Home About the Guild Articles Books –New Books –Guild Books –Guild Library Consulting Contact us Resources –Requirements –Software Engineering –Project Management –Other –Cocktails Requirements Template Seminars –Mastering Requirements –Risk Management –Requirements Modeling –Mastering the Requirements Process part II Services –Litigation Support –Project Clinics –Physical Exam Volere   If you build software, chances are that you and your organization are using some technique developed by The Atlantic Systems Guild. July 13, 2008

Perspective: Summer 2008   Groundhog Day Part II Patterns of Project Behavior    Many IT organizations seem to be stuck in "Groundhog Day."  They make the same mistakes over and over again, and then methodically vow at the end never to make those mistakes again.  And then next time they do it all over again.  The Lessons Learned sessions at project end often cite lessons that everybody thought had been learned before.  (Maybe we ought to start calling these Lessons Unlearned sessions.)    Organizations that can't change are like skiers, caught in the rut of past skiers tracks and unable to break free to make a new track of their own.  The rut they're in is their corporate culture.  Tom DeMarco    We often talk about corporate culture, particularly when we try to explain why a given change that seemed to make sense to everyone just couldn't get established.  We say "the culture didn't allow the change to happen."  So far so good, but then the conversation ends.  The follow-on conversation about What do we have to change about our culture and how do we go about it? most often never gets started.  We make our pronouncement that the culture is the problem and then we shrug and turn our attention to something else.     We don't even know how to talk about corporate culture.  We lack vocabulary, definitions and ground rules.  Yet this is a conversation that needs to precede any really ambitious change.    I'm indebted to my friend Jerry Weinberg for a working definition of corporate culture, a definition that often helps in kick starting a conversation on the topic.  In Jerry's view, Corporate Culture is a set of unwritten rules, commonly understood and universally obeyed by all members of the group.     Let's take an example: In some organizations there is an unwritten rule that you must never finish work much before the date that you agreed to.  So if you ask for five months to get a project done, you simply are not allowed to finish in three and a half. You could probably finish a week early and be congratulated, but finishing six weeks early makes you someone not to be trusted.     This rule is a disaster.  If you're not allowed to beat your estimate, then you're never going to finish on time.  Think about it.  If the rule applies in your organization, you have to repeal it.  It's possible to repeal such rules, but only if you put them on the table and examine them in detail.  You'll never get beyond them if they remain unwritten and undiscussed.    In our book on corporate culture, Adrenaline Junkies and Template Zombies: Understanding Patterns of Project Behavior, we found it easiest to observe the pattern of behavior first and then tease out the underlying rule.  Only when these first two steps are completed can we begin the (still difficult) task of tailoring the corporate culture to the organization's real needs. That's something that desperately needs to be done.  Let me say that even more directly: You need to design and revamp your corporate culture to align with the organization's real goals.  A failure to do this will result in an organization whose goals are tailored to align with the needs of the existing culture. Tom DeMarco Camden, Maine 12 July, 2008 Adrenaline Junkies and Template Zombies: Understanding Patterns of Project Behavior.  Published by Dorset House in the US and Hanser Verlag in Germany. Click for free sample pdf.   Past Perspectives The Winter-Spring 2008 perspective entitled Groundhog Day was written by Tom DeMarco The Winter 2007 perspective entitled Teams Don't Move was written by Steve McMenamin The Fall 2006 perspective entitled Three Hours to Three Years was written by Peter Hruschka. The Spring 2006 perspective entitled The Web Undone by Tom DeMarco. The Winter 2006 perspective entitled Have We Finished Yet? was written by Suzanne Robertson. The Fall 2005 perspective entitled Adult Behavior on Projects was written by Tim Lister. The Summer 2005 perspective entitled No Great Leaps Forward? was written by Steve McMenamin. The Spring 2005 perspective entitled Mastering Software Architectures was written by Peter Hruschka. The Winter 2004 perspective entitled Early Involvement of Testers was written by James Robertson. Links from this site to Amazon.com or Amazon.co.uk are done using Amazon's associates program. That means, that if you use one of the links and end up buying the book, we get a cut. We are not getting rich on this, but thought that you should know that it is happening. The contents of this site are copyright © 1995-2008 Atlantic Systems Guild Inc. and Atlantic Systems Guild Limited. Material may be reproduced provided this copyright notice is attached and the source is acknowledged. Please pay us the courtesy of notifying the author if you wish to use material from this site. Happenings James Robertson teaches Mastering the Requirements Process in Brussels, August 5-7. Please contact I.T.Works. James Robertson teaches Mastering the Requirements Process in Eindhoven, September 1-3. Please contact Telelogic Netherlands for details. September 8-10, Tim Lister teaches Mastering the Requirements Process in Washington, DC for Software Quality Engineering. Innovation, Creativity and their Role in Business Requirements. Suzanne Robertson and James Robertson in conjunction with Neil Maiden and Sara Jones from City University, London, give a full-day tutorial at RE'08, the 16th IEEE Requirements Engineering conference in Barcelona. Tuesday, September 9. Details and registration. September 11,12 Tim Lister teaches Requirements Modeling. in Washington DC. Contact Software Quality Engineering for details. James Robertson teaches Mastering the Requirements Process in Brussels, September 15-17. Please contact I.T.Works for details. Suzanne Robertson presents Mastering the Requirements Process in London, September 15-17. Contact IRM UK Strategic IT Training James Robertson teaches Mastering the Requirements Process in Stuttgart, October 6-8. Contact QA Systems. October 6-8, Tim Lister is in San Diego to teach