Peopleware:Productive Projects and Teams

Presented by Chris Kessel

Source Material

• Peopleware, Tom DeMarco & Timothy Lister• The Mythical Man-Month, Frederick Brooks• Software Creativity 2.0, Robert L. Glass

Agenda

• Managing the Human Resource• The Office Environment• The Right People• Growing Productive Teams• It’s Supposed To Be Fun To Work Here• Peopleware 2nd edition additions

Somewhere Today, A Project is Failing

“The major problems of our work are not so much technological as sociological in nature”

• 15% cancelled or aborted– The % goes up with larger projects

• Rarely is a technological issue the cause• We most apply technology, not invent it• Social problems (“politics”) often cited– Staffing, indecision, turnover, morale, etc

• Success/failure largely from team interactions

…

• Managers and management skills– Frequently come from the dev ranks• Promotions to management aren’t usually due to

management skills

– Instinct is to manage technically• Used to be developers, good with components• GANT chart optimizers• Intricate excel spreadsheets

Make a Cheeseburger,Sell a Cheeseburger

• Software Creativity 2.0 by Robert Glass– 80% of time is thinking– Complexity is exponential

• Creativity– Involves wrong turns and intuitive jumps– Can't punish mistakes, it's inherent in creative

processes– We learn the most when not afraid to fail– Ask what "ought" to be done, understand value

…cheeseburgers..

“You may be able to kick people to make them active, but not to make them creative, inventive, and thoughtful.”

• Motivation– You can force activity (carrot/stick), not creativity– Most creative workers like to work on problems– Uniqueness in people enables team chemistry

Vienna Waits For You

• The Spanish Theory of Value– Required overtime– Heavy oversight, micromanagement“But you know, Bob, that will only make someone work just

hard enough not to get fired.” – Office Space

• Overtime– Creativity is exhausting, limited amount per day– Hidden costs in turnover, compensatory undertime

“We don’t work overtime so much to get the work done on time as to shield ourselves from blame when the work inevitably doesn’t get done on time.”

Quality – If Time Permits

"Any step you take that may jeopardize the quality of the product is likely to set the emotions of your staff directly against you."

• Self esteem is tied to our quality, not quantity• Impacts of demoting quality's importance– poor job satisfaction, higher turnover– hides costs (maintainability, lack of unit tests, etc)– time pressure causes quality reductions

• Emphasis on quality is associated with low turnover, high job satisfaction

Parkinson’s Law

“Treating your people as Parkinsonian workers doesn’t work. It can only demean and demotivate them.”

• People don't gravitate to software to slack• People want to be successful

– "aggressive" schedules are demoralizing, which in turn feeds their own propensity to fail

– Highest productivity when there is no schedule (1985, 1992 studies)

• When Parkinson’s Law is true– Organizational busy work– meetings always take the full time

Laetrile

"The manager's function is not to make people work, but to make it possible for people to work“

• Management's False Hopes– Some new trick will send productivity soaring– But other managers/companies are doing X– Technology is moving fast, we have to hurry– Changing languages will be a big boost (see #1)– Banking on productivity increases for project feasibility– We automate tests, builds, why not development?– Pressuring people will get more work out of them

Agenda

• Managing the Human Resource• The Office Environment• The Right People• Growing Productive Teams• It’s Supposed To Be Fun To Work Here• Peopleware 2nd edition additions

The Furniture Police

“Police-mentality planners design workspaces the way they would design prisons: optimized for containment at a minimal cost."

• Development is mostly mental/creative work• Intellectual work needs– Quiet– Space– Good lighting– Low level of distractions

Saving Money on Space

“A penny saved on the workspace is a penny earned on the bottom line, or so the logic goes.”

• A worker (salary, benefits, etc) can be 20:1 the cost of the space they use– ergo, you get a 20:1 return for workspace investments

• IBM study w/ architect Gerald McCue– 100 sq ft per person– 30 sq ft of work surface (desk/whiteboard)– noise protection (walls or good partitions)– workers in a quiet area generated fewer defects

More on Workspaces

• Background noise inhibits creativity– Cornell study: quiet => more intuitive leaps

• Using space– Usefulness trumps appearance– Useful “vital” space, customizable by teams– Identifiable private, semi-private, public space

“Rooms without a view are like prisons for the people who have to stay in them.” – Christopher Alexander (A Timeless Way of Building)

You Never Get Anything Done Around Here Between 9 and 5

"The top performers' space is quieter, more private, better protected from interruption, and there is more of it."

