Intel Chief Engineer Wugansha: All detours are straight roads

Journalist/Dong Xixiao

As the first chief engineer to emerge from the Intel China Institute, Wugansha's story may enlighten us. He believes that no matter what you do, as long as you take it seriously, even if you go a detour, you can also achieve another success.

Chief Engineer's responsibility, rights and benefits

　　"Programmer": first of all, congratulations on your becoming Intel's chief engineer, please describe the job responsibilities of the Chief engineer.

Wugansha: According to my understanding, the chief Engineer is not a specific job, more of an honor, or a title. With a total of 80,000 employees, nearly 50,000 of whom are engaged in technical work, there is a need for a system that allows everyone to find their own orientation and direction. So we created a system of professional ladder, so that the new people can start from the grassroots, slowly climb up, and finally went to the chief engineer, Senior Chief engineer, academician, senior academician and other positions.

Two days ago my daughter sang her newly-learned "grape tree" to me, there is a lyrics called "Snail carrying heavy shell, step by step up", let me have deep feelings. In fact, we are like snails, it is likely to never climb the top of the vine, never to eat grapes, but the pursuit of the process is the true meaning of life.

Of course, the chief engineer also has its responsibilities, rights and benefits.

"Lee" is certainly there, on the one hand will pay a raise, on the other hand, can enjoy some exclusive treatment. For example, our company will hold the Academician Strategy Forum every year, discuss the company's core technology and future direction, the chief Engineer will have the opportunity to participate in this forum.

"Right" is relatively small. We have 40~50, many are commander, not necessarily with a large team, more in the technical contribution.

With regard to "responsibility", I have been thinking about my expectations from three of people. The first person is my mother, when she heard that I became chief engineer, said the first sentence is "Shinang, greatly hyped", on the one hand, to my low-key, on the other hand, the chief engineer in some specific areas of special contributions to the entire academia, industry has a certain reputation, so must maintain technical excellence. The second was Dean Fang, who gave me a strategic leadership expectation, this includes two levels of meaning: time, to see enough, to find the right direction for the company; in space, should not only be limited to their own three-acre, after becoming the chief engineer, must be from the perspective of the entire institute, More consideration and assistance to the development of the Institute. The third person, who is my academician mentor, says that when you are small, you need to consider giving more opportunities to your people, giving them the opportunity to develop and helping them grow into the next chief engineer, from a talent-training perspective.

into the computer industry

　　"Programmer": Just mentioned "Grape tree" This song, metaphor is very image, that your childhood dream is what?

Wugansha: I dreamed of becoming a painter, writer, or musician as a child. As for the scientist, I never thought about it. At that time, the love of science, more is to see some of the magazine about UFOs. But it backfired, like "The Old boy" singing in the "Dream is always unreachable", I embarked on the road of technology. Of course, in general, if the dream of childhood is not realized, it will be in some other ways to make up for. My wife is the Central Arts and Crafts Institute, more or less round my dream as a painter; I bought a good stereo for my daughter, I hope she has made a contribution to music, I am also trying to write some of the work of the sentiment, I hope one day to share with you.

　　"Programmer": are there any impressive experiences before you go to college?

Wugansha: Before the university is basically smooth sailing, people tend to be like this, if too smooth, in retrospect of the past, can not find any special sparkle. But near the college entrance examination, there is a thing that has affected my life. Before the college entrance examination in the province, I have very good results, if not mistaken, should be the first in the province. So, I am very proud, in the college entrance before the time to play too far, but the pride is sure to pay the price, the results of the college entrance examination is not very ideal, although admitted to Fudan University, but failed to be the first voluntary "genetic engineering" in the admission, accidentally read the computer professional. Although I do not regret now, but this experience has really taught me a profound lesson.

This setback also let me understand another truth-"as long as you are serious, all detours are straight road", that is, may start a curve, but if you go down this corner, the same can also achieve another success.

　"Programmer": It's like Helen Keller's classic, "God closes a door for you, it will open a window for you." So did you start programming with the university?

