April 18, 2008
The Agile Checklist
I've been spending a lot of time lately thinking about whether a checklist makes sense for Agile or not. As we all know, agile is not a very checklist-friendly methodology. In fact, it's probably a fair thing to say that...
April 16, 2008
Speck on a Whale
I had a really great experience happen to me in an agile team the other day -- I was wrong. I guess most people would think being wrong is a bad thing, but I look at the ability to be...
March 31, 2008
Burke and the Agile 400
Do Agile teams need experts? If an expert says "We need to have a structured conversation that looks like this" -- is that continuing self-directed emergent behavior? Shouldn't we value having really smart people over having a really open and...
March 6, 2008
It's not the Code, Stupid (Part 2)
Ludwig WittgensteinCouldn't there just once be a bikini model who was also a philosopher?Seems like we always get guys like this. Things are never what you think they are. Take developing software. We call it that because -- duh! --...
March 3, 2008
Explaining Modeling
I have been talking to some friends who are more into Agile with a big A than I am over the past couple of weeks. One of the topics was the purpose and use of modeling in developing software. On...
January 25, 2008
Seven Things I Hate About Agile Literature
I'm an Agile Coach. That means I help teams adopt agile practices to make time-to-market shorter. I love agile with a little "a" But I have a confession to make: as much as I love the concepts in Agile and...
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January 17, 2008
Be Careful what you Predict
Project management is all about making good predictions. For some reason, it's something I've been rather good at over the years, even though there's quite a bit of black magic involved. Sometimes you can be too good....
December 25, 2007
It's not the Code, Stupid
Programming is not about programming. I came to this realization after reviewing my XP and Agile books as part of an engagement for a large client. I must confess that each time I start on my XP books I have...
December 19, 2007
The Guy
I am continually amazed at how a form of hero-worship exists in IT. Just a few months ago, I was fortunate enough to apply for funding at Y-Combinator. It's like a boot camp for startups. It was formed in part...
December 12, 2007
Philosophy and Software Development
Recently one of my large clients asked me to come out and look at their development process. It underscored even more to me the relationship between philosophy and software development....
November 7, 2007
Pon'far Approaches
So. You said what about Ron Paul? It's that time again. The time that every true consultant dreads: American elections are just around the corner. Once you get the bits and bytes of making software happen, you realize that the...
October 24, 2007
Interview Checklist
I had an interesting discussion with a potential cofounder last night. We had met online, and were kind of feeling each other out for whether or not a partnership would be a good match. Today I have an interview with...
October 17, 2007
Who me? Worry?
Coming soon is the big day where Y-Combinator chooses its Winter teams. Over on the news.yc board, there's a lot of angst and tension.I applied too (for the first time), but I have absolutely no worries at all about...
October 8, 2007
Imaginary Worlds Mean Real Money
While you read this, over 30 million people all over the world are thinking or working in an imaginary world. Another 100,000 are busy at work building the worlds and collecting the rent. They're not neurotics and psychiatrists, they're workers...
August 1, 2007
Being Anti-Social
I'm a technology strategy management consultant by day. That means that I keep abreast of a lot of technology and how business can use it to make a buck. In my time off, I've been studying how new businesses make...
June 6, 2007
What's Wrong with European IT?
"You Yanks are an obnoxious, fun-hating bunch," my British friend told me once, "on the continent people take an entire month off for holiday, and most Yanks don't even take a week." It's true -- mostly. A recent study by...
May 8, 2007
The Year I was Stupid
Recently, I was reading stories of how Bill Gates handles his meetings: So you’re in there presenting your product plan to billg, steveb, and mikemap. Billg typically has his eyes closed and he’s rocking back and forth. He could be...
April 5, 2007
Saying No
One of the things I've always admired about top-notch consulting firms is their ability to say no. When the customer has the checkbook out, when it would be easy to take a few dollars and deliver something that wouldn't work...
