Visio diagram to HTML project

I’ve been in my new job just over four months and it is going really well. A few weeks ago I got promoted to technical leader of a small team of programmers which was a big surprise and I’m loving the new role. I’ve been working some really long hours the last few weeks as I have inherited a large project that is coming to an end and the deadline is near. So I got a surprise when a lady from Canada emailed me about my post about diagrams and the challenges of dealing with them at work. She is a project manager and so diagrams are part of the corporate world in which she works.
My solution in my last job was the create HTML diagrams specifically structured for my screenreader. I would get some help of a colleague to explain the diagram and then I would write the HTML by hand. Then because writing HTML is tedious I designed a short hand which was quick to write and wrote some software to generate HTML from that. This was OK for me but for most non technical people it isn’t a great solution. I got good feedback on the HTML diagram itself though, it is just the method of creating it that needs some work. Luckily, I have worked on two projects in my last job where I had to build software to read and write Microsoft Excel and Word files. It isn’t too difficult and I wondered if I could build software to read Visio diagram files. It turns out that it isn’t that hard. And so a project is born.
I am now working on a website where you can create an account, upload Visio diagram files and use your screenreader to navigate the diagrams using headings and links. Boxes will be headings, lines will be links, box text will be paragraphs and any type of grouping of boxes will be described too.
Later versions might read other diagram file formats and even be able to auto-generate diagram files for you. That last one is a lot more complex however so will be a possible feature farther ahead.
So far I have only been researching the file format and have not written any code yet but I hope to start very soon. My job is very demanding on my time plus I have a young family so time is short.
If this site would be useful to anyone then please do contact me and may be you could help me with things like testing, designing better HTML structures, provide real-world example diagrams, or even give this project a name. As always you can contact me as thebanqui@gmail.com

Triumphs and failures

It has been a few weeks since my last post and a lot has happened. Things have been quite hard and I am flipping between being on tops of things and feeling like I am sinking.

The good news is that I received a job offer. I accepted it but unfortunately there was miscommunication at the interview stage and it turns out the company didn’t understand how restrictive my disability was. On my first day it was obvious after only a few hours that I couldn’t do the job I was hired for. The job was helping develop some complicated industrial automation software. I could do the programming work but part of the day to day work was operating the software in order to test the new code. The software was totally inaccessible so I couldn’t perform testing which is a critical part of the job. So I lasted 4 and a half hours which officially my shortest job.

Although this experience was a bit humiliating and frustrating it has showed me that jobs are out there and although this one didn’t work out there will be another one out there for me in the near future. I have also learned the lesson that not everyone understands the capabilities of a screenreader. I don’t think I explained how I work in enough detail and it happened that the interviewers made some assumptions without me realising. I guess I also felt that hammering in that I can’t do certain things would just put them off so I didn’t explain in enough detail exactly what kind of things would not be possible. I wanted to focus on what I could do and what my strengths are, not my weaknesses but this experience has taught me that the interviewer needs the full story, both the good and the bad. I definitely don’t want to go through a false start like this again.

But this has been hard for me to deal with the last few weeks, in fact this experience was today and I already have gotten over the shock and surprise. What has been getting me down the last few weeks and what the cause of my brief hiatus is my pain level. Over the last 3 months I have gone through another deterioration. So far I have experienced about 4 major pain level shifts. I am in a plateau most of the time then every few months I experience an escalation and enter another plateau at this new pain level. I haven’t been wanting to think about it but I have been forced to recognise that my condition seems to be progressive, I seem to on a downward trajectory and this is really starting to worry me. The pain is quite bad all the time now and is extremely sensitive to the trigger action, focusing my eyes, and I wonder how long till the next deterioration. Coupled with extra pain is an accompanying deterioration in my logic thinking powers. Each time the pain worsens my head gets a little more foggy. This was having an impact on my performance in my last job, being finally honest with myself. So now I don’t know that I am even capable of being a programmer. May be I can still do it now but will I still have enough logic thinking left to be a programmer in 2 years time? I don’t know and this has been making me pretty depressed. So I am flipping between bouts of depression and feelings of optimism.

A few weeks ago I was at a king of breaking point and I declared that I was done with computers for a while and vowed not to touch it. I needed a rest from my worries about job, computer use and thoughts of the future. So I put my laptop away and didn’t touch it for weeks. I have to say that I didn’t miss it in all that time. I have been spending all my evenings exercising, stretching and listening to books. I have totally put work, the future and my disability out of my head and focused on life itself, spending time with my wife and kids, getting my body healthy again after putting it through so much stress. I have picked up my computer now to write this post but then I think I might take another week without using the computer and spend a little more time getting my head straight. The pain has not gotten any better and I am no closer to working out what my future is but I have lost the sense of sinking and the feeling of deep anxiety.

