Author / Pusing Musing

by Pusing Musing

The Future of Employment Post-COVID-19

COVID-19 has has forced many changes to daily life. But there is one word that is probably synonymous with COVID-19 as it emerges as COVID-19 spread, Zoom.

From an application that people hardly knew, the usage of Zoom has skyrocketed as people prefer to stay at home and need a way to communicate for work and social life.

Zoom is not the first video conferencing application in the market. We have BlueJeans, WebEx, Skype, GotoMeeting and other products. But Zoom is perhaps what most people know and use for collaboration.

Zoom is also the tool what many companies used (many for the first time) to enable their employees to work from home (WFH).

COVID-19 has forced the companies to do WFH, whether the companies were ready or not; and after few months many companies found that they could continue to function even with its employees WFH.

It is a revolution in the way office work works, but it is not new. Even before COVID-19, some companies have been practicing WFH. Automattic (the company behind WordPress), BaseCamp and GitLab, are few examples that have its workforces mostly WFH.

This will have a lot of impacts (and opportunities) on employment.

The effectiveness of WFH is still debated. Some companies like Automattic and Gitlab embraces it a big way and found no issue with productivity of its workforce. Twitter announced its employees could WFH as long as they would like. Other companies such as Netflix preferred to have its workforce to be in the office as it founds it could get more creative ideas from face-to-face collaboration.

With ‘forced experiment’ with WFH, companies start to realize that there is longer requirement for a space (or a big space) – called ‘office’ – to house its employee anymore. A significant cost could be saved by reducing office space or even eliminate it altogether.

However, the biggest impact is many companies now realize it could reduce the manpower cost.

Some companies, such as VMWare cuts the salary of professionals who are WFH from area outside the Silicon Valley area. It arguably fair to other professionals who choose to stay in Silicon Valley. Professionals who work in other states or area with lower cost of living as compared to the Silicon Valley should ideally have their salaries reflect the current local conditions.

However, the biggest impact is probably companies now realize it could also hire professionals from practically anywhere in the world and many countries have lower cost of living (which is translated to lower asking salary).

It is a boon for professionals from developing countries as they can market their talents to companies beyond what are available domestically. It potentially reduces unemployment in those countries and increase domestic economy.

However, it will be huge challenge for professionals from developed countries. Lowering their asking salary may not be a good option as the cost of living is significantly higher.

Productivity loss may be overcome by hiring more people. It is a rather crude solution. However, if hiring two or more offshore professionals in order to achieve similar productivity as one inshore professional and yet with lower cost for the former, then it is a rather simple math for companies.

Companies may also gain more by strategically hiring from different regions so that there is always a professional working in different time zones. A 24×7 operation is possible without incurring the extra cost to incentivise people to work at graveyard hours.

We may see the next wave of outsourcing and a rather different one.

Rather than outsourcing to other companies, companies may choose to outsource directly to individuals. It could get the best talents from various countries, with lower cost.

Companies may also exploit different law, favoring professionals from countries that have more lax employment protection or simply base its ‘physicals’ office in the country with lax employment protection and have all professionals (regardless their locations)hired by the companies to adhere to that country’s law.

Professionals, especially from developing countries, would have more opportunities. On the other hand, professionals from developed countries now run risk of losing jobs to other professionals from other countries.

As talent is now available globally, professionals would also need to compete globally. It is no longer sufficient to ‘shine’ locally; the professionals need shine globally.

For professionals from developed countries, with high cost of living, they also need to show they can provide more values with skills or capabilities that are difficult to get elsewhere, despite higher commanding salary.

It will be a different competitions, and probably a more intense one. There is less protection from local employment law in case there are disputes as companies could hire the professionals directly, bypassing local laws.

Rather than permanent jobs, employment would be more transient. Short-term contract may be a norm. This allows the companies to adjust its manpower requirements in short notice, for example when there is an economic downturn.

Professionals would have more options to choose from and could simply pick different companies. However, it also means there is less job security on employment.

Having transient workforce from various countries would also mean less bargaining power for employees. There is no collective bargaining power on the employee’s side as employees are scattered in different parts of the world.

Governments will also face issues. For developing countries, having its citizens to be employed by foreign countries would be a blessing. Rather than ‘exporting’ their population out, the professionals would remain in the country, contributing to local economy and indirectly growing other local talents.

However, if those countries do not have strong tax law, there is a possibility that its citizen would under-declare their incomes, resulted in less revenue from the income tax.

Similar issue with shrinking income tax would be even more visible for developed countries; the jobs went to other countries and its citizen faced downward pressure on the salary.

Countries would also face issue in attracting foreign investments. Typically such investments would require commitment from the companies to make certain amount of investment and commitment to hire local professionals. However, with ability to hire professionals from virtually anywhere, companies may be less keen to hire local professionals unless the country could provide more incentives.

