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We tried KFC once. Just once. It was bloody awful. 
Keep your friends close. Keep Kill your enemies closer.
The End
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I'm wondering if your employer is stimulating employees to stay up-to-date with current technologies.
My previous employer would pay up to €500,- for courses, training, etc., but never required you to do anything.
No one out of about 30 employees even spend €1,- from that €500,-.
When I told my employer it may be a good idea to do a regular mailing on courses or training that were interesting for us, a project, or the company as a whole I got the reaction "you may think that, but you get €500,- and we think that's enough." (while it clearly isn't if no one is spending it).
Knowledge sharing was so bad that an Oracle team blew a SQL Server job while I, the only SQL Server certified person in the company, wasn't even aware!
At my current company everything is paid for and we have regular meetings on what the company is focusing on.
I'm currently participating in an Azure certification group, I just got invited to a group interested in front-end development, and this week we'll be having another presentation on some technology or another (last month it was Machine Learning, the co-worker who presented got an Azure subscription from the company right away to continue his study).
Other presentations I've attended were about .NET Core, Azure, Docker, and Blockchain.
Too bad it's all in my free time (it's also not mandatory, mind you).
The contrast with my previous employer couldn't be bigger.
I prefer my current employer, the difference in skill, knowledge, and mentality is huge.
How is training and knowledge sharing handled in your company and what's good/bad about it?
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I think somewhere in the mists of time, I've heard that word you used - what was it again? - ah, yes, "training" - now, let me think ... somewhere back there, somewhere ... back in the days of green screens ... there was something - what was it? - so, so long ago - just can't quite put my finger on it ... maybe if I can just remember when Methusaleh had his 21st birthday bash, it was around the same time as that, I'm sure ... no, it's gone ...
98.4% of statistics are made up on the spot.
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If i ask for a training, they say plan it in your budget, so the only "training" available for me is to visit ONE conference of SW Dev fanatics a year.
Whenever i see a Websession or short trainings and ask for the permission it's like this:
Boss: "Is it in budget?"
Me: "No, just heard of it"
Boss: "No"
Me: "But it's only 100€"
Boss: "No, make a budget for that for next FY." (You have to state for what exactly you budget and also add the price for it)
So i'd say i got the worst... if i wouldn't try keep up by myself i'd probably be outdated tomorrow.
Rules for the FOSW ![ ^]
if(!string.IsNullOrWhiteSpace(_signature))
{
MessageBox.Show("This is my signature: " + Environment.NewLine + _signature);
}
else
{
MessageBox.Show("404-Signature not found");
}
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Ouch... The question should be the other way around "why haven't you followed any web sessions lately!?"
It's in your employer's own interest (as well as yours).
Unfortunately, all management sees is money spent, but never what it gains them 
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Sander Rossel wrote: all management sees is money spent,
Jup, and since we have no separate Software dev team i count as "IT" which always only costs money 
Rules for the FOSW ![ ^]
if(!string.IsNullOrWhiteSpace(_signature))
{
MessageBox.Show("This is my signature: " + Environment.NewLine + _signature);
}
else
{
MessageBox.Show("404-Signature not found");
}
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and this folks is the number one reason why I.T and software dev departments get the sh*t they do.
Beacuse we are always seen as a cost to the business and never part of the profit generation cycle.
It's also always why the flyby night lying toerag B******d sales folk get away with telling people that wetting their pants why installing undercracker 4000 deluxe edition onto a new mainframe made from the finest hair of a vestal virgin (and all for the bargain price of $400000000000) will bring their company all the best fortune it deserves, and get massive bonuses for doing so.... because they are always seen as profit generation.
<rant>over< / rant>
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This is good for you, and fortunate. I have worked at companies like this and it is great. Unfortunately, the pay was sh*t.
Now I make very good money, but have nothing like what you are talking about (knowledge sharing, collaboration, etc.).
I would love to have both worlds, but that is probably wishful thinking.
Again, good for you. 
