3 ms·
While recognizing the completely different context, I'd approach it like organized sports management/coaching. There you have disparate members with similar ski
by phreanix 13y ago
While recognizing the completely different context, I'd approach it like organized sports management/coaching. There you have disparate members with similar skillsets but different roles that as a whole contribute to one thing: winning. Trust, respect, belief in each other's abilities, and most of all, pushing HARD to accomplish a shared goal and vision. You have a captain who plays, a coach who is trusted completely, and different roles that are recognized as indispensable yet won't work without the others playing their part.
Of course not everyone wants to be pushed this hard, wants to be part of something like this, and is paid enough to take the obvious abuse. It's just something nice to fantasize about.
- jarrett 13y agoExactly. These types of social attributes are necessary for a software project to succeed. The problem, of course, is that you can't devise a system which will reliably organize an arbitrary group of people* into the kind of effective team you describe. * As an example of an "arbitrary group of people," consider the set of contracted engineers, contracted managers, government employees, and insurance company personnel that had to work together on healthcare.gov. These are people who were not previously on a team together, and who cannot be expected to be of a uniformly high quality.
- phreanix 13y agoWhat if product managers were trained to be more like sports coaches? Motivation, the right game plan, and working hand in hand with other products managers? Doesn't an organization like NASA work somewhat the same way? Different teams tackling different parts of a project and ending up with a rover on Mars?