It looks gloomy, however it is inevitable. WFH unintentionally forced companies to experiment with WFH and opened up other possibilities for the companies.

For professionals, especially for the next generation professionals, it will be a reality. Things will be different moving forward; each of us would compete globally. We should continuously develop ourselves, adaptable and build unique capabilities and values to remain relevant.

Image source: People vector created by pch.vector – www.freepik.com

by Pusing Musing

Food Independence for Singapore

Recently the Singapore Government announced a new strategy, “30 by 30” to raise Singapore’s food self-production level from current 10 percent to 30 percent of total needs by 2030.

Singapore is highly dependent on food import. Singapore, according to the AVA (Agricultural and Veterinary Authority), imports foods from 170 countries, ensuring a problem with one country would not affect food supplies to Singapore.  However, the exporting countries may also experience forces external to the countries, such as climate change, COVID-19, and other factors that are beyond the control of both Singapore and exporting countries.

The biggest problem is probably to produce protein. Singapore has no space to rear cows, pigs or broiler chickens. Even though Singapore is surrounded by sea, there is a limited area that are suitable for fish farming, either due to water quality or to prevent intrusion to sea lanes. Fresh-water fish farming in reservoirs may be possible, but it requires careful control as the water in reservoir are eventually used for drinking .

Rather than limited by those constraints, Singapore should look to technology and also the future trend.

Recently Tip Top Curry Puff introduced ‘Impossible Rendang Puff‘ with meat-substitute from Impossible Food. It is an interesting mix, a traditional pastry mixed with latest meat-substitute. 

Impossible Meat, together with Beyond Meat, have been the forerunner in meat-substitute industry.  The ‘meat’ is based on plant (which would appeal vegans) and do not require rearing animals which may appeal environment-conscious consumers who are worried about environment impact of rearing animals for food.

However, rather than producing meat-substitute, Singapore should consider producing protein using technologies such as Precision Fermentation (PF) and Cultured Meat (CM).  These technologies promise abundant production of protein with low cost. 

Precision Fermentation (PF) is a process that enables the programming of micro-organism to produce almost any complex organic molecule. It is converting the source ingredients using microorganism such as yeast or bacteria to produce complex molecule such as protein. The ‘meat’ is technically not a meat because the protein does not come from animals.

The ‘meat’ from the Cultured Meat (CM) process, on the other hand, can be argued is a meat. Using tissue engineering, the technology multiples the source tissues to become the meat that we know of.  The ‘source tissues’ can be taken by scratching the skin from any parts of the animal.  There is no need to slaughter the animals; only some cells are needed.

Both technologies promised to produce protein with high quantity and (if we reached the critical mass) lower cost as compared protein from animals. Nutrition, flavor, texture and other properties of the ‘meat’ can also be controlled or even tailored differently according to different requirements or consumer preferences. 

Cultured Meat and Precision Fermentation does not require any large land to produce the meat. The issue surrounding rearing animals, (especially cows), such as water consumption, food consumption and green house impacts are practically eliminated. The ‘meat’ would be produced in the factory instead.

It may be difficult to convince the consumers in the initial phase.  People are used to meat from animals.  It will take some time for consumers to get used to idea of having ‘meat’ from non-animal sources. Flavours, nutrition and especially safety would be in their mind. It does not help that both technologies are producing meat in factory, from ingredients that sound alien and using processes that looks similar to producing genetically-modified food.

Having ‘Singapore’ brand probably helps to promote the acceptance.  While the technology is new and promising to make Singapore more independent for its protein consumption, Singapore should not be compromising on quality and safety.  Only if the consumers see that the Government does not compromise (and transparent) on safety and quality of food produced by those technologies, they will embrace such food.

Singapore may need to embrace such technologies early if it wants to secure its food supplies.  With world’s growing population (and affluence), there is an ever increasing needs for protein.  However, there is a limited available land in the world that can be used farming – without affecting the environment.  Over fishing is threatening global fish production. Global warming will also threaten the food production.

The government should prioritize research and development (R&D) on the technologies.  The technologies, while progressing fast, are still relatively new.  The R&D will allow Singapore to improve the technologies, better the quality of the meat and reduce the cost.

These technologies may come with some high costs due to patents, so it is important for Singapore to have its own R&D to hold some patents. It can use its patented technologies, sell it to other companies (with clauses to safeguard Singapore interest).

Singapore could also be the hub for such technologies, not only limited to R&D but also production.  If it is done correctly, and with acceptance from consumers, Singapore may be in the good position to export the ‘meat’ to the world. 

