Lego Role Models

January 1, 2015September 10, 2021 jo2sn Family and fun, LEGO brain, change, collaboration, communication, geeks, knowledge, learning, LEGO_friends, STEM, WomenInTech

Who had the family’s largest LEGO set this Christmas – it was the 11-year-old and their 8 wheel 42008 Service Truck – 1276 pieces, power functions, pneumatic, gears and 44 cm forcefulness. There was no band merchandise, no glitter or similar gender framing. Quite a project – as is the story about the “Research Institute” mini-figure set.

Continue reading →

People are people – despite their labels

April 2, 2013April 4, 2023 jo2sn Autism asperger, brain, conference, special_needs, STEM, waad

I generally despise the “despite” in the following sentences

Despite being black … they became a president
Despite being a Dane … they described atomic theory
Despite being a child carer .. they where astronomer
Despite being asperger … they was a genius scientist
Despite having ADHD … they became a an educational inspiration for kids (dk)
Despite being autistic … they were an expert in finding patterns (dk)
Despite being autistic … they can play together (dk)
Despite being autistic … they had complex emotions (dk)

I’d rather we use a child with autism, a child with ADHD, a person with asperger… A mother, a woman, a Dane, a black person – a person. Children with a diagnosis is so much more than the diagnosis – they are children. People are so much more that their labels, they are people first – labels second.

it’s your greatest skill that matter

January 3, 2013September 10, 2021 jo2sn Autism, Enterprise IT, Softwaretesting change, economy, jobs, skills, STEM

it is increasingly a worker’s greatest skill, not their average skill level, that matters. As capitalism has grown more adept at disaggregating tasks, workers can focus on what they do best, and managers are challenged to make room for brilliant, if difficult, outliers.

This march toward greater specialization, combined with the pressing need for expertise in science, technology, engineering and mathematics, so-called STEM workers, suggests that the prospects for (knowledge *) workers will be on the rise in the coming decades. If the market can forgive people’s weaknesses, then they will rise to the level of their natural gifts.

…

The above is from The Autism Advantage – I have replaced the word “autistic” at the * with KNOWLEDGE and it’s probably true for most knowledge jobs – including software testing 🙂

[ Hire Autistic People; Here’s Why | inc.com | January 3, 2013]

“It will be an economic failure if the new wave of high school graduates can’t be employed. All these kids have talent and ability and a tremendous capacity to contribute. We have to stop thinking that all employees have to be the same, with the same skills, the same attributes.”

…

For example, anything very repetitious and detail-oriented, work that requires great visual memory for the spotting of anomalies. You might not often think of someone with autism in terms of communication but they can be fantastic at understanding rules-bound communication, where it matters exactly what can and can’t be said to whom.

[ The Autism Advantage | New York Times | November 29 2012]

This emerging understanding of autism may change attitudes toward autistic workers. But intelligence, even superior intelligence, isn’t enough to get or keep a job. Modern office culture — with its unwritten rules of behavior, its fluid and socially demanding work spaces — can be hostile territory for autistic people, who do better in predictable environments and who tend to be clumsy at shaping their priorities around other people’s requirements.

Olivia’s new car – they work in tech, obviously

June 8, 2012September 10, 2021 jo2sn Enterprise IT, LEGO, Softwaretesting LEGO_friends, STEM, WomenInTech

IMG_8531, a photo by jlottosen on Flickr.

Olivia Friends’ new white VW beetle cabriolet – an AFOL LEGO MOC

More Diversity in testing

May 28, 2012September 10, 2021 jo2sn Enterprise IT, LEGO, Softwaretesting change, LEGO_friends, STEM, WomenInTech

I see more Diversity in software testing than among developers in general. Too bad that the ratio among developers is low – but good for software testing :-). It is proof to me that Software testing is a skill of many skills and that people from different backgrounds come together to make the testing groups diverse. Some come with strong domain expertise and user experiences others with people skills – and others with tech skills on par with the best. How to get more Diversity in software testing and tech – Miss more in the pink aisle perhaps.

So I probably need both a question mark and exclamation point in the title…

[ The Build-A-Tester Workshop | MARCH 13, 2012 | jlottosen ]

you might find initial engagement and strengths in a team of like-minded people – the team with the right mix of types for the context has the best options and is likely to be more successful. Said in other words a team consisting of only one ”type” would be good at only a few things and not so good in the rest.