Ship It!
(Sun Jun 26, 2005) [/Books] #
What makes a software project succeed? Or, more puzzling, why is it that some projects succeed, but when their recipe is followed by a different set of cooks, the project fails? The fact is there is no recipe you can follow to guarantee the success of your project. Developing software is a human activity, and no two software teams are alike.
But what you can do is follow a set of practices that works best for a particular team of people. That means you're constantly tailoring the practices: trying new practices, adopting the practices that work, and having the courage to throw out the practices that don't make the cut. Indeed, you have to come up with your own recipe. But which ingredients do you start with? What better than to ask the people who've been successful across projects big and small, each with unique team dynamics.
In their book Ship it! A Practical Guide to Successful Software Projects, Jared and Will set you on a course for project success with a collection of cream of the crop practices hand-picked from a cross-section of projects. Make no mistake, this isn't yet another book touting a brand-name process or methodology. It's all hard-won experience from the trenches: what worked, what didn't, and why they've adopted some practices and eliminated others.
What I love about this book is that I can hand it to any developer or manager and know that the advice is relevant to their project. It doesn't matter if they're already using a formal process or they have no process at all. Without the practices outlined in this book, every project is at risk of not shipping on time to happy customers. And so it should come as no surprise that I'll be highly recommending Ship It! to every project I visit.
Simply put, Jared and Will have done all the homework to help you get software out the door on time, every time, and with minimal fuss. And it's about time we all got the satisfaction of a job well done capped off with an exuberant Ship It!