Many years back Singapore government identified the need to be independent with its water supplies; now it has array of water sources to guarantee its water supplies. Now, it is time for Singapore to secure its food supplies by embracing new technologies.

by Pusing Musing

Singapore and COVID-19 Vaccine Nationalism

It has been 8 months since the first COVID-19 case was reported in Wuhan, China.  The pandemic has spread to the entire world, millions have been infected and many people have died.  The pandemic does not seem to be abated, with countries that previously managed to control the outbreak is now struggling to control the 2nd wave.

Current methods, such as social distancing, curfew, closing any social gathering place – while it helped to manage the outbreak – is not sustainable.  It comes with high cost to the economy.  Many companies are facing closure, employees are either being furlough or let go altogether.

Prevention, in the form of vaccine, is always better than the cure.  However, it usually takes many years to get an effective and safe vaccine.  Due to the urgency, the vaccine development has been sped up tremendously.

Assuming we have effective and safe vaccine, the next question is how to manufacture and distribute the vaccine.

Having the population vaccinated against COVID-19 will give the country in a better position to restart its economy.  People could do their normal activities without any restrictions. People can work and study with peace of mind.  Industries and Services can operate normally and start hiring people.  The government could stop all the subsidies given to its population during COVID-19. The benefits are very clear.

There are many companies that can produce vaccine.  However, their facilities are not geared towards producing massive number of vaccines in a very short period of time.  It will take time for them to ramp up the production to serve world.

As a result, there will be a shortage of vaccine. Coupled with expected benefits and domestic push, many countries will simply force vaccine manufacturer in their countries to produce vaccine for their own population first before exporting the vaccine to other countries.

Welcome to vaccine nationalism.

Problem with vaccine nationalism is real; it is naïve to think that countries should not advance its own domestic agenda first.  It is political suicide for a government to simply sends the vaccine away while its domestic populations are still affected by COVID-19.

The problem gets deeper.  Even if the population of the countries where the vaccine manufacturers are located are fully vaccinated, the next question is who’s next.  Countries with deep pocket will simply buy the vaccine, putting them ahead of the queue.

However, COVID-19 is a global problem.  Until the last person in the world is vaccinated, similar to what human managed to achieve with smallpox, COVID-19 will still be in circulation and infect people.

Perhaps this is what small countries like Singapore can offer. 

It can help by fully pay the cost of setting up high-capacity vaccine manufacturing and selling the vaccine at cost.  In return, it has first priority to the vaccines needed for its population.

As the country is small, with only 5+ million population, Singapore would produce lots of excess vaccine that can be sent to other countries, such as its ASEAN neighbors.

This sounds attractive but it may also sound too simplistic.  Building vaccine manufacturing facility will take time.  It requires specialized people to operate.  It may take time to get the facility to ramp up the production. Lastly, there are different vaccine candidates and each may have different ingredients.

However, where there is a will, there is a way.  Building a facility should not be difficult for Singapore.  It can divert contractors and people from other projects to build the facility. Specialized machines require to produce the vaccines could be procured now so that it arrives when the building is ready.

Staff from existing research facilities and laboratories can be tasked to operate the facility in the beginning until there are enough people trained to operate the facility. Biomedical science graduates from universities or people who are currently unemployed can be trained to operate the facility.

If necessary, Singapore may also allow skilled technicians from other countries to also operate the facility. This not only help to jumpstart the production but also to show to the world that Singapore’s facility is a global facility, manned by people from many countries, to produce the vaccine for the world.

There may be some teething issues during initial productions, so it is expected first few batches would go waster.  Perhaps, the new facility could produce other vaccines as the way to train the workers and test the production line.

Singapore may also take similar approach as other vaccine manufacturing by starting to stockpile all ingredients of few vaccines that look promising without waiting for final clearance for the vaccine.  The idea is to have all ingredients ready the moment green light is given.  However, it also a gamble because some vaccines that originally look promising may later on found to be ineffective.  It is a necessary gamble in order to speed up the vaccine production.

It may sound too ambitious, simplistic and perhaps crazy.  However, having Singapore to produce the vaccine for the world would show Singapore’s commitment to the world and also showing Singapore can punch above its weight.

by Pusing Musing

COVID-19 and Travel

This week my family and I are supposed to be having holiday in New Zealand; stretching our annual leaves by having holiday between 2 public holidays (Labour Day and Vesak Day).  It would be our penultimate holiday without following school holiday as next year our daughter will start her first year in primary school.

We also have plan to make another trip before end of the year, a long one, re-exploring Canada.  I even tried (but failed) to reserve for bus ticket to enter Lake Ohara, a beautiful lake deep inside Yoho National Park.  My wife and I visited the lake during our honeymoon, and we would like to visit the lake again, this time with our daughter. Some of spectacular photos of the Rockies I took were taken when we hiked around the lake.

Alas, because of COVID-19, our trip to New Zealand has not happened and our planned trip to Canada most likely will not happen either.

