How to screw your development team

youngjoo — Sat, 12 Aug 2006 03:09:00 GMT

Kris – COO
Jim – EVP of Division X
YJ – Development Manager in Division X
Mike – Lead Developer in Division X
Paul – Development Manager in Division Y

Conversation #3: 3:00 PM, Kris & Mike

KRIS: You better have a good explanation of why project X is not done yet.

MIKE: I am working as hard as I can but it will take some time to finish.

K: Non-sense. If you have been working as hard as you can, you would have finished this project 6 months ago.

M: We started this project 6 months ago.

K: According to my estimate, this should only have taken 2 weeks.

M: …

K: What time did you get to work this morning?

M: 9 AM.

K: What time did you leave yesterday?

M: 5 PM.

K: This is exactly what I am talking about. You are not motivated at all to finish this project. You have no urgency!!

M: I completely understand how important this project is to you. And as I said, I am working as hard as I possibly can.

K: No, you are not. What percentage of your time was spent on this project past 6 months?

M: I would say 50%.

K: What have you done with the other 50%?

M: I still need to support the team with their current project. I am the only one who knows about modules they are modifying. That project is suffering also since I am not available full-time to support.

K: Why did you let that happen? What happened to sharing knowledge? Let them figure it out. Everyone in your team is wasting company's money!!

M: They are also trying their best to avoid interrupting me. But when we worked on those modules, you put everyone on another project and I was the only one available to work on them.

K: Oh, now you are blaming me?

M: No, sir. Just trying to explain.

K: Your team has never been reliable! The other team working on this project has already finished their part and is doing final testing. It only took them 2 weeks!

M: I would like to understand how that's even possible.

K: Go talk to Paul. I had a status meeting this morning with him. Let's do this. You tell me when you can really finish this thing. Give me the date.

M: …

K: …

M: …

K: …

M: I guess another two weeks maybe.

K: Ok. Here's what I will do to help you. Since all the noise coming from your team is making you less productive, I can put you in a separate office all by yourself. If you need faster computer, I will have IT set it up for you tonight. I can even throw in two 32" monitors. I will buy you lunch and even dinner if you need everyday and will provide car service for your commute. I can also talk to your wife. Let's get this done in two weeks.

M: …

K: I will see you in two weeks.

Conversation #2: 2:00 PM, YJ & Mike

YJ: KRIS will come down to talk to you. He's very unhappy about the project.

MIKE: What else is new?

Y: He's serious this time. I had a meeting this morning with him. He said that Paul's team already finished their part and is about to start testing. According to him, it only took two weeks which is what Paul has been telling everyone since the beginning.

M: You mean for past six months, right?

Y: Yeah. Paul's been saying "two weeks" for past six months. Anyway, I have a feeling that Kris will try to make a deal with you.

M: What do you mean?

Y: He thinks putting you in a locked room with fastest workstation and feeding meals to you will make you finish the project.

M: What the…

Y: I know. Jim was there, too. Jim has been telling Kris that there are other more important commitments to make. This is Jim's division after all and if Jim can't meet financial goal, he's screwed. You know that Jim is betting everything on the project our team is currently working on, right?

M: Yeah. I've been trying to help them. They are lost without me. I should have never worked on those modules alone.

Y: Jim and I have tried to stop Kris but he did not listen. He will come and talk to you at 3:00 PM. Just be honest with him about the progress.

M: We are months away. How can I tell him that?

Y: Jim and I explained where we were. So, he should be expecting it. Remember, just be honest with him.

M: Ok, I guess.

Conversation #1: 10:00 AM, Kris, Jim & YJ

KRIS: So, how's Mike doing?

YJ: He's still working on the project.

K: You know this is 6^th month that he's been on that project. Why is he still not done?

Y: Haven't we told you that it was a big project? From what I see, Mike is making a tremendous progress on the project.

K: Your division has been doing very poorly financially. No contribution to the company's bottom-line at all!

JIM: Kris, that's exactly why I need Mike on another project YJ's team is working on. That project is too critical for my division.

K: Mike would have been on that project if he finished his 6 months ago.

Y: Kris, it's a big project and there's no way we could have finished it in two weeks.

K: Paul's team did it. Met with Paul right before this meeting and he said they were pretty much done with a couple of bugs to address.

Y: Their scope was much smaller than ours.

K: I don't get it. You guys are making same changes to your systems. I can't understand why it takes longer to do it on your side. Paul's team only spent two weeks!

Y: We have two completely different systems.

J: Kris. I seriously need Mike back. The project he's working on adds no value to my business. We've wasted enough time already.

K: You are wrong, Jim. It has long-term strategic value. It's very important for our company.

J: I cannot meet my commitments this year if we keep spending money on Mike's project.

K: Have Mike finish his project so that he can help. By the way, Paul's division has been making great progress with their business. New deals are coming in.

Y: Kris, we should pull Mike out of his project right now. Otherwise, we won't meet our goals this year.

K: Guys. You are making me to do something that I never want to do. I've only done this once in the past and I believe this is the only solution.

J: What is it?

