Category Archives: Mentoring & Other Business

Yesterday, we selected 33 new SEED Engineering mentoring program
participants from Israel and Russia. The selection was difficult
because this was a very accomplished and highly recommended
group. We ended up picking 11 from Tel Aviv (Herzliya) and
22 From St. Petersburg from among the 45 applicants. As usual,
about a quarter of the participants are women. Unusually,
all of this group works in Sun’s Software Group.

Since the selection meeting, Tanya Jankot and I have been very busy indeed.
We have sent out announcements, started the Mentor Wish List building
process, set up email lists, and done all of the electronic and
management chores that go along with setting up a new SEED term.
I have also been communicating with disappointed managers of staff
who were not selected.

Today, Tanya created an internal individual web page for each
participant to help show them off to potential mentors. The
participants will now have until 22 February to personalize those
web pages and send us their Mentor Wish Lists.

The deadline for all SEED Engineering mentoring program application
materials was on 6 February. 41 out of the 45 original applicants
completed their submissions and are now eligible for selection as
SEED participants. Tomorrow (9 February), we hold the selection
discussion and I will announce the results.

Tanya Jankot and I are now reading all of the application materials
from Russia and Israel – the application forms themselves and the
recommendation letters in particular. What an impressive and
accomplished group!

Here are some of my notes:

• Enthusiasms:
  
  Asian studies, photography, sports (lots: paragliding, whitewater,
  soccer, equestrian, basketball, fencing), games (pool,
  puzzles), gardening, music (oboe, guitar, choir), bungee jumping,
  cooking, etc.

• Prior and current additional professions:
  
  university professors (lots), university researcher, journalists &
  editors & writers (lots), military officers (lots), teacher, business
  owner, rescue worker, medic, etc.

• Community work:
  
  teaching children, volunteer police officer, animal rights advocate,
  running synagogue programs, etc.

Tomorrow’s selection decision is going to be very hard.

33 out of the 45 SEED applicants have already sent in all of the
materials they need to qualify for selection to participate in Sun
Engineering’s mentoring program. Only 1 has been
disqualified so far. However, today is the last day for resumes
and letters of recommendations so up to 12 will be disqualified
if further materials do not come in. Tanya Jankot and I have checked our
application records against those of Sun Human Resources and we contacted
the applicants’ managers where there was a problem. We have spent
all day sorting out individual questions where there was discrepancy
with regard to perfomance rating, job grade level, requirements, etc.

It is particularly impressive to get a call or email from a manager or
executive you know in Russia or Israel because for them it is very much the
middle of the night. These are very dedicated folks!

18 SEED out of the 45 applicants from Tel Aviv and St. Petersburg
have already submitted
the minimum due for a complete application (presuming that HR
confirms their ratings as given). That is, they have sent in their
resumes and the required letters of recommendation have been submitted
in support of their application. Only 3 applicants have submitted nothing
but the original application.

Only one applicant has been disqualified so far. This is quite good. Last
term about 10% of applicants were disqualified and the term before that,
about 30% were disqualified. I expect some more will disqualify themselves
by not submitting all of their materials by the deadline (but so far so good).
All materials are due 6 February (California time).

Out of the 45 applicants to the SEED mentoring program from Russia
and Israel, 10 have so far submitted the minimum materials required
for a complete application package. The deadline is Monday, 6
February. We are working with some of the managers to help them
get executive letters of recommendations for special cases.

This term, we started asking specifically for applicants to identify
on the SEED application form the highest academic degree they have earned.
We have always had
access to this information through applicants’ resumes but some degrees
are hard to interpret. Also, academic achievement by Engineering staff
seems to be more valued outside of the USA so we wanted to give
applicants a more specific opportunity to show off. Among the 45
applicants from St. Petersburg and Tel Aviv, we had:

• 11% Doctorates
• 58% Master’s
• 31% Bachelor’s

For comparison: in 2001, the last time we collected data on this subject,
61 of Sun’s Engineering executives had:

• 41% Doctorates
• 26% Master’s
• 33% Bachelor’s

In the 2000 U.S. Census, 16% of the population had a Bachelor’s degree
and 9% had a graduate or professional degree. This is an impressively
well educated group!

Today, Tanya Jankot, John Plocher,
and I host our weekly Tea. We have a two hour tea and sweets party every week
for the SEED participants, their managers, and their mentors who are in the
area (4 p.m. in Menlo Park 17). We also invite everyone working on an
architectural review committee, the usability engineering staff, our
hallway neighbors, and interested Sun Engineering staff. Today, SEED alumni
and Accessibility Architect
Peter Korn is going to demonstrate
a tea ceremony and John and I are going to share the pastries we purchased
in Jerusalem’s Old City last Sunday. One of the fun things about SEED is
all of the fascinating people we get to know!

The application form for SEED’s second EMEA term (for Tel Aviv and
St. Petersburg) is now disabled. There were 45 application forms
received: 32 from Russia and 13 from Israel. All of the applicants
are in the Software Group. 9 of the applicants had applied to SEED
in a prior term.

All other application materials are due 6 February (California time):
that is when the required resume and letters of recommendation must be
submitted. I will announce SEED’s selection decision on 9 February. The order
in which the documents arrive does not matter. No action is taken until
the deadline for submission has passed. Human Resources is now verifying
application information (performance ratings, hire date, title and grade
level, etc.). Applications which are incomplete or are found to contain
deliberate misrepresentations are eliminated from consideration.

We had a fascinating trip to Russia and Israel but it is pleasant to
be back in rainy California where the jasmine vines and
almond trees are blooming. John and I have just signed the contract
to buy a 1916 rail train caboose (my new office!) and we have
made arrangements to have a crane and trucking company move
Western
Pacific 688 next week from the
Golden Gate Railroad Museum in
San Francisco to a nearby lot for storage here in San Jose. We will be
spending all of our spare time during the next few months getting our
swimming pool filled in and turned into a very very short rail line.

John and I returned safe to the San Francisco Bay Area
from our 2 weeks of travels in Russia and Israel visiting SEED potential
mentoring participants. We had a wonderful trip but we, our
kids, our dogs, our cats, and the bird are all happy we are
back home now. Today, we went through security checks and customs
in 3 countries (Israel, Germany, and the USA) and I am quite
happy to be home, away from X-ray machines, patdowns, bag
searches, shoe searches, and the endless stream of the polite
inquisitions and impositions that make up modern international travel.

Today is the deadline for applications for the Israel and Russia
“EMEA-2” SEED term. There are a few hours left but so far we
have 44 applications: 31 from St. Petersburg, and 13 from Tel
Aviv. Applicants will now have until 6 February to get all other
materials submitted (resumes, letters of recommendation, etc.).
We will announce our selection decisions on 9 February.