I don’t have much use for Gantt charts; if you’ve determined the tasks in enough detail and far enough out to really see the critical path, you’ll be wrong in 24-48 hours. If you don’t put in that much detail, it’s a pretty picture, but not enough information to manage the project. (Of course, […]
I taught my Pragmatic Project Management workshop in Israel last week. I was talking about defect charts and what they mean and how I use them. (No, I don’t include priority or severity data on defect charts; just # opened and closed by week and # remaining open each week. One of the participants
While teaching a management class recently, one participant came up to me at a break, and said, “Why are you teaching us project management with this portfolio stuff? This is supposed to be a management workshop.” Portfolio management, determining which projects to fund and when, is management work. The best managers actively manage the
Imagine you’re a project manager. You talk to your technical lead and ask how far along the team is. “Oh, we’re about 90 percent done,” he says. If you’re like most project managers, your heart sinks. You’ve been here before. Ninety percent done means the other 90 percent is left to do. But what can
Drum roll please… Manage It! Your Guide to Modern Pragmatic Project Management is available. (I don’t know when it will be available from Amazon. Soon, I suspect.) See the press release. I’m sooo excited. Labels: Manage It, project management
In his recent IEEE Software column, “Ship Effortlessly” J.B. Rainsberger has a gem: I start each project with two rules: all source files must be in a version control repository, and the build must be fully automated at all times. Does your project follow these rules? If not, what would you have to do?
There are several questioning comments on my post Testing is Not a Service: What do I mean by testing and how do I reconcile my statement with the context-driven school of testing? Let me clarify what I mean by service first. The way the participants were discussing testing as a service, they meant a common
I taught a one-day workshop at StarEast yesterday with Esther. I was astonished at the number of test managers who think testing is a service. Effective testing is not a service. Effective testing is an integral part of development. When people–especially senior management–consider testing a service, there are inevitable consequences: Testers multitask between several
I am happy to report that Manage It! is at the printer, both the book and the cover. We’re looking sometime in June as a ship date. Just thought you’d want to know 🙂 Labels: Manage It, project management
I taught a workshop about transitioning to Agile earlier this week. One of the things that’s difficult for many project managers to recognize is that milestones must be deliverables–otherwise, it’s too hard to know when something is done. One of the participants had a slightly puzzled look on his face when I said that,