Short story: Alistair one-liner "Would your team still work in the same way?"
Story - Wilhelm (Jim McCarthy)
Also known as the "genius with a thousand helpers" Jim Collins, Good to Great
Paradoxically, adding more components to an overall system design can actually undermine efforts to achieve high availability. That's because complex systems inherently have more potential failure points and are more difficult to implement correctly. The most highly available systems hew to a simple design pattern: a single, high quality, multi-purpose physical system with comprehensive internal redundancy running all interdependent functions paired with a second, like system at a separate physical location. --Wikipedia, "High Availability"
Specialization is another way of saying "many teams of one" --William Caputo, extremeprogramming Yahoo group
See also XP Is Genius Friendly http://c2.com/cgi/wiki?XpIsGeniusFriendly
Refrain from answering question if you feel they can answer it themselves.
“Give a man a fish and he will be fed for the day. Teach a man to fish and he will never be hungry again.” --Chinese proverb
The only reason to organize groups... ??? Jim Collins
Asking for help vs. Pairing:
- Expert consultation
- Expert imitation
- Expert perception
In fact, many Aikido dojo - at least in Europe - don't distinguish mudansha at all with colored belts (like done e.g. in Judo). This has the effect, that there is not only one teacher but many of them. Transferred to software development, this could mean: don't use one explicit coach, but create a collaborative atmosphere, where everyone is everyone's coach. (I'm learning Aikido since 28 years, and find myself pretty often learning from WhiteBelt?s - and the same happens from time to time in software development, where I'm looking back to only 18 years of practice, when I'm finding myself learning from people in a class I'm giving from time to time...) -- ChristianMann http://c2.com/cgi/wiki?BlackBeltsTrainWhiteBelts
Practices
- Open workspace
- Check ins require two names - Always ask the second person
- Reviews
- Pair chart (Game)
- No second chance
- Suggest stories (for iteration planning) for people's interests
- Push problems back for the team to solve
- Ask for help
- "We get our stories done"
Ward on collective ownership: http://www.artima.com/intv/ownership.html
Paul Hodgetts http://www.agilelogic.com/weblog/index.cgi/2004/09/21#BenefitsOfPairProgramming
Stewardship: Choosing Service over Self-Interest by Peter Block
- Stewardship is being accountable to the larger team or organization by "operating in service, rather than in control, of those around us."
- "We choose service over self-interest most powerfully when we build the capacity of the next generation to govern themselves"
- Stewardship offers a model of partnership that distributes the power of choice and resources to each individual.
- Stewardship is personal - everyone is responsible for outcomes; mutual trust is the basic building block, and the willingness to risk and be vulnerable is a given.
- Total honesty is critical. End secrecy. Give knowledge away because it is a form of power