My team is currently working on two very different programs by pulling work off both backlogs into a single sprint. We did this for pragmatic reasons having to do with our size and the wishes of both the product owners and the team. This was working well when the two programs were clearly defined projects. However, we’re going through a rough patch with one program driving maintenance work and the other rallying towards release. We’re paying a price for context switching with lower point commitments overall per sprint.

Inspect and adapt.

The Washington Post published an article by Lori Aratani, Teens Can Multitask, But What Are Costs?

When subjects were focused on sorting, the hippocampus — the part of the brain responsible for storing and recalling information — was engaged. But when they were multitasking, that part of the brain was quiet and the part of the brain used to master repetitive skills — the striatum — was active.

The Journal of Experimental Psychology published a paper by Joshua S. Rubinstein, David E. Meyer, and Jeffrey E. Evans on Executive Control of Cognitive Processes in Task Switching. As an APA release summarizes:

…subjects lost time when they had to switch from one task to another, and time costs increased with the complexity of the tasks, so it took significantly longer to switch between more complex tasks. Time costs also were greater when subjects switched to tasks that were relatively unfamiliar.

Neither the article or paper distinguish results by gender. The First Sex says that according to gender specific studies women are better multi-taskers than men.

I bring up the gender differences because I work at a women-owned company. One of the benefits is seeing the world from my CEO’s point of view. Sometimes not identifying differences between men and women denies women opportunities, or worse, perpetuates harmful stereotypes. As a society, we are late to acknowledge that women present with heart disease differently than men. This has perpetuated a myth that heart disease is a male illness.

“(A)ccording to the American Heart Association (AHA), more women than men die from heart disease in the U.S., and 1 in 3 women is living with it today” – TIME Magazine

If women are truly better multitaskers, maybe they have some inherent advantages in certain kinds of jobs (like mine ).

Both the men and women developers in my team have acknowledged that the context switching penalty has gotten worse recently. So whatever the difference in this case, some kind of scrum master response is required.

Short link: http://jkat.me/fXIy6l

Tag(s): American Heart Association, CEO, David E. Meyer, Executive, heart disease, Jeffrey E. Evans, Joshua S. Rubinstein, Lori Aratani, male illness, management, scrum, The Washington Post, United States

Comments: none

I just found out that the ambassador to Iraq, Ryan Crocker, is an alumnus of my school, Whitman College.

It’s an interesting coincidence because I’ve been thinking alot about Renee Montagne’s February 7th NPR story:

Like his military counterpart, Lt. Gen. David Petreaus, the new top general in Iraq, Crocker raised questions about the conduct of the war. Now, Crocker and Petreaus are being asked — perhaps too late — to correct it.
…
Crocker and Petreaus will be sent to fix the troubled post-war situation that they warned of four years ago. [Barbara] Bodine [, former ambassador to Yemen,] wonders where the United States might be today, had Crocker and Petreaus been appointed earlier in the war.

“It will be one of the inevitable speculations of history,” she says.

As Demarco and Lister say in Waltzing With Bears: Managing Risk on Software Projects, it can be futile to be the only one in the room acknowledging risk.

It really is so late.

Is it too late for professionals with relevant experience, appropriate authority and a willingness to entertain complexity?

Short link: http://jkat.me/mBOAD4

Tag(s): ambassador, David Petreaus, ethics, Iraq, Lt. Gen., top general, United States, Yemen

Comments: none

Constraints

(July 2008) “There are some 146,000 U.S. soldiers in Iraq, down from a peak of 170,000 in 2007″ — Reuters

“Although no decision has been made, by the time President Bush leaves office on Jan. 20, at least one and as many as 3 of the 15 combat brigades now in Iraq could be withdrawn or at least scheduled for withdrawal, the officials said. The most optimistic course of events would still leave 120,000 to 130,000 American troops in Iraq.” — NYT

(July 2007) “More than 180,000 civilians — including Americans, foreigners and Iraqis — are working in Iraq under U.S. contracts… The numbers include at least 21,000 Americans, 43,000 foreign contractors and about 118,000 Iraqis — all employed in Iraq by U.S. tax dollars.” — LA Times

Goal

“(O)n my first day in office, I would give the military a new mission: ending this war… ensure that our troops were redeployed safely, and our interests protected.” — Barack Obama

Estimate

“Military experts believe we can safely redeploy combat brigades from Iraq at a pace of 1 to 2 brigades a month” — Barack Obama

Target

“…that would remove them in 16 months. That would be the summer of 2010″ — Barack Obama

A lot of attention has been placed on the target of sixteen months and whether Obama will stick to it. Obama has said, “I am going to do a thorough assessment when I’m there,” he said. “I’m sure I’ll have more information and continue to refine my policy.” This has been called a “flip flop” or “reversal”.

But this is a simplistic interpretation of both Obama’s position and the nature of a target. The target is informed by the estimate in an attempt to attain the goal. The target should change as new information provides better estimates and if the adjusted target better attains the goal.

It is not the target but the estimate and goal that need to be debated.

Who are the military experts? Does this estimate represent a consensus among these experts? What are the assumptions surrounding this estimate? Does a range of 1-2 brigades per month represent the full range of uncertainty? What are the set of risks that might scuttle this estimate?

