Thursday, August 09, 2007

Discipline and Unity

I've just about finished up Jim Collins' Good To Great audio book, and I've recently finished Dynamics of Software Development by Jim McCarthy. After reading/listening to both, I've come to the conclusion that:

  1. For a software team to become successful, you need a common understanding of the goal. Every member needs to know what the final desired outcome is.
  2. Every team member also needs discipline. Jason Alexander sums it up better than I could.
With discipline and a clear goal, everyone focuses on the outcome with all the effort they can muster.

Now, there are obviously more factors that contribute to a successful team, but I feel like these are some of the most important ones. If your team has these qualities, you're definitely on the right track.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

How would you define "discipline" as it applies to software development shop?

Nic Webb said...

Ah - you've touched on what I want to write about next. Stay tuned.