Rules of Productivity
Rules of Productivity
Rules of Productivity
8 productivity experiments
you dont need to repeat.
What is Productivity?
+ Work accomplished
- Work required to fix defects
- Work required to fix bad design decisions
Experiment
Results 1
Productivity
60 hours a week
(declining)
start
40 hours a week
(steady)
2 week
4 week
6 week
8 week
Lessons
Work 40-hour weeks with time for
rest and family.
Never work 2 months of 60-hour
crunch.
o It accomplishes less, despite the initial
boost.
Experiment
Results 2
Productivity
1. Crunching
2. Crunching ends
4. Return to baseline
B
3. Team recovers
Typically A B
Lessons
Short spurts <3 weeks can raise
productivity temporarily.
Team can use overtime tactically to meet
nearby deadlines.
Plan for an equivalent reduction in
productivity immediately afterwards.
Consider 4-day work weeks as a flextime
option.
Experiment
Results 3
Lessons
Overtime kills creativity.
If you are stuck on a problem, go
home or take a break.
Get 8 hours of sleep. Sleep
substantially improves your problem
solving abilities.
Experiment
Results 4
Productivity
Graphing perceived
productivity
Perceived
Baseline
Actual
Why?
Failure to measure
o Cost of defects
o Cost of bad design decisions
o Missed opportunities
Lessons
The feeling of increased long-term
productivity is false.
Rest your exceptional producers to
achieve even better results.
Use customer metrics to determine
actual productivity
Experiment
Results
Productivity is maximized in
small teams of 4-8 people.
Lessons
Split your projects into small crossfunctional teams.
Use Scrum-of-scrums to link small teams
together on larger projects
Create a process for:
Growing new teams
Splitting large teams
Transitioning to new projects
Experiment
Results 6
Lessons
Seat the team in their own room.
With walls.
Give at least 50 square feet per
person. Less reduces productivity.
Create side rooms for private
conversations, phone calls and
meeting with external groups.
Minimize non-team distractions.
Experiment
Results 7
Cross-functional teams
outperform siloed teams
Why?
Lessons
Create teams where every skill needed to
solve the problem at hand is in the same
room.
Limit the charter: Do everything = big
team.
Fulltime: Focuses team member efforts.
Multitasking = 15% drop in efficiency.
Experiment
Results
Why?
Lessons
Schedule 20% below possible velocity if
you are running a scrum team.
Hold periodic reviews of side projects and
award interesting ideas.
Publicize and reward side projects that
make their way into production.
Keep a public list of important things if
anyone runs out of work (happens rarely).
Other productivity
techniques
Experimentation Culture
Fail faster to find success sooner.
Short iterations.
User metrics such as A/B tests
Stage gate portfolio management.
Safety nets
Test-driven development.
Daily/weekly access to real customers.
Empower the team
Constraints-based requirements, not mandates from above.
Training
References
Crunch in the game industry
http://www.igda.org/articles/erobinson_crunch.php
http://www.infoq.com/news/2008/01/crunch-mode
Best team size
http://knowledge.wharton.upenn.edu/article.cfm?articleid=1501
http://www.teambuildingportal.com/articles/systems-approaches/teamperformance-teamsize.php
Sleep and problem solving
http://www.cnn.com/2004/HEALTH/01/21/sleep.creativity.ap/index.html
Sickness and Overtime correlation
http://cat.inist.fr/? aModele=afficheN&cpsidt=15461524
Prioritization
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Things_First_(book )
4 day work week
http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1093/is_1_42/ai_53697784
http://rop.sagepub.com/cgi/reprint/28/2/166
From http://www.shrm.org/hreducation/Creating_Flex_Work_PPT_Final.ppt
Team spaces
Rapid Software Development through Team Collocation IEEE Transactions on Software Engineering, Volume 28, No. 7, July 2002