First Day at Work ?

First Day at Work ?

First of all, Congratulations on securing a job !! Well done. 

Preparation for the first day:

May be this is your first job or your changing job to new employer,  you will have to prepare for the first day to make sure you leave good impression on your employer. Below is the list of Items I would prepare for my first day at work.

Know when and where to report?

 This may sound obvious but it gets slipped through many occasions.   This is absolutely crucial.   From all the communications that you have had with the future employer, make sure you have got the details on where to go on your first day. and make sure you also have the details of contact person or person to report to on the joining day.   That last thing you want is showing up late on the joining day.

Prepare for awkward conversation:

For some people it is an easy thing to initiate conversion with new people and go in with it for hours but for the most,   It is hard to engage in a conversation with a stranger. That is when bit of mental preparation helps. You have to see yourself in it. Probably,  Practice few mins with a friend or just in front of the mirror, Your friend or other character of you being reporting person. 

Be confident and bold:

You have gone past all the hurdles to secure a job,  that means your employer wants you to work for the organisation .  Just remember that.  A Firm handshake with confident greeting will set the things for the rest of the day. 

Refresh your skills:

You will meet one guy at least who wanted to inquire and investigate  your capabilities straight on your first day.   So expect that and prepare for it. 

Sample ITIL V4 questions (Service, Service management)

1) [..........] is a set of specialized organizational capabilities for enabling vale to customers in the form of services?

A. Product

B. Organizations

C. Service management

D. Value

Answer: C

Service management is defined as a set of specialized organizational capabilities for enabling vale to the customers in the form of services.

2) [............] is a functionality offered by a product or service to meet a particular need?

A. Value

B. Utility

C. Warranty

D. Outcome

Answer: B

Utility is a functionality offered by a product or service to meet a particular need

3) Service relationship management consists of joint activities performed by a [.............] to ensure continual value co-creation based on agreed and available service offerings.

A. Service provider and Customer

B. Service consumer and Provider

C. Service consumer and Service provider

D. All

Answer: C 

Service relationship management consists of joint activities performed by a service provider and service consumer to ensure continual value co-creation based on agreed and available service offerings.

4) [........] is the perceived benefits, usefulness and importance of something?

A. Value

B. Product

C. Service Offering

D. Resources

Answer: A

Value is the Perceived benefits, usefulness and importance of something.

5) [...........] is a configuration of resources, created by the organization, that will be potentially valuable for their customers?

A. Service consumer

B. Service Offering

C. Product

D. Goods

Answer: C

A Product is a configuration of resources, created by the organization, that will be potentially valuable for their customers.

6) A person who defines requirements for services and takes responsibility for outcomes from service consumption.

A. Sponsor

B. Customer

C. User

D. All the above

Answer: B

Customer will be defines requirements for services and takes responsibility for outcomes from service consumption.

7)  'fit for use' is determines?

A. Service

B. Product

C. Utility

D. Warranty

Answer: D

Warranty is also determines 'fit for use'

8) [..........] is refer to possible events that could cause harm/loss, or make it more difficult to achieve objectives?

A. Risk

B. Cost

C. Output

D. Resources

Answer: A

Risks refer to possible events that could cause harm or loss or make it more difficult to achieve objectives.

9) Access is granted/licensed under terms or conditions; this sentence is related to which word?

A. Service Offering

B. Goods

C. Service Actions

D. Access to Resources

Answer: D

Access to resources means giving the access under terms or conditions.

10) Which statement is related to outcome?

A. Tangible

B. Result for stakeholder

C. Result of a user

D. None

Answer: B

An outcome is a result for a stockholder enabled by one or more outputs.

11) Which sentence is correct?

A. Costs removed from the consumer by the service.

B. Costs imposed on the consumer by the service, including charges by the service provider

C. Costs expressed in non-financial terms can be translated into financial costs

D. All the above

Answer: D

Costs are divided 3 types:

> costs removed from the consumer by the service

> costs imposed on the consumer by the service, including charges by the service provider

> costs expressed in non-financial terms can be translated into financial costs

12) Service is a mean of enabling value co-creation by facilitating [.........] that customers want to achieve.

A. Outputs

B. Products

C. Resources

D. Outcomes

Answer: D

Service is a mean of enabling value co-creation by facilitating outcomes that customer wants to achieve, without the customer having specific costs and risks.

13) [............] is the assurance that a product or service will meet agreed requirements?