I still can hardly believe that I started a new job today and I am already unemployed again. I am sure I will find the right job though, and even if I only have another 2 years of programming in me that at least gives me time to move into a less logically intensive career. Who knows, the doctors might even find out what is wrong with me and cure me.

The main takeaway I have from today is brutal truth during the interview. Not everyone knows what screenreaders are. What tricks interviewers with me is that I look totally normal, I see my surroundings fine and there is no indication that I have a visual impairment. So I need to be more explicit so they realise the extent of my limitations.

Promising interview

Yesterday I got a call from one of the recruiters who interviewed me to say that their client wanted to meet me. That interview was today.

Overall I think the interview went well and at the very least I think I am a strong contender. They have already interviewed a few applicants but haven’t found what they are looking for. I am in the second round of their searching and there are two other applicants being considered. I’ll know in a few days whether I got the job or not, or if there is a second interview to attend.

I do think this role fits me well, it matches my personality and much of my experience is relevant. I think that is half the reason for feeling that the interview went well. The other 50% is that my preparation the night before and on the morning of the interview ended up helping me massively. So I wanted to share the preparation activities as I think it might be useful to someone. None of it is ground breaking or original but I don’t think everyone always does this.

So here goes:

1. I spent a few hours researching the company. That means its history, the market it is in, where that market is heading, how the company fits into the market and where it is positioning itself and who its main competitors are. I also spent a lot of time learning the main key acronyms and terms of that industry.
2. I looked at the technology solutions the company produces; these are the technologies I would be working on if I got the job. I called a couple of contacts in the software industry who I thought might be able to help me understand this technology space a little better, from a high level. Kind of understand the most pressing design concerns, best practices and so on.
3. My wife decided to investigate the key company people based in the office where I was due to have the interview. She was able to find out some super interesting nuggets from LinkedIn. From her research I found that my interviewer had some similar interests to me regarding team process and as soon as she showed me what she had learned I knew I was in a stronger position.
4. My wife looked up on Google a list of interview questions for the role that I was being interviewed for. Then we practised these interview questions over and over again. We critiqued and developed my answers repeatedly until we were happy with the content and tone. In the end we had to stop as my throat was getting sore and we didn’t want me to lose my voice the night before the interview.
5. On the morning of the interview I downloaded and listened to a couple of podcasts that I thought were highly relevant to the position I was going for and listened all the way to their office.

Of the above I would have thought all was pretty obvious except for researching the background on key managers in that office of the company. At that point we only knew the name of one interviewer but knew there would be more than one.

In the end there were two interviewers and both were among the people my wife had researched. I had the information in notes in my pocket and had memorised it all on the trip to their office. This helped me a lot as I was able to tailor my answers to them a bit more. I didn’t exaggerate anything, but I did emphasise some things that I might have left out entirely.

In the end I suspect that the interviewers got many of their interview questions from the same list as I did. Many of my best answers were ones that I had already honed with my wife the night before while others related to things that my phone calls with software developer contacts had covered.

Without this preparation the interview wouldn’t have gone nearly as well and now that I know more about the role I am so happy that I spent an entire day preparing. I really really want this job.

Just got to cross my fingers now and wait.

Finally, I wanted to say how my visual impairment affected things. As I have said before, my visual impairment is not obvious unless I am actually using a computer when you see me. I was so engrossed in the interview and the discussions I almost forgot to disclose my disability. Unfortunately this was right at the end as we were about to stand up and leave the meeting room. I told them about the disability and how I have been working productively with it for a few years now. Their reaction wasn’t positive or negative. They seemed to weigh it up and then we wrapped the interview. I don’t know what that means but I do know that I wish I had disclosed a little earlier. I didn’t want the last words of the interview to be about a disability but about my experience or about the job I was going for. So I have learned that lesson and will try and find an opportune moment to disclose a little earlier next time.

I just hope that this is my last interview, crossing fingers and toes.

Job search update

I have been going through some highs and lows with the job searching but today was definitely a high.  I was contacted by a software consultancy firm about a job vacancy on Friday. It was the HR manager and she found me on LinkedIn. I responded suggesting a telephone call and she replied asking that I attend an interview. I had this interview today and it went better than I expected. I was super nervous and my stomach was tied in knots. I had all these scenarios where the interview would be drawn into a long and prolonged interrogation about my eye issues. I was terrified and I am usually pretty confident in interviews.

In the end the job vacancy is at a client company and the consultancy is just acting as a recruitment agent in this case so the interview was a non technical HR pre interview but regardless it went well. We reached the end of the interview and I realised I hadn’t disclosed my disability so I just came out and said it. To my surprise the HR manager seemed to get excited and asked me about it. It turned out she is visually impaired with a lack of central vision. She was really happy to share stories on accessible technologies! I couldn’t believe it.

Talk about softball first interview.