Mastering the Requirements Process for Software Quality Engineering. Suzanne Robertson gives the keynote presentation on Requirements Management to the Business Analyst Forum in Wroclaw, Poland. October 7,8. Contact Business Process Management Forum. October 9,10 Tim Lister is in San Diego for Requirements Modeling. Contact Software Quality Engineering for details. James Robertson is in Stuttgart, October 9,10 for Requirements Modelling Contact QA Systems. James Robertson teaches Mastering the Requirements Process in Eindhoven, October 13-15. Please contact Telelogic Netherlands for details. Ocgtober 14-16, Suzanne Robertson is in Tromso for Mastering the Requirements Process sponsored by the University of Tromsø Suzanne Robertson teaches Manging the Deadline in Rome, October 20-22. Contact Technology Transfer. Suzanne Robertson teaches Mastering the Requirements Process part 2 in Rome, October 23,24. Contact Technology Transfer. James Robertson teaches Mastering the Requirements Process in Brussels, October 21-23. Please contact I.T.Works for details. Canberra: James Robertson teaches the popular Mastering the Requirements Process for Software Education. November 5-7. November 10-12, Suzanne Robertson teaches Mastering the Requirements Process in Melbourne. Please contact Software Education for details and registration. Suzanne Robertson teaches Mastering the Requirements Process part 2 November 13,14 in Sydney. Contact Software Education for details of this advanced class. In Wellington, Suzanne and James Robertson teach Mast ering the Requirements Process November 17-19. For details please contact Software Education In Auckland, Suzanne and James Robertson teach Mastering the Requirements Process November 24-26. For details please contact Software Education Suzanne Robertson teaches Mastering the Requirements Process part 2 December 1,2 in Melbourne. Contact Software Education for details of this advanced class. December 3-5, Suzanne and J ames Robertson are in Sydney for Mastering the Requirements Process sponsored by Software Education In Depth The Guild's new book Adrenaline Junkies and Template Zombies - Understanding Patterns of Project Behavior was published in the US in February. Orders at Dorset House Publishing and Amazon.com See Tom DeMarco's video about the Adrenaline Junkies book project. NEWS: Adrenaline Junkies and Template Zombies has been adopted by the Copenhagen Business School for Prof. Rob Austin's course, "The IT Manager as a Business Leader." The new Guild book has been published in German Adrenalin-Junkies und Formular-Zombies - Typisches Verhalten in Projekten. The book demonstrates the effect of behavior on project success. Please visit Hanser for more details. Suzanne Robertson has written an Executive Report "Requirements for Managing Requirements" for the Cutter Consortium's Agile Product and Project Management advisory service. Download a free copy The Microsoft Store on Microsoft's Redmond campus will for the first time start carrying books from publishers other than Microsoft Press. Mastering the Requirements Process is one they have chosen to stock in this initial test phase. The Volere Requirements Specification Template has been translated to Spanish. Thanks to Paul Babic of Smartmatic for the translation. A Microsoft Word version is available from the Volere site. Suzanne and James Robertson announce the publication of the second edition of their best selling Mastering the Requirements Process We are pleased that Precilog are now offering Mastering the Requirements Process in France. See the Happenings column for dates. Version 11 of the popular Volere Requirements Specification Template is now available in pdf and Microsoft Word versions from the Volere site. The html version is here. In response to many requests we have started a Volere Requirements discussion group. The judging of the Exemplar Competition: Stand on My Shoulders is over. Congratulations to Beata Wieczorek for her winning exemplar, and to the eight honorable mentions. Read them here. Influences on Your Requirements Process Suzanne Robertson (Atlantic Systems Guild), Neil Maiden (City University), and Ian Alexander (Scenario Plus) ran a survey to investigate what influences the way people in industry do their requirements work. The results are reported in this paper, published at the Requirements Engineering 2005 conference in Paris. Many thanks to all the people who participated in the survey. Suzanne and James Robertson's new book Requirements-Led Project Management – Discovering David's Slingshot is now available. Download a sample chapter here. Lister and DeMarco win the Jolt Award for Waltzing with Bears: Managing Risk on Software Projects. Download three sample chapters from: WWB. A new article on our sister site entitled Getting Started with Volere shows how this popular set of requirements tools are used. Suzanne Robertson has posted an article on our Volere sister site entitled Stakeholders, Goals, Scope: The Foundation for Requirements and Business Model Read Lister and DeMarco's article on Risk Management during Requirements published in IEEE Software APR-04. The Volere Requirements Specification Template is now available in Czech. Our thanks to Jana Hatasova of Eurotel for the translation. Mastering the Requirements Process by Suzanne and James Robertson has been published in Japanese by Sangensha Publishing. Read Tom DeMarco's recent article in the CACM about a new dynamic for teams. OCT-24-03 New from Dorset House: DeMarco & Lister's 2003 book, Waltzing With Bears: Managing Risk on Software Projects.  Also, you can download three sample chapters. OCT-24-03 Peter Hruschka and Derek Hatley's book "Komplexe Softwaresysteme beherrschen - Requirements verstehen, Architekturen konzipieren" is available here. Listen to Lister and DeMarco on CIO Radio. (Streaming audio.) JUN-05-03 Everything Volere. Visit our Volere sister site, home of the Volere Template and a full set of requirements capture and analysis support tools. An important new book: Jim and Michele McCarthy's Software for Your Head, reviewed on our essential books page. Nov-20-02 Tom DeMarco's new collection of short stories, Lt. America and Miss Apple Pie was published in October by Down East Books. Nov-04-02 Remembering Simula project manager Kristen Nygaard (1926-2002), a member of the Guild pantheon of great managers.

home | about | articles | books | consulting | events | litigation support | resources | physical exam | clinics | template | seminars |services |

Contact the Guild top of page