Until the world could address the COVID-19, either by finding effective medications, vaccine (which will take months to get one and additional months for mass vaccination, if countries could get hold the vaccine in the first place) or (ironically, when COVID-19 is spreading out-of-control) the community attained herd-immunity against COVID-19, travelling would not be the same.

In the attempt to limit the spread of the virus, various governments, including Canada and New Zealand, either imposed quarantine rule for visitors or returning citizens or closed the border altogether. Practically, we have multi-level lock-down, starting at household level, domestic travel and international levels.

Some countries, such as New Zealand, Germany have started to loosen up the lock-down, however the speed of easing up the lock-down vary from countries to countries and it does not immediately lead to opening up of the border. 

The quarantine rule for incoming passengers may still be apply.  There is always worry that lifting the lock-down too early and too fast may lead to another wave of COVID-19 which may be more devastating.  History taught us that the second wave of the 1918 Spanish flu (which ironically did not originate from Spain) claimed the most life.

Opening up the border may not immediately mean the return of travel as we had before COVID. The quarantine rule for incoming passengers may still be apply.  This would immediately disincentive any travels except for any essentials or emergencies. Nobody would like to spend 14 days upon arriving in a country, then spend one or two weeks for holiday, then spend another 14 days upon returning.

Scientists also learned that many people who contracted COVID-19 are asymptomatic, which means when the next wave of COVID-19 is detected in the population, the health system would be immediately behind the curve and another round of lock-down needs to be imposed in order to prevent further spread.

Travelling could not be planned well in advance anymore.  Air ticket, hotel could not be booked and paid in advance because there is no guarantee that the destination country remain opens when at the time of the travel.

Worse, if the lock down happened while inside the country.  The prospect to get extended holiday because the country is locked-down is simply unpalatable.

Some countries may impose mandatory health check for all visitors. It may take hours just to wait for the result.  Antibody tests may give result in minutes, but it may give false positives; the best result is from PCR test but it takes more time to complete. Those hours are spent waiting anxiously in the arrival area of the airport which is never known to provide good amenities in contrast to the departure area. 

A clean bill of health does not mean people are out of the wood; if there were one passenger seated tested positive for COVID-19, other passengers seated that passengers may also be quarantined. Travelling is suddenly involving so many uncertainties.

The worst part is when the test showed a positive result.  The question is, who will pay the cost of the hospitalization.  The local government may not want to foot the bills for non-residents.  Travel insurance industry, facing the prospect of high bill for COVID-19-related costs, may exclude COVID-19 from the coverage or impose high premium for the coverage. 

Airlines and countries may demand each passenger to have certificate that proofs him free from COVID-19.  The certificate may allow the passenger to bypass any health and quarantine check at destination country.  However, not many countries provide walk-in test for COVID-19; the tests are mostly reserved for people who have showed symptoms or for people who happened to be in close-contact with patient tested positive for COVID-19.   

Certification meant the person is free from COVID-19 at the time of the test. As the person may contract COVID-19 after the test, the validity of the certificate could not be too long. When the person (holding the certificate) is taking the flight back home, his certificate may no longer valid.

Lacking of certificate, the person may need to get test from local health system.  Local government may not be too kind for visitors as they need to prioritize local residents, imposing high cost for such test. There is also a certain level of uncertainties, if the test showed positive, the trip home is no longer possible and the person would need to spend additional days in hospital.

The flight itself would be different.

Planes are not designed for social distancing in-mind. Faced with requirements for social distancing, airlines need to separate the passengers by having empty seats between them.  However, there has not been any consensus on how far the distance is; the problem is the distance has major impact to airlines and passengers.

The easy solution is to have one empty seat between passengers.  In a standard economy class of the Airbus 350 (with 9 abreast seats) means a load reduction of 33%. Passengers may have to fork out the same extra percentage for the airfare.  However, if local authority insists for bigger gap, such as a 1-meter gap, there could be only 3 passengers for every 3 rows of standard Airbus 350; a reduction of almost 90% of loads.  This arrangement would make air ticket out-of-reach for many people; less people would be able to travel, less income for airlines.

Budget airlines, such as Air-Asia group, FR, WN, would also face additional pressure. Those airlines depend on quick turn-around so that it could maximize their fleet by having as many flights as possible in a day. However, with the requirements to disinfectant the cabin before flight, it is no longer possible to do a 25-minute turn-around.  More time is also needed for passengers to embark and disembark, such as by ensuring passengers seated at the back do no pass passengers seated at the front. Planes need to sit longer on the tarmac, which means less flights which is translated to higher cost.