The good news is that I will now be presented to the client as a job candidate and my visual impairment seems to be a non-issue so far. I have to wait till September for the next stage though as it is the summer and key people are on holiday.

I got home and my wife and I did our regular job search. I emailed an agency regarding one very interesting role and I got a call 5 minutes later asking if I could attend an interview the same day. So I went down to their office and had another pre interview. It went really well and this time I disclosed my disability near the start of the interview. The recruiter was fine with it and was eager to put me forward.

So now I am waiting for interview dates for two jobs. Both jobs look interesting and both are much more suitable for me than my last job, being more pure programming jobs. That means that I should have a smaller amount of variety in my work and can hone my skills with a smaller set of tools and processes.

July and August, I have been told today by both recruiters, is pretty terrible for job hunting though. It gets really hot here and everyone leaves the city for the coast. It is just too hot with too few people working to get very far with job searching. But despite that I have had two interviews, albeit recruiter interviews after two weeks of searching. I have other things in the works, talking to other recruiters by email so I am hoping for more interviews soon. I will try and be better at updating the blog on progress. I have been consumed with job finding activities and self-development. I don’t feel so nervous now that I have had two easy going interviews. I know it will get much tougher when I interview with the end clients but I think I needed these soft ball interviews to help break the ice a little bit. I need to relax a bit and not let my imagination get carried away with interrogation scenarios.

This evening I’ve had a night off the job searching and had a couple of beers but tomorrow I will get back to my job searching, open source project work and self-development. Gotta keep at it every day until I sign that job contract.

Finding a job – The Battle Plan

It has been a few days since I got laid off, I have had some time to relax and clear my head. I am now ready to put together my battle plan and get started on it. Some parts of the plan I have already put in place and others I am just writing now.

The first step was to write a new and up to date CV. I thought long and hard about what kind of job I want and what technologies I want to work with and have written a CV that complements this future direction.

However before I send off my CV to agencies, load it up on job boards etc I need to do two things.

1. I have a little personal project, a little computer program I wrote, that helps me analyse database performance. The existing tools are visual so I wrote one that outputs screenreader friendly HTML. In my line of work owning or contributing to open source projects is a big deal. Open source means that the code is hosted somewhere publically and that other coders can contribute to the code. People who are interested in using the program can download the code, compile it and have their own working copy of the program.
2. Send the CV off to family and friends in the tech industry for feedback.

Once the project is open sourced and the CV is ready I will create accounts in various job boards and upload the CV there.

I will update my profile on LinkedIn and see if there are any groups that I think would be useful to join.

I also have contacts in the tech industry so my CV will go to those people.

There are meet up groups in the tech industry called usergroups. They are usually targeting a single technology or area of technology and have events every few weeks or months. These groups are great for learning more about specific  technologies but more importantly they are a great way of networking. Attending events and talking to other software developers and companies that attend has the potential for finding a job. I will join a few of these usergroups and start attending events.

I will start applying to jobs on job boards. This could land me interviews and also make more job agencies aware of me.

Once I have got all these actions going I will continue to improve my open source project. I have a few ideas of different accessible interfaces that I would like to implement. This will help me by giving me a more powerful tool, it will help me learn new technologies and will also make the project more interesting to other coders and any potential employer that reads the code after seeing the link to the project in my CV. I will also search for other open source projects that look interesting to me and see if I can contribute code to them. This will help me learn further and I can also add to my CV that I am a contributor to a project as well as having my own.

There are also technologies that I have identified that would better suit a screenreader so I will be spending time learning these technologies better so I can improve my chances of gaining a job where these technologies are used. Part of this self development will be listening to software development podcasts. There are a bunch of podcasts I haven’t listened to regarding technologies I think may be important for me. I will not learn the details of how to develop software with these podcasts but I will learn more about the current direction of the technologies, key components and get an idea of the culture around them.

So essentially there are three main threads of action: searching for work, showing off my skills in open source software projects and self development.

Below I summarise my battle plan.

• Open source my database performance tool.
• Write my CV.
• Send off my CV to key contacts for feedback.
• Create accounts on job boards and upload my CV.
• Update my LinkedIn profile
• Send off my CV to key contacts in the tech industry so they might forward it on.
• Start attending technology usergroups
• Apply for jobs on job boards.
• Continue to work on my open source project
• Find another open source project that I can contribute to.
• Spend time on self development.

Finally I would like to talk about prior disclosure of my disability. I am not planning on disclosing my visual impairment before any interviews; I don’t want to be discounted before I even get the chance to sell myself in an interview. One of my strengths is that I am pretty confident and generally do well in interviews. I will disclose my disability during my interviews at the point I feel is most suitable. It is not obvious when meeting me that I have any visual problems so it will be up to me to actively disclose it during the interview. How I do this I don’t know, I think it will depend on the interview and I don’t need to have a specific plan for how I will do this. Whatever seems most appropriate in the interview.

