20
votes
Any tips on how to 'sell' the necessity of dealing with technical debt to nontechnical stakeholders?
You might tackle it by highlighting increases in development costs caused by technical debt. That is a problem we are facing right now, too. Business is requesting more and more features they need ...
- 301
11
votes
Accepted
What to do with work not on the board?
You can have a technical leader. You can have him do work off the charts. You can hide this work from others that don't "need to know". You can reduce that person's capacity to make planning more ...
- 7,650
11
votes
What to do with work not on the board?
TL;DR
If the work matters, make it visible. If it doesn't, then treat it as muda and trim it as non-essential waste. You truly cannot have it both ways.
No Invisible Work, Ever!™️
CodeGnome's Law ...
- 47.9k
9
votes
Strategy for whole team switching tehnologies
Don't do this.
Speaking as a developer, this sounds great. We get to rewrite that horrible old spaghetti code from scratch! We get to paid to learn a new language! There's a mandate for quality, so ...
- 14.7k
7
votes
Splitting PM responsibility between technical lead and non-technical PM on an agile project?
Firstly, you could use different methods/frameworks to run projects. Scrum wouldn't necessarily be the solution here as your prime concern is around the line in responsibilities between these two, ...
- 2,758
7
votes
Any tips on how to 'sell' the necessity of dealing with technical debt to nontechnical stakeholders?
Take a more proactive approach to dealing with technical debt
In one of my previous projects, we had a major part of a site run on annual data put together by the business. Unfortunatley, the ...
- 10.9k
7
votes
Accepted
Should a technical person take part of the user stories prioritization process?
Product Owner and the Development Team collaborate
The Scrum Guide is very clear on these aspects:
Product Owner and the Development Team collaborate on Backlog refinement:
Product Backlog ...
- 10.9k
6
votes
Any tips on how to 'sell' the necessity of dealing with technical debt to nontechnical stakeholders?
By analogy, you are asking people to replace a car that works perfectly well because you know that at some point in time the cost to maintain the existing car won't be worth the effort. You need to ...
- 8,879
4
votes
How often should a development team review code quality metrics so that we keep reasonable control over technical debt and code quality
From a technical standpoint, code metrics should be baked into your test-driven development (TDD) or acceptance testing, preferably in an a fully-automated way. However, from a Scrum perspective, the ...
- 47.9k
4
votes
Accepted
Can an inexperienced person be a project manager?
Experience is necessary for capability and competency growth; however, the weight we tend to put on experience, I believe, is grossly overrated. The velocity and degree of capability and competency ...
- 36.6k
4
votes
How do you handle a tech lead that takes over PO/PM role? (Unwanted)
TL;DR You will end up with a product that does not meet your business need, unhappy employees, and self-organising teams that are dead on arrial. Innovation will also suffer.
Impact on Product
Since ...
4
votes
As a technical lead how to ensure that DB schema is perfect for the new project to start with?
You don't try to handle everything up front or predict the future. It's a waste of time and effort. As you build out the software and get stakeholder feedback, you will learn more about the true needs ...
- 17.7k
3
votes
Can an inexperienced person be a project manager?
I completely second David (as usual). Having experience MAY increase the likeliness of a professional being a good manager, but it's not mandatory. I believe this "increase" might come pretty much ...
- 8,381
3
votes
How to transition from programmer to project manager?
As they say in the Washington Post's Worst Week in Washington column, "Congrats - or something..." Set aside the UML, you have more pressing concerns. As is so often the case, your multi-part question ...
- 356
3
votes
How to assess technical knowledge of the team?
If you're going to base it on code, then why not take code they've written already? That would save the 3 days. ;-)
Assuming your company (like all companies) hires only the best people, the quickest ...
- 4,532
3
votes
How to assess technical knowledge of the team?
Check their CVs and look for experience and other talents that will add value to the team. Also, keep in mind which skill sets are key to your project
Get feedback from previous project managers and ...
- 386
3
votes
Splitting PM responsibility between technical lead and non-technical PM on an agile project?
To be blatantly honest, if your project has a non-technical project manager who is not very strong on the business logic or functional aspects of the project and is also involved with other projects, ...
- 1,117
3
votes
Splitting PM responsibility between technical lead and non-technical PM on an agile project?
I understand that the situation are:
You are a technical lead (TL),
You report to a PM that has no or almost no domain knowledge, technical knowledge.
The PM does not understand you.
"A non-...
- 41
3
votes
Should managers be involved in decisions about what technical practices the team adopts?
Consideration should be given to the nature and size of the organisation, and the number of projects / initiatives being run. If the team is likely to flex significantly in terms of the people working ...
- 6,763
3
votes
Should a technical person take part of the user stories prioritization process?
It sounds like there's a whole lot going wrong with your Scrum process.
It's important to realize that a product backlog is not prioritized. It is ordered. There is no reference to a prioritized or ...
- 17.7k
3
votes
What is the most technically challenging project you have worked on as a non-technical project manager?
My answer would be:
I facilitate technical answers. I trust the team to provide technical answers; I make sure that there is nothing that stands in the way of their understanding the problem and ...
- 8,697
2
votes
Should managers be involved in decisions about what technical practices the team adopts?
Always. You said the word "involved". Involved - yes. Dictate - no.
One of the most often unseen aspects of a successful Agile development project is that the team is one cohesive team. Not the ...
- 121
2
votes
Accepted
Should managers be involved in decisions about what technical practices the team adopts?
This is an interesting question, worded well (thanks @CodeGnome for editing) and highly relevant.
Unfortunately the answer is, like many questions regarding ideal practices, a firm "it depends&...
- 4,046
2
votes
How technical should a Project Manager be?
The requirements for a project manager always go out from a project profile.
Check DPCI for instance. You can use risk profiles as well.
More technical experience:
Small - you just won't have ...
2
votes
How technical should a Project Manager be?
While I have seen projects completed successfully with non-technical PMs, I've also seen a lot of disasters. (That's one of the pushes I had to move from programming to PM.)
One point I have not seen ...
- 4,532
2
votes
How technical should a Project Manager be?
The project manager should have a good understanding of the technologies involved in the project. Not that they can code, but understand how the pieces fit together from a high level. Leadership and ...
- 71
2
votes
How to deal as PM for a technical-only refactoring project
Looks like it is a rewriting project not a refactoring project
How do I know this? You said, "the project can not really be delivered in steps". Refactoring can (and should) be done a little at a ...
- 10.9k
2
votes
Can an inexperienced person be a project manager?
Can you be a good Project Manager without experience? Certainly. It has been done before, and it will be done again.
Consider Joel Spolsky, who founded Stack Exchange, who wrote Joel on Software, ...
- 121
2
votes
Characteristics of a real project manager
This is a tough one to answer. I think a lot of discussion on this topic one might find out there is not much more than hyperbole. There have been some studies on leadership, where some traits were ...
- 36.6k
2
votes
Characteristics of a real project manager
This is not an easy question to answer. The answer varies from company to company, from culture to culture. So collected some existing qualities that I can resonate with.
I have found this list on ...
- 11.8k
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