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September 08, 2004
Lessons Learned
I've learned a lot of lessons this release. They mostly reinforce my assumptions about good project management.
I was trying to learn how to have mission critical external dependencies, to work within an unclear reporting structure, and to do a double ended rewrite/integration.
What I learned was:
1) try to reduce impact of external dependencies (don't put them on the critical path) and use fixed code v 2.0
2) create a logical reporting structure and put authority with responsibility
3) integration is hard and takes a long time (don't understimate it)
4) document so that you can negotiate at the endgame
5) clearly communicate state throughout the project
6) be careful what you ask valuable people to work on, because if you burn them out you have lost a valuable person
7) losing key people during the release can really be hard to recover from
8) be careful with team chemistry.
Posted by Chris at September 8, 2004 03:00 PM