Open Agentic Web

Posted on May 21, 2025 by sujatad

Microsoft and Agentic Web

An open agentic web, where AI agents make decisions and perform tasks on behalf of users or organizations, is fast becoming the vision of the internet – this is the sentiment expressed by Microsoft at the recent Build 2025 conference.

My takeaway so far from the conference is that, Microsoft is fulling embracing the agentic space by introducing enterprise-grade agents into platforms like Azure AI Foundry, GitHub and Windows and making code available to the developer universe. There is a full blown commitment to open source.

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Delegating

Posted on May 29, 2022 by sujatad

One of the principal attributes of a good leader is their ability to effectively delegate specific tasks while still being accountable for the final outcomes. By assigning work loads to specific people or teams the leader can then focus on making the more strategic decisions. The people working on the tasks also benefit from acquiring deeper skills and developing confidence.

Effective delegation requires very clear understanding on the delegated task. There needs to be clear directions or instructions and desired outcomes. Secondly, it’s important the delegation is to the right person and they are properly empowered. Third, need a feedback loop as progress is measured. The chances of success are greater starting on smaller scope of tasks and building towards bigger scopes.

Delegation fails when, – when leaders do not trust and micro-manage, not offering the right level of support or resources for person(s) working on a task and when outcomes are not clear.

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Team Culture

Posted on July 10, 2020 by sujatad

I came across an interesting suggestion online regarding determining company and team culture, an exercise that one can ask a team to do. I tried this at my team meeting – went around the room asking everyone – ‘what 3 words would you use to describe the team?’. That gave us a look at the dominant qualities of the team.

That allows the team to self reflect and also allows decision makers to see how best they can help support the team.

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What is DevOps?

Posted on July 7, 2020 by sujatad

I came across this great definition of what DevOps is from the folks at Amazon – DevOps is the combination of cultural philosophies, practices, and tools that increases an organization’s ability to deliver applications and services at high velocity: evolving and improving products at a faster pace than organizations using traditional software development and infrastructure management processes. This speed enables organizations to better serve their customers and compete more effectively in the market.

Traditionally, organizations have had siloed teams – development, operations etc. but DevOps bridges both.

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Recruiting

Posted on June 13, 2020 by sujatad

How do you determine the right candidate fit during recruiting? Ask additional questions that center around topics such as,

  • Your company and the culture around it.
  • Describe the position and expectations of the role and then ask questions around it. Focus also on any constraints such as working with older technologies.
  • Have the candidate actively solve a problem and observe how they go about solving the problem.
  • Have a diverse interview panel and plan questions ahead of time to avoid overlap and to cover more ground.
  • Ask for code samples (git hub etc)
  • Review their public profiles like LinkedIn, Blogs etc.
  • Encourage questions from the candidate – it will tell you a lot about them.
  • Finally do remember, to let them know what the recruiting process in your company is and the time frames on final decision on the position.

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Information Security

Posted on June 13, 2020 by sujatad

Information security helps protect an enterprise from threats and avoid customer data compromise. Every organization needs to have its security posture well defined, monitored and audited. The security posture has to keep up with threats emerging every day.

I was asked to lead an initiative on Security in our organization – to review, recommend and implement various security measures through the organization. As a first step the most current threat assessment was reviewed, and gaps identified. A working committee was established to develop standards and policies with consultation of various departments.

These standards and policies were then rolled into an Acceptable Use company policy that was then published out to the company. As part of that process various presentations, meetings and training sessions were organized. The internal web site was also updated and companies home page flashed messages on security for a short period of time to make everyone aware to keep security in the fore front daily.

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5 Levels of Leadership

Posted on May 31, 2020 by sujatad

I came across a great article and followed up by listening on Utube to John C. Maxwell about the 5 levels of leadership. Really, liked all he has to say on this topic.

Inspriation by the book "5 Levels of Leadership"​ by John C Maxwell

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Build Conference 2020

Posted on May 25, 2020 by sujatad

I was reading about the 2020 Build Conference which for the first time was completely virtual. Can read more the details here…

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Switching to working virtually…

Posted on May 23, 2020 by sujatad

It’s been about a month and half nearly two months now of working completely virtual and staying away from the office due to Covid19. There were some initial bumps, such as,

  • dropped vpn connections or capacity overload
  • home wifi connectivity issues
  • missing having two monitors
  • issues with team collaboration tools
  • missed meeting by team members
  • video shy team members

However once things settled down, everyone began to,

  • appreciate the flexible schedules and no commutes
  • appreciate the improved team communication with the collaboration tools.
  • show an increased willingness to have more meetings.
  • laugh at people’s sartorial choices sometimes.
  • appreciated that the productivity stayed steady perhaps even improved.
  • most of all appreciated the pervasive sense of we are in this together

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Leading in troubled times

Posted on March 25, 2020 by sujatad

March 2020 will be a time in our history that we will remember for ever. Almost overnight we went from a time of economic prosperity and freedom of movement to one where businesses were quickly shuttered and we were severely restricted in our movements. Masks and social distancing became part of our daily life.

Working for a smaller company and in an industry (hospitality) that was especially affected meant that there would be additional challenges to conduct business as usual. Our customers were badly hit and everyone wondered at when the recovery will happen, will it even be this year. As an IT manager, I had to, stay calm, stay positive and help my team adapt to a new changed work environment. Mostly working remote and social distancing with masks when in the office. We had to find creative ways to make working remote productive and also pause some current projects, to refocus on projects that will directly help our hurting customers. Projects that automated some of their daily activities for instance.

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