Network Appliance

At length, we arrived at the Network Appliance BTC office just off M.G. Road and just around the corner from the Oberoi. We actually spent most of our time there but I didn't take many pictures of it because, well, we were busy most of the time. These are the pictures I DID take.

Here is the name of the building the BTC office is in.

Here's Jay Perry standing next to the building directory. Notice how "Network Appliance" in the building directory sort of glows. This is due to clean living and exemplary service on the part of the members of that office. I only needed a little work in Photoshop to bring this Truth out...

Three or four floors up there is a balcony that looks down on the first floor (excuse me, that would be the 0th floor, the way they count floors in India). It's interesting in that it's completely open on two sides. I didn't see any way to lock it up so this is really not so much the ground floor of a building as a kind of partially enclosed porch to the building. At least while we were there, a slight breeze blew through it which kept it rather pleasant and probably cooled the rest of the building, as well.

Here's the sign outside the offices. I suspect it looks like the sign outside every NetApp office; as I recall it's very similar to the sign outside the Singapore office.

Here is the security guard and the receptionist whom you encounter just inside the door to the office.

When you enter the main office area you are greeted by a column with 4 clocks presenting the local time, Sunnyvale time, German time and Eastern US time. May the plant always be green and leafy!

Here is the cube farm that makes up the bulk of the BTC office. There are also four small conference rooms (which would be behind the point of view in this picture), a larger conference room and a cafeteria. I found it interesting that, for some reason, the four small conference rooms seemed significantly colder than the refrigerator in the cafeteria!

When we got to the BTC Network Appliance offices, we discovered that there was about to be an all hands meeting featuring none other than Ken Hibbard (our VP of engineering)! We had each come, through different routes, more than 10,000 miles to find ourselves in the same place. This is Ken getting ready for his talk about the new structure of the company.

Here is our interviewing rooms. Each table in this picture has a NetApp candidate and interviewer (or a candidate waiting for an interviewer) sitting around it. It turns out to be a lot easier to simply sit out on the patio at the Oberoi than to get rooms. This might prove interesting this April when the temperature soars to 30 degrees Celsius (in the 90s for the metrically challenged).

These two pictures show us discussing Something Important about recruiting. Meenakshi, on the left, is our recruiter. To the right of her is Shyam, the senior engineering manager in BTC. These two are the movers and shakers of our recruiting effort and I owe them both a large debt. Next to Shyam is Ravi, one of the BTC engineers and on the right is Jay, one of the two engineers I brought from CA.

Jay again, listening to the proceedings.

Anawat, the other engineer I brought, leans over the table to get some information from Meenakshi. I know it looks like he is attacking Meenakshi as Shyam tears his hair but that's not what's going on. I don't think. Probably not, anyway...

Here we see Jay phone screening (and, in this case, ultimately rejecting) one of the many candidates who were discovered in India while we were there. Before we showed up, we phone screened them from the US; it's much easier to screen them locally. I sat and listened carefully to his questions to determine if, as was suggested, we were being too hard on candidates. I am happy to report that his phone screening seemed perfectly satisfactory; ultimately it turned out that phone screening was NOT the reason we didn't hire any candidates.

Here Anawat shows his genial good will and demure sense of appropriateness that characterizes him generally.

I brought him a nice bottle of Black Label and took him out to dinner when he got to California. Feeling guilty, yet, Shyam? :)

Here I am, trying not to burst into tears from the spicy food.

Manik looks on; he LIKES spicy food.

This is Jay explaining EMS to the BTC engineers. He gave an hour talk on DFM followed by another hour talk on EMS.

Here is part of the audience to the EMS talk. This is a pretty good turnout considering this talk has been going on for an hour and a half at this point...

This is V, the new senior manager in BTC, here watching one of the presentations that engineers put on for the BTC staff.

Jay talked about DFM as it exists; here Anawat follows up with the future of DFM.

Here's Anawat talking about DFM.

And here are some rapt listeners. I would think they would get annoyed with my taking pictures of them but, generally, people took my annoying picture taking with good will.

V is stretching as he watches one of our presentations.

This is Kartik Ayyar also known as "Junior". I noticed that every picture I have of him shows him smiling! Kartik is an engineer in Sunnyvale who has done an enormous amount to grow BTC.

