Nuggets of Wisdom From The Cluetrain Manifesto
Fellow Tacit Passengers on the Cluetrain Manifesto Express:
So I am working my way through Cluetrain this weekend hoping to complete it before our discussion group on Tuesday and I am kind of having a hard time hanging in there with the book as it goes through some dry spells. But them WHAMMO! a great section or nugget of truth will really jump out at me. Last night it was this passage from pages 129-130:
“We often assume that complex projects can only be accomplished through centralized planning and control. It worked for building the Hoover Dam, after all. Not to mention World War II.
“But of course, in only works for some types of wars in some types of places. And the builders of the Hoover Dam aimed at creating a massive physical object with delicate dependencies so that there was only one way to succeed and many ways to fail.”
The light bulb come on! That’s it! This is why do so many people in the software development business, especially architects, continue to manage by command and control. They believe that there is only one way to succeed in building an application – THEIR WAY. But with software development there are MANY ways to succeed (and of course still many ways to fail).
This insight gives me a way to help determine if waterfall or agile is appropriate for a project. Yes, I believe that there are situations where waterfall is appropriate. So the question becomes: am I faced with initial constraints that dictates details of the solution or can that solution emerge? And if I am faced with these kinds of constraints, are they the preferences, styles, latest fads or bigotry of an architect or manager, or are they real constraints?
I’m going back to reading now…thanks for listening!
Tom
