Build a Team that Ships (2012)
I’ve been shipping for more than thirty years. Twenty-five of them, as a manager.<p>Not everything has been a success, and I was not the “big boss,” during most of that time, so I often had to work in far-from-perfect systems.<p>The one thing that has been a constant drumbeat, throughout my entire career, was a relentless focus on “Done.”<p>“What does ‘Done’ look like?” Is a question I’m constantly asking myself. It can change, as the project progresses, but it’s always there.<p>I tend to start vague, with “Done” being almost abstract, and get sharper and more focused, as the project coalesces around an end-user deliverable.<p>As I said, I have had many less-than-stellar outcomes, but I’ve always delivered an end product.<p>The best ones have been the ones with the least planning up front. Not always the most ambitious ones, but the best ones.<p>I’ve learned to adopt an “organic” project process, based on the assumption that it’s impossible to know the end result when I start.<p>I write about that in these articles:<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;littlegreenviper.com&#x2F;miscellany&#x2F;evolutionary-design-specification&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;littlegreenviper.com&#x2F;miscellany&#x2F;evolutionary-design-...</a><p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;littlegreenviper.com&#x2F;miscellany&#x2F;forensic-design-documentation&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;littlegreenviper.com&#x2F;miscellany&#x2F;forensic-design-docu...</a><p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;littlegreenviper.com&#x2F;miscellany&#x2F;thats-not-what-ships-are-built-for&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;littlegreenviper.com&#x2F;miscellany&#x2F;thats-not-what-ships...</a>