Better Software Magazine Articles

Knowing the Odds

Want to know what you’re up against before you start? In just one afternoon, you can perform a simple risk analysis for your project. Doing so can ensure that you are better prepared for whatever surprises may lay ahead. Payson Hall teaches you how to do that in this article.

Payson Hall's picture Payson Hall
Show and Tell

It's critical that you discover the defects before your customers do. Metrics give you plenty of data, but creating charts and graphs that properly showcase this data can be difficult. In this article, read about six techniques that can help make this task a lot easier.

The Upside of Downsizing

This article gives some pointers on surviving downsizing and will introduce you to the Scrum process. Scrum empowers teams by allowing requirements to be fluid while work is progressing. Learn what steps to follow to simplify and streamline your project by adopting this process.

Mike Cohn's picture Mike Cohn
Are You Listening?

Chances are you won't be able to deliver on everything your customer wants. Asking good questions at the beginning of a project can help you determine where your customer wants to go. Although you may not be able to give them everything they want, if you are able to deliver the top ten things on a list of fifty items you've still delivered value. Keeping the lines of communication open is essential to helping you achieve your project goal.

Esther Derby's picture Esther Derby
The Productivity Factor

How effectively and efficiently your team functions can make the difference between project success and project failure. Once a decision-making process is established, it is up to the project manager to hold the team accountable to the process. Over time, processes can stagnate and lose their relevance. The project manager should continually monitor the process for applicability and make adjustments where necessary. Learn how to leverage your team's performance through process, structure, and team leadership.

Geof Lory's picture Geof Lory
A Calculated Gamble

Starting a project without considering the risks is quite a gamble. Learn how to increase your odds through the practice of good risk management. Effective organizations recognize that bad stuff may happen during a project. Risk management is about anticipating what might happen, examining and prioritizing those possible bad events, and figuring out what to do about them. In this article, review the Risk Management Glossary and discover remedies to risks that may help you prevent many common problems.

Payson Hall's picture Payson Hall
Making Virtual Teams a Reality

What all virtual teams have in common is that they are working on a project, but may not be located in close physical proximity, and they must find ways to communicate, track progress, and manage tasks without being able to physically meet regularly. The prerequisites for success with virtual teams are 1) clear, manageable objectives; 2) management's commitment to necessary resources; and 3) mature management and technical personnel. Learn how to lead a workgroup you cannot see.

Linda McInnis
It's in the Bag

Kristi Wheeler wanted to create a forum in which all of the testers in her company could come together to talk about their skills, learn more about testing, and bring individual experiences into a group setting. Here, she describes how she started up brown bag groups for testers and developers in her organization–and how you can start them in your own company.

Kristi Wheeler
Eileen and Wayne Strider on Building and Managing Technical Teams

Eileen and Wayne Strider recommend some useful resources for building and managing technical teams. Technical team leaders have two different yet related responsibilities. One responsibility is to build a product such as a system, an application, a network, or a Web site. The second responsibility is to build and maintain their team's ability to work together so they can build a product. Building a product requires the right mix of technical skills and experience. Building a team's ability to work together requires a different skill set. Reading about those skills is valuable, but practice is essential.

Eileen Strider Wayne Strider
Wall-to-Wall Tools

Got blank walls? Instead of hiring a decorator, perhaps you should enlist the help of a facilitator. This article examines how three experts use the wall in very different ways to make retrospectives, design, and collaboration better and easier.

Amanda Sulock

Pages

CMCrossroads is a TechWell community.

Through conferences, training, consulting, and online resources, TechWell helps you develop and deliver great software every day.