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Slacker007 wrote: I have worked at companies like this and it is great. Unfortunately, the pay was sh*t.
Was your education in your boss's time?
My current employer "hires only seniors" and seniors should keep up with technology (in their spare time, mostly).
As such, pay is pretty good, but you spent quite some time travelling and studying.
It makes no sense to ask people to keep up and not pay them for it... 
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Sander Rossel wrote: Was your education in your boss's time?
When I worked for Goldman Sachs, it was on my employer's time. I have had it both ways for education, etc.
I am a contractor now, and I work from my home office. They expect me to learn everything on my own. Which is fine, and I do, but I miss the collaboration and knowledge sharing.
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We're bush pilots ... we get it done because we have to.
"(I) am amazed to see myself here rather than there ... now rather than then".
― Blaise Pascal
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Where I work now has budget for training but management never authorizes spending from it. When asked about how we are supposed to stay up to date on new technologies they reply that we should do it on our own time.
I like to assume that each year, upper management uses the entire training budget to go to a conference where they "network".
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Wanna learn something quick? Get asked to deliver a project with technologies you've never used before, within a fixed amount of time (that you'd barely think reasonable if it was done with what you do know).
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Doesn't really work like that.
Mostly, people just make A LOT of mistakes like that and somewhere way down the line you find out that the application must be fixed from the bottom up.
I've joined teams that had been using Entity Framework for years, but still weren't aware of lazy loading and the existence of expression trees (or why ToList() can be detrimental for performance).
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"Learning" to use something doesn't imply following best practices right off the bat. 
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We're not talking about best practices, we're talking about not knowing the basics after years of usage and a really buggy application as a result 
Entity Framework lesson 1: ToList() does a query to the database and gets the results.
Application after years of work:
context.MyTable.ToList().Where(o => o.FullName == "...")
public string FullName
{
get { return FirstName + " " + LastName; }
}
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Really?
Pro-devs. who did that?  
I suddenly feel a (tiny) bit better...
I work in Local Government (UK)  and I've sort of 'inherited' all things IT - DB stuff, software development (when it suits the higher food chain), reporting, what laughingly passes for analysis/stats, etc.
Training is Verboten!!! (never mind encouraged) and pay is still crap.
One thing I have noticed over the (interminable) years - if 'they' are desperate (like, 'we need this yesterday to make me look good') then I'm allowed to play - else it's 'software suppliers only' (for the 'support') 
Bitter? Probably. Frustrated? You bet.
Just too near retirement to move.....
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Ha yes, I feel your pain......
Contractor here who's worked on both government, NHS and UK Military projects in the past.
It's soul destroying at times.
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Has to do with "ownership".
I'll "own" my projects; so there are no issues.
But once someone else "takes control", I can no longer be responsible.
If that other party won't "own", then the "technical debt" accumulates.
"(I) am amazed to see myself here rather than there ... now rather than then".
― Blaise Pascal
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I don't see what ownership has to do with understanding your tools 
This was code written by the team that worked on it from the start and they were still writing it like that.
Ownership or not, you won't write code like that if you know what you're doing.
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True story:
- I think we should go .NET.
- No; Java.
- Me: Struts; Swing; Beans; Eclipse; JBoss; Linux; Apache; etc; Java-related courses out of town...
- (weeks later) OK ... you can use .NET.
"(I) am amazed to see myself here rather than there ... now rather than then".
― Blaise Pascal
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We have pluralsight licences for everyone and I set up a bunch of courses that they have to take within a certain period of time. Each employee can block out 2-4 hours per week for study time on the company dime. Seems like a reasonable approach.
Keep your friends close. Keep Kill your enemies closer.
The End
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Unfortunately, in most companies I have worked for, keeping current was seen as a bad thing, something that distracts you from the job currently at hand.
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My employer doesn't stimulate anything, I stay up-to-date because I want to. Sure, my company does shelve money for seminars, trainings and such, but I have to become active demanding money for that training myself. Not that this was a bad thing, I think that this laissez-faire aproach fits best with intelligent people.
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