Welcome,
This blog was produced to create a space to discuss how IT professionals manage the high-tension pressures of work life in the Information Age.
Why call it Optimal Friction™? Simply put, we find that, for those of us in the field of Information Technology, high-pressure demands are a breeding ground for friction within and between organizations that affect us both personally and professionally. In this environment – to build more and more in less and less time – friction is a fact of life. Small amounts are unrealistic – too much can exacerbate conflict and drive a team to failure. Somewhere in between lies a sweet spot where friction is optimal, serving a useful purpose, but not causing collapse - at work, in health, and at home.
We encourage our fellow professionals to weigh in on this topic. We want to share ideas and solutions. Welcome to the conversation.
- Michael Mah
August 1, 2010
Does Outsourcing Destroy IT Innovation?
Andy Grove penned a fascinating commentary about the impact of outsourcing on American job creation, and the subsequent ability to innovate in the sectors that have been outsourced. He challenges the belief that as long as knowledge work stays in the United States, it doesn't matter what happens to factory jobs. Grove believes that, "not only did we lose an untold number of jobs, we broke the chain of experience that is important for technological evolution." Grove makes a good argument that, over time, companies lose the ability to innovate in the sectors they outsource. Read more...
Fascinating article here by Susan Cramm out of the Harvard Business Review, posted by Bloomberg.
Does Outsourcing Destroy IT Innovation?
Andy Grove penned a fascinating commentary about the impact of outsourcing on American job creation, and the subsequent ability to innovate in the sectors that have been outsourced. He challenges the belief that as long as knowledge work stays in the United States, it doesn't matter what happens to factory jobs. Grove believes that, "not only did we lose an untold number of jobs, we broke the chain of experience that is important for technological evolution." Grove makes a good argument that, over time, companies lose the ability to innovate in the sectors they outsource. Read more...
Continue reading "Does Outsourcing Destroy IT Innovation?"
Posted by Mike at 7:22 PM | Comments (0) |
June 7, 2010
In Las Vegas for Better Software Conference?
If you are in Las Vegas attending this year's combined Better Software Conference / Agile Development Practices conference and expo, please come join Michael Mah on Weds, June 9 @ 4 pm PST. He will be offering "Rightsizing Your Project in a Down Economy" As the description notes: "In tough times, both shoes often drop simultaneously. Then, unsustainable “scarcity thinking” takes over. Many times, the tendency is to say “yes” to impossible dates, take on too much, quietly suffer the budget cuts, and pray that heroics will save the day. Resulting dysfunction can wreak havoc on your projects in the... more...
Posted by Sean at 3:35 PM | Comments (0) |
May 25, 2010
Hanging Out with Ken Schwaber...
... and keynoting with him at the Central Ohio Agile Association 2010 Conference, "The Path to Agility".
PLUS! My good friend Dr. Israel Gat will be there as well along with an incredible attendee list. As always I'll have some surprising benchmark stats to share, which I also presented last week at SET 2010 in Zurich Switzerland.
Here's Ken's keynote address overview. If you're anywhere near Columbus Ohio this Thursday, be there or be square!!
Ken Schwaber "State of Scrum"
The Agile Manifesto was created and signed in 2001. In 2008, more organizations reported using agile processes to develop software than waterfall. Of these organizations, 84% reported using Scrum as their agile process. Is that good, or bad, or somewhere in between. This questions has pertinence because less than 505 of the organizations reportedly using Scrum also reported using iterative, incremental techniques. Even worse, Martin Fowler reported on observing many cases of “flaccid” Scrum.
Scrum has been around for 19 years, proving both its worth and the difficulty to effectively use it. Ken will discuss this history, the findings, the current state of Scrum, and the next steps.
Ken Schwaber developed the Scrum process with Jeff Sutherland in the early 1990’s and has gone on to test and popularize its use. Ken was a signatory to the Agile Manifesto in 2001, and has founded the Agile Alliance and Scrum Alliance. Ken has been a software developer for over 30 years, from hacked to procedural to object, from bottle-washer to cook.
more...Continue reading "Hanging Out with Ken Schwaber..."
Posted by Mike at 8:42 PM | Comments (0) |
May 18, 2010
Showing Off the iPad in Zurich
This was fun... Europe doesn't get the iPad until the end of May, so after my SET 2010 conference speech on Offshore Outsourcing vs. Agile, we flashed the 'Pad at the booth and got tons of visitors. Yeah, that's cheating, I know...
