May 15, 2009 at 5:04 pmabout PM-altruists, sausages and that light
PM-altruists, sausages and that light.
if you want to know what connects these concepts, please:
PM altruist
A true manager must be selfless. Unselfish. He must understand how his team lives, what people like with whom he works. After the "stormy night" of the release, it should be more important for him that the developers suffered. In addition, he must understand that it is he who bears responsibility for the night gatherings, besides all the evil bosses and bosses there. he represents the interests of developers in the "highest circles."
Developers are often willing to help and meet them. Especially when it comes to their own mistakes and errors. If I voiced certain deadlines, and I can’t meet them, I will agree to stay at work or to arrive early, but I will try to keep my word. Another question - when I announced the deadline, he was cut in half, and they kick him for not being able to meet him. But I obviously could not keep within it, because I need twice as much time. Here, it is here, at the planning stage, that the PM should stand up for his programmer for the first time, and defend the dates given to him. but he must also control the completion of the assignment on time. If necessary, recall that tomorrow is surrender. Perhaps - view the intermediate results of the work. This will help to understand what kind of world you are.
Well, PM defended the time that the programmer voiced, proved that he was objective, explained that it is better not to save on matches and salt, because porridge cannot be cooked without them, and all that. But then the next day comes. New task. Burning, so to speak. So here. At this stage - it is very important not to forget that the deadlines for completing the current task are moving apart. And the time for its implementation will in any case be longer, since a person needs some time to switch between tasks. If you do not shift plans, then we will either break the deadlines or force the developer to spend his personal time. Both that and another - demotivates that, in turn, slows down development.
They did it. We did all burning tasks, all current, all sleepless nights behind. It is important to remember that the project was not done by PM, but by the whole team. To sum up. To say what was good and what needs to be fixed. And more objectivity. If you forced a person to work overtime, please note this and suggest options to exclude similar cases in the future, or at least minimize such risks.
Sausages
Sausages are obviously false motivation. “We will hand over the project, then ...”, “We will develop this piece, then ...”, well, and all such statements. Sooner or later, we all understand that the sausage that we are chasing just flies in front of us, and we won’t be able to catch it, because the stick on which it hangs is tied to our back. Be realistic. Tell me honestly: "guys, we are head over heels", "we will have to be tight." Think everyone will run away? I doubt it. Difficulties may not bring people together, but at least we understand in what light we are, which is very important.
To solve the problem, you need to localize and voice it. otherwise it will be in the air. everyone will feel that something is bothering them, but, remembering the “sausages,” they will not dare to voice it. voiced - lose the sausage. here and run after her. In addition, if you yourself do not believe that the sausage will fall into your mouth, the people around you can only amuse themselves with it. But the motivation from this will not increase.
In pursuit of sausages, simple tools such as planning, code review and refactoring will help you. Having planned everything carefully, you will have an idea of the date of contact with the sausage. The review code will tell you if the sausage escaped from under your nose, and refactoring will help return the escaped sausage.
A request for new functionality has arrived. We planned it. Implemented. We are sitting, waiting for the sausage. Due to the lack of a code review, we learn that everything that we worked on for many days works, at least, incorrectly and not optimally. And for the lack of refactoring, we will be condemned to perpetual wanderings through the bug tracking system and code in search of the very last bug that the sausage rests on. But, as we all know, it will always be the penultimate one.
That light
Check your vital signs daily. Buy yourself blood pressure monitors, tachometers, heart rate monitors, oscilloscopes, and everything that can help with this, and use as intended. In the absence of signs of life on your part, the sausage will go to another. Your project should at least move so that you can finish it. If the patient is more dead than alive (like Philip Dick), then only Ubik will help you. Or palmistry. Or spiritualism. Everything that can help communicate with those who are no longer with us. better to warn than deal with the consequences.
And let your project live for a long time. But not too long in development.