November 28, 2006
Transactional Programming
Seems like the word "transaction" has been prominent in my lexicon these last few months. First I wrote an article about "Transactional Warfare" which stated that all commercial transactions have some military value. Programming is transactional too, just like many...
October 19, 2006
Scaling Back: What Do You Need For A Small IT Shop?
Over the last few months, while not working on batBack (my social bookmarking invention), I've been helping a couple friends of mine with their consulting business in Virginia. This is kind of "coming home" for me, as I haven't worked...
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October 18, 2006
Signs You Have Too Much Process
I'm a simple man. I used to program a lot (and still do), but then I got into project management, program management, and finally, teaching process to large organizations and inventing. Along the way, I've been beaten up many,...
September 28, 2006
Lowering Your Altitude: Where does BPM Start?
Recently I was brought in to a small company that had purchased a new enterprise system and wanted to integrate it. What I found was fascinating....
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September 13, 2006
Notes From the Old Man
I liked the Col. Tigh character, until they made him into a caricature. Probably the fault of writers who never knew a really good tough XO I have an affinity towards hard-core characters in fiction and real life. I'm not...
August 18, 2006
FBI and Program Management: The Contractor Made Me Do It
I've just got though reading an article in the Washington Post about the FBI's new Virtual Case File system. It's an incredible story....
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July 19, 2006
Lack of Motivation
I've been getting little emails every day with nice motivational quotes. Stuff like "What you think, you become" and "Success means doing what makes you happy" When you are an inventor like me, everybody is more than willing to give...
June 19, 2006
Good Luck, Ray Ozzie!
Way to go, Ray! But you got a long, hard road ahead of you. Let's take a minute and look at why Microsoft is in the mess it's in right now.
June 13, 2006
Tell Me What I Say
Are we listening? Are we really listening?
June 8, 2006
Helpdesk Form Letters
In my ongoing crusade to provide useful information to IT Professionals and find ways not to work, I'd like to present you with form letters you can use when your users bug you with problems. Let's face it, those users are always whining and complaining about something, so why not give them form letters to moan about too? It'd be a little something extra you offer for no extra charge.
June 4, 2006
Kick me in the Teeth. Please.
Right now at the top of my list for batBack I'm putting together a business plan. I'm doing this for a couple of reasons: 1) to organize my thoughts about where we are, and 2) to seek some mezzanine growth...
May 31, 2006
Business Plan Blues
I'm working on a business plan today for like the third time. I really hate paperwork. Over the past few months I've come to realize that I might need to raise a little bit of funding or take on some...
April 28, 2006
Cool .NET RUP Gig in DC at the Federal Reserve
One of the neatest contracts I've had was working for the Federal Reserve Bank Board of Governors back in 2003. Not only was the view cool -- check out that view from the cafeteria! -- the project was neat and the people were friendly.
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April 17, 2006
Starting Over
Knowing when to say when the secret to project success I'm starting to get that uneasy feeling again. If you've ever doneo software development, you'll understand that it's not like building a bridge. When you build a bridge, you know...
April 6, 2006
JSON vs XML
JSON vs XML
April 1, 2006
Em and Ems
Recently I read an article on the web espousing the use of "em" in measurements for your web page.
September 19, 2005
RFID News
Here's some of the latest RFID news.
September 13, 2005
Santa Discovery Stolen By Spaniards
Dr. Michael Brown of Caltech had discovered something new. It was a bright object out beyond the orbit of Neptune. Did he report it? Of course not.
September 6, 2005
September 3, 2005
Katrina: Strategy Versus Tactics
I'm joining in the Monday-morning quarterbacking here about Katrina, not for political reasons, just to provide a little insight.
August 31, 2005
Moon Invasion By Rocket Penguins Possible!
Defense contractor Raytheon has developed a robot, dubbed the Lunar Penguin, that could one day bounce across perilous craters and imposing mountains on the Moon's craggy surface using a set of compact rocket boosters.
