Author: Oliver Brandon

--Originally published at Blog Oliver

In these chapter we see Webster meeting a new character which in my opinion is one of the most interesting persons in the book. Maestro Diyeniar who is an expert resolving conflict, he used to be a teacher in kindergarten, so he had to deal with a lot of stressful situations and conflicts thats why they call him Maestro.

Along these three chapter Webster main focus is in understanding conflict and how to deal with it. We come across different reflections, but the most important thing is mediation. Mediation is easier than negotiation, because everyone wants to preserve their win conditions. Thats why people must understand they are on the same side and the conflict is in the other side.

A month has passed and we see staff members have different opinions about Diyeniar, some think he talks too much but others really like to be around him. Diyeniar have histories and songs for days. Webster main concern is that people are wasting hours in lunch time listening to him. So he arranged time to eat with him. Webster is shocked about how much histories Diyeniar know, I mean after two hours of telling histories Diyeniar forgets about eating his swandich and Webster had to tell a story of his own to let him eat. In the end of the chapter we see Webster trying to solve a problem between two members of a team. He fails, so we learn that we need a mediator with the same power as both parts with no specific interests.

In the interlude Webster feels guilty because of all the lies he has been telling to Minister Belok, Belinda has one of the best idead so far. Close all projects and give a 3 day full vacation to all team and staff members, Webster Continue reading "Errors Errors Errors"

--Originally published at Blog Oliver

In this chapter we have news of Lahksa she has been in traveling for 7 or 8 chapters.  She sends Webster team a document with al the Specifications from the FAA NASPlan which is a project similar to the one Webster needs to finish for the olympic games. But we have a problem NASPlan project was a totally failure, thats not all one of the managers from Websters teams is angry and is getting loud and abusive with his team. So Webster is thinking on how to talk with this manager and see if he can help. Belinda also tells Webtser how working in stressful situations serves as opportunities to learn. So they decide to create a team with experience in similar projects to work in air traffic control project.

Next day after the team have read the documentation they realized its poorly written, they cant obtain useful information from this paper because of this. But everyone thinks the documentation is useful and the problem is they cant understand the problem because of the difficulty of the final product.

In this chapter I realize Belinda is one of the most or the most wise of all the characters, she always have an answer for everything and no matter the situation she remains calm, I think its because she suffered from a burnout. She realized that nobody understood the documentation but everyone said they did because of fear. Nobody wants to admit the other its more intelligent and they understand the documentation but we dont. Documentation must have all details needed in order to understand the inputs and outputs of the project this way the user knows how it works.

--Originally published at Blog Oliver

In this chapter we see Webster talking to Minister Belok again, yeah Minister Belok who is always trying to put difficulties in Webster projects and thinks Webster needs to push the teams even more. This time Belok is complaining about overtime hours, he thinks people are not working enough, they need to work more hours and increase monthly overtime hours. And thats not all, also Olympic games will be hosted in Korsjak in 2000, so they need to build a new air traffic control system, that can support three thousand landings and three thousand takeoffs. Webster is in a big problem he doesnt have any experience working in this type of projects.

Webster team starts to talk about how to deal with the new air traffic control and also the overtime hours. So they dig around information of past projects so they can see the relation between overtime hours and the time required to finish a project. We see something different from what everyone was thinking, overtime hours dont decrease the time needed to finish a project, this is shocking because it sounds logical if we work more ours we finish before. The reality its different we learn this when Webster and his team ask the oracle, the oracle responds with my favorite quote of the book so far “People under pressure dont think faster”. It makes more sense now it doesnt matter if we put more pressure or we make people work more overtime theres a limit in what people can do and how fast they can work. Pressure is not a good option to improve the efficiency of a team.

 

--Originally published at Blog Oliver

In this two chapters we meet a new different department that will consume more time and make the deadlines more difficult. We meet the audit group which are in charge of certificate all team projects to level three or more. Teams must follow certain rules or specifications. For example using a suitable documentation model. Audit group will go from building number one to number seven which is a problem for Webster, they will discover his secret teams and experiment. And thats not the only problem Webster have.

One of the project managers from the teams was following a different pattern for the documentation that the one required for level two. So that specific team was in level one. The reason behind this was very unique. The project manager found a shortcut where he could save some time in the step most programmers hate, the documentation. Webster needs to find a solution quick or the audition will consume months in order to take effect. We learn that not because you add an improvement to a project it means it will reduce the time needed. Improvements need time to take effect and sometimes its not worth it.

In the next chapter we meet the two persons in charge of the audit group, Webster goes to talk with them because he need a big favor. He needs them to pretend all groups are now in level 4 going to level 5 and ignore Webster secret teams. Webster finds out why people follow him and follows his orders. Webster care for his teams and work the best he can. Webster talks with Dr. Mennoti who he thinks is the boss of the audit group. Dr. Mennoti is a really nice guy who understands what Webster was talking about. Mennoti agrees to let Webster talk Continue reading "Webster meets the “first programmer”"

--Originally published at Blog Oliver

In this chapter we meet a peculiar character Mr T. Johns Caporous, he is introduced after Lahksa send a letter to Webster. So a few days later we meet Mr T. and man he talks a lot. He remembers all kind of different facts from a lot of topics. And not just that he also is good with numbers and calculations. Specifically with everything related to measure the impact, size and efficiency of projects. He talks with Webster about Functions Points, which are a measure to determine the size of a project. This way we know how much effort we need and how much time we are going to finish the project.

Every team project can create their own Function Points with the name they want so they can measure the time needed in that specific team. For example if we have data about past projects we have created and how much time we needed, we can calculate our own functions with this data. This way we have a more realistic approach to start a project. Thats what Belinda explained no Webster and how they could add this function points to the data modeling they already had. Webster also regrets they didnt use this points since the beginning of the projects, that way they could have a more realistic approach of how much time is needed to develop all projects.

We also see Webster and Belinda giving a new position to Webster personal assistant Waldo. He is now the manager of the metric group. Because he is good with numbers and he can get all the information needed from past projects.

In the end we see Belinda and Webster talking about why they do their jobs and if they are helping or harming people.

--Originally published at Blog Oliver

This chapter starts with Webster having a really nice and calm walk to the work. Webster was having a good time, everything was going according to the plan. But nothing last forever.  We found out NNL (who is secretly bill g…….shhhhh) went back to the states, along with Lahksa and they will be out for a long time, so we meet the man that will be in charge meanwhile.

Mister Belok its like the master mind behind all financial decisions NNL has made, he even tell Webster that NNL success its because of him. Belok is more strict and severe compared to NNL, we even see him loosing his temperament and raising his voice to Webster.

Mr Belok came to talk to Webster about the deadline that was established and about Webster experiments. The deadline was reduced to only 420 days. Even thought Webster was going to ask for more time for some projects. Mr Belok also demand that Webster dissolves the three teams for every project and merge them in one bigger only team, Belok thinks more people is equal to less production time. But software dont work this way.

We also see Webster putting his job on the line, to defend his

--Originally published at Blog Oliver

Risk management is one of the most important parts a manager must do. He must census the risk of every project, for this task he can select a person to be a risk officer. Every risk is important even the small ones, small risks can transform into bigger problems later. 

When a project is over, if the team worked well don’t dissolve it, we already know that team works and have good synergy. Time is really important, its the same if we lose a day in the beginning or the end of the project. We can’t buy or get more time.