Continue reading "Showing Off the iPad in Zurich"
Posted by Mike at 9:00 PM | Comments (0) |
April 20, 2010
What QSM and SLIM Are Finding re: Agile
This Thursday April 22nd I'm presenting case study research on Agile methods at the Nashua Scrum Club in Nashua NH. It's entitled, "The Good, the Bad, and the Puzzling; The Agile Experience at Five Companies (UPDATED!)"
This talk has elements of a keynote address from recent conferences like Better Software and Agile Development Practices. It also packed the house at the OOP Conference earlier this year in Munich Germany. Since you wouldn't have to fly though ash-laden skies in Europe to come join us, come to Nashua NH if you're in town.
The meeting will be held at 6:00 PM on Thursday, April 22. Registration and more information is available via Eventbrite.
The Good, Bad, and the Puzzling: The Agile Experience at Five Companies
Strategic software development - and failures - happen every day; Agile methods offer a major paradigm shift. But are they working? Drawing from industry statistics, Michael answers vital questions about Agile’s effectiveness, which may be turning the “law of software physics” upside down. Until now, there have been predictable relationships among schedule, staffing, quality; industry data indicates Agile may be changing all this. See productivity findings at 5 Agile companies, & the results for time-to-market, productivity, & quality. Learn the right practices for your environment, including characteristics of successful measurement. See how metrics reveal insights into Agile approaches that are becoming mainstream.
more...Continue reading "What QSM and SLIM Are Finding re: Agile"
Posted by Mike at 11:41 AM | Comments (0) |
April 13, 2010
Rightsizing Your Project In a Down Economy
Tomorrow at the Software Quality Group of New England, I'm giving a speech entitled, "Rightsizing Your Project In a Down Economy."
Truth be told, whether the economy is up or down for you, the ideas will strike a chord. I'll be showing QSM Industry Case Studies where technology managers set the wrong dates, over-committed on scope, and staffed a project entirely wrong. The good news out of these disasters - is that we see how to get it RIGHT!
If you're in Burlington MA near the Sun Microsystems campus, come on down. Directions are here.
Rightsizing Your Project In a Down Economy
Abstract: In tough times, both shoes drop and “scarcity thinking” often takes over for senior execs, managers, and development teams. In this environment, dysfunction can wreak havoc on your projects in the form of scope greed, death-march deadlines, and budget cuts. Often, the tendency is to say “yes” to impossible dates, take on too much, suffer the budget cuts, and pray that heroics might save the day. This is a sure-fire formula for sky-high defects.
But… Project disasters are NOT fait-accompli. It takes a skillful manager to “rightsize” critical projects – right team, right scope, right dates – at the beginning. Scarcity thinking threatens all three. Michael describes how to have these difficult conversations and discuss the “undiscussables.” He shares how to artfully frame these trade-offs for stakeholders to set priorities and get buy-in, using a blend of common sense, essential measurement concepts, and rules of software estimation. Whether you’re agile, waterfall, or offshore, you’ll discover information you need to make the right choices and get the support of your team.
Target Audience: CIOs, Directors, VPs, Software Engineering Managers
Pre-Requisites: Organizational and Project Leadership
Level: Intermediate- Advanced
Continue reading "Rightsizing Your Project In a Down Economy "
Posted by Mike at 4:47 PM | Comments (0) |
March 9, 2010
Israel Gat Blog Post on Agile Productivity
Combining technical debt figures with productivity data is an effective way to consider the pros and cons of “fix it” versus starting afresh. The combination of the two simplifies a complex investment decision by reducing all considerations to a single common denominator – $$.
This is a very nice article by Israel Gat on Agile Productivity, Quality, and Value metrics, where he combines ideas that both Jim Highsmith and I have been espousing for some time.
Follow Israel Gat on twitter @agile_exec
Enjoy :)
http://www.dzone.com/links/how_to_combine_development_productivity_data_with.html
more...Continue reading "Israel Gat Blog Post on Agile Productivity"
Posted by Mike at 3:54 PM | Comments (0) |
March 5, 2010
Agile Symposium at Quick Solutions Inc.
Quick Solutions Inc. in Columbus Ohio asked if I'd be their featured speaker at their Agile Symposium for the company and it's clients. It's called, "Agile vs. Industry, How Does Agile Compare?"
