Oozy Plans

So, you work at a big software factory. It's pleasant enough, in a very sterile, non-evil, Office Spacey way. But your company isn't the best at project planning. You fall into a trap that lots of large companies fall into when they try to put together software projects. The project works something like this:

Step 1: Executive or non-technology department (Marketing, "The Business Unit", etc.) dreams up great idea.

Step 2: Idea dreamer upper tells technology group to build The Thing (oh, and how long do you think it will take?).

Step 3: Technology group assigns project to a project manager.

Step 4: Project manager - well-meaning but perhaps under pressure - gets a few reliable heads into a room and quickly puts together The Plan, complete with a code freeze date, a testing complete date, and a release date. Don't worry, this plan is just a SWAG. It isn't written in stone.

Step 5: Project manager presents SWAG to executives.

Step 6: Executives write project plan in stone.

All is well until the developers begin designing and building the project and discover it's going to take approximately nine months longer to complete than they have time for, assuming everyone works nights and weekends. At this point, the project managers begins thinking and comes to the conclusion that Just a Few More Developers will do the trick. Or maybe we'll Just Get Lucky and it will all work out in the end.

Step 7: The Mythical Man Month ensues.

This is a good way to create very high turnover or build a large unwieldy project that is useless at best and unmaintainable at worst. Fortunately this problem is easy to fix, but the solution is not always obvious and takes a little discipline.

Insert:

Step 3.5: Project manager locates developers (the actual people who will write the code).
Step 3.6: Project team builds spec. Developers get to help.
Step 3.7: Project manager asks developers for detailed estimates of the time it will take. No task is allowed to exceed 16 hours.

Yes, steps 3.x take a little time, sometimes months. But you'll have to do these steps anyway and if you do them before step 4 instead of after step 6, you're going to get a schedule you can actually rely on. You know, the kind that hurts your hand when punch it. The kind that doesn't ooze all over the floor when it's dropped. And your developers will probably come up with creative solutions you never thought about that will save you loads of time and money. Plus, they'll enjoy themselves more and feel like they have some control over their lives and stay at your company and you'll get very large bonuses for the rest of eternity because your team will be so phenomenally productive.

Oy

My 2-year-old son recited an entire book to me tonight. I gave him a handful of prompts, turned the pages, and did nothing else. It was frightening - even though I know he's listened to that story 8,000,000,000 times - because I wouldn't have the slightest chance of repeating anything in that story from memory. And I can read. And he can't. I think.

I know my kids will eventually be better than me at lots of common tasks, until eventually they dominate me in things like bowel control and saliva removal. But I'm disappointed that I'm losing ground already.

This is about you

Scientific American has a great article about how kids learn. There are nuggets in there for everybody. No matter how old you are, if you think this story doesn't apply to you, you are either deceiving yourself or you are very very very well-adjusted.

The (possible) Dungy Exception

An addendum to my previous post on parenting:

Some professions require a lot of time away from family. Sometimes, these situations are unavoidable - either because of unfortunate circumstances or because of a spiritual calling. These parents have a doubly difficult task: to work hard at a demanding job, yet be physically, emotionally, and mentally connected to their spouse and children as often as possible. It can be done, but one must be always on guard for warning signals and open to changing course, even if it means overcoming fear or ego.

Consider yourself blessed if you never find yourself in this position.

Book Review: Tony Dungy's Quiet Strength: The Principles, Practices, & Priorities of a Winning Life

Tony Dungy's Quiet Strength: The Principles, Practices, & Priorities of a Winning Life is a memoir about Tony's faith and NFL coaching career. His story starts slow but hits a quick pace by the end, where Tony enters some of the most emotional moments in his life: his son's suicide and his Super Bowl season.

I agree with Tony's values, but there's a disconnect between his message and his actions. The demands of his job make it nearly impossible for him to be an effective father. He discusses this in the book and surely continues to struggle with it.

In almost every other aspect of life, Tony is a great role model and his words contain important messages for all Christians, particularly fathers. But fathers should be cautious to do as he says, not as he does. Be there for your wife and children.

Life's Little Priority List

1) God (if you're a person of faith)
2) Spouse (if you're married)
3) Kids (if you have them)
4) Extended Family
5) Friends and Community
6) Career, Hobbies, pretty much everything else

If anything gets out of order, especially for a long time, and especially high up in the list, nasty long-lasting problems occur. If you keep this list in mind and act accordingly, your chances of having a supremely happy life go way up.

Brain Candy

I love The Economist. In every issue, there are at least several articles that make me say "hmmm" out loud. Whenever my wife hears 3 or 4 "hmmm"s in quick succession, she knows I'm about to start reading some obscure facts to her about globalization or Indonesia at a Crossroads. She pretends to be bored, but deep down, I know she's extremely bored.

Anyway, here are a few "hmmm"s from this week's issue:

Explaining one of many delays in the Airbus 380 launch:

"The cabin wiring—more than 330 miles of it and over 40,000 connectors in each aircraft—caused problems because two incompatible versions of computer-aided design software were used. The Germans in Hamburg had one system, the French in Toulouse another. When the electrical harnesses came to be fitted in the forward and aft fuselage sections, many didn't connect with each other. Despite efforts to resolve this, it was decided in October last year that only by updating the computer-design tools would Airbus get on top of the problem. That meant a third delay."

Why 1-day old donated blood is dangerous:

"The main reason for giving a patient blood is that it carries oxygen. It carries lots of other things, too, such as glucose. But it is a lack of oxygen that will kill you quickest. However, as Dr Stamler points out, what determines whether transfused blood works as a treatment is not merely how much oxygen it is carrying, but whether that oxygen can reach the tissues that need it. This is where nitric oxide comes in.
Nitric oxide increases the flow of blood to tissues by dilating the arteries that penetrate those tissues...When a red blood cell reaches any tissue in need of oxygen it releases nitric oxide in order to dilate the capillaries. Only then can it deliver its cargo. And that is doubly true of the cells in stored blood since red blood cells become less flexible with age, and thus less able to squish into capillaries. Dr Stamler thus wondered if a lack of nitric oxide was causing the problems associated with transfusions.
What he and his colleagues discovered, and published this week in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, was that the amount of nitric oxide in stored blood does indeed decrease—and does so rapidly. Within a day of storage, blood loses 70% of its nitric oxide. After a few days, up to 90% has been lost."