For airlines that depend heavily on transit passengers and without domestic market such as SQ, EK and QR, border closure created another set of problem. Those airlines have no domestic market; even though the countries (where those airlines are based) are rich, they have small population which means a limited market for O&D (Origin and Destination). Those airlines instead depend heavily on picking up passengers from many countries to their hubs (such as SIN for SQ) and flying them to their destinations out of their hubs.

With countries closing its border, practically there is no market for those airlines to fly to.  When countries start to open up its border, it may not be immediately beneficial to SQ, QR or EK as each country opens its border at different time and may be in the wrong side of its network.

For example, the famous Kangaroo route would not make sense if only Australia and New Zealand opens its borders.  SQ, QR and EK need countries Australian likely to visit like the UK or North Asia countries to also open up its borders. 

For SQ, even if many countries in SQ’s network open up its borders, SQ may not be able to exploit it due to the situation in its hub, SIN.  Until Singapore showed it could control COVID-19 situation, many countries may ban travel or transiting via Singapore, which in effect banning SQ from carrying passengers from their countries.

Controlling the spread of COVID-19 may allow Singapore to establish open border with other countries that are also able to control COVID-19, similar to proposed travel-bubble between Australia and New Zealand. Such open border would allow free travel, potentially without the need for quarantine control.

The time when SIN opens for transit passengers is also important.  If other hubs like DOH and DXB open up earlier than SIN, those hubs would simply siphon away the limited number of passengers away from SQ and SIN.

Airlines are in difficult position. It needs passengers, but it could not easily stimulate demands by lowering the fare because doing so would simply suicidal – even with government’s support – as the fare would not cover the cost. And this still with assumptions that people are still flying and there is a relaxation of border and quarantine control.  With economy grinds to halt due to lock-down, many people are out-of-job or have less incomes.  People and business would prioritize what essentials for them; travelling, either for leisure or business, would be lower in the priority list.

With less passengers, airlines would become smaller. Airlines will need to reduce frequency, close or suspend some routes and reduce its fleets and manpower. Many airlines would not survive with consolidations, government-support [] and bankruptcy would become common. 

It is clearly difficult time for airlines, airports and passengers.  For passengers who have their flights disrupted, many airlines offered credits rather than reimbursements.  Airlines need to preserve the cash; and offering credits is the way to preserve the cash.  However, it means passengers (including me) now become creditors to airlines. The credits may worth zero either due to time-limit or the airlines is totally gone under. Best outcome would be to utilise the credits after the whole COVID-19 is over but perhaps with less value as the ticket fare may increase due to social-distracting requirement.

It is heart-wrenching to me (who have strong interest in aviation industry) to see so many planes parked in the airports through out the world.  No doubt we, as human, could overcome COVID-19 but it will take years and during and after that period, the aviation industry would be different.

As for my family’s holiday; I don’t think we can fly to New Zealand, soon.  With so much uncertainties, staying put perhaps the best options.

by Pusing Musing

Great Experience with NZeTA App

Many countries now require visitors from supposed-to-be visa-free countries to apply for ETA (Electronic Travel Authority) or similar scheme before entering the country.

ETA is easier to obtain as compared to the visa.  The former requires only online submission and the results would be made available within a short time, a few days max. However, filling up the form for the ETA – especially for the USA – may be quite daunting.  It is not difficult but simply time consuming.

Until I applied for ETA for New Zealand, NZeTA.  From 1 October 2019 New Zealand will require visitors from visa-free countries to obtain NZeTA prior to the travel.

The New Zealand Immigration provided two options to apply NZeTA: through web or mobile app.  Interestingly, it costs NZD 3 less to apply using the app as compared to the web.  Out of curiosity I chose to apply using the app.

Searching the on Google App Store (well, I am an Android user) app was easy.  The installation was a breeze without any issues.

The application process was surprisingly easy.  Upon opening the app, I was prompted with the welcome page.

Followed by acknowledgement for the usual privacy and term and use.

The next step caught me a bit off guard. It prompted me to take a picture of the passport.

However, rather than taking the picture of the whole passport, the app actually scanned the Machine-Readable Zone (MRZ) area. The screen would show a blue bar where you should align the MRZ. As a result, capturing the MRZ was a breeze!

The next step was quite interesting, it asked me to do selfie!

It took me a few attempts to do the selfie. Once completed, the app displayed the information captured from the MRZ, with the picture on the top-left corner. It asked me to confirm the details.

After that, the app asked a series of questions, starting from whether I want to stay in NZ or coming as a transit passenger, whether I am an Australian permanent resident, and so on. Interestingly, the ‘expected’ answer is always highlighted.

After answering all the questions, I proceeded to pay the ETA and the International Visitor Conservation and Tourism Levy (IVL). The payment was done using credit card and it was a fuzz free. I did not use the feature to take picture of the credit card – which I believe would help me to key-in the credit card details; I chose to key-in the card details myself. The only missing is there was no 2 FA for the credit card transaction.