I have already published my software project to an open source host and have a first draft of my CV. I have joined three usergroups and already attended one meeting. The meeting was fun, I learned a little but didn’t find any choice contacts. These events will probably not be my most promising job seeking activity but there is the chance still and I need to cast my net as wide as possible.

Looking at the above I think this battle plan would work for anyone who works or wants to work in software development. For those who have not yet worked in the software industry and who have little personal experience programming then the open source software aspect of the plan will be the most challenging but also the most important. Open source is a big deal in this industry and is a great place to learn. If anyone is looking at this battle plan and thinking it would help them too but are not sure about open source then feel free to email me and I would be happy to help you get on your feet.

I will update the blog soon with progress and any interviews that come along.

Been fired.

My fears have come true, I have been laid off.

It was on the cards so I am not surprised though I am still a bit shocked. I came into work on Friday to find a meeting request in my inbox between HR, the CTO, my line manager and myself for the following Monday. I knew instantly that I was out. I had been expecting this day since the new technology was confirmed but expecting it and then it happening are a bit different I suppose. I tried to contact HR and my line manager to get some information before the Monday meeting but no one was available. I ended up sweating it for the whole weekend and then by then I was grasping at the idea that may be they were going to promote me not fire me. I couldn’t tell my wife as I didn’t know 100% I was definitely getting fired so I tried to forget it and enjoy the weekend as best as I could. It would be the last weekend without stress for my wife and kids before the bad news.

On Monday morning I came into the office and walked into the video conference room and waited. Within a few minutes the HR manager arrived in person and my manager and CTO joined on the VC unit. Then the HR manager started talking and her first words were “unfortunately” so I knew for sure in that instant that I really was being fired, then I heard the words “it has been decided to terminate your contract”. Even though I knew it was coming at this point it was a hard blow.

I don’t want to go into the details but you can be sure that they didn’t say that they were letting me go because of my disability though I do believe that is the case. Whether that is legal or not here in Spain I don’t know and to be honest I don’t have the gumption to fight it. I guess the company was worried so they provided me with a generous severance package which I have agreed to.

The rights and wrongs of it all I don’t fully know or understand at this stage. However the company has gone to great lengths to make sure that I am provided for and with 2 years of the Spanish unemployment benefit available to me I am in no immediate financial straits as I had feared.

I had worked at this company for many years and all I can say that I feel right now is shock. It seems weird and unreal to be typing this and not be at work. I won’t be talking to my work buddies every day and my deadlines are no longer my deadlines. I feel like I am in the twilight zone.

Part of me feels sad at leaving but another part of me feels an excitement for a new stage in my life. I have always embraced change and every time major changes occur I feel a sadness for what I have lost but find that the excitement of starting off something new far outweighs it. Now I am looking at my career anew. To a certain extent I have the power to change the direction of my career if I want to. I think there are areas of information technology that would be more suitable for using a screenreader and so I now have the freedom to go and find a job more suited to me. The next job I start I will start with a screenreader which I think should make a big difference to my job satisfaction. I started my last job without my disability and spent most of the next years just trying to keep up with my old duties and speed. It wasn’t the ideal job for me once I started with a screenreader.

At this stage I am not discounting a career change whether it be major or minor. The critical factors are: being able to perform the job with a screenreader without a large amount of friction and whether the job is challenging and interesting. Probably I will stay in software as it is a major passion of mine but there are many sub specializations and adjacent career paths.

For the next few days I plan on just sitting back and enjoying the summer weather. I will stay at home with the kids and take them out to the park and down to our local café. I will take the dog up into the forest and explore a bit and just let things settle in my head. Once I am ready I will form a battle plan for finding another job. I already have some ideas of what I need to do.

Right now I am in too much shock to really take in the situation. This will be my first experience of looking for work with a visual impairment and it could end up taking a long time. Having work experience and a university degree will be a help but I really don’t know how much difference that will make. I guess I’ll only find out once I start interviewing.

As I type the end of this post it is 9pm, it is 30 degrees with a steady breeze and I can smell the pine of the nearby forest. So I’m going to take a glass of red wine with my wife now and just enjoy a summer’s evening, battle plans will come in a few days.

Fighting for my job using the value yardstick

May be it is just me, but I think like a tactician now at work. Where before I just did my job, now I am constantly thinking how I can do better, be better than how I was last week and be better than my colleagues. Ultimately it is the fear that drives this behavior. The fear is that my employer will one day tell me that I am being let go because of something related to my visual impairment, even if they don’t present it that way.

I am the single breadwinner and if I lose this job then things could get quite tough. While there are laws against discrimination I am not naïve. I think I have a healthy and valid fear. In the last few months there has been much talk about a new technology being brought in that all the programmers in my team would use. It is a completely mouse driven, visual technology and requires no code to be written. So it is looking like my team will not be programmers for much longer but a team of mouse clicking monkeys. This new technology enables less qualified people to build an albeit simpler version of the software we develop currently. I am struggling to work out how I am going to survive this change and I am wondering if any of my highly skilled colleagues will stick around for this new era.

