Professional Documents
Culture Documents
THE MORE
THINGS
CHANGE... BY KARL WIEGERS
Much has happened in the software personal integrity. In a time when jobs effort to conduct reviews signals that
industry since the book was published. are tight, an individual put in this situation peer reviews are a desired behavior.
The agile movement arrived, many com- must balance his professional notion of
panies are outsourcing portions of their appropriate behavior against the possible 3. Ongoing education is every
IT work, and multi-site development is threat of losing his job. The ACM and the team members responsibility.
commonplace. Ive heard that the more IEEE Computer Society have jointly This principle applies now more than
things change, the more they stay the same. adopted a software engineering code of ever. All software practitioners and
In this article, I reflect on those fourteen ethics and professional practice (see the managers should identify their personal
principles to see whether they apply to StickyNotes for a link). It behooves all areas for skill growth and continually
twenty-first-century software development. software professionals to familiarize enhance their capabilities. The skills
themselves with this code and remember mix that contemporary practitioners
1. Never let your boss or it when being pressured to do the need is changing as more development
your customer talk you wrong thing. is outsourced. Some foresee reduced
into doing a bad job. demand for American programmers and
Software professionals sometimes are 2. People need to feel the a greater need for business analysts in
pressured into doing what they consider work they do is appreciated. the future.
to be a bad job. Uninformed managers Software development today can be Conference and training seminar
or customers might challenge a technical a high-stress job with long hours, rapid attendees obviously are trying to better
persons intent to perform a specific activity change, staff turnover, and the constant their software skills. However, I think
(such as a peer review) or to create a threat of outsourcing. Most software we can do a better job as an industry to
particular deliverable (such as a design professionals are nicely compensated for foster professionalism and continuous
model). I knew a manager who informed their efforts. Nonetheless, most people learning. Id like to see more practitioners
his developers that, to save time, he did appreciate receiving rewards and recog- become active members of professional
not want anyone doing any unit testing. nition for their contributions. software organizations, such as the
System testing on that project took twice At a seminar, I once asked seventy Association for Computing Machinery,
as long as planned. Are you surprised? employees of a company if they had a the IEEE Computer Society, and the
As with all philosophical principles, this recognition program. Only a few raised American Society for Quality. Books and
one should be tempered by reality. This is their hands. At a break, the human magazines are good learning mechanisms,
not an open invitation for developers to resources manager whispered to me, but Id like to see higher circulations for
debate endlessly the technical decisions They all have a recognition program. software periodicals. Id also like to see
of the architect. Nor is it intended to en- I whispered back, Its not working. more people pursue professional certifi-
courage analysts and developers to build An invisible recognition program wont cations and advanced degrees, and I
a Cadillac when a Chevy will suffice. be much of a motivator. An effective have great respect for those who do.
Someone needs to make key project program helps with staff retention,
decisions, and the team must respect morale, and quality of work life. 4. Customer involvement is
those decisions. By bad job, I mean an Recognition can be a powerful tool the most critical factor in
action that is unprofessional or clearly for the software manager. Suppose software quality.
will not lead to the desired outcomes. youre attempting to implement peer Shortly after I wrote my initial article,
Resisting the pressure to do a poor reviews. Publicly recognizing the efforts of The Standish Group released its oft-cited
job is a matter of professional ethics and team members who make a good-faith CHAOS report on the sad state of soft-