That somehow seemed appropriate.)

Gratitude Monday: those who make it work

Well, here I am, back from RSA Conference 2020. It was quite a week, and there are a couple of things in particular I’m grateful for today.

First is the army of service workers it takes to put on a conference of this size. All the cleaners—especially this time, what with coronavirus and all; the food workers; the trash emptiers…

All no doubt low-wage contract labor for Moscone, with few (if any) benefits. The ones I saw were mostly non-white and over-40ish.

Also, the ones brought in by the various exhibitors to pizazz up their booths—making margaritas for this one, lattes for that; baking cookies on the spot (which were not handed out to Expo-only badge holders, BTW). I did not see one crabby-looking person, and the latte I got was just as pretty as any coffeehouse’s:

And the hotel housekeepers, God bless ‘em. You could not pay me enough money to clean up after someone else, so I always leave a fiver of the local currency and a thankyou note after each night of my stay. For the first time ever, I got replies. Tuesday’s:

Wednesday’s:

  

Thursday’s:

(Yes, I left a fiver and a note for whoever cleaned up after I left on Friday, too.)

The other object of gratitude today is the confraternity of product management. The one party I was really looking forward to was the “Luxury Whisky Tasting” set for Thursday night. Wednesday I was at a lunch event and chatting with a couple of fellows who are also PMs. I thought the company one worked for sounded familiar, so I said I thought I’d signed up for a party they were hosting. He got an odd look on his face and said they were holding a whisky tasting.

Yay!

But—a lot of people were going to get no-room-at-the-inn emails.

Damn.

But, he suggested we connect on LinkedIn, and he’d send me the suite number on the sly (it was being held in my hotel). And indeed, late Thursday he emailed me the info and suggested that there might be room later in the evening.

So I held off until about 45 minutes before end-time and then shot up. Man—the aroma of that nectar filled the lobby as I got off the elevator. My PM pal escorted me in, and I had one of the best times ever at a conference event. It wasn’t just the whiskies; it was the conversations as well. Cyber sec folks are very congenial; even more so when they’ve wrapped themselves around some single malt.

They’d run out of the Belgian whiskey by then, but I tried the Japanese, Welsh, Israeli and Scots stuff. The first did not suit my profile, but the others were divine.

And I’d never have had that opportunity had I not chatted with my new PM pal the day before. (I learned that the company had had 650 replies to their announcement. They gave 250 the lucky golden suite number, figuring about 40% would actually show up. More than 200 did; they were lined up down the corridor by the time the party officially started.)

So here’s to the professionalism of service workers, the generosity of PMs and the discovery of new worlds. Much, much gratitude today.