Beyond Chaos: The Expert Edge in Managing Software Development - Softcover

Constantine, Larry L.

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0201719606 ISBN 13: 9780201719604

Publisher: Addison-Wesley Professional, 2001

Synopsis

In Beyond Chaos, the keenest contributions to the Management Forum have been incorporated into a single volume to reveal best practices in managing software projects and organizations. The forty-five essays contained in this book are written by many of the leading names in software development, software engineering, and technical management. Each piece has been selected and edited to provide highly focused ideas and suggestions that can be translated into immediate practice. Pragmatic and provocative, they address key management concerns involving people, planning and productivity, coping under pressure, quality, development processes, and leadership and teamwork.

About this title

About the Author

Larry L. Constantine, a pioneer of modern software engineering practice, is highly regarded as an authority on the human side of software development. A leading international lecturer, author, editor, and consultant, he has ten books and more than 120 published papers to his credit. Under the pen name Lior Samson, Larry has just published his first novel,Bashert, a political thriller set against the backdrop of Israel’s emergence as a nuclear power.

From the Back Cover

The popularity of the Management Forum in Software Development Magazine is not surprising. Because the majority of software development projects fail to come in on time, on budget, or on specification, software development managers are constantly seeking out management approaches and techniques that will help them achieve success. Many software development projects deteriorate into a state of chaos.

In Beyond Chaos, the keenest contributions to the Management Forum have been incorporated into a single volume to reveal best practices in managing software projects and organizations. The forty-five essays contained in this book are written by many of the leading names in software development, software engineering, and technical management. Each piece has been selected and edited to provide highly focused ideas and suggestions that can be translated into immediate practice. Pragmatic and provocative, they address key management concerns involving people, planning and productivity, coping under pressure, quality, development processes, and leadership and teamwork.

Highlights of the book include:

• Larry Constantine, "Dealing with Difficult People: Changing the Changeable"
• Karl Wiegers, "First Things First: A Project Manager's Primer"
• Capers Jones, "Productivity by the Numbers: What Can Speed Up or Slow Down Software Development"
• Ed Yourdon, "Death March: Surviving a Hopeless Project"
• Dave Thomas, "Web-Time Development: High-Speed Software Engineering"
• Meilir Page-Jones, "Seduced by Reuse: Realizing Reusable Components"
• Jim Highsmith, "Order for Free: An Organic Model for Adaptation"
• Steve McConnell, "Managing Outsourced Projects: Project Management Inside-Out"

These and many more insightful and advisory essays together represent the cutting edge in software development management and the collective wisdom of the field's most knowledgeable practitioners. Both entertaining and enlightening,Beyond Chaos will enrich your skills and enhance your deeper understanding of the process of bringing software from idea to reality.

0201719606B06262001

From the Inside Flap

Chaos. Not the inchoate state of the early universe, not the ill-behaved subject of a specialized branch of mathematics, not the mid-revolutionary fragmentation of a society in transition, but coding chaos--the everyday reality of projects that develop software applications for computers and the World Wide Web.

Countless managers struggle for control and stability, for accountability and predictability amidst this chaos. From the project leaders, who provide the day-to-day oversight and guidance all the way up to the CIOs, whose charge is strategic direction and corporate-wide coordination, they struggle to understand and manage technology and processes of enormous complexity made all the more complex and unmanageable by the relentless and accelerating pace of technological change.

Herding squirrels. Corralling cats. Taming the mongrel hordes. Whatever the metaphor, the challenges of managing software development are legend. The stories are alarmingly similar for projects of every scope and size, whether staffed by the arrayed forces of thousands of programmers and testers or tackled by a small team of freelancers. The budget may be blown by a hundred percent or more and deadline upon deadline may be passed like so many exits on a freeway. Rarely do software development projects meet budget constraints, technical objectives, and delivery schedules--if indeed recognizable constraints, objectives, and schedules exist. Applications that are far more complex than a high-rise office building have sometimes been launched with little more planning than a sketch on the back of a napkin.

Some managers simply give up and accept this uncontrolled chaos as the state of affairs, an unchangeable reality and the unavoidable price of dealing with a highly paid and poorly understood profession. They accept the reality of seeking discipline among the undisciplined, of perpetually pushing the envelope of the possible, or of seeking certainty where specifications are little more than executive fantasies and deadlines are the arbitrary impositions of uninformed marketing managers.

Some managers seek refuge in mind-numbing manuals of procedure and in the step-by-step details of elaborately defined processes. They rationalize the investment in expensive systems that promise predictability through the imposition of regulation and regimentation.

Some managers, defining defeat as success, instead celebrate unmanageable chaos as the crucible of creation, the necessary and desired context in which to unleash the powers of the digital genie that will transform life on earth.

Beyond chaos, however, beyond surrender or celebration, is another view of software development--the view that software development projects and software developers are indeed manageable, that chaos is not an inevitable condition or concomitant. In this view, salvation dwells in the details, success lies in subtle insights, and control is achieved through thoughtful attention and planning.

The expert edge is the difference. Compiled in this book are the insights, inspiration, practical pointers, and provocative thinking of an elite assemblage of working managers and practicing consultants--the recognized experts who contributed monthly to the Management Forum. The Forum, a regular feature in the respected industry publication Software Development, occupied the prestigious inside back page of the magazine and proved to be one its most popular features.