So right now my fear has spiked but even before this new technology came on the horizon I felt a healthy dose of fear. Personally I find that this isn’t necessarily a negative in my life, it is more like one of the drivers that spurs me on to be better at my job and not let me get complacent. But I don’t want to talk about “The fear” in this post. I want to talk about the word Value.

Value. It is a word that is part of the corporate speak that you hear executives and middle managers use in team and company meetings. The corporate speak probably makes sense if you are an executive, each line of work has its own language and phrases to describe it and the language of business strategy and operations efficiency too has its own. But it sounds rather cheesy to everyone else.

But the word value, I have learned, is a word that is worth paying attention to. Quite simply, thinking about value makes you better at your job and makes you more essential to your employer.

Thinking about value frees you from the constraints of how you usually look at your role and your duties. You stop thinking as a programmer, or a salesman and start looking at things unfiltered. You start questioning how you do things and how your team does things. You start seeing inefficiencies and issues that are pain points for the team and yourself.

It is very easy to become accustomed to doing things a certain way and accepting things the way they are without question. But ask yourself the question: What could I do right now or this week that would add the greatest value to the team?

I think this way of thinking came out of acquiring my visual impairment right when large changes to our team were occurring. I was feeling extremely vulnerable and was terrified of losing my job. So out of that I came up with the strategy that I would be as valuable to the team as I could. I figured if I was valuable then I wouldn’t get fired. So that meant more than just programming, there are plenty of programmers out there and plenty of gifted ones at that. I needed to differentiate myself and so I started analyzing things, cutting away the customs of the team and really looking.

My first effort with this new way of thinking was identifying why our relationship with another team was so troubled. It really came down to that we had never formerly agreed on how to cooperate and whose duties were whose. So I wrote a short document that would formalize the relationship with the other team and sent it to my boss. I suppose I was winging it here as I had never written anything like this before. But my boss liked it and although my document never got further than this boss it did start a round of meetings where the terms of the relationship were arranged and a new and better document was written and signed.

With that mini achievement I continued to keep an eye out for value adding opportunities. When an external consultancy was hired to develop a large suite of business applications for us I quickly saw room for improvements. Our approach to testing had always been informal as had our relationship with the owners of each project we were involved with. But because of the large amount of money at stake the relationship with the consultancy quickly became very legalistic and rigid. I saw that we really needed a formal testing process. So I bought books on software testing process and read blogs about the subject and documented a formal testing process that would state how we would interact with the consultancy, what the deliverables were, how we would manage testing tasks internally, the format of test scripts and so on. I presented it to the whole team and invited comment.

This was really a success for me as it was taken up and reduced a lot of the friction between the consultancy team and our own. I was put in charge of the testing process and made accountable for it.

Those are two examples and there are more but I think you get the idea. Thinking about value allowed me to be the guy that solved a problem and managers tend to love those types of people, if done in the right way. Sometimes the manager is not interested and that could be for any number of reasons and if you can’t persuade them then look for something else.

Adding extra value to a team in this way is probably more true for jobs which have a wide variety of tasks and duties rather than narrower fields. For example being an analyst programmer involves a huge variety of duties whereas being a telephone operator is more focused on a single activity.

In jobs which are more narrowly focused it will be harder to apply this way of thinking. However where the duties are wide ranging there is usually a lot of areas where the entrepreneurial spirited employees can see an area which can be improved and be the one to bring that improvement to the team.

Coming back to my situation, I am now looking at how I can survive the sweeping changes in technology that are about to come in. I will be looking at how I can carve myself a niche and make myself useful, using value as my yardstick. I don’t know if I will be successful, to be honest I think I might lose this one but even if I do I know I’ll be using value when I enter the next interview room, when I look at any training opportunities while trying to improve my chances of gaining employment and then when starting my next job. I hope that I can keep my job but if I can’t then I suppose that’s life and I’ll move on to the next challenge.

When The Low Points Hit.

This blog is about my story of visual impairment and sharing what I have learned with anyone who wants to read it. So far I have written about my eye condition, about working with a visual impairment and some things that I have learned along the way. I have focused on the positive so far and talked about proactive measures that I take that I think are useful to share. But I haven’t talked so much about the things that I really struggle with, the experiences that I go through which I usually keep more private. I am going to talk about my own experiences of anxiety, depression and even desperation that I have been through. I think this is important so that I can convey a fuller more real representation of what someone with a visual impairment can go through.

I like stories of spirit and determination and it is this kind of proactive, go out there and make noise attitude that is most likely to make someone succeed but without also sharing the bad times, the faltered steps this message becomes less credible.