Well, one exciting aspect of this speech will be "How does QSI compare?" Their teams provided basic velocity, effort, and defect metrics, and the results are superb. I decided to create a case study on their behalf, and combine it with slides from my OOP Conference speech that I gave in Munich, Germany about a month ago.
This is going to be an incredible day of debate, dialog, and town-meeting style discussion of Agile. If you're part of the Quick Solutions client community, don't miss it! Unless you want to wait and see about coming to Germany next year if I deliver a similar talk there... :) http://bit.ly/cNHkRu
Text of the announcement is below, with pictures of their Agile environment:
Many companies are adopting Agile practices in an effort to increase project throughput, reduce cost, and improve quality. But are they working? Drawing from industry statistics, Michael answers vital questions about Agile’s effectiveness, which may be turning the “law of software physics” upside down. Until now, there have been predictable relationships among schedule, staffing, and quality; industry data indicates Agile may be changing all this. See productivity findings at 5 Agile companies, and the results for time-to-market, productivity, and quality. Learn the right practices for your environment, including characteristics of successful measurement. See how metrics reveal insights into Agile approaches that are becoming mainstream.
Michael Mah is managing partner at QSM Associates Inc. He teaches, writes, and consults to technology companies on estimating and managing software projects, whether in-house, offshore, waterfall, or agile. He is the director of the Benchmarking Practice at the Cutter Consortium, a US-based IT think-tank. With over 25 years of experience, QSM has derived productivity patterns for thousands of projects collected worldwide. His work examines time-pressure dynamics of teams, and its role in project success and failure. His background is in physics and electrical engineering, and he is a mediator specializing in conflict resolution for technology projects.
Continue reading "Agile Symposium at Quick Solutions Inc."
Posted by Mike at 1:49 PM | Comments (0) |
January 24, 2010
OOP 2010 Conference Munich Germany
Arrived safe and sound in Munich Germany, preparing to speak at the OOP 2010 Conference. The people are friendly here :) Nice to be in Europe again. Special thanks to Gunter Fuhrmeister, Frances Paulish, Wolfgang Reuter, and Thorsten Janning, who invited me to contribute to the conference with our latest research on Agile methods, and to teach my full day tutorial on Deadline Driven Software Estimation :)
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Productivity: People, Process, and Technology
This year we address a particularly broad set of topics, mostly related to the conference motto "Productivity: People, Process, and Technology". Especially today, it is very important that as software professionals we know how to improve the productivity of our development teams. Key factors to achieve this include people (e.g. ensuring that team members have the necessary individual and team skills), process (e.g. having processes that help discover problems early to avoid rework), and technology (e.g. modeling for working at a higher level of abstraction, architectures that enable large-scale reuse).
Continue reading "OOP 2010 Conference Munich Germany"
Posted by Mike at 11:41 AM |
October 28, 2009
Cutter Latin America Summit, Mexico City
Very excited today; The Cutter Consortium Latin America Summit begins in Mexico City. I'm givng a Keynote Address entitled: "Geography Matters: What Measurement Tells Us About Agile, Outsourcing, and the Flat World." Here's the Agenda.
Cutter Consortium Summit Latin America: IT Leadership Starts Here
Each year, the Cutter Summit provides business-IT professionals with a commodity that is all too scarce -- an opportunity to brainstorm key issues, challenges and concepts that require more of your attention than the ten uninterrupted minutes you may squeeze in on any given day -- and to do so with the top thinkers in the field. This year was no exception.
Your ability to keep systems running, introduce architectural changes that will allow the business to be more agile and to operate at greater velocity, foster and fuel innovation, and help business adapt to the emergence of new market influences will determine your success. These are exactly the topics that we will explore. Summit 2009 is packed with opportunities to drill down on and debate the issues that will impact IT and business professionals in the months ahead.
The first two days of the Summit feature three keynote/panel debates, one Harvard Business School-style case study, and luncheon sessions. The third day includes your choice of longer, hands-on working sessions. Plus, you'll find plenty of time to discuss and debate with other attendees and speakers during unstructured breaks and the cocktail party on Monday evening.
Summit 2009 will reveal new ways to think about how IT can be a differentiator for your organization and help it soar through this economically challenging time.
The power of the Summit is its collaborative nature. So please join the debate and enjoy!