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August 30, 2005
RFID Update
RFID, or Radio Frequency Identification, is a really hot topic among today's retailers. Here's a recap of several articles over the last couple of weeks.
August 29, 2005
Don't Reinvent the Wheel
Some more news is leaking out of NASA this week, with rumors that the new Crew Exploration Vehicle will be based on existing technology, either one of the military rockets or a modification of the shuttle engines already developed.
August 14, 2005
Managing Secret Programs
I'm beginning to believe that the US has a new secret aiframe, the TR-3B.
August 12, 2005
Trillion Here, Trillion There
Some of these solutions hurt worse than the original problems.
August 2, 2005
Making Mistakes
This morning, over my first Diet Mtn. Dew, I got a comment about the blog. I can't repeat all the language invovled, but suffice it to say the author was displeased. I think his words were that I was "so ******* boring I am going to go and kill myself as soon as I click post."
July 29, 2005
RFID -- Another Bubble?
There's word that Alien Technologies, an RFID company, just secured $66 million in second-round financing. That's great! But I keep getting this funny feeling that there is a bubble in here somewhere....
July 26, 2005
Infrastructure -- Not As Sexy, but More Important
Everybody wants to write the killer application, the killer web site, the killer marketing plan. When a program like the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter comes along, it doesn't get a lot of attention. That's a shame.
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Attack of the Network Nazis
I was onsite today (I guess I can tell stories -- this is not meant as a criticism of my current client) and went to check my webmail during lunch. "WARNING: FORBIDDEN SITE" the screen warned, "ACTIVITY IS LOGGED". It also gave me my network username and IP address.
Jeesh! I kind of feel like I got caught trying to lift a candy bar from the 7-11 when this happens. I quickly looked around -- were the coppers after me yet?
July 25, 2005
Software Valuation: Tidbits
Here are a couple tidbits about software valuation in the news recently. First, somebody with knowledge of arbitrage and derivatives took a look at software valuation. His results? somewhere around 85% of the price of software is in maintenance, upgrades, etc. Frankly, I find his analysis a little lacking, in that he did not mention integration costs at all, which as we all know rise exponentially with the number of systems deployed. Plus, it sounds like a shill for open source -- not that I think there isn't a great argument FOR open source, this just wasn't it.
July 23, 2005
The Reading List: Good Entrepreneurial Program Management
I'm writing a little less and reading more for a week or so. I'm reading "A Good Hard Kick In The Ass", by Rob Adams. So far, it looks interesting -- Rob presents himself as the ultimate pragmatist in what works and doesn't work with business ventures. I'll let you know when I finish -- so many of these books are all written by experts, and yet so many of them disagree. Geesh! Busines books are like diet books -- everybody has one and they all promise a miracle insight. We'll see. If you're interested in the book, you can find it on Amazon here.
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Intel Finds Huge Savings In MetaData
Word from Intel that they are saving six dollars for each dollar spent in managing metadata. Aside from just software artifacts, I'd like to see them do a similar thing with process control metadata. Probably a lot more money to...
July 21, 2005
The Future Of Computing
Some really cool news out today. First, a company called EtherTouch has invented a system that uses electric fields in the body to interact with the computer. Wave your hand, point your finger, etc, and the computer responds. You may have seen something like this in the movie "Minority Report". It's not just that your finger takes the place of a mouse; it also opens up computer to more 3-D interfacing with people. The company anticipates the first-adopters will be tablet computers. I know I want one! And what's the screen going to look like?
Amazing
Astrophysicists at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology have captured footage of Pluto's moon, Charon, blotting out the light from a single star. While we're able to see things so far away, we still don't know what happened to this woodpecker...
July 20, 2005
Portfolio Management For Government Agencies
One of the hottest topics today in the IT world is portfolio management. There are a lot of definitions, but for us, let's look at all of the activity of an IT department like an investment portfolio. After all, that's really what it is. So the logical questions are: what's the dollars associated with each activity, and how do I decide whether to keep something in my portfolio or get rid of it?