When writing this post, not a single manager was hurt. The words “must”, “obliged” refer to euphemistic categories, and are real exclusively in my “parallel reality”.
and yes ... forget about everything that I wrote if your programmers write perfect code.
if you want to know what connects these concepts, please:
PM altruist
A true manager must be selfless. Unselfish. He must understand how his team lives, what people like with whom he works. After the "stormy night" of the release, it should be more important for him that the developers suffered. In addition, he must understand that it is he who bears responsibility for the night gatherings, besides all the evil bosses and bosses there. he represents the interests of developers in the "highest circles."
Developers are often willing to help and meet them. Especially when it comes to their own mistakes and errors. If I voiced certain deadlines, and I can’t meet them, I will agree to stay at work or to arrive early, but I will try to keep my word. Another question - when I announced the deadline, he was cut in half, and they kick him for not being able to meet him. But I obviously could not keep within it, because I need twice as much time. Here, it is here, at the planning stage, that the PM should stand up for his programmer for the first time, and defend the dates given to him. but he must also control the completion of the assignment on time. If necessary, recall that tomorrow is surrender. Perhaps - view the intermediate results of the work. This will help to understand what kind of world you are.
Well, PM defended the time that the programmer voiced, proved that he was objective, explained that it is better not to save on matches and salt, because porridge cannot be cooked without them, and all that. But then the next day comes. New task. Burning, so to speak. So here. At this stage - it is very important not to forget that the deadlines for completing the current task are moving apart. And the time for its implementation will in any case be longer, since a person needs some time to switch between tasks. If you do not shift plans, then we will either break the deadlines or force the developer to spend his personal time. Both that and another - demotivates that, in turn, slows down development.
They did it. We did all burning tasks, all current, all sleepless nights behind. It is important to remember that the project was not done by PM, but by the whole team. To sum up. To say what was good and what needs to be fixed. And more objectivity. If you forced a person to work overtime, please note this and suggest options to exclude similar cases in the future, or at least minimize such risks.
Sausages
Sausages are obviously false motivation. “We will hand over the project, then ...”, “We will develop this piece, then ...”, well, and all such statements. Sooner or later, we all understand that the sausage that we are chasing just flies in front of us, and we won’t be able to catch it, because the stick on which it hangs is tied to our back. Be realistic. Tell me honestly: "guys, we are head over heels", "we will have to be tight." Think everyone will run away? I doubt it. Difficulties may not bring people together, but at least we understand in what light we are, which is very important.
To solve the problem, you need to localize and voice it. otherwise it will be in the air. everyone will feel that something is bothering them, but, remembering the “sausages,” they will not dare to voice it. voiced - lose the sausage. here and run after her. In addition, if you yourself do not believe that the sausage will fall into your mouth, the people around you can only amuse themselves with it. But the motivation from this will not increase.
In pursuit of sausages, simple tools such as planning, code review and refactoring will help you. Having planned everything carefully, you will have an idea of the date of contact with the sausage. The review code will tell you if the sausage escaped from under your nose, and refactoring will help return the escaped sausage.
A request for new functionality has arrived. We planned it. Implemented. We are sitting, waiting for the sausage. Due to the lack of a code review, we learn that everything that we worked on for many days works, at least, incorrectly and not optimally. And for the lack of refactoring, we will be condemned to perpetual wanderings through the bug tracking system and code in search of the very last bug that the sausage rests on. But, as we all know, it will always be the penultimate one.
That light
Check your vital signs daily. Buy yourself blood pressure monitors, tachometers, heart rate monitors, oscilloscopes, and everything that can help with this, and use as intended. In the absence of signs of life on your part, the sausage will go to another. Your project should at least move so that you can finish it. If the patient is more dead than alive (like Philip Dick), then only Ubik will help you. Or palmistry. Or spiritualism. Everything that can help communicate with those who are no longer with us. better to warn than deal with the consequences.
And let your project live for a long time. But not too long in development.
When writing this post, not a single manager was hurt. The words “must”, “obliged” refer to euphemistic categories, and are real exclusively in my “parallel reality”.
and yes ... forget about everything that I wrote if your programmers write perfect code.