Wugansha: It's a shame I touched a computer two times in high school, but I didn't call. After I learned that I would be reading computer science, I hurried to buy a book on basic programming. At that time, the university needed military training for more than 40 days, so I took the book and sat on the ship to Dalian. During the military training, I took a sneak, I read the book, feeling slightly small, but basically in the brain programming, even the keyboard has not touched once. As soon as I entered the university I was dumbfounded, learning is with basic a little relationship has no FORTRAN. What's more, the first time I sat in front of the computer when unexpectedly panic, the face of VAX green screen do not know what to do, and finally typed a program, but the full keyboard can not find the CTRL key. This is my first real programming experience, make a lot of jokes.

This situation was changed in the sophomore, I slowly found the feeling of programming, the achievements have been promoted by leaps and bounds. Then I went to the professor's lab internship and contacted a network of things similar to the current project, which will have a lot of power equipment to achieve remote control through this project. During this time, I realized the pride of being a programmer.

University is the happiest time of my life, I think it is still vivid, but this kind of happiness is related to programming. If the night to rob seats, lying about the round beauty or common phenomenon, then the rain after giving blood to play football, lights out to the corridor to steal electricity to watch the World Cup and the next day is the final exam questions, that is, then the youth invincible can drive us to do these almost crazy things.

When it comes to harvesting, it feels like four points: broaden your horizons, strengthen your physique, define your career as a programmer, and achieve financial independence. In particular, it was against the Intel scholarship that I realized my financial independence from my sophomore and didn't ask my parents for money, so it had an indirect effect on my later joining Intel.

Ploughing at Intel

　Programmer: How did you find a job after graduation? Did you choose Intel from the start?

Wugansha: The premise of my job is to work in Beijing. At that time, the Intel China Research Institute also came to Shanghai to recruit, but in the job fair interview official American English, listening to me confused, and he said are speech recognition, human-computer interaction, natural language understanding and other aspects of the content, and my field is very different, so I did not go back to the head.

Later, I applied for another multinational company, its laboratory is quite seductive, with more than Nobel laureates, but also invented a lot of changes in computer technology, so I went, and got an offer.

In fact, I like Intel very much, on the one hand I took the Intel scholarship, on the other hand, Intel has provided the scholarship winner with the mentor to help us grow. Then I had a meeting in Beijing, my Intel mentor, Ruanmoyingpao, asked me to go for an interview again, and the interview was a windfall-I was transferred from Shanghai to work in Beijing, mainly because my girlfriend was studying in Beijing, and the Intel China Research Office was opposite my girlfriend's school. The thought of the future can go to her school canteen inside dinner-my enthusiasm came up. It turned out to be a very smooth interview, Intel, I'm here.

　　Programmer: How did it feel when you first joined Intel?

Wugansha: I just started in the Man-machine interface group, although not my "dish", but rely on "as long as you are serious, all detours are straight road" belief, I persisted down, and got the first patent in life. But I also had a big disease in this group: because my small boss came to work 3 o'clock in the afternoon every day, 3 o'clock in the morning, I think I just came in always embarrassed like him, so I 7~8 point every morning, 3 o'clock in the morning walk, this is probably supported for 1-2 months ... In the period of illness, I was thinking about this road is not going to go on, my dream in the end is what, strengths in where, what kind of work can reflect my advantages, the company really need what kind of project ... Just at that time Fang Dean gave a lecture to China Academy, deeply touched me, this also became a catalyst, let me feel that the party Dean is the direction I love, I must go to that group. Next, as the group-programming system group-was logically established, I applied for a transfer in the second year. In fact, I am a happy-go-go person, from 2001 to now has been in the programming system group.

　　"Programmer": what would you do if you joined Intel to the present and divided several stages?

Wugansha: In this regard, I have an observation, called four-year cycle theory, that is, every four years to change the direction: 2001 ~2005 Year is the mobile controlled running direction, 2005 ~2009 year is the parallel programming and the core architecture direction, 2009 to now is embedded system software direction, Of course this time I hope to be able to stay longer, because the opportunity of China's embedded market is very big now, so I hope this can break the four-year cycle theory.

Of course, the four-year cycle theory is indeed very coincidental, and if a few points have to be delineated, I think there are four points.

2004 was the first turning point in my career, from a technician to a manager, from a personal contributor to a team manager. To realize this change, I would like to thank my then manager, who was in fact the first person in China to get the chief engineer, but he belonged to the United States and was temporarily sent to help us. In him, I learned a lot, whether it is technology, research methodology, or management.

