Freakonomics has a great interview with Mary Barra, the CEO of General Motors that provides some insights into what it means to lead and what it takes to innovate. Sometimes, it’s as simple as moving barriers out of the way....
From the outside looking in, it is easy to think that innovation is about the technology. One important lesson I’ve learned over the last decade is that more often than not, innovation is about business and process models which enable...
I was reflecting with a previous collaborator recently on the product I am working on now. The team I lead is a small team of only 4 engineers. Yet the product we’ve developed transacts upwards of a million documents a...
Over the weekend, I listened to a TED Radio Hour podcast titled The Meaning of Work. The whole thing is worth a listen, but there was something in the first segment by Margaret Heffernan which really caught my attention: Social...
For many small software teams with loose (or non-existent) project management, “crunch time” usually leads to the unraveling of the project to some degree and inevitable crisis management. In most of these cases, crunch time is the result of: Poor...
Poorly Controlled Scope Scope is enemy number 1; it is the amorphous blob that threatens to consume and grow until it is an uncontrollable monster, swallowing all of your carefully planned man hours. Increases in scope are often the result...
Eric Brechner came up with one of my favorite acronyms of all time in software development: FOCKED. I want to add an alternate: Failure to Orchestrate Collective Knowledge Effectively for Delivery. Successful delivery of software requires that different members of...
One of the lessons I’ve been mulling about the past few weeks is the importance of scope when delivering software. Delivery of software can be thought of as a balancing act between three buckets: Time – this is the schedule...
I’ve been thinking heavily on the topic of leadership for several days now and trying to understand what works and what doesn’t. I am currently in the midst of a massive and daring undertaking and putting tremendous demands on my...
Reflecting on the past year and a half, I’ve come to some conclusions on how development teams can be successful in delivering software. I don’t think any of them are major or relevatory, but I think each team and each...