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Robot Soccer Champions By 2050?
They picked a pretty hard thing for robots to do, so when the robots finally win, and they will, it will be a major milestone in our own evolution.
July 19, 2005
Endgame: Winzip Bought Out By VC Firm
Looks like word today is that Winzip, the popular file compression program, has been bought out by a VC firm. The firm promises to "more agressively" pester users about paying for the program. Talk about pouring good money after bad.
July 18, 2005
Compete? Or Cooperate?
Slow news day, but Slate is running an article about how Hollywood uses a common database system to prevent movies from directly competing with each other. Now I tend to think direct competition is a good thing. The author of...
The Oracle Speaks: Pricing Must Be More Complicated
Oracle recently announced that pricing for its database is going to get even more complicated than it already was, due to the prevalence of multi-core processors. Let's assume for a minute that somehow this makes sense to established customers. How the heck are new endeavors supposed to price-compare development options?
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July 16, 2005
Podcasting: Can Business Adapt?
Blogging and podcasting have taken the business world almost completely by suprise, pitting millions of individuals as content providers up against "old" media giants. ABC is running a story about how podcasting is the next big land rush. But where is the money?
July 14, 2005
Extra Bang, Same Buck
It's a sign of a good project that the costs are low, the mission is a success, and there are "freebies" at the end. Too many times, in my opinion, NASA has engineered it's way out of politically workable missions. I'm glad to see them making some wins as well.
Spiderman Joins Microsoft
News today that Microsoft has licensed all of Marvel's 5000 characters for online gaming. You think your boss is bad, try working with the X-Men for a while: that brainy-head thing has got to hurt!...
Shuttle Manages To Not Fly Again
Good luck to the great guys at NASA -- let's hope they have a picture-perfect launch and mission next week. They could use a little manned spaceflight experience about now.
July 11, 2005
Enterprise Software Sales Lagging
It's almost enough for me to give Willie Nelson's new reggae album a try. Well, I said almost.
Customers Complain? Stop Listening
People have a tendency to listen to what they want to, especially in large organizations. That's why its no surprise that Dell seems to have shut down it's customer support forums. The rumor is because people were using the forum...
July 9, 2005
Breaking Vegas: Lessons in Project Management
Instead, maybe we should all concentrate on the fundamentals. That doesn't mean that there never should be any complexity -- far from it. But that if we grow complex solutions, it should be a natural consequence of playing by the book. I try to remember the old saying KISS. Keep It Simple, Stupid.
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Get On the Grid
It's a wonder dog groomers don't offer grid services as well. Everybody else does.
July 8, 2005
V-22 Osprey: Cool, Fast, and Expensive
I love the V-22 Osprey. As a fixed-wing pilot, there's something ultimately cool about being able to take off like a helicopter and cruise like a jet. But talk about poor program management! Software that kills people, testing data...
July 7, 2005
Culture Clash: It isn't Just About Geography
I learned a lot of great lessons from that contract. You can't have a productive, decision-making meeting with 20 or more people in the room. 5-10 is pushing it. And failure to understand culture and deal with it is the same thing as failure to deliver.
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SarBox For the Feds
Congrats to IBM, however, in being the first to release the tool. What with the October deadline approaching and this being the end of the Federal Fiscal year (with managers sitting on a lot of funds that need to be distributed) things are looking up for Big Blue.
July 6, 2005
Saving Money: One Key to Program Management
But what are some good targets for cost reduction in software development?
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Taking Apart a Press Release
Then performance is poor, people complain, money is poured down the drain, and everybody walks away with clean hands. It's a great country, no?
July 5, 2005
Learn Management, Kid
We can measure, acknowledge, and work around these issues, or we can try to force reality to change from the top. Take a guess at which is going to be more effective.