And that’s it! The whole process was completed in less than 10 minutes, all from within the app itself. It was a great experience!

The app made it easy for anyone who applied for NZeTA. There was no need to upload any additional documents or pictures. The app also reduces or even eliminates error by using MRZ to fill up the details; no need for the applicant to type all the details manually.

The selfie is also interesting. There is no need for the applicant to rush to to instant photo booth or photo studio to take the picture, which would delay the whole application process.

The app practically eliminates all frictions in applying the NZeTA. It is a great innovation from The New Zealand Immigration. As a citizen, friction-less transactions such as what the app offered is the one I am looking for when transacting with the Government; and as a public servant such app is the yardstick for a good Government eServices.

by Pusing Musing

Process and Customer Experience at Economic Rice Stall

One of places I usually go for lunch in the weekdays is the food court at the Esplanade Link.  It is only a short walk from Raffles City complex, it has variety of foods, the foods are generally good and the price is reasonable.

My favorite stall in that food court is the Economic Rice.  This stall always has the longest queue during lunch time; and yet people don’t mind to queue.  Despite the long queue, the queue is surprisingly fast, thanks to the way they serve the customers.

The stall is in the corner, in “L” shape, something similar to the image below.  There were usually four stall keepers manning the stall, other than perhaps another two or three at the back who do the cooking.  The queue started from the stall keeper in the corner, marked with ‘1’.

Capture.PNG

The stall keeper ‘1’ main responsibility was to ask the customer what he wants: whether he wants rice or porridge and whether he wants to eat the food at the food court or to ta bao (take away).  He then scooped the rice to the plate or a take away box.  He was responsible to scoop the first one or two side dishes that are closest to his area.

The 2nd stall keeper, marked as ‘2’ on the picture above, would then take over the dish.  The customer move dto the left and continue to order side dishes from the area closest to the 2nd stall keeper. Meanwhile, stall keeper ‘1’ took new order.

Once completed, stall keeper ‘2’ handed over the plate or takeaway box full with the food to the 3rd stall keeper, marked with ‘3’ on the picture.  In front of this stall keeper there were two big bowls, one with gravy and another one with curry.  Stall keeper ‘3’ main responsibility was to ask the customer whether he wants curry or gravy to be added to the dish. If the customer ordered porridge, stall keeper ‘3’ would scoop the porridge to the bowl. He then put the dish in front of the 4th stall keeper.

The last stall keeper, stall keeper ‘4’, marked with ‘4’ on the picture, was mainly responsible to handle the payment.  He was also in-charge to put the takeaway box in the plastic bag.  Customer would then leave the stall.

As illustrated above, each stall keeper in the stall had a very clear roles and responsibility; and they followed it to the dot.  There was also a coordination between stall keeper ‘1’ and stall keeper ‘2’; the moment the 2nd stall keeper was free, he would immediately take the plate/box from the stall keeper ‘1’.

Putting the curry and gravy in giant bowls was also a brilliant idea. Without those bowls, if the customer wanted curry or gravy, the dish needs to move back to stall keeper ‘1’ or ‘2’, disrupting the order from other customers.

All of the arrangement above resulted in an efficient queue.  The customers would have a great experience as they could get their meals fast.  The customers would then willing to queue despite the long queue.  The stall also benefits, it could get more income as they could serve more customers within the same period.

However, the stall owner might realized that the arrangement could be improved further. For example, not all customers would want extra gravy or curry.  The 3rd stall keeper was not as busy as his colleagues.

The 4th stall keeper, the cashier, was busy with money (the stall does not accept cashless payment), worse if the customer gave him a big note. For takeaway, he need to close the box, get one plastic bag and put the box[es] in the plastic bag.  This was slower than the speed the first three stall keepers in serving the customers, caused a delay.  It was uncommon to see three to four customers waiting to pay.

Today,  I came to Esplanade Link’s food court again and I noticed the layout of the stall changed a bit and I noticed the queue was even faster.

There was no change in roles and responsibilities for stall keeper ‘1’ and ‘2’; however once stall keeper ‘2’ completed the order, he would hand it over to the cashier, who occupied the space originally meant for the big bowls of curry and gravy.

Customers would make the payment.  The cashier did nothing but accept the payment.  If the customer did not want to get curry or gravy, he would simply pick the dish and leave. For customer who want extra curry or gravy, he simply moved to the left and then scoop the extra curry or gravy himself from the giant bowls.

Stall keeper ‘4’ was responsible to put the boxes to the plastic bag or to get the porridge.

This simple improvement, swapping the role of stall keeper ‘3’ and ‘4’, is brilliant.  It removed bunching at the cashier – when the cashier was busy putting the takeaway box[es] into the plastic bag, which slowed down the whole process.