I read an article by a blind developer a couple of years ago where they said that with all the tools of the modern day there is nothing to hold blind people back from a career in software development. It painted a picture of easy street and success and said nothing of the very real hurdles to achieving a successful career. When I first read that initially I felt bad as I was experiencing lots of hurdles and figured that if it was really so easy then I must be not intelligent or not gifted enough. Now I just know that that article had no credibility, I think it was designed more as an addition to his CV to help him get more work or something like that.

Depression is one of the hardest things to go through and it is also deeply personal so for that reason I can only talk about my own experiences and my own thought processes. I don’t have depression but I do go through short periods of it which I refer to as low points. Longer term depression is not something I have experienced since my early twenties. I remember what it felt like and I am relieved that it seemed to just be a phase of a couple of years that I went through while trying to work out who I was and how I fitted in. Now in my early thirties I have figured out the biggest questions and feel comfortable in my own skin. Now the low points I go through are not related to hormones or fitting in but as a direct consequence of my visual impairment.

I have an undiagnosed condition where looking at near objects causes me intense pain. All manner of lenses, eye training and dietary changes have failed to make a difference and if anything the condition is worsening over time. I have chronic pain in my eyes and a secondary headache which also never goes away.

There are three factors that can cause me to spin into a brief spell of depression. It doesn’t happen that often, every few months I suppose, and it usually takes more than one of these factors to push me into it.

The first factor is a feeling of frustration. This could be because of a bad day where something or many things went wrong on my computer, or I was under lots of pressure to get something done quickly but struggled to do it or that I am performing a task that is much harder now than it was when I had normal sight and this memory surges up a venting of frustration at my situation. This type of stress is acute and related to a specific things I am doing.

A second factor is a general anxiety about the future. There have been many changes in my company, lots of lay offs, changes in technology and I have felt really vulnerable at times and feared that I will lose my job and not be able to afford my rent and pay for the costs of my young family. I have more uncertainty about the future now and feel a background anxiety that I won’t be able to provide for my family, that I may not have a successful career and so on. I am not saying I am expecting to get fired or I am expecting to fail in my career because I really don’t think that but sometimes I have periods of doubt that aren’t fully rational. This stress is like a constant low level background stress that I haven’t managed to shift and that can spike when triggered by some other event.

The third and for me the most influential factor is the chronic pain. I would say that in the vast majority of cases it is when the pain is bad that I enter a low point.

It is true that you learn to deal with pain to a certain extent, it becomes normal so you just try to ignore it and carry on. But sometimes the constant unrelenting weight of it wears me down. When it gets bad I can’t ignore it anymore, I can’t think and a feeling of panic starts to envelope me. I think it is because I feel trapped, it hurts and I want to stop but there is nothing I can do except keep my eyes closed and turn the lights down. I know it will alleviate a little in a couple of days but right now in that instant I am powerless.

It doesn’t take much to push me into a slump when in this state. I could have a bad day at work which triggers my fears and insecurities and suddenly I fall into a state of desperation. Once it starts it grows rapidly and I start wanting out, wanting an escape from the pain. I just want it to stop, to leave me alone but it won’t. I am now fully in a state of helplessness, frustration and self pity.

The feeling of desperation doesn’t last too long, may be  a few hours or a day. But when it is gone it leaves me drained and depressed for a few days and there is nothing to do but to wait for it to lift as the pain lifts.

I have learned that there isn’t anything specific I need to do except acknowledge that I am in a low point, not get too carried away and know that it will lift on its own in a day or so.

The key is expecting it to come along and knowing it doesn’t last. When you’re in it things look bleak and it can be hard to see that there is a way back up. Now that I have had my share of low points I can deal with them better as I know, even if I don’t feel it at the time, that the cloud will lift and the world really is a wonderful place. I live in a wonderful country which is beautiful and has warm and open people. I have two amazing toddlers and a loving wife. I have forest and hilltop views within 5 minutes of my house, no car, no loans, no credit, I have my distance sight and a healthy body. I guess I feel a little ashamed when I look at all the amazing things there are about my life. If pain is the cost of seeing then I’ll take it openly with both hands.

There will be another low point though and that is ok, it won’t last and soon enough I’ll be back to striving for a better life for myself and my family, and even a better life for those around me who I can help in some way.

I do think I am doing ok in general. I have come a long way with my skills with a screenreader, with how I tackle my job and I think I have some positive and practical lessons learned that I can share with the world. I will keep on learning, keep on improving and hope one day that I can be a mentor to someone who needs help. But no matter who you are and how capable you are I think that these low points come around and I want to acknowledge that. I don’t feel like a failure because I falter sometimes, I am not superman, I’m just a regular guy who has to deal with issues that sometimes get the better of me.