• Conducted various coding games (over years)– 10:1 from best to worst, 2.5:1 from best to average– The top 50% 2x as much done as the bottom 50%– Multiple studies: Sackman 1968, Schwarz 1968, Myers

1978, Davis 1995, McBreen 2002– High performers cluster in high performing companies

Brain Time vs. Body Time

"Flow is a condition of deep, nearly meditative involvement. In this state, there is a gentle sense of euphoria, and one is largely unaware of the passage of time."

• Flow is a must for mentally intensive tasks– takes 15+ minutes of concentration– interruptions and noise reset that clock– lack of flow results in frustration– flow hours matters much more than body hours– interruption sources: phone, email, IM

• Are people working from home or odd hours?

Agenda

• Managing the Human Resource• The Office Environment• The Right People– Get the right people– Make them happy so they don't want to leave– Turn them loose

• Growing Productive Teams• It’s Supposed To Be Fun To Work Here• Peopleware 2nd edition additions

The Hornblower Factor

"The final outcome of any effort is more a function of who does the work than of how the work is done."

•"Fit" - People may grow, but rarely change•Resist a drift towards uniformity, differences are good (perspectives, backgrounds, etc)•Resist “professional” uniformity (dress codes, hair, desk rules)•Uniformity is a social tendency

Hire A Juggler

• See samples of their work• Holistic thinking– Consider asking them to present a relevant topic

(10-15 minutes)– A puzzle is fine, but that's narrow focus

Happy To Be Here

• What's the cost of the turnover? (~6 months)• Why do people leave?– "Just passing through"– Feeling disposable, seeing no point in loyalty– High turnover breeds short term vision

• Low turnover– A focus on being the best– Company investment in the individual– An expectation of long term

Methodology“Like any other system, a team of human workers will lose its self-

healing properties to the extent it becomes deterministic.”

• Big “M”ethodology– detailed processes trumps skilled work– centralized thinking (the smarts are in the process)– believes following the process results in the

desired output

• Small “m”ethodology– tailored plan– skilled individuals– creativity doesn't follow a prescribed process

Agenda

• Managing the Human Resource• The Office Environment• The Right People• Growing Productive Teams

"In the best work groups, the ones in which people have the most fun and perform at their upper limits, team interactions are everything"

• It’s Supposed To Be Fun To Work Here• Peopleware 2nd edition additions

The Whole Is Greater Than The Sum Of The Parts

• Developers are in it for the joint success• The Jelled Team– Sense of identity– Sense of eliteness– Joint ownership of the product– Obvious enjoyment of working together

• Corporate goals rarely match developer goals– Company profit and share value are disincentives

Teamicide• defensive management, not showing trust• bureaucracy• physical separation• time fragmentation• deemphasized quality• phony deadlines• team discontinuity• overtime• competitive incentives (prizes, singling out, etc)

– Incentives have negative effects for creative jobs – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u6XAPnuFjJc

Chemistry for Team Formation“In organizations with the best chemistry, managers devote their

energy to building and maintaining healthy chemistry.”

• Promote quality• Provide closure (a habit of success)• An identity of eliteness• Heterogeneity (diversity)• Continuity• Managers, by definition, aren't peers– power differential

Agenda

• Managing the Human Resource• The Office Environment• The Right People• Growing Productive Teams• It’s Supposed To Be Fun To Work Here• Peopleware 2nd edition additions

Chaos vs. Order

“…a policy of constructive reintroduction of small amounts of disorder.”

• Order is a worthy goal and important– …but chaos is invigorating

• Inject chaos in managed doses– proof of concepts– training/trips– celebrations

Agenda

• Managing the Human Resource• The Office Environment• The Right People• Growing Productive Teams• It’s Supposed To Be Fun To Work Here• Son of Peopleware (2nd edition additions)

Human Capital“This human capital can be substantial; thinking about it

erroneously as a sunk expense may lead managers toward actions that fail to preserve the value of the organization's investment.”

• High cost of training for knowledge workers– domain knowledge– system expertise– team formation

• Turnover/layoff is throwing out an investment• Team fragmentation

Management Sins

"The ultimate management sin is wasting people's time."

• Ceremonial meetings –serial status meetings

• Time fragmentation• Improper team sizes (~7 max)–Brooks’ surgical team–XP team size–Scrum teams

Making Change Possible

• Focus on one change at a time– flow, quality, reduce noise/interruptions, etc

• "The fundamental response to change is not logical, but emotional"

• "You never improve if you can't change at all"• "Change only has a chance of succeeding if failure, at

least a little bit, is also okay."

Questions?