Customers who eat in the food court and who don’t want to get curry/gravy could immediately pay their meals and go.  The queue for them was faster; other than there was no bunching issue, they also skipped the gravy/curry step in the previous process.

For customers who want extra curry or gravy, they could get the curry/gravy themselves.  As there was no bunching, they could get the food faster.

For takeaway customers, the experience may be the same as before, or perhaps slightly better because there was no bunching.

This small improvement does improve customers experience, simply because the queue moved faster and they could get the food faster.

I am not so sure whether there is a financial benefit, too.  However, as the queue moved faster, it would lead to shorter queue, which may attract more customers.

Whether the stall owner realized or not, he had improved the process and customer experience. He also showed that such activities could be done even by small business like his.  Huge Improvements could be achieved by simple (and looked trivial) changes, such as swapping the stall keepers.

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by Pusing Musing

Embracing Messiness

One day I was asked to draw how the applications we have are interfacing with other applications. It was a quite big task to come out with such diagram, but I managed to do it.

The diagram looks like this.

Untitled

(of course, I need to remove the details)

When I presented the diagram, the most comments were about how messy the applications are.

I disagreed. Such messiness, in fact, should be EMBRACED.

Firstly, there is no application that can do all the functions that the organisation needs. An organisation typically uses different applications and integrate them at the back-end so that to achieve a good user experience across different applications.

When an organisation moves to the cloud, it opens up even more applications it can use. The integration between cloud-based applications (and also with Intranet-installed applications) would even be more pervasive.

With the advent of microservices and container, the integration would even more complex than typical application-to-application integration. A particular business function may be served by multiple microservices, each may call other microservices.

Microservices and container when combined with DevOps also introduces more complexity. If properly configured, a container can run in different hosting environment at different time, transparent to the user, but introducing a more (at least to what some people think of) another dimension of messiness (and complexity) as the service has no ‘permanent home’.

Trying to simplify the interfaces between applications would simply not work. What the organisation needs to do is to embrace such messiness with some measures to prevent chaos.

For a start, the organisation should put in place governance. The organisation should know what interfaces are being deployed, who is calling what, version, security, schema and which interfaces to be retired. This will also allow the organisation to better reuse existing interfaces, rather creating new ones.

However, governance itself is a rather tricky concept as may hinder application development. Governance implies set of rules that must be followed by developers otherwise there would be some kind of penalties. The scrum team may also see governance slowing down their works as they need to go through ‘review’ process. Some pragmatic approaches on governance needs to be applied.

The organisation may also consider to implement some systems, such as API Gateway or message queue to provide the layer of governance on interfaces. It also provides additional layer of security with the cost of additional complexity and reduced reliability as such systems may become a single-point of failure in the whole organisation.

Data governance is also important. An entity should have consistent data structure throughout organisation and across all applications. An inconsistency would simply create confusion, not only for users but also for integration. It would make interfaces more complex as application would need to transform the data to its own data structure. Intermediary systems such as API Gateway could used to do transformation; however it would simply move the complexity into such system and with more complex governance as there is a need to track the transformation logic.

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by Pusing Musing

Two Lessons for DevSecOps from Grounding of 737-MAX

As an IT professional who is working DevSecOps and with strong interest in Aviation industry, I learnt some lessons from the grounding of 737-MAX series.

Automation is Essential but People Need to Know What Automation Does

The crash of ET302 and JT610 might be due to MCAS (Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System). The computer reads attitude of the plane and in certain situation it would intervene. It is meant to assist pilots and in ideal situation the pilots would not notice.

In DevSecOps, automation is essential; in fact without automation, it is not possible to achieve DevSecOps. Tools are used to achieve automation.

Use it right and in the hand of good engineers, the tools would do wonder. The DevSecOps would be able to deliver features, fixes, and updates frequently to deliver business values.

US Airway flight US1549 showed how a pilot, Capt. Sully, was able to utilise automation (in the form of auto pilot) to help him to steer the crippled plane before ditching on Hudson River.

In contrast, the computer on Air France flight AF447 provided warning to the pilots that the plane was stalling and approaching terra firma; however the pilots did not respond to the warning and only at last minute it figured out what happened, but it was too late.

In DevSecOps, it is common to mix different tools from different vendors. Each tool has its own strengths and the organisation may have its specific needs and constraints that dictate the tools used.

An engineer who is clue-less on the tools would make DevSecOps fail to deliver its value.

The engineer must be familiar with all of those tools. Using the tools everyday, however, does not make an engineer familiar with the tools; it was simply making the engineer as operator.

The engineer is expected to know how the tools work, how the tools interact to each others, how to exploit each individual tool, how to interpret the errors generated by the tools and how to fix the issues.