The devil is in the diagrams

In my line of work diagrams are everywhere and they present one of the biggest challenges I face in my job. I guess I was unlucky to be working in a team developing business process software where each requirements document contains detailed flow charts to show how work flows between departments and teams in order to do things like create contracts with clients, approve purchases, onboard new employees and so on. Each business process that we turn into software requires flow charts. Then there are diagrams to describe network architectures and data flow diagrams to describe how different systems exchange data.

I am surrounded by diagrams and I have to tell you that there is no easy answer.

95% of diagrams that I encounter are Microsoft Visio diagrams. If the diagram is super simple and essentially a list of nodes with no fork in it then I can navigate the diagram in Visio using the tab key. However if the diagram has a decision node which has two or more exit lines then I have no way of choosing which path I follow or even knowing what the different options are. Then there are cross functional diagrams where nodes sit in swim lanes, each lane describing something about the node. I don’t even know there are swim lanes, let alone use them.

Another problem that I face is that I cannot create diagrams anymore. This is pretty limiting given that I am in a programmer analyst role. This means that I am responsible for writing code but also interviewing project stakeholders and users to define the requirements of a new or current business process. This is where diagramming is essential.

So what do I do given that I cannot see a screen, my access technology, my screenreader, cannot read diagrams, likewise I cannot draw diagrams?

First of all, the days of me creating diagrams with my own hand are over… period. I have had to be very clear about that with my team as they don’t always know what I can and cannot do. It means that my role in the team has shifted away from requirements definition and to a more technical only role.

When it comes to diagrams that other people create and which I need to understand I spend time creating HTML based diagrams manually. I work with a colleague and note down in text what the diagram consists of. Any nodes, any lines that connect these nodes, any direction of the lines, any swim lanes and enclosing boxes around nodes.

From there I hand write HTML and design a text based diagram where headings represent nodes, hyperlinks represent lines between nodes and a paragraph description provides any extra information that I need.

This works reasonably well. I can quickly traverse a simple diagram by following hyperlinks that lead me to headings which represent nodes. To help me I include information in the link such as the line label and the destination node so I don’t have to follow a link to find out where it leads. I differentiate between lines coming into a node and lines going out of a node so I can move forwards and backwards through a flowchart and know which direction is forwards.

I have a convention for flowcharts which I always follow but other diagrams sometimes require some creativity to convert into headings and links.

Writing raw HTML can be a bit time consuming so for flowcharts, for which I have a consistent format that I like, I have developed a kind of shorthand notation that I write in which is much easier and faster to write than HTML. Then I have a simple computer program that I run against the shorthand and the program generates an HTML document for me.

The program is a bit rough around the edges as it is only me who uses it, if I make mistakes in my shorthand then the error messages given out are a bit cryptic as I haven’t put much error handling logic in the shorthand parsing engine. But it works pretty well for me as I wrote the program and designed the shorthand but I think I might need to work on its robustness if I gave it to anyone else.

On a daily basis I work with people in the UK, Belgium, Germany, France and South Africa. Add to the mix that I work from home in Spain and you’ll see that all meetings that I attend are phone and video conferences. In many of these meetings there are screen shares between the various attendees and usually it is a diagram being shared. This presents a challenge to me as even if I have my own HTML version of the diagram then I still often struggle to keep up with what part of the diagram is being discussed. The key for me is to find out ahead of time if anyone intends on sharing a diagram. If so then I try and get a copy before the meeting so I can learn about it and if it is important enough and if I have enough time then I make an HTML version.

If I get surprised with a diagram then I often gently prompt a colleague to give me a brief description of the diagram in the meeting if appropriate.

So while diagrams are a big challenge, there are workarounds for many situations. The key is getting support from colleagues to sit down with me and help me convert the diagram into my shorthand for later conversion to HTML. Because this is a bit of a drain on my colleagues time I usually choose a junior and trade some knowledge and help with something they are working on. Very often they could do with some help in some programming work and I am happy to spend some time with them, help them solve an issue as a trade for helping me with my diagram.

If anyone is interested in getting hold of my shorthand and the HTML generator then drop me an email to thebanqui@gmail.com

How podcasts can help you find work

Every skilled profession has multiple podcasts run by practicing professionals of that industry. The current news and events of the industry are discussed as well as the main topics that are being talked about industry wide. The usual set up consists of a couple of hosts who are successful professionals of the target industry. The hosts discuss the news and topics and often bring in a guest to talk about a specific subject. The guests are usually the thought leaders of the industry, speakers of the conference circuit, authors of books on the target industry or the CEO of an up and coming company in the sector.

The argument that I make in this post is that listening to one or more of these podcasts of the industry or career path you have chosen to take, may help you get hired. You cannot rely on podcasts alone, they are the icy topping for the cake of knowledge and training.