A. Warranty

B. Utility

C. Service Actions

D. Goods

Answer: A

Warranty is the assurance that a product or service will meet agreed requirements.

14) An organization is a person or a group of people that has its own functions with responsibilities, authorities and relationships to achieve its [.......]?

A. Value

B. Objectives

C. Service

D. Product

Answer: B

An organization is a person or a group of people that has its own function with responsibilities, authorities and relationships to achieve its objectives.

15) What is Utility? 

A. fit for use

B. fit for purpose

C. Offering

D. All

Answer: B

Utility can be also called as 'fit for purpose'

Prepare for the colors/gallery appointment

Do you have a Gallery/Colors appointment soon and no clue where to start ?

Building an home is not an easy thing. Its takes lot of energy and patience to put together all the things needed for it. If you have gallery appointment soon then congratulations!!!.  You are half way through the journey. You have decided on other major things such as where to build i.e location, and what to build i.e floor plan and size and type of the house.


Me and my partner are going through this process now and we have just finished the gallery appointment today and I thought I will share our experience in this article.

Preparation for the big day:

There are so many things to decide, so normally the colors appointment with the major builders will last entire day.  You will have so many options and so many decisions to be made on that day. More home work you do, the less stressful it is going to be. Here are the few tips.

• Budget :  Go with the budget in mind.  The amount you are willing to spent. 

• Important vs Nice to have :  In terms of addons and upgrades,  If you are from an area where it is going to be cold for most part of the year, Heating system may be necessary for you than having Feature FACADE. So work out !!.

• Pictures:   I am sure, you have visited display homes during floor plan selection phase. If you have taken pictures during those visits, they will come in handy now.  Pictures of interior, exterior,  bathrooms , kitchens, bed rooms  everything or anything will give an inspiration at this crucial stage.  

Below are things you need to decided on, 

•  Electrical plan: Down lights, power points, TV points,  Heating and Cooling outlets how many of them, where exactly you want them in your home.  My suggestion here is,   don't comprise on power points as they generally will not cost much and you will see the benefit of them in the long run.

•  Floors : Below are few flooring options for the house.

• Laminate ,Vynl, Wood for the timber look. 
• Different Carpets.
• Different Tiles.

• Bathroom, kitchen tiles:  This is one of the area, we have not paid much attention to during our home work and ended up spending lot of time on the colors day.   So, please keep that in mind as well.

• Cupboards, benchtop colors and handles:   If kitchen is the center of the home, you will have to pay extra attention on deciding the colors for the area.   

• Bricks, mortar, renders :  Have you thought about exterior look of the house, if not its the time!!. You have to choose colors for bricks, mortar, render. 

•  Doors, locks :  You will also have to decide on the passway and entrance door models and colors and you can add locking system to them if you want to. 

There are  definitely other things as well, but above lists give you an idea on the items and having an opinion on them will help you on the big day.

Working with Assignment Rules

Assignment Rules in ServiceNow:

Assignment rules are configurable feature in ServiceNow to drive the task assignment.  Based on attributes of the task, we can configure rules to assign that task to a group.   That is all good until I find myself in a situation where the assignment rule that I have configured not working and I could not figure for a while why  ?

So,   Below is the example set up that I have created dev environment to describe the issue.

Workflow:

Assignment Rule Configuration:

That set up fairly simple and I was expecting to work. i.e When change request type of Normal gets created the change task of it will be assigned to Change Management Group. But It did not. The created change task remained unassigned and I have got work in hand to debug why is that the case.

After bit of time, I have realised its the execution order. The workflow engine here is running ahead of the change request insertion into the database. So, when the assignment rule gets executed the condition in it will not get satisfied as the parent change request type is going to undefined by then.

Work Around:

I have created my custom script include to exactly mimic, what out of the box assignment rules is supposed to do. i.e I have glide recorded the assignment rule table and evaluated the matching condition and returned the assignment group. Since, this is my custom utility I had the control of injecting missing values on to the change request reference.

