John Peebles - Sentry Data Systems

John Peebles is the CIO of Sentry Data Systems in Florida. He is 26 years old and graduated from Taylor University in 2003. He is a laid back young man who has had trouble with academic life before starting his own business and taking on random programming jobs before finding his current position at Sentry Systems.

One of the first topics John talked about was the how best to run a remote development organization. In order to do this, it is very important to have good people. There is a large difference between a good programmer and an average or poor programmer. Another important attribute is a fast Internet connection. This ensures a constant line of communication between remote developers and managers. Bug tracking and organized documentation are tools that have also proven very useful.

Another principle John Peebles concentrated on was the community of the organization. Sometimes it takes a crazy project that developers can pour their creativity into in order to build up the community and bring people together.

I felt John Peebles presented his information well. He kept the students' attention and delivered his points in a way that was fun and interesting. Although I do not plan on pursuing a career at Sentry Data Systems, I can appreciate the principles of the development process that are in place there.