Archive for the 'Baseline' Category
(Chronologically Listed)
The five books every IT manager should read…right now
I’ll add “software engineers” as well, not to mention CIOs and CTOs.
My latest Baseline column is up, and in it, I discuss just why you should read these books — or, if you have read them already, why you should re-read them. ..bruce w..
The latest Baseline columns
The first column, “Second Class Software Quality for Major IT Projects”, talks about the curious fact that organizations are willing to spend millions, tens of millions, even hundred of millions of dollars on major IT project and yet still nickle-and-dime their software quality assurance (SQA) effort. It doesn’t help that SQA personnel are pretty much on the bottom of the tech status totem pole, either.
The second column, “Do Not Defer The Difficult in IT Projects”, describes the all-too-human tendency in IT development to put off dealing with the toughest problems until last — at which point, you may not be able to solve them all. It also explains why so many IT projects get 80-90% “done” and then suddenly slip for weeks or months without making much progress.
Enjoy, vote, and comment! ..bruce w..
Latest Baseline column up
My latest Baseline column is now up:
Last week, I talked about some of the reasons why large organizations often reject the best solutions for a troubled IT project: fear, pride, budget, and the ever-present internal politics. This week, as promised, I will talk about what it takes to champion the right solution. I can’t guarantee that you’ll succeed, but you will have a better shot at it.
Go read the rest of the column. In the meantime, I’ll start posting more pitfalls here. ..bruce..
New Baseline column up
I have a new Baseline column up on the tendency of large organizations to reject the best solutions for a troubled IT project:
The consultants, usually with the help of the employees in the trenches, would use their time, effort, and expertise to analyze the system under development or in production. They would arrive at a clear, supportable, essential solution – technical, architectural, methodological, organizational, whatever. This would be presented to upper management…whereupon upper (or project) management would say, “No, we can’t do that.”
Sometimes, they would give no specific reason why the solution was not acceptable. Sometimes, they made it clear that it wasn’t the solution they wanted or that they felt was acceptable. If they did explain their rejection, it was usually in budgetary or political terms.
The investigating team would often then go back and look for an alternate (and less optimal) solution. If one was found, often that was rejected as well, and so on, often down to the least desirable solution. Barry [Glasco] said that he and another colleague, Chuck McCorvey, had gone through this so many times with one client that they joked about simply presenting the worst solution first, since it seemed to be typically the only solution the client would accept.
Go read the whole thing; comments are welcome here or there. ..bruce..
IT projects: fooled by success
I’m currently reading (and enjoying) Fooled by Randomness by Nassim Taleb; his concepts inspired my latest Baseline column, which talks about the risks that follow a successful IT project:
But sometimes with projects that really shouldn’t succeed—that are attempting too much, too fast, with too many risks—enough things go right, particularly along the critical paths, enough superhuman effort is made by those involved, so that the project does indeed go into production on time and possibly even under budget. Upper management is thrilled; the development team looks great; and all’s right in heaven.
And that’s when the real trouble begins.
Feedback is welcome, there or here. ..bruce..
Using a maintenance architect
My lastest Baseline column is up, in which I argue that setting up one or more maintenance architects within an enterprise can help reduce maintenance costs while at the same time providing a training path for chief software architects. Let me know what you think.
Sorry things have been a bit quiet here; both Bruce Henderson and I have been on the East Coast at a client site. ..bruce..
Latest column up: distributed development (part 2)
My latest Baseline column is up, discussing how to make a distributed software development project work. ..bruce..
Latest column up: wrapping up IT project metrics
My newest Baseline column is up: “Lies, Damned Lies, and Project Metrics (part 3)“. In it, I wrap up my discussion on IT project metrics, outlining a possible approach using instrumentation and heuristics. Go check it out. ..bruce..