What’s more than 140 characters but less than my normal tome? This blog post 🙂 Its midnight here in Seattle and my brain is still whirring about topics stirred up at Lean Coffee this morning. So, I just wanted to throw some quick thoughts down on virtual paper regarding capacity, slack and WIP. Here goes…
Look, managers (and I can say this to you, because I’m a manager too). It’s about flow, not capacity. What I mean is that the measure of success is not ensuring that developers are busy every single minute. Rather, its improving your system flow so you get more done in less time. The problem is that people think to do the latter, the former must be done. Beware! It can have the opposite effect.
In addition, that 15 minutes at the foosball table or 10 minutes playing with nerf guns can be crucial to those with jobs involving complex thought work. The brain needs time to process information. A developer who is actively coding 100% of the time is likely not doing their best work. Now, team, if you’re reading this, I’m not signing off on 4 hour sprees in the game room!
This morning a topic was how to get developers to buy into WIP limits. I can say with certainty that my experience proves that WIP limits are analgesics for workers. More focus breeds better quality features completed faster and THAT equals less stressed developers. Who doesn’t want that?