This is Anureita, one of the engineers in BTC who interviews for us.

This is me.

And here's Manik.

To my Traveling To India pictures

Last changed 4/13/04.

	Here is the name of the building the BTC office is in.
Here's Jay Perry standing next to the building directory. Notice how "Network Appliance" in the building directory sort of glows. This is due to clean living and exemplary service on the part of the members of that office. I only needed a little work in Photoshop to bring this Truth out...
	Three or four floors up there is a balcony that looks down on the first floor (excuse me, that would be the 0th floor, the way they count floors in India). It's interesting in that it's completely open on two sides. I didn't see any way to lock it up so this is really not so much the ground floor of a building as a kind of partially enclosed porch to the building. At least while we were there, a slight breeze blew through it which kept it rather pleasant and probably cooled the rest of the building, as well.
Here's the sign outside the offices. I suspect it looks like the sign outside every NetApp office; as I recall it's very similar to the sign outside the Singapore office.
	Here is the security guard and the receptionist whom you encounter just inside the door to the office.
When you enter the main office area you are greeted by a column with 4 clocks presenting the local time, Sunnyvale time, German time and Eastern US time. May the plant always be green and leafy!
	Here is the cube farm that makes up the bulk of the BTC office. There are also four small conference rooms (which would be behind the point of view in this picture), a larger conference room and a cafeteria. I found it interesting that, for some reason, the four small conference rooms seemed significantly colder than the refrigerator in the cafeteria!
When we got to the BTC Network Appliance offices, we discovered that there was about to be an all hands meeting featuring none other than Ken Hibbard (our VP of engineering)! We had each come, through different routes, more than 10,000 miles to find ourselves in the same place. This is Ken getting ready for his talk about the new structure of the company.
	Here is our interviewing rooms. Each table in this picture has a NetApp candidate and interviewer (or a candidate waiting for an interviewer) sitting around it. It turns out to be a lot easier to simply sit out on the patio at the Oberoi than to get rooms. This might prove interesting this April when the temperature soars to 30 degrees Celsius (in the 90s for the metrically challenged).
These two pictures show us discussing Something Important about recruiting. Meenakshi, on the left, is our recruiter. To the right of her is Shyam, the senior engineering manager in BTC. These two are the movers and shakers of our recruiting effort and I owe them both a large debt. Next to Shyam is Ravi, one of the BTC engineers and on the right is Jay, one of the two engineers I brought from CA.
	Jay again, listening to the proceedings.
Anawat, the other engineer I brought, leans over the table to get some information from Meenakshi. I know it looks like he is attacking Meenakshi as Shyam tears his hair but that's not what's going on. I don't think. Probably not, anyway...
	Here we see Jay phone screening (and, in this case, ultimately rejecting) one of the many candidates who were discovered in India while we were there. Before we showed up, we phone screened them from the US; it's much easier to screen them locally. I sat and listened carefully to his questions to determine if, as was suggested, we were being too hard on candidates. I am happy to report that his phone screening seemed perfectly satisfactory; ultimately it turned out that phone screening was NOT the reason we didn't hire any candidates.
Here Anawat shows his genial good will and demure sense of appropriateness that characterizes him generally.
	I brought him a nice bottle of Black Label and took him out to dinner when he got to California. Feeling guilty, yet, Shyam? :)
Here I am, trying not to burst into tears from the spicy food.
	Manik looks on; he LIKES spicy food.
This is Jay explaining EMS to the BTC engineers. He gave an hour talk on DFM followed by another hour talk on EMS.
	Here is part of the audience to the EMS talk. This is a pretty good turnout considering this talk has been going on for an hour and a half at this point...
This is V, the new senior manager in BTC, here watching one of the presentations that engineers put on for the BTC staff.
	Jay talked about DFM as it exists; here Anawat follows up with the future of DFM.
Here's Anawat talking about DFM.
	And here are some rapt listeners. I would think they would get annoyed with my taking pictures of them but, generally, people took my annoying picture taking with good will.
V is stretching as he watches one of our presentations.
	This is Kartik Ayyar also known as "Junior". I noticed that every picture I have of him shows him smiling! Kartik is an engineer in Sunnyvale who has done an enormous amount to grow BTC.
This is Anureita, one of the engineers in BTC who interviews for us.
	This is me.
And here's Manik.