Brooke Baldwin

Consulting

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Big Projects Often Fail

Posted by Brooke on 10 Jan 2009 | Tagged as: Consulting

In the past decade the most successful development projects that I’ve been a part of have always been on small, high functioning teams. Large projects are often too bureaucratic and meandering in focus to hit deadlines and produce even core functionality according to the project plan.

And here’s some proof of that happening, once again.

Why is it that great things are usually built on the sly, cheaply and simply, by one or a handful of people?

I think it’s because when it’s only a few people there is more personal accountability. Everyone has to contribute and be productive. Anyone is exposed as a fraud quickly and easily if they can’t contribute; the wheat is separated from the chaff efficiently. Communication is improved because you’re probably all sitting near each other or know each other well enough that you’ve developed a short-hand that obviates some of the usual barriers of understanding.

But if you’ve got 5 layers of management then it’s easy to pass the buck, and humans can be quite lazy creatures. Lots of people want to come to work just to go through the motions. Good for them, but stay out of my way, ok?

I’ve heard them called SWAT teams before; I think that sounds goofy. We’re not taking the building before the hostages are shot, we’re writing code, we’re building an interface. But I do like the notion that we’re not a large group, we’re all highly trained, we all have very specific things we do and don’t do, and we all agree on a process to help control the natural chaos of the event.

So it’s never been my dream to run a giant department or have a ton of direct reports. That doesn’t appeal to me right now. I’d rather work with a few very smart, very capable people. We’ll get more done. I promise.

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