I have been in a foul mood in the office this week. There are many contributing factors, most of all continued pressure late in our development cycle. Without going into too much detail, suffice it to say that I am Busy. With a capital B.
I have heard about the development approach of having the entire team get into a room together and code/test/fix things and we actually tried it with this release. Today, since we were starting a new user story (late) I opted to do this once again and I was amazed at how productive I was. In fact, I might have a run at pulling off the impossible and getting things done in time for the end of Friday!
I actually love coding. I love designing as well. What I don’t like is doing either while under extreme pressure to deliver. I could now vent for a long time about how processes fit into this space, but I don’t feel like putting up a 2,000 word essay on the topic tonight.
I will leave it at this: if you leave a nerd to code, he will code. Most times, he will code for what appears to be a ridiculous amount of time without sustenance or other human interaction. If you add to this a neverending batch of ultra-high priority items, said nerd will code until he is a withered skeleton with no social skills and eventually you will be staffing another role because he slumped over at his desk one day. Also, accusing that skeleton of not producing enough only makes you look stupid.
I don’t know why this is difficult for management to understand. Maybe one day I will, but that day will not be today.
Related Articles
No user responded in this post