Continue reading "Cutter Latin America Summit, Mexico City"
Posted by Mike at 1:34 PM | Comments (0) |
October 2, 2009
Highsmith on Agile Triathletes
This is an excellent blog post by Jim Highsmith, Director and Fellow of the Agile Practice at Cutter Consortium The Agile Triathlete by Jim Highsmith, I was having coffee this morning with colleague Ken Collier and we were talking about Test-driven development (TDD) and the trials and tribulations of trying to implement TDD in a development environment. I left Ken and went out for a leisurely bike ride down from the Ponderosa pines in Flagstaff to the Scrub Oak and Juniper 1,500 feet lower and 15 miles out of town (then back up-ugh). As I was pedaling down hill thinking... more...
Posted by Mike at 1:49 PM | Comments (0) |
July 31, 2009
Special Webinar - Agile Research Findings, Aug 4th 11am ET
Next Tuesday, August 4th, at 11am ET, I'm hosting a Special Webinar called “Financial Benefits of Agile; Case Studies from the Agile Impact Report." It's open to the public; so if any readers of this blog are interested, you can send me a message and we'll get you a URL link.
Parts of this webinar have been featured as Main Stage and Keynote Addresses at Agile 2008, Better Software, and the Agile Development Practices conference. It was also featured as part of a multi-city “Agile Success” tour by Rally Software this year in NYC and Atlanta. There will be time-to-market, quality, and productivity data from actual benchmark studies of 30+ Agile projects compared against the QSM SLIM Database of over 8,000 predominantly waterfall projects collected worldwide.
Join us if you are:
1. Interested in how Agile projects measure against industry benchmarks
2. In need of data to make the business case for Agile
3. A decision maker or team lead interested in adopting Agile
4. Considering Agile and would like learn more from others' experiences
5. Looking learn about Agile measurement and estimation
Want the link? Click here and type "YES"
P.S. You can get a copy of "The Agile Impact Report" by clicking on the Rally logo at the QSMA Online Resource Library here.
Continue reading "Special Webinar - Agile Research Findings, Aug 4th 11am ET"
Posted by Mike at 2:21 PM | Comments (0) |
June 22, 2009
Rightsizing Your Project in a Down Economy
...is the topic of a new talk that Lee Copeland - chief poombah at SQE - asked me to give at the Fall 2009 Agile Development Practices Conference at the Rosen Shingle Creek Resort in Orlando FL this November.
I've got a few war stories to share since the case study format is what I find best for topics like these. Self-defeating behaviors are what I'll try to tackle; some of what happens in a recession falls into this category as people scramble to adjust to "compressed" thinking - compress my dates, budgets, (expand project scope), and compress my family life. How can we cope?
I'd welcome folks to weigh in on this subject by the blog comments or via email. Send a message to my attention at info@qsma.com. Would love to hear from you! Or better yet, come to Orlando on November 9th. Here's a description of my talk:
Rightsizing Your Project in a Down Economy
In tough times, both shoes drop simultaneously and “scarcity thinking” takes over in senior executives, managers, and development teams. In this environment, dysfunction can wreak havoc on your projects in the form of scope greed, death-march deadlines, and budget cuts. Often, the tendency is to say “yes” to impossible dates, take on too much, suffer the budget cuts, and pray that heroics might save the day. This is a disaster waiting to happen. It takes a skillful manager to “rightsize” critical projects – right team, right scope, right dates – at the beginning. Scarcity thinking threatens all three. Michael Mah describes how to lead difficult conversations to discuss the “undiscussables.” Michael shares how to artfully frame trade-offs for stakeholders to set priorities and get buy-in by using a blend of common sense, essential measurement concepts, and rules of software estimation. Whether you’re agile, waterfall, or offshore, discover information you need to make the right choices and gain the support of your organization.
more...Continue reading "Rightsizing Your Project in a Down Economy"
Posted by Mike at 1:07 PM | Comments (0) |
May 16, 2009
Inspiration
A slightly off-topic post, off my Facebook. I'm thinking of a mother who lost a son on the hijacked plane that struck WTC Tower2 on 9/11. Then deciding with her husband to build a girls school in Logar Afghanistan - land where terrorists were trained - as a way to make PEACE; thus creating a tribute in her son's memory, transforming grief into inspiration and joy, and bridging cultures in faraway lands. That is the story of Sally Goodrich as told in the film-in-progress, "Axis of Good".
Director friend Rick Derby and I have gotten the documentary of Sally Goodrich's journey into the Berkshire International Film Festival www.biffma.com. Go see it in Gt. Barrington MA at the Triplex2, tomorrow, Sunday 5/17 at 4pm. Inspiring. Heartwarming. Incredible. Rick, Sally and Don Goodrich will be there to share, after the film concludes.