First of all, if you are interviewing for jobs in a sector then you need some skills in that sector first. If you are in a position to be able to attend university then this is probably the best path to take generally speaking. A university degree behind you is a statement of ability and trustworthiness. But not all of us are in a position to attend university, possibly because of being the family breadwinner or something like that. The next option could be training courses but these are often expensive and not always accessible. But what you can do, if nothing else, and I think that you should do it even if you have a degree, is read books about the profession.

Don’t just read one book but read as many as you can get your hands on. Although not all books about a profession are in eBook format a lot are. Read books and get real knowledge of the subject matter of the career you are striving to enter.

But books don’t always convey a sense of the culture of an industry, you cannot always get a sense of where the industry is, where it is going, the current news and events occurring within the industry and what the latest trends are. Some industries are more fast changing than others but all do change, they all evolve and the concepts and tools evolve with them. Podcasts are a fantastic window into the industry. You get to listen in to conversations between industry experts and hear expert opinions each week on all matter of subjects.

You don’t learn subjects in any great detail, for that we have books and training courses, instead you learn how real experts talk, what is going on right now and it can also motivate you. Some podcasts can be very motivating as you can start to feel part of the industry, you have your finger on the pulse.

There are three main benefits that I would like to outline.

1. Learn the lingo. Of course you do learn many of the terms of a profession when you study, whether it be at university or through books. However the way experienced professionals talk about things usually involves a richer dictionary of vocabulary and phrases. Moreover, listening to multiple podcasts each week, over the period of weeks and months, allows this industry speak to infuse into your own way of speaking. You get so used to hearing experts talk about subjects that you start thinking and talking in those same terms.
2. Know the news and current events of the industry. If you don’t know what is going on in the wider industry then even if you are inside it you can feel on the outside. When you know the latest news and events you start feeling more comfortable, more included in the industry. It can open up conversation for you that might not otherwise have happened. Knowing where things are heading and at what pace allows you to prepare for changes that are occurring ahead of everyone else which can give you the edge.
3. Learn what the key topics are of the moment. Understanding what issues the industry faces from all levels whether it be at an individual professional level to the industry as a whole will improve your ability to do the job. Add that each week you are hearing what experts with lots of industry experience are saying about these topics and you have a wisdom on the subject that is ahead of what you could probably have managed on your own. Managers tend to know what issues might be facing them and their team and take note when someone has something valuable to say about it. Knowing the issues and knowing what key people in the industry say about it gives you an amazing opportunity to add value and to impress.
4. There are many resources that you can discover through listening to podcasts. It can be book recommendations, websites of guest speakers or hearing about other podcasts you hadn’t heard of before.

Let’s take all the above and see how that can benefit you in an interview.

When you walk into an interview with a cane, or with a guide dog or you inform them that you are partially sighted, right away that interviewer is nervous. Even if you disclosed it before attending the interview. There is a lot of ignorance and misconception among the sighted regarding blind and visually impaired workers. They may feel nervous as they don’t know what you are capable of and what you are not, what kind of costs might be involved, how this could affect insurance, how the law affects them and so on and so on. Your interviewer has likely never interviewed a blind or visually impaired person before, they no nothing or little about these worries they have.

This very often is the arena in which you place yourself and as long as this nervousness, this doubt, persists then it will be that much harder for you.

But if you can talk their language, can talk in the terms and phrases they are used to. You can include references to events and issues currently happening in the industry then you start becoming more familiar and more approachable. When they ask you questions you are more likely to have a great answer. Hopefully you have heard it before in one of your podcasts and can backup that expert opinion with knowledge from your training or books you have read.

One thing I want to be very clear about is that none of this is about misleading an employer. If you have no work experience then that needs to be clear. You need to frame your answers accordingly and not try and pass yourself off as an expert. The knowledge you gain from podcasts is real knowledge, and the expert opinions can genuinely be your opinions. So if you have no real world experience then tell the interviewer why you think this or that. Say that such and such person said this and that you agree with it. Mention that you listen to X and Y podcast which covered this subject. Mention all the books you have read.

The idea is to get the interviewer to feel more confident in you and trust that you are for real. For this reason you should be careful how you frame answers using knowledge gained from expert opinion.

So in summary, if you can talk the talk, show you know about and keep up with industry news and events, show that you are passionate about the industry by listening to all these podcasts and reading books, then the interviewer is more likely going to look at you as a potential candidate worth talking to further.

The next question is where can you find all these podcasts. Personally I find iTunes to be the largest single source of podcasts. I tend to use the Podcast app on my iPod Touch to search, subscribe and listen to my podcasts. iTunes for Mac and Windows is also excellent. On iTunes just enter a search term like “project management”, then filter by media type and view all the podcasts in the search results. Subscribe to a few and see which ones you like. Try the Listeners Also Subscribed To feature to find other similar podcasts.

You can often use Google to find people’s favourite podcast lists of a given industry too.

Give it a go, subscribe to a few podcasts and see if you like it, what have you got to lose?