Currently, on the Cingular Business Online project we have several outstanding individuals that have worked many hours to complete the CBO project. Some work for Cingular, while others are contractors coming from different outsourcing partners. Ram Dhan is a contractor for ASAP that has been on the CBO project since May 2002. He has been an outstanding individual to work with and has exceeded expectations during the entire project. This document will outline why Cingular should hire this individual regardless of H1hiring limitation that has been mandated through out the company.

At the beginning of the CBO project we had many hurdles to overcome for the project to be successful. The main limitation we, as a team, was we were inexperienced in this type of development effort. We hired contractors, not only to suppliment our staff, but also to help with transition from a front-end type of development project to an end-to-end enterprise application environment. Ram came into this project with a previous experience developing telecommunications applications. He immediately was up to speed on what we were trying to accomplish and was on board from day one. The following sections describe specific situations where the team needed his help and expertise to solve difficult issues during the project. It furthermore explains how well he works in our environment and with our team.

The first item I had him work on was the original hierarchy model in the Catalog Manager and that module was the only module that had no errors in its first release. He also finished with a week to spare. I had him at that point work with Marga on Order Entry system to be responsible for the screen flow manager. This module required integration with every single module within the Order Entry system. He became familiar with everyone’s deliverables and personally integrated the entire site into one application. This also made him responsible for the builds that would be available in the consolidated environments. He worked several weeks without a day off to make sure that this application was delivered on time and successfully. During this time, he became the subject matter expert for the Order Entry System. Over the past month and a half the team has been working non-stop to make sure that the defects for this system are resolved as soon as possible. Ram was always on site working with the team to make sure the fixes were in the build and stayed until they were pushed successfully to the consolidated environments. When other contractors were itching to head home, Ram had a genuine interest in the success of this application.

Usually when contractors are introduced into a team that already works well together, you get some friction between the two groups. On this project, as every project, we had our issues between the two different groups of people. Everyone on the team loved working with Ram. He was always helpful, never condescending, and got the job done on time with no complaint. A recent example of him helping out when it was not his responsibility is the notification system. He stayed after hours to help one of my team members complete a difficult module that had been a major point of failure for us. Not only does the module now work, but my team member now understands the business flow, as well as, where the major faults in the system occurred.

You would expect that contractors would always deliver quality modules on time fully documented. Those of us who have worked with contractors in past or have been contractors in the past know that this is not the case some of the time. Due to time limitations or other unpredictable occurrences, projects lag behind. Although Ram has yet to transfer his knowledge over to one of my team members, he has always delivered quality work on time. When I have an Order Entry system emergency, I immediately turn to him to fix the problem immediately. He usually turns these types of critical problems around in 24 to 48 hours.

I assume that reason we are not hiring people with H1s is because of the investment Cingular has to make. The question will be, "Why not hire a non H1 with the same technical skills as the proposed candidate?" Sure, I can go through the interview process with potential candidates and find someone with the same technical skills, but what I can’t find in an interview is how will that person re-act in our environment? Will they work well with my team? These are risks that every potential employer face when they hire someone from outside the organization. With Ram we don’t have to face any of those risks. We already know that works well within the team, his work ethic is impeccable, he produces quality deliverables, and he already is a subject matter expert with the application in question. This, in itself, is worth the money Cingular would need to spend to transfer the Visa over. We also can low-ball the offer to help cover any costs Cingular may incur by hiring him. He is looking for a permenant place to work and wants to work here because he enjoys it. I would rather hire someone who already comfortable with our environment and team than take a risk with someone who may not like the aggressive development efforts we will be undertaking in the future. Ram has been one of the cornerstones of this project and I would hate to lose a quality employee without trying hiring him. I have included his outstanding resume for your reference. If you have any questions, feel free to call me at any time.