Continue reading "Inspiration"
Posted by Mike at 12:26 PM | Comments (0) |
May 5, 2009
Cutter Summit 2009
Hanging with my Cutter Summit gang at the Royal Sonesta Hotel in Boston. Preparing for a Harvard Business School case study led by Rob Austin. Great fun! Weather stinks; it's not sunny like this picture shows. Check out the Tweets here.
Continue reading "Cutter Summit 2009"
Posted by Mike at 1:15 PM | Comments (0) |
April 23, 2009
New Metrics for Turbulent Times - Excerpts
Cutter IT Journal's issue on "New Metrics for Turbulent Times" is out! Here's an excerpt from my Guest Editor introduction. This issue contains some great articles by Cutter authors Vince Kellen, Michael Rosen, Evan Campbell, Sara Cullen, and William Walton on Ethics, IT Architecture, Agile Methods, Outsourcing, and Portfolio Management. Interested in more - perhaps a trial subscription? email me at info@qsma.com.
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New Metrics for Managing Turbulent Times
Point: Tough Times Demand New Metrics
The recession is forcing companies to make tough decisions. New metrics are needed to make the right decisions on getting through the downturn.
Counterpoint: Existing Metrics Are Good Enough
Organizations should resist the urge to concoct new measures when the existing ones, applied correctly, will do.
Opening Statement, by Michael Mah
The current economic downturn has cut a deep gash in the economies of virtually every country and industry, affecting the lives of perhaps every living person in many ways not seen in over 50 years. In a recent live appearance on CNBC, billionaire Warren Buffett said unemployment will likely climb higher and that the economy has basically “fallen off a cliff.” Fear is dominating Americans’ behavior and the economy has followed the worst-case scenario he envisioned. Moreover, in a global recession - fear goes global. It’s not limited to just Americans and U.S. companies. Economies around the world are more interdependent today than ever before. In work and in private life, no one seems immune from having to make tough decisions in the months ahead.
How do people make wise decisions in the face of such unrest? What information do they rely upon and how does that data come into play? When it comes to work life, if cutting costs are mandatory, should we simply make across-the-board cuts with a hatchet, or is it wise to find a more surgical approach? Or is this a time to make strategic decisions to invest, and thereby out-recover the competition when the recession ends? What information, what metrics, should we rely upon to decide?
more...
Posted by Mike at 2:18 PM | Comments (0) |
March 26, 2009
QSMA @ Better Software Conference...
I'm Sean Callaghan, QSMA's Director of Business Development and I’d like to invite you to join us at the Better Software Conference June 8-12 2009 at the Venetian in Las Vegas. Among the many outstanding speakers is QSM Associates’ Managing Partner, Michael Mah, who will be sharing his latest findings on the state of Agile development, taken directly from his “real world” work with innovative companies who depend on creating great software....
Michael, along with QSMA's Anny Randel, will be offering workshops, discussion and insight at one of the software development industry's most important conferences. He is also teaming with Rally Development's Richard Leavitt to present a compelling case for the significant ROI advantages of Agile development.
So, whether you are Agile, considering it or are just looking for deeper insights into your software development metrics, please join us at this engaging and practical conference and expo. If you would like to sign up for any of our workshops, please let me know at info@qsma.com
Continue reading "QSMA @ Better Software Conference..."
Posted by Sean at 8:35 PM | Comments (0) |
January 5, 2009
New Metrics for Managing Turbulent Times
Happy New Year 2009!
I'm pleased to kick off an editorial New Year at Cutter Consortium as guest editor for the March 2009 issue of the Cutter IT Journal. I'm posting the call for papers here in case any of you sports fans would like to make a submission for consideration. Let me know by emailing me :)
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CALL FOR PAPERS
Cutter IT Journal
Guest Editor: Michael Mah
Abstract Submission Date: 13 January 2009 Articles Due: 6 February 2009
New Metrics for Managing Turbulent Times
The current economic downturn has cut a deep gash in the economies of virtually every country and industry, affecting the lives of perhaps every living person in many ways not seen in over 50 years. It seems as though the fall of communism was, in hindsight, a prelude to an even larger shockwave that would come and strike the heart of capitalism, completing a shakeup to economies of nearly every nation across the globe.
more...
Posted by Mike at 3:04 PM | Comments (0) |
