Good, Fast, Cheap — Pick Two or Three
December 20th, 2003 by Hal
Let me introduce you again to David J. Anderson. David is the author of Agile Management for Software Engineering. He has a companion weblog where he continues to explore the topics in his book. David will be one of our guest authors in next year's Project Leaders' Studio™ Conversation with Authors teleconference series. Have a look and sign-up.
In a recent posting David proposes Good, Fast, Cheap, Pick 3! Common wisdom says there is an iron triangle cornered by good, fast, and cheap. For any project or product you can have two of those elements but not three. That wisdom makes permanent the relationship. By not questioning the wisdom people go about designing products, processes, projects, and services to provide just two.
David's been reading Built to Last, by Jim Collins and Jerry Porass. In this classic management book the authors speak of the phenomena as The Tyranny of the OR. They offer an alternative view, The Genius of the AND. David claims,
Agile software development is all about having it all - good quality through rigorous testing, reviewing, and learning - fast speed through face-to-face communication, less bureaucracy and more tacit knowledge - low cost through small teams of empowered generalist developers.
You'll need to read Agile Management to learn how. (David, how about a few follow-up postings?) You can also dig through his previous weblog postings for hints.
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December 28th, 2003 at 6:30 am
In the work I do, complete is a perception. Control the perception, scope can change.
The problem with Agile is that it is also cover for not even doing Agile. Thus, in some orgainzations, you get none of the above.
Further, the empowered generalist developer is one that can be outsourced overseas in a blink of the eye. Congrats. Get a new career. IT isn’t coming back.