Death March Projects in today s Hard Times

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1 Death March Projects in today s Hard Times Edward Yourdon ed@yourdon.com blog: Boston SPIN conference March 16, 2010

2 Publication Details, and General Disclaimer This presentation is an open-content collaborative document. Anyone with an Internet connection and World Wide Web browser may view and/or alter its content -- for better or worse. Please be advised that while the material in this presentation has been reviewed by Ed Yourdon ("Ed"); the theories and business practices expressed by the document are not necessarily his. This isn't to say you won't find valuable and accurate information herein; however, Ed cannot summarily guarantee the validity of this document. The content of any given page may recently have been changed, dumbed-down, or otherwise edited by someone whose opinion does not correspond to Ed s original material (or any subsequent drafts). Neither Ed, nor any of the contributors, collaborators, nor anyone else connected with this document, can in any way whatsoever be held responsible for the appearance of any inaccurate information, or for your use of the information contained in or linked from this document. You are being granted a limited license to copy anything from this document; it does not create or imply any contractual or extra-contractual liability on the part of Ed, nor any of the contributors, collaborators, or viewers of this material. There is no agreement or understanding between you and Ed regarding your use or modification of this information beyond the GNU Free Documentation License (GFDL); neither is Ed responsible should someone change, edit, modify, or remove any information that you may post on this document. Any of the trademarks, service marks, collective marks, design rights, personality rights, or similar rights that are mentioned, used, or cited in this document are the property of their respective owners. Their use here does not imply that you may use them for any purpose other than for the same or similar informational use -- as recognized under the GFDL licensing scheme. Unless otherwise stated, Ed and this document are neither endorsed by nor affiliated with any of the holders of any such rights; as such, Ed cannot grant any rights to use any otherwise protected materials. Your use of any such or similar incorporated property is at your own risk. 2

3 Agenda Introduction and quick summary Project Politics Project Negotiations Peopleware Issues Software processes Monitoring and Controlling Progress Languages, Tools, and Technology 3

4 Two kinds of deathmarch project Defensive Offensive 4

5 Defensive death-march Give me an estimate for the XYZ system. I think it will take 6 months 5 people $5,000,000 I need the estimate in one hour, for my meeting with the budget committee. 5

6 Your assessment I think it will take 12 months 10 people $10,000,000 but I really need more time for a careful estimate! 6

7 Offensive death-march project 7

8 Indicators of new age of death-march projects Overall indicators Stock market, real-estate prices, GDP decline, etc. Drop in consumer spending, decline in consumer confidence How long will it last? Hard to imagine that 2010 will be anything better than flat Recent economic reports suggest worst may be over, but recovery may be weak and slow for years to come Impact on IT: depends on what kind of company Banks, financial institutions Government, public-sector organizations Manufacturing, consumer-oriented Startup companies that depend on VC funding 8

9 Supply vs. demand Demand for new death-march projects Probably LOTS of defensive death-march projects to cut costs, etc. Probably FEWER offensive death-march projects, except in companies where it s deeply ingrained in the culture (e.g., Apple s ipad initiative) Supply of participants for new death-march proj Cynicism/skepticism much greater than in pre-2008 period Many people have no choice/alternative it s not a question of volunteering Perceived inevitability of outsourcing may cause some IT professionals to think that participation in death-march project won t save them anyway Generational factor Recent CS/SE graduates may abandon IT careers if they can t get a job within a year or so after graduating Some recent graduates abandoning ALL professional careers, taking lowpressure jobs and shifting their priorities elsewhere. 9

10 Impact of new death-march projects? Faster? Unlikely - indeed, things might slow down because of decision delays Barry Boehm: Projects finish late because they start late! Cheaper!! Spending freeze on capital items, upgrades, new tools, etc. Increases pressure on open source, SAAS, Web 2.0, etc. Also, more outsourcing -- but maybe outsourcing to Kansas instead of India Smaller budgets means more inexpensive, junior-level developers Fewer people! Smaller teams Less admin support More fragmented teams, with people working on multiple projects 10

11 Agenda Introduction and quick summary Project Politics - more ugly projects Project Negotiations - more unilateral, less compromising Peopleware Issues - more important, but people will feel they have fewer options Monitoring and Controlling Progress - yes Languages, Tools, and Technology - collaboration tools (Twitter, etc.) Software Processes let s discuss... 11

12 Project Politics: determining the h a p p i n e s s Basic Nature of the Project kamikaze suicide chances of success mission impossible Ugly 12

13 One comment re peopleware It doesn t have to cost a lot of money to make people feel good about their participation in a team... 13

14 Monitoring & controlling progress Traditional, common-sense ideas e.g., the nightly build still make a lot of sense in today s hard-times death-march projects 14

15 Process Issues Good Enough software Economic justification of PI initiatives Agile processes Process impact of junior-heavy teams 15

16 Good-Enough Processes Zero defect is the enemy of good enough except in situations that people perceive to be safety-critical (today s software(?) example: Toyota) Emphasis on good-enough will increase, especially in consumeroriented web applications Lots of technical issues - e.g., caching, queues, graceful degradation when servers fail But what about tolerance for bugs and security flaws? Do we really accept Microsoft s idea of a hacker tax? Google has created a beta-forever culture Consumers show amazing tolerance for barely-good-enough when it s free (Google mail, Twitter, etc.) Emphasize risk-based testing to minimize TOTAL failures Remember consumers will be grumpy, pissed-off, fickle 16

17 Economic justification of PI initiatives Process improvement is much harder to sell as a philosophy in bad times Imagine arguing in favor of investing in CMMI when CIO has just been told to reduce IT budget by 25% in 2010 Justification will have to be based on credible ROI or risk-based argument Realistically, ROI is likely to be based on multiyear time-horizon... politically dangerous 17

18 Agile Processes Obviously! Cost-cutting culture will probably favor light processes, with less bureaucracy, formality But increased pressure on end-users will jeopardize back-fill and other userparticipatory activities in development projects In fact, overall economic pressures will push senior management to find excuses to cancel expensive development projects 18

19 Process Impact of junior-heavy teams Less-experienced people need a more formal, rigorous, disciplined process Ugly (high-pressure, heavy overtime) death-march projects will lead to grumpy, demoralized junior staffers... and while they ll keep working (because they can t vote with their feet)... they ll resist efforts to formalize processes. You can threaten to fire them if they refuse process rules but there s a real risk of quiet process-related mutiny, anarchy Prediction: we ll have a LOT of crappy systems to fix up 5-10 years from now 19

20 Conclusions Most of these cycles last 2-3 years, and then we re back to good times But people are like elephants: they never forget when they re treated badly, even if they have to tolerate it for a while. But this downturn could last longer than most of the previous ones, and could alter the supplydemand balance We will get through it, but it may take a while... But I ll still be here when the good times return... 20

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22 Death March Projects in today s Hard Times Edward Yourdon ed@yourdon.com blog: Boston SPIN conference March 16, 2010

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