ACM Journal on Computing and Cultural Heritage
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all areas relating to the use of IC T
in support of Cultural Heritage,
seeking to combine the best of
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sometimes it seems
the software process
is implemented
with the intention
of squeezing out any
trace of individuality
and creativity.
ing: “…they’re making me rewrite something that already works!...” Fortunately,
his griping was ignored, the director
backed the team, and Harold had to rewrite the program to the original design.
When the code finally came back for inspection, it matched the design, worked
well, and passed inspection easily with
relatively few comments and issues.
A Better Team, A Better system
As a team, we noticed an interesting
thing: because Harold was a low-achiev-ing programmer, we had become a better team: we had defined and enforced
our process more tightly, we had set
up and captured metrics more consistently, we had learned to provide better
counseling and support to the programmers (especially Harold). Most importantly, we had adopted a team goal and
ethic: we would never accept bad work
and never simply discard a weaker
member of the team who could not perform—we would do what was necessary
to allow the person to meet the team’s
standards. Provided team members
supported these goals, availed themselves of the resources, and produced
viable products, they could be a member of our team and the team would
take care of them professionally. This
higher ethic made us a better team.
Modern physics is learning that the
behavior of systems may not be a direct
function of the behavior of the parts of
a system. Not all cogs in a watch have to
be big cogs. Sometimes more optimal
behavior in a system can be obtained
from less optimal parts. Sometimes the
best teams are not made up of all super-heroes and when a team asserts itself to
overcome some limitation, even with
its own personnel, it can become better than it would have been without that
limitation. This is not to say we should
intentionally seek to employ bad programmers; but teams are not disconnected parts like nuts and bolts in a
bucket—they are systems. The dynamics of an effective team are more complex and subtle than they sometimes
appear and low-performing people may
have an effect on a project other than
through the products they produce.a
Sometimes it seems the software
process is implemented with the intention of squeezing out any trace of individuality and creativity—to make building systems a mindless process. In this
team, we were careful not to do this; but
we were also careful not to simply allow
anyone to change anything, anytime,
without consideration of the value and
return. We certainly never allowed anyone to make changes simply out of laziness, misunderstanding, or incompetence. And we never let anyone fail.
Harold Redeemed
When Harold had his code approved, he
(to the surprise of everyone on the team)
remarked “You know, this design is
much better than the one I did.” In fact,
from that point onward, Harold became
a believer in our approach and (to the
surprise of everyone in the installation)
a vocal evangelist for our team and our
processes. He even made a significant
contribution to the team’s processes
and tools—with the appropriate team
reviews and approvals, of course.
The team had defined the highest
level of inspection acceptance as an
“AS-IS,” meaning no errors of any sort,
no minor functional issues, no design
questions, no documentation inac-curacies, not even spelling or grammar mistakes. AS-IS was perfection. In
nearly 500 inspections we conducted
during the project life cycle, only one
person on the team ever got an AS-IS
on any work product submitted for inspection. That was Harold.
Phillip G. Armour ( armour@corvusintl.com) is a senior
consultant at Corvus International Inc., deer Park, Il.
a See J.B. Harvey, How Come Every Time I Get
Stabbed in the Back, My Fingerprints are on the
Knife? And Other Meditations on Management,
Jossey-Bass, 1999.