Here is the script  that did the trick.

var WorkflowUtils = Class.create();
WorkflowUtils.prototype = {
initialize: function() {
},

getAssignmentGroup: function (task) {
gs.log('running');
var rules = this.getRecord('sysrule_assignment', 'table=' + task.getTableName() + '^ORDERBYorder');
var filter = GlideFilter;
while (rules.next()) {
if (filter.checkRecord(task, rules.condition + '')) {
return rules.group + '';
}
}
},

getRecord: function (table, query, limit) {
var log = [];
var gr = new GlideRecord(table);
gr.addEncodedQuery(query);
if (!global.JSUtil.nil(limit))
gr.setLimit(limit);
gr.query();
log.push('table ' + gr.getTableName());
log.push('encodedQuery ' + gr.getEncodedQuery());
log.push('count ' + gr.getRowCount());
gs.info(log.join('\n'));
return gr;

},

mapParent: function (ge, parent) {
ge.type = parent.type;
return ge;
},


type: 'WorkflowUtils'
};


I have called the above script from the workflow CreateTask Activity.

Car Odour Eliminators - How did I get rid musty smell from my car

Yes. We bought a used car ..

Me and my partner have decided to buy a used car  to get around the shopping centres and visit family friends and occasional get a ways from the city for fresh and more natural air.

The car mechanically was in a okay condition and but it had dull musty smell inside. We thought we will be able to get rid of the smell easily by cleaning the interior and we went ahead and bought the car.

Ain't an easy job

We have then cleaned the car interior,  seats,  top, floor and carpets of the car.  We have vacuum cleaned the car.   Dirt Devil Hand Held Vacuum cleaner did the job and its worth the money. We have purchased the product from Bunnings here.    We have sprayed the Deodorant and felt we are set to zoom around in our new car.

But guess what, right after a day we have started smelling  it again, the same musty smell. It has gone nowhere its only been masked by Deodorant for that day.

So, We have  gone back to Bunnings to see what else can be done and found a Sanitiser & Deodoriser , then it all made sense to us.  To eliminate the smell, masking is not just enough we will have to kill the bacteria underneath that causing the smell. 

So,  We have bought below 2 products

 2 hours of hardwork paid off.

With those 2 products, We have sanitised entire interior of the car. Please read the usage guide from the manufacturers of those products. They have done amazing job and now our car smells so fresh.  Everytime we step into our car,  We remember the 2 hours we spent cleaning the car and appreciate ourselves for the effort.

Multi Variable Set - ServiceNow

Multi variable set

Multi variable set is a new variable set type that has been introduced in London version of ServiceNow.   Its a great feature but it still requires few enhancements to blend in with rest of the platform.

Below are few scenarios that I have encountered while working on it and felt its worth a share how I worked around the limitations.

How to limit number of rows using client script?

Write an onload client script as follows

var field = g_form.getField("multiple_approvers");  // multi variable set name

if (field != null) {
field.max_rows_size = 3;  // number of rows allowed to be entered
 }


You would have the multi variable set limiting entries to only 3 and Add button getting grayed out after the 3 entries.

Here are the related articles on ServiceNow.

Hyderabad to Melbourne

Planning to come to Melbourne ?

I have moved to Melbourne from a place near to Hyderabad not long ago,  Melbourne is one of the great place to live in the world,  I hope you will find the same and will thoroughly enjoy your stay as well. 

Weather : I have arrived during the end of the winter when the temperatures are started picking up so it was not that of a noticeable difference in the temperature for me when I arrived.  Summer is when you see lot of people outside, visiting beaches, long drives, skating  and so on.

Winters temperatures are bit chilling anywhere from 6-15 degrees. so If you are visiting in winter, you will surely need a Winter Jacket.  Melbourne is known for its coffee, so make sure to venture out and have a sip of warm coffee. If you are in/around Melbourne CBD check out Axil Coffee Flinders Ln , Melbourne.

Public Transport:  Melbourne has great public transport connectivity with its bus, train, tram facilities. Believe it or not, you dont have to pay for public transport for all your trips in CBD. However, If you have to go outside of CBD you will need a valid myki ticket.  You can find more details link  https://www.ptv.vic.gov.au/tickets/myki/

Food:   If Hyderabadi biryani is your favorite, then make sure to check out Dosa Hut in Melbourne CBD.  Just opposite to Dosa Hut , there is another good Indian cuisine restaurant Delhi Rocks.  They serve unlimited chapathi for $10.  Good Italian place is just with in a km in Collins st, Vapiano.

Getting Started with Javascript

Why Javascript ?

Javascript is just everything these days in Software Development.  Javascript used to be all over the browser and respond to user events such as form loading, form filling, form submission.

With the introduction of Node the dynamics have changed , now javascript can run not only on  browser but on the servers that serving the content. So,  If you are thinking, what I am thinking then we both are exactly right, Javascript is everywhere.