2005 was the second turning point, when we had done the fastest in the mobile Java execution Environment, and began to consider the next stage of technology development. We found that Java and the operating system have a lot of overlapping parts, such as memory management, thread management, and can bring some new things to the operating system, such as type safety, controlled execution, can give the entire system security guarantee. So we were thinking about how we could make Java support multitasking, let Java run directly over hardware, and make Java work with existing operating systems, but in many ways it was close to Android. Unfortunately, in the 2005, the entire company was in transition, turning right to multi-core and nuclear, so we went through a very painful transition. This transition, let me learn how to change, at the same time, also learned what should adhere to. In fact, much of the technical accumulation of parallel programming in the 2005 ~2009 was obtained from the previous four-year cycle.

2009 I went to the embedded system software direction, 2011 to obtain the chief engineer, this is a turning point.

Management concept of "and different"

　　Programmer: In the process of transforming from a technical individual into a manager, do you have any reserves? Please give some advice to people who are in this transformation process.

Wugansha: There's no such thing as reserve. In fact, my transformation process is still very painful, for a long time, the boss gave me the evaluation is "you rob your team of the work", that is, despite becoming a manager, but still can not let go of technical work, each feeling progress a bit slow, all personally to do. So it's a long process.

Overall, I was from three aspects to improve: the first is to learn, read more, take part in training, the second is to learn from others, through social interaction, the third is in the work of middle school. These are certainly not overnight, need time to experience, slowly from the role of competition with team members, into supporting the role of team members. Managers are more of a supportive role and need a sense of public servant to serve their team members.

Each person's road is different, will certainly according to its individuality, the strength, the weakness, in the environment to find one most suitable one kind of management idea and the style.

　　Programmer: So what is your management style?

Wugansha: I belong to the kind of smooth and quiet people, so not like the wind and rain, you do not want to do, criticized you do not good, more is the hope that they can do a good role model, slowly affect you. In fact, my whole idea is Confucius's word-"and different."

And is harmony, I hope the whole team has a very good atmosphere, can produce chemical reaction. My first manager gave me a spiritual legacy: "You don't have to choose the best person, but you have to choose the right person, the best fit for the team, and the chemistry that can happen." ”

On the basis of harmony, I encourage competition, encourage "difference", encourage independent thinking, encourage argument, and of course the argument should not be hysterical or personal attack. This idea I have for many years, and the source of ideas is the renaissance of the "American odd effect", that is, different people, sculptors, scientists, engineers, painters, musicians together, in order to produce a cultural revival. When he talked about the success of his first product, jobs thought he had organized a team of historians, musicians and even zoologist, and that they were good engineers who were able to create innovative products. So I particularly encourage employees to think independently and to inspire different things.

In practice, on the one hand, I hope that the formation of this culture, so that everyone has the inherent driving force of innovation, on the other hand, I will create a sense of urgency, so that people feel that we have to innovate. After the formation of this culture, I will delegate, so that everyone has enough space and time to be under the premise of risk control innovation. I am a good provider of the role, to provide them with resources and support, and then after they have been made, I will help them to promote. Finally, after the results, I help them apply for a reward.

　　"Programmer": the country now attaches great importance to the Internet of things, embedded prospects will be very good, you as an expert in the field of embedded, please describe what will be the future scene?

Wugansha: We are now from the e-era into the U-era, U is ubiquitous (Universal), a feature of the U era is the great wealth of computing equipment, may be to Chi or trillions, each computing device may be very small, deep embedded. In a computational environment that does not see embedded devices, but at the same time they are actually being computed.

The first two industrial revolutions, one for PCs and one for the internet, China is just a bystander and participant. So in the internet of things, the integration of three networks in the U-era, our country must be to be a leader in the industry. So this is a great opportunity for people who do embedded research.

　　"Programmer": Please say a few words to the reader of the "programmer" magazine.

Wugansha: Among the It people, the programmer is a very rare group, like just said the snail step by step up, so hope that "programmer" magazine can provide our programmers with spiritual sustenance and mental guidance, common progress.

This article is selected from the "Programmer" magazine 2011 09, more exciting content please pay attention to 09 issue magazine