Clarke Ching’s post, Functional Blindess, reminded me to post the ways I know about how to see the current state in a project or in an organization. For projects: Ask to see a demo. Can you see anything at all? If you can’t see the results of prototype tests, unit tests, some kind of […]
I gave a talk at the local PDMA group called “Setting Expectations Between Engineering and the Three PMs”, attempting to clarify how the roles of product management, program management, and project management are sometimes confused, and to suggest practices that help people unconfuse them. I set up teams of people to create a little
I’m familiar with managing defects by severity (how bad the problem is for the user if the user encounters the problem), and by priority (what’s the business value of fixing this problem), but I had lunch yesterday with some folks who use frequency of occurrence to also manage defects. They started this because they
Caveat: I just started thinking about this, so I don’t feel particularly articulate. After reading Roy’s post of Kent Beck’s discussion “Invest in the design of the system every day”, I realized that’s what I do for project planning. Every day, I’ll adapt the work I’ve planned to do, to meet the needs of
In Greg’s provocative comment, he says, “The idea that contributor initiatives are a drag on an organization speaks more to the insecurity of the management than to its skills.” I’ve been noodling that comment since I received it. I agree with Greg that some managers are insecure enough to insist that they make all
Read The Graphing Calculator Story. (Thank you to Obie Fernandez for finding this gem. Some ideas that stood out for me: The secret to programming is not intelligence, though of course that helps. It is not hard work or experience, though they help, too. The secret to programming is having smart friends. …he told
Yesterday, I was talking to a colleague about a new job he’s considering. It’s in a regulated industry, and he had some assumptions: that regulated industry auditors assume a waterfall lifecycle and that organizations require process people to improve the process. Regulated industries do not require a waterfall lifecycle. What they do require is
I was reading An Elder Challenges Outsourcing’s Orthodoxy, yet another discussion about the merits — or not — of outsourcing. (You may have to register to read the article.) Whether you think outsourcing is an economic good or evil, here’s my perspective. You can choose to turn your products into commodities or you can
Well, that’s certainly a provocative title. Let’s see if I can back it up 🙂 First, read Keith Ray’s Engineering post, where he says “software development is a cooperative “game” in creating and deploying “knowledge” and various people-oriented practices help make that work” Some of my recent posts about requirements show the problems when software
I’ve been traveling a lot this summer, and I saw bad requirements exposed while waiting for my turn at the kiosk. If you buy an e-ticket, you can walk up to a computer, called a kiosk, insert a major credit card, and check in. No one calls you. You have to know the computer