Waltzing with Bears: Managing Risk on Software Projects

Description

Winner of the Software Development Jolt Product Excellence Award

Greater risk brings greater reward, especially in software development. A company that runs away from risk will soon find itself lagging behind its more adventurous competition. By ignoring the threat of negative outcomes - in the name of positive thinking or a can-do attitude - software managers drive their organizations into the ground.

In Waltzing with Bears, Tom DeMarco and Timothy Lister - the best-selling authors of Peopleware - show readers how to identify and embrace worthwhile risks. Developers are then set free to push the limits.

The authors present the benefits of risk management, including that it

* makes aggressive risk-taking possible

* protects management from getting blindsided

* provides minimum-cost downside protection

* reveals invisible transfers of responsibility

* isolates the failure of a subproject.

Readers are armed with strategies for confronting the most common risks that software projects face:

* schedule flaws

* requirements inflation

* turnover

* specification breakdown

* and under-performance.

Waltzing with Bears will help you mitigate the risks - before they turn into project-killing problems. Risks are out there - and they should be there - but there is a way to manage them.

Insights from the Book

"Running away from risk is a no-win proposition. Sometimes you come across a project that looks positively risk-free. In the past, you may have looked at such an endeavor as a 'slam dunk' and thanked your lucky stars to be given an easy project for a change. We've had the same reaction. What dummies we were. Those projects weren't worth doing at all." - from Chapter 1