What does safety mean in the context of a war? What does it mean to ensure our “interests” are “protected”? What kinds of events would threaten our interests and change the redeployment schedule?

As long as our public debate focuses on positional bargaining around targets we will continue to miss the point.

Short link: http://jkat.me/eIRKk1

Tag(s): 15 combat brigades, Barack Obama, Bush, estimation, Iraq, LA Times, president, Reuters, United States

Comments: 1

From the New York Times article, Vast Spy System Loots Computers in 103 Countries, by John Markoff

Intelligence analysts say many governments, including those of China, Russia and the United States, and other parties use sophisticated computer programs to covertly gather information.

The electronic spy game has had at least some real-world impact, they said. For example, they said, after an e-mail invitation was sent by the Dalai Lama’s office to a foreign diplomat, the Chinese government made a call to the diplomat discouraging a visit. And a woman working for a group making Internet contacts between Tibetan exiles and Chinese citizens was stopped by Chinese intelligence officers on her way back to Tibet, shown transcripts of her online conversations and warned to stop her political activities.

Short link: http://jkat.me/fNNPyQ

Tag(s): China, Chinese government, Chinese intelligence, diplomat, ethics, foreign diplomat, John Markoff, morality, New York Times, online conversations, Russia, spy, spying, technology, Tibet, United States, Vast Spy

Comments: none

Grassroots developer communities form around shared values in dissent against institutions and norms that dehumanize their work and diminish their efforts. They attack these orthodoxies with humor, heretical thinking, and hard work.

This benefits society when developers defy those with greater power. It harms society when developers bully people with less power.

At the ThoughtWorks sponsored Agile East, Martin Fowler spoke to his post, SmutOnRails.

Part of the community was offended by a presentation at the GoGaRuCo (Golden Gate Ruby Conference). Others fought back saying that no offense was meant, the presenter apologized, and that the tone was in the spirit of the Rails community.

(T)he view of the rails leadership seems to be this: that the objections to the presentation are yet another attempt to foist empty corporate values on the thriving Rails ecosystem… (more)

This debate is not unique to the Rails community. It reminds me of concerns my friend, Luke Melia, raised over jokes and behavior at the first Austin Alt.NET. Martin Fowler links off to a similar controversy in the Flash community.

It is also not unique to developer communities but developers in particular need to be concerned about the outcome.

Women, African Americans and Hispanics are under-represented in IT and even more so in software development. In 2001-2002 74.4% of software developers were men. 78% of those men were white.

In 1986 the percentage of women in CS programs peaked at 37%. The percentage of women in computer science programs has gone down since then.

In 2001-2, only 28 percent of all undergraduate degrees in computer science went to women. By 2004-5, the number had declined to only 22 percent. — What Has Driven Women Out of Computer Science?, NY Times

There were 15,000 women in CS progreams in 1986. Riding natural cycles this number was not matched again until 2003. This latter number contains a higher percentage of non-resident aliens who will not necessarily contribute to the US workforce.

This despite higher percentages and numbers of women acquiring college educations than men. In 2007, 33% of women 25-29 held a four year degree or higher versus 26% of men. 55% of graduates with four year degrees or higher aged 25-29 were women.

Women are even receiving the majority of degrees in science and technology. They have shown steady progress in biology, chemistry, physics, mathematics and engineering.

Metrics can be misinterpreted but these quantitative measures support a stunningly obvious anecdotal observation. US software developers are a white male enclave.

This is a power imbalance and we developers are part of the problem.

Isolation is a key factor for a higher attrition rate among women and minorities, said Teresa Dahlberg, director of the Diversity in Information Technology Institute at UNC Charlotte. People tend to associate with “like communities,” where people have similar backgrounds and interests, she explained. — Computer science lacks women, minorities, SD Times

So when we behave in a way that marginalizes and intimidates talented women and minorities, we abuse power. We become bullies. We are oppressors.

“There is a good amount of research that shows that women are judged more harshly than men, for hiring, evaluations and promotions,” she added. “Virginia Valian [author of "Why So Slow? The Advancement of Women"] shows this for women in science, technology, engineering and math faculty jobs.” Virginia Valian is a professor at Hunter College. — SD Times

Part of the problem may be a perception that software development doesn’t contribute enough to society. To the degree this perception is true it is damning. To the degree it is just a perception we have work to do as advocates.

Our actions need to be judged not by our intentions but by the outcome.

Requisite variety within our teams remains an essential enabling condition for sustained innovation.

Access to technology is growing across all tiers of class, race and gender both in the US and overseas. Diverse teams can better address our market and build software better adapted to our end users.

A more diverse workforce provides the kind of social change that will help us create a more humane workplace for developers.

Finally, anything that limits the number of able US software developers hurts our ability to compete.

When developer communities marginalize women and minorities, we conspire to isolate ourselves from the larger society. We defeat our own attempts to change the power structures around us and improve our lot and our output.

Short link: http://jkat.me/7kfHtY

Tag(s): Austin Alt.NET, colleagues, Computer, creativity, developers, director of the Diversity, dissent, ethics, Hunter College, Information Technology, Information Technology Institute, Luke Melia, Martin Fowler, minorities, power, professor, sexism, software developer, software developers, software development, Teresa Dahlberg, United States, Virginia Valian, women

Comments: 1