Not easy, but at least the engineer could quickly recover the tool-chain when there is/are error[s].

If an engineer is not familiar what each tool in tool-chain does, then he would not know what to do when something unexpected happened. In DevSecOps, it would simply created delays.

Unmanageable Technical Debt will Snowball to Bigger Problem in the Future

The Boeing 737-MAX is the latest variant of the venerable 737 series that started in the 60s. Throughout the years, Boeing kept improving the plane. It accommodate bigger engines, longer airframe (for bigger capacity), etc. It makes the plane still relevant, especially after Airbus rolled out A320s in the 80s.

However, what Boeing has been doing was simply continuously tweaking the plane. As the landing gears are not high, there is a limit on how big the engines 737 could use. Boeing has been tweaking the engine pylons so much that on 737-MAX the pilot needs to be assisted by the MCAS.

The Boeing 737 design has limited the changes that Boeing could do. It has become a technical debt but nothing was done.

Likewise in DevSecOps. While meeting the objective to deliver business values is very important, the technical debt also matters. Delaying addressing the technical debts would simply make the problem bigger and soon or later becomes unmanageable and affecting the business.

It is important for the organisation and DevSecOps team to allocate time and resources to address technical debt. It is either to be done in specific sprints/releases or inserted as part of releases.

by Pusing Musing

Airbus and the Unlucky 8

Recently Airbus announced that it would stop the production of the largest airliner, the A380.  Despite its popularity with the passengers, the plane is unfortunately not popular to bean counters airlines executives.

The premature end of A380 productions (as compared to its rival, Boeing 747 series), also cap Airbus unlucky experience of using supposed-to-be lucky number of 8.

From A300 to A380

Both Airbus and Boeing have naming convention for its planes.  Airbus named its first model it produced, the A300.  Subsequently it named the model in multiply of 10: A310, A320, the A330 and A340 .

However, when Airbus announced the A380, it deliberately skipped A350, A360 and A370.  The number ‘8’ was chosen because it resembles the double-deck cross section – the A380 is the first airliner to have a full-length double-deck* – and it is considered as lucky number in Chinese numerology.

It is not uncommon for aircraft manufacturers to have different variants for the same model; different in range, capacity or generation.  For example, the 747 started as 747-100 and subsequent variant was named 747-200.  Airbus A330-200 is shorter (and has more range) than the A330-300.

The A380 has, in fact, two eights because the base (and only) variant of A380 is … 800.

Despite having two ‘8s’, the Airbus A380-800 – shortened as A388 – has not been having good sales.  Other than Emirates – which ordered half of A388s produced, no other airlines acquired the A388s in large number. The A380 programme was doomed.

Alas, Airbus continues to have problem with number 8.

Among other models Airbus is currently producing, A350 is its largest twin-engine wide-body airliner.  It has at least 3 variants, A350-900, A350-900ULR and A350-1000; with -900 has the shorter frame (and lower passenger capacity) as compared to A350-1000.  However, the A350-900 was not planned as the smallest variant.

Airbus planned to ‘shrink’ the -900 to even shorter frame (and with less passengers count) and name it A350-800.  It was meant to serve thinner route while maintaining commonality with its larger cousins. However, the shrink made the variant noncompetitive; so the -800 variant was a stillborn.

Airbus unlucky experience with ‘8’ does not stop here.  It recently launched the re-engined variant of its popular A330 model, called A330NEO (New Engine Option).  It has two variants, A330-800 and A330-900; with the former is having shorter frame (and longer range) than the later.

However, the -800 model has not been popular. Airbus has received order for only 8 A338 from one airline, Kuwait Airlines; as opposed to 231 orders for the A330-900 variant. It is unlikely for A338 variant to have large orders, considering that the -900 variant is as capable as -800 and the entire A330NEO line is facing stiff competition from Boeing 787s.

Boeing has a better experience with number 8.

Even though its latest variant of 747, the 747-8, is not selling well (with only 154 orders), the saving grace for Boeing is it spent a modest amount to develop B747-8 as it was a modification from earlier model, 747-400.   Boeing also could claim that nothing could dethrone the ‘queen of the skies’ as it will still be producing 747-8 – with current backlog and production rate – will still be produced when the last A380 leaves Airbus production line.

While the 747-8 is not considered successful, Boeing has a better experience with number 8 with its latest twin-engine wide-body model, the 787.  This model has been a runway success, clocking more than 1,400 orders. Its smallest variant, 787-8 has similarity to A388, it has a ‘double-eight’. However the similarity ends there as airlines ordered 444 B787-8s, well better than 251 orders for the A380s.

So, number 8 may not be a lucky number for everyone!

 

* Technically the A380 has 3 decks; however the passengers would see only the main deck and upper deck. The lower deck is used for cargo or crew rest area.