Written for busy working managers, the Forum featured pragmatic, provocative essays by the leading thinkers and doers in software and Web development, software engineering, and technical management, including such industry luminaries as Ed Yourdon, Capers Jones, Meilir Page-Jones, Steve McConnell, and Jim Highsmith. The column set high standards for the clarity and quality of both the writing and the thinking it expressed. Every guest columnist was charged with the twin tasks of providing something that a working manager could put to use tomorrow and of offering something to think about for the next week.

Not surprisingly in light of the diversity of contributors, the discussions reprinted in this volume represent diverse views grounded in a variety of backgrounds and experiences. What they have in common, however, are common and positive threads--that software development and software developers are manageable, and that better management in this economically and technologically critical field is sorely needed.

The essays span such diverse topics as dealing with difficult people, managing from the bottom-up, coping with project failure, sustaining teamwork, and building software to throw away. Managers will find among the chapters the distilled essence of experience and the hard-won wisdom of those who have fought in the trenches of technical management, and won.

Highly focused analyses and specific suggestions are combined with provocative arguments and thoughtful perspectives. The essays have been edited and organized by broad subject matter and arranged to form a logical progression, finishing with what I hope will stand as a challenge and a look to the future of management and of software development.

Larry Constantine Rowley, Massachusetts March 2001

0201719606P04062001

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

Chaos. Not the inchoate state of the early universe, not the ill-behaved subject of a specialized branch of mathematics, not the mid-revolutionary fragmentation of a society in transition, but coding chaos--the everyday reality of projects that develop software applications for computers and the World Wide Web.Countless managers struggle for control and stability, for accountability and predictability amidst this chaos. From the project leaders, who provide the day-to-day oversight and guidance all the way up to the CIOs, whose charge is strategic direction and corporate-wide coordination, they struggle to understand and manage technology and processes of enormous complexity made all the more complex and unmanageable by the relentless and accelerating pace of technological change.Herding squirrels. Corralling cats. Taming the mongrel hordes. Whatever the metaphor, the challenges of managing software development are legend. The stories are alarmingly similar for projects of every scope and size, whether staffed by the arrayed forces of thousands of programmers and testers or tackled by a small team of freelancers. The budget may be blown by a hundred percent or more and deadline upon deadline may be passed like so many exits on a freeway. Rarely do software development projects meet budget constraints, techni-cal objectives, and delivery schedules--if indeed recognizable constraints, objectives, and schedules exist. Applications that are far more complex than a highrise office building have sometimes been launched with little more planning than a sketch on the back of a napkin.Some managers simply give up and accept this uncontrolled chaos as the state of affairs, an unchangeable reality and the unavoidable price of dealing with a highly paid and poorly understood profession. They accept the reality of seeking discipline among the undisciplined, of perpetually pushing the envelope of the possible, or of seeking certainty where specifications are little more than executive fantasies and deadlines are the arbitrary impositions of uninformed marketing managers.Some managers seek refuge in mindnumbing manuals of procedure and in the step-by-step details of elaborately defined processes. They rationalize the investment in expensive systems that promise predictability through the imposition of regulation and regimentation.Some managers, defining defeat as success, instead celebrate unmanageable chaos as the crucible of creation, the necessary and desired context in which to unleash the powers of the digital genie that will transform life on earth.Beyond chaos, however, beyond surrender or celebration, is another view of software development--the view that software development projects and software developers are indeed manageable, that chaos is not an inevitable condition or concomitant. In this view, salvation dwells in the details, success lies in subtle insights, and control is achieved through thoughtful attention and planning.The expert edge is the difference. Compiled in this book are the insights, inspiration, practical pointers, and provocative thinking of an elite assemblage of working managers and practicing consultants--the recognized experts who contributed monthly to The Management Forum. The Forum, a regular feature in the respected industry publication Software Development, occupied the prestigious inside back page of the magazine and proved to be one its most popular features.Written for busy working managers, the Forum featured pragmatic, provocative essays by the leading thinkers and doers in software and Web development, software engineering, and technical management, including such industry luminaries as Ed Yourdon, Capers Jones, Meilir Page-Jones, Steve McConnell, and Jim Highsmith. The column set high standards for the clarity and quality of both the writing and the thinking it expressed. Every guest columnist was charged with the twin tasks of providing something that a working manager could put to use tomorrow and of offering something to think about for the next week.Not surprisingly in light of the diversity of contributors, the discussions reprinted in this volume represent diverse views grounded in a variety of backgrounds and experiences. What they have in common, however, are common and positive threads--that software development and software developers are manageable, and that better management in this economically and technologically critical field is sorely needed.The essays span such diverse topics as dealing with difficult people, managing from the bottom-up, coping with project failure, sustaining teamwork, and building software to throw away. Managers will find among the chapters the distilled essence of experience and the hard-won wisdom of those who have fought in the trenches of technical management, and won.Highly focused analyses and specific suggestions are combined with provocative arguments and thoughtful perspectives. The essays have been edited and organized by broad subject matter and arranged to form a logical progression, finishing with what I hope will stand as a challenge and a look to the future of management and of software development.Larry Constantine
Rowley, Massachusetts
March 2001 0201719606P06202001

Edition details

• Publisher: Addison-Wesley Professional
• Publication date: 2001
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0201719606
• ISBN 13: 9780201719604
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 392