Career Options:

With such massive spread footprint of javascript, you have ton of options that you can make career out of.

• Front End Developer :   Frameworks such as React, Angular Js are widely being used in organizing, stying most of the http(s) content, so pick your framework to start the journey.

1. React : https://reactjs.org/
2. Angular Js: https://docs.angularjs.org/api. 

• Back End Developer:  Node js developers are of high demand and the fact that this environment is being well received and supported by major cloud players such as AWS, Google, Microsoft in their serverless stack/applications, you will be winner if you know Node js.   There are other serverside javascript environment such  rhino, if you want to venture out and explore the possibilities. You could always use official docs https://nodejs.org/en/docs/

• Full Stack Developer :   Having familarity with the front end, back end worlds and knowledge in atleast framework of each side Full stack developer is a god like person.   Remember its the hands on expereince that matters , so if you are an expert in either front end or back end development eagarly lookout for opportunities or leads in your current organisation or outside of your organisation. It will pay off for sure down the line.

 I find below Node School  website particularly useful with its exercise oriented learnings. 

Getting Started with ITIL V4

Why ITIL?

If you are from the IT Service Managment industry, be a Developer, Analyst, Administrator, or more senior roles you would already know the term ITIL atleast.

ITIL is a widely accepted best practice book in this industry and having a familiarity with ITIL will significantly help your career progression or chances of landing in a job in this industry.

Where to start?

Buy a book, Udemy course or a paid training is completely up to you, I have bought this course from Udemy. It has done the job for me. The important thing to remember while learning ITIL is, it is a recommendation book and not a mandate book i.e. based on the circumstance and your organization's needs, you would use your best judgment on what rules can and cannot be applied.

Certification ready?

Double check by taking practice tests and again I have used Udemy for this in my case I also have saved few bucks by using the voucher from this site.

Exam day:

I have registered online proctored exam and given my exam from my kitchen hall.  The examiner is friendly and there were couple of tricky scenario-based questions.  I managed to pass my exam on first sitting. 

Back to the work life:

After having this certification under my belt and rules of this book in my head, now I see things more clearly that I used to be.  I noticed myself being bit more proactive in nature, methodological in debugging.  

The take home message from this course for me is "Process is measurable, Follow the process so you can measure your progression". 

Also, I have listed few sample questions, if you wanted to get a feel around the type of the questions that you will get in the exam.  Here are the

Essential Topics for the ITIL V4 Exam

ITIL V4 foundation exam pattern

Service Management sample questions

Four Dimensions of Service Management sample questions

Getting Starting with ServiceNow

Why ServiceNow?

ServiceNow is a PaaS/SaaS platform, where it provides Software applications for IT Service Management, Human Resource Service Delivery, Customer Service Management and ton of other areas.  You can find the complete list here

The company has grown so rapidly after its launch in 2004, now it's the market leader in many lines of its product offerings and it still has enormous growth potential, especially considering the strength and easiness of the platform.  So, obviously company of that size can produce lots of career options if you are familiar with the platform.

Career options:

ServiceNow Developer:  

Paying anywhere from AUD $80,000 - AUD $140, 000, this stands out as a best career opportunity if you are a development geek and are strong in JavaScript programming.   Hit the ground by registering ServiceNow Developer portal and get your hands dirty. You could always use a help from the fellow people/gurus in this area. Post a question in the community and you will be surprised to see the response times, Its normally within seconds.   Remember, you just have to ask!!!!!. 

Business Analyst:

Paying anywhere from AUD $80,000 - AUD $140, 000, this is your dream job if you are seasoned business analyst and trying to move into the ServiceNow world.   If you have the background/experience already in Service Management, Service Delivery areas you have already added advantage if not, you can always learn.  ITIL is one of the well-regarded certifications in this industry, so get one quickly at least for the showoffs. 

ServiceNow Administrator: 

You could get paid somewhere around AUD$50,000 - AUD$10,000 for administrating the platform i.e. for doing tasks such as fixing access control rules, setting up reports, managing user accounts and occasionally fixing bugs in the code. Flying start to your career if you are a Non - IT - Graduate and wanted to get into IT Industry.  

Leadership, Sales, Pre-Sales, Architect

After having enough familiarity with the platform, venture out career growth opportunities such as Architect, sales, pre-sales and more senior roles.

Here are the related articles on ServiceNow