Patterns of Projects: From Adrenaline Junkies to Template Zombies - PowerPoint PPT Presentation

Patterns of Projects: From Adrenaline Junkies to Template Zombies Tim Lister

Patterns QuickTime™ and a TIFF (Uncompressed) decompressor are needed to see this picture. Let’s look at some Project Patterns…

More Patterns Let’s look at some Project Patterns…

Safety Valve To counter the intensity of their work, the team devises a pressure release activity that becomes a regular part of team life.

Mañana The loss of a “natural” sense of urgency.

The Dead Fish of Failure It sits on the table of far too many projects.

How can we accept projects formulated to fail? Everybody smells it right away. Everybody hunkers down.

Who’s to blame for this loathsome situation?

Me, and my generation.

The joy of success. It lets you: try hard learn experiment have pride

Lessons Unlearned QuickTime™ and a TIFF (Unkomprimiert) decompressor are needed to see this picture. Retrospectives rarely trigger change. (Sorry.)

What Smell? People in the organization cannot detect its underlying vitality or decay .

SMELLS… Nursing Home Monkey Cage Teenager’s Bedroom Make-up Room Backstage Sea Breeze Mildew Electrical Fire Cigar Bar

Marilyn Munster… The esteem often given technical workers versus managerial staff varies. In some organizations developers are kings; in others they are pawns.

Surprise! Can you find the Big Boss in this picture? The manager offering rewards and incentives gets responses in addition to those he planned.

Project Sluts Managers who just can’t say, “No.”

Rattle Yer Dags! urgency + confidence + iteration = bent for action

Dashboards Dashboards are used by strong teams and weak teams, but typically not by average teams.

It’s Always the God-Damned Interfaces Project team members focus relentlessly on interfaces both system and human.

Cool Hand Luke “What we have is a failure to communicate.” A legitimate conflict is interpreted as a “failure to communicate.”

Straw-man Team members feel comfortable offering a straw-man solution in order to elicit early feedback and insight.

Cider House Rules CIDER HOUSE RULES 1. Please don’t operate the g rinder or the press if you ha ve been drinking. 2. Please don’t smok e in bed or use candles. 3. Please don’t go up on the roof if you’v e been drinking — especiall y at night. 4. Please don’t tak e bottles with you when you go up on the roof. Members of the project team ignore or work around rules made by people who are unconnected to the project’s work.

White Line The chalk line on a tennis court clearly defines the extent of the playing surface. The project needs a white line to achieve a non-arguable delineation of scope.

Endless Huddle The right of infinite appeal ensures that no decision is ever final.

Music People with real musical skills are disproportionally represented, sometimes extremely so, in technology organizations.

Look for Patterns… Name them… Propagate them, or Defeat them. You’re good at this; you can do this together.

Send me your patterns! Tim Lister The Atlantic Systems Guild, Inc. 3143 Broadway, 2B New York NY 10027 USA 212 620-4282 lister@acm.org systemsguild.com 1-800 DH BOOKS: AJSPECIAL www.dorsethouse.com/ajspecial/