K: I will put Mike in a locked room with fastest computer we can get. I will buy him food everyday. I will let him use our car service to commute. I will make sure that no one bothers him so that he can focus. It always works. I've done this once before and it worked beautifully.

Y: Jim actually told me about that plan you had discussed with him. I disagree. It will not only hurt his pride, it could have significant impact on others. Please don't go there. Those things won't help him a bit.

K: That's the only way you guys can get out of this mess and have a chance to get back on track. Please set up a meeting with Mike this afternoon. I will talk to him.

J: Kris, YJ and I talked about that and YJ really doesn't think it's such a good idea.

K: Then finish the damn project now! You guys are wasting my money!

Conversation #4: a couple of months later, YJ & Mike

YJ: Mike, I was in a meeting with Kris and Paul. We discussed the project you are working on. Paul's team apparently lost the developer who originally worked on it. And no one can figure out where things are right now.

MIKE: I thought they were done?

Y: Apparently, they were nowhere near done. It's not even testable.

M: Huh? Didn't Paul say that it only took them two weeks and they were just fixing a couple of bugs?

Y: Yeah, he did. But when they were asked to do some demo, they couldn't produce anything. Maybe they did some very basic stuff. Or maybe they used crap load of hacks to finish in two weeks and never tested it. Anyway, they are rolling back their changes completely.

M: What the… Are they going to start over?

Y: No. They have something else they need to address and they have no idea when they will be able to get that project started again.

M: Did Kris let them do that?

Y: Yeah. They were losing so many customers because their product was so unstable. They've been losing a lot of money.

M: …

Y: By the way, thanks for going beyond to help with the team to finish and launch their project. Jim has been working with marketing and product teams to talk to our customers. I think customers are really happy about those new fixes.

M: Well, I couldn't let the team suffer because of the mess I created.

Y: It wasn't your fault that you were the only one who knew ins and outs of those modules. You did great.

M: Well, I contributed to the problem.

Y: I think Linda will help you finish your project. Since your project also involves those modules you trained her on, it will definitely help you.

M: Yeah, I've already started talking to her.

- THE END –

Joel's The Econ 101 Management Method inspired me to write this. Yes, this really happened even though above story has some exaggerations. I owe a lot to Mike (not a real name, of course) and his team. I could have stopped the mess very early on had I been brave enough. I will discuss what I've learned in future posts.

Special thanks to Daryl who forwarded Joel's article to me and help bring out ugly side of my career. You have an amazing skill to make me think. :)

This blog was written and published using Microsoft Word 2007 Beta.

Technorati Tags: software+engineering management developer

You and Your Manager

youngjoo — Mon, 10 Jul 2006 20:46:00 GMT

I got a perfect article for you if you've been wondering about what the heck your manager does and how to work with him/her so that you can be successful.

Deconstructing Managers Day 1
Deconstructing Managers Day 2
Deconstructing Managers Day 3
Deconstructing Managers Day 4
Deconstructing Managers Day 5
Deconstructing Managers Day 6

By the way, if you are not reading Rands In Repose, you are missing out a lot. I stopped my daily visit to Joel's blog once I discovered Rands!

Technorati Tags: software+engineering management

My Goal

youngjoo — Sat, 01 Jul 2006 10:19:00 GMT

Change the world.

Will take my entire life to achieve this goal. But I will never get bored for sure.

Technorati Tags: career

Yag moves on and why I believe our paths will cross again

youngjoo — Fri, 05 May 2006 22:16:00 GMT

Yag moves on. He used to be the Group Manager of Visual Studio Data team before the team got merged into Visual Basic product unit and became a part of Visual Studio Professional Data team. Although I only spent a couple of months in Visual Studio Data team and only had 1 face-to-face meeting with him, I learned a lot from him. You see, it really doesn't require multiple encounters to learn great stuff from a great person. You know it when you meet that kind of person and you naturally absorb great stuff from that person like a dry sponge. That's what happened when I met yag.

Well, I actually had two face-to-face "official" meetings with him. One was during my interview and one was after I joined VS Data team. I think I only spent abouut 30 min with him during my interview. But that 30 min definitely helped me decide to eventually accept the offer. I met great people during my interview process and yag just sealed it at the end. We mostly talked about my passion around Agile Development. The second "official" meeting was the 1-on-1 he scheduled with me. During that meeting, he showed his passion around community. We also shared some frustration about how community stuff was done. Oh, don't get me wrong. That frustration was from being too passionate about something. I guess "frustration" is the wrong word for that...

Now, why do I think our paths will cross again? It's because we share same passion, creating great software that customer really needs by being pragmatic (Agile + Community). If you ask me, I rather listen to the customer and provide solution that just works as soon as possible rather than worrying about hundreds of other political, process and architectural things (a.k.a. impediments). If you ask me, I rather sit with the customer during the project cycle than in my own office guessing what customer needs. If you ask me, I get more excited when I get a small "thank you" note from the customer I helped than when I receive a "job well done" message from my manager. And I believe that's where yag's passion lies also.

Best wishes to yag in his new and exciting role.

Tags: microsoft, agile development, community

Only Passionate People Win : Passionate People

How to screw your development team

You and Your Manager

My Goal

Yag moves on and why I believe our paths will cross again