I had a terrific time with Scott Hanselman on his podcast, Hanselminutes. Listen to our conversation on Modern Management Made Easy with Johanna Rothman. I started listening to Scott’s podcast a couple of years ago. I regularly listen because he: Selects people I’ve never heard of before Organizes the interview in ways that clarify the […]
A manager took me aside at a recent engagement. “You know, Johanna, there’s something I just don’t understand about this agile thing. It sure doesn’t look like everyone is being used at 100 percent.” “And what if they aren’t being used at 100 percent? Is that a problem for you?” “Heck, yes. I’m paying their
I did decide to talk about how we got started on 100% utilization and what to do about it. I didn’t say everything I wanted to say, so here is what I wish I’d said: How 100% Utilization Got Started Back in the early days of computing, machines were orders of magnitude more expensive than
I’m at Belgium Testing Days, and in about 90 minutes, I’ll be giving a lightning talk as part of a keynote. I love lightning talks because I love to talk and I love the challenge of a 5-minute, go-for-broke, get-it-organized, and do-it. And, it’s an excuse to drink a lot of cold caffeine in preparation.
Summary: Keeping your team busy with work all of the time may seem good for productivity and a good use of your work force. But it comes with serious backlash in the form of delayed work, incomplete iterations, technical debt, and the negative consequences of multitask context switching. In this column, Johanna Rothman explains how