Organizational Patterns of Agile Software Development

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Summary: Get Smarter, Faster
Review: I think of patterns as "concentrated knowledge pills" that make you stronger (smarter). The best patterns can be taken many times over the course of a project, a job, or a career. This carefully researched (nothing artificial), artfully described (no sugar added), and extraordinarily useful (no known harmful side-effects) catalog of organizational patterns gives every software development manager a lifetime's supply of knowledge pills that should be taken many times throughout their career.

Recommended dosage: as many as you need, as often as you need. Refills? Keep the book handy.
Expiration Date? None -- the wisdom in this book is timeless.

-- Luke Hohmann
Founder, Enthiosys
Author of "Beyond Software Architecture"

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Summary: Patterns for managers
Review: In my role as project manager, I have been aware of the work of the authors for a few years. I have applied some of the patterns with very good results (Architect also Implements, Size the Organization, and more). It is great to see the work now out in book form, and it contains much more than I expected!
With almost a 100 patterns it can get hard to start, but part III and part IV of the book with the foundations and case studies give good help in the thinking process. I would read these first after a quick scan through the patterns.
I like the way the patterns are structured into project management, people and code etc. And the pattern language figures are a good help. The book can be used on several levels. It has best practices to be applied individually, and as such it will give you ideas that are immediately useful. To get the full value and understand the full potential of the material, you need to spend time (read chapter 2) and understand the nature of the underlying research on highly productive teams.
Oh, and I love the pictures!!

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Summary: Common sense is so uncommon!
Review: It's true. There are a lot of patterns here, but most of them are just a page or two and you will remember them, not only because the patterns are well-written and the names are compelling, but because each is tellingly illustrated with a great photo! Some of these may seem like "common sense" -- especially to those of you who are great managers and team builders. Unfortunately, we know how well common sense appears at staff meetings these days :-)! Even the experts, can learn from the research that supports these patterns and some of it is surprising. The pattern "Size the Organization" recommends that teams have no more than 10 members and is one of my personal favorites. As a consultant who facilitates retrospectives across companies I can say that the penalty for not knowing these patterns can be severe. Pick up a copy and let the pictures and the prose draw you in!

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Summary: IT-project insights for adults!
Review: Patterns are good - good patterns are better - too many patterns are bad, if not presented well!

Jim Coplien and Neil Harrison definitely mined good org patterns and present them in way one can digest.
Many of them we had the chance of watching getting refined over years in the org pattern community so with the book you get definitely much more than what two persons could collect or research!
One can get out very practical hints if one is willing to spend at least several hours with the book to grasp the ideas and underlying concepts first. Once beyond that hurdle one can harvest details and insights for years.
Based on my own experiences and those of my faciltator group with several hundreds of IT-project retrospectives at Siemens Austria, regarding the concrete findings, the nice thing is, that it seems to be universal and not too culturally different what is summarized. I agree with most pattern core insights.

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Summary: Practical diagnosis and repair for software team dysfunction
Review: The largest piece of value I got from this book was the immediate applicability of the patterns to organizations that are experiencing a form of dysfunction. It's easy to see what applies to you, why the pattern is intended to fix it, and even what needs to be in place in your organization for the change to be effective. Though at the back, you shouldn't ignore the advice on how to actually roll out pattern changes and the additional notes on when your organization needs more basic work on trust before it can start to be more effective.

The major shortcoming (for me) is that a lot of the patterns are interlinked tightly enough that a single read through them in linear order will leave you resolving a bunch of forward references as you continue on. I found I had to read them through twice to make sure I understood some of the more subtle distincions, especially between particular roles like Gatekeeper, Patron, and Matron -- it made me wonder if there wasn't a different order or refactoring of the presentation that would've made it flow more smoothly. Still, a minor nit on such an otherwise useful book.

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Summary: Outstanding distillation of experience
Review: This is an outstanding book that distills years of experience into a system, a pattern language, that names, organizes, and relates together, many of the experiences and realities that those of us in the world of development have to deal with all of the time. As one who has functioned at many levels in development, I was able to recognize and appreciate most of the patterns. The only cavil I might have is that section 6.2 and on really pulls together what the book is about, and it seemed that it, or some version of it, really belonged in chapter 1.

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Summary: Best organisational patterns
Review: This is the best book on patterns since the publication of Alexander's A Pattern Language. The book offers four pattern languages containing over 100 patterns that show you how to design, grow, shape and improve an organisation. The patterns are dense, full of insights, wisdom and knowledge; they are based on the authors' more than a decade of research and experience. Many of the patterns are timeless, such as CommunityOfTrust, ConwaysLaw and NamedStableBases. Some patterns are really beautiful, such as WorkFlowsInward, ArchitectAlsoImplements and FormFollowsFunction. Although the book is about organisational patterns, I have found it valuable for anyone who is interested in patterns or wishes to learn about patterns.

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Summary: Finally
Review: This rare jewel is a practical guide to the deeper secrets and relationships of software development.

It is however based on "true Science", since it was originally based on extensions to Moreno's sociometric techniques, although it reads like literature -- it is art.

To the lucky ones that read it, understand it, and practice it, it will provide, undoubtedly, the passage to a higher level of understanding of how people work, and work best, when doing software devleopment.

Although "agile development" pehaps was first practiced by LISP programmers in the 1960's, Organizational Patterns is perhaps the first documentation that ever existed on true Agile development. No one, to my knowledge, had done so before. (Not Scrum, which started in 1993, nor XP which started much later. etc.)

To the interested readers I only have one simple advice: read every single page -- twice!!, and practice the patterns, many times!!!