Introduction
If you work with Microsoft Business Intelliegnce technology there was a huge announcement this week. Yes yes, there was the new release of SQL Server 2008, but that wasn't the big news. The big news is:
The Visionary Has Left The Building
This was my one-line response to an internal email circulated among the Technical Brain Trust at Solid Quality. (My name was mistakenly added to this list and - so far - no one has caught on! Shhhhh...)
The Choir
If you've read anything I have to say about business or developer communities, you already know I'm a huge fan of teams. I go so far as to advocate Leadership Teams for large projects and user groups. Why? Because of a fundamental engineering concept: fault tolerance.
If one of the leaders (or a family member) becomes ill, or get sent out of town, or just needs a personal day off from leading the endeavor; things can still proceed without a hitch.
I refer to a post by Eric Sink - one of my blogging mentors - entitled My Comments on "Hitting The High Notes"; which was, in turn, a commentary on a post by Joel Spolsky - another of my blogging mentors - entitled (you guessed it) Hitting the High Notes.
Eric makes great points about teams (the choir). Joel makes great points about gifted individuals (soloists). Even I commented some, here.
From a purely engineering point of view, teams allow for more dynamic leadership. "Dynamic" is a fun word. We tend to think of dynamic as positive and, for the most part, it is. Here are some non-positive examples of dynamic:
- "I just had a dynamic flight."
- "My doctor's visit was dynamic."
- "My finances are going to be dynamic for a dynamic amount of time until I find a new job."
The Soloist
Soloists are leaders. They are gifted and talented individuals. For whatever reason other people follow them. In fact, that's the best clue that they're leaders: people follow them.
To continue the theme in the last section, this does not make them all good people. Some examples of good leaders who are not good people:
- Adolf Hitler
- Charles Manson
- Jim Jones
Leaders can accomplish great things but - in engineering terms - the model has a single point-of-failure: If the leader is removed from the picture for any reason (I prefer the win-the-lottery reason over the hit-by-a-truck reason... I'm a glass half-full kind of guy...), things quickly grind to a halt.
What Does This Have To Do With Bill Baker?
I'm glad you asked.
Mr. Baker is a visionary leader who (soloist) inspires and builds leadershp teams (choirs). He did it at Microsoft. I bet he did as much of it as he could at Oracle before he came to Microsoft, and I'd be willing to bet he's going to continue to do so at Visibile Technologies.
This combination is the best of all worlds. Mr. Baker is a leader who can manage. He's a team builder. He's inpirational. And his leadership model scales very well.
So Why Is He Leaving?
I honestly don't know.
One thing is certain - and has been certain since Bill Gates announced his plans to step down as Microsoft's Chief Software Architect two years ago: things at Microsoft are... dynamic.
It was bound to happen. No matter how well one plans succession, no matter how much time is alloted for the transfer of ownership and responsibilities, some things change. And change is a dual-edged sword.
Some of the changes I've noted: SQL Server 2008 was released three days ago, a mere 161 days after the launch event in San Francisco. 
Select DateDiff(dd, '2/27/2008', '8/6/2008')
I don't know of a single SQL Server professional who was happy with this decision. And while I don't think it ruined or harmed SQL Server 2008's reputation in any way, it did leave a lot of geeks scratching our heads and asking "Why are they doing this now?"
It's a visible tip of an iceberg, to be sure, but it signals a difference in the way Microsoft operates, and that difference is a trend towards a more marketing-think.
Is Marketing Bad?
No. Let me make that perfectly clear. I say that because I believe it in my heart of hearts. I also say it because I believe it in my stomach of stomachs. Marketing pays a lot of my bills. They do a bunch with Business Intelligence, and I work in the Business Intelligence field.
More than that, marketing is really a communications vehicle. It lets us know about cool stuff coming down the pike and in the pipe at companies like Microsoft.
What Is Bad?
Anything out of balance. That's bad.
So Is Microsoft Out Of Balance?
I don't think so. You have to remember I'm an outsider looking in. Although I'm an MVP and have some visibility into a team or two, I'm not privy to much more than anyone else outside the company.
I think things are dynamic. And we've already discussed that dynamic is good and bad.
So What Do You Think?
I think Microsoft has lost an incredibly talented and gifted visionary, leader, and team builder named Bill... Gates. I think they lost another one named Bill Baker. And if I were a betting man, I'd wager they will lose more talent in the months ahead.
At the same time, I think they have been attracting and recruiting the next Bill Bakers and adding some of them to the fold. I have knowledge of some of these efforts and applaud them.
These folks have joined or will join Microsoft. They will engage, impact Microsoft technology, and probably leave when they feel so inclined. Lord willing, I will be writing about their departure in 2018, and still wondering about why they left!
Conclusion
Attrition is a function of entropy. It is going to happen whether we like it or not. This is the #1 reason I advocate Leadership Teams in Developer Communities.
All in all, it's good for the software ecosystem, even if some teams - particularly those who lose their awesome leaders - are impacted, even temporarily. Change is inevitable. And Microsoft manages change well - they've demonstrated as much a dozen times.
I'm sad to see Mr. Baker leave Microsoft. I applaud his efforts, vision, leadership, execution, and style; and wish him success in his new position.
:{> Andy