Rating: 
Summary: Skip the first 5 chapters
Review: The second half of Kerth's book (ch. 6-9) contains some helpful advice on conducting end-of-project reviews. Kerth makes little distinction between reviewing (a) the end product of the project and (b) the performance of the project team. I recommend these chapters to discerning experienced project leaders as a supplement to a comprehensive book on project management.The early chapters, on the other hand, are loaded with naive misconceptions, e.g. on what a "successful project" is and an obsession with measuring "lines of code". They could actually do harm if taken seriously by a naive manager. The self-indulgent writing may approach a record for use of the first-person pronoun.
Rating:
Summary: Skip the first 5 chapters
Review: The second half of Kerth's book (ch. 6-9) contains some helpful advice on conducting end-of-project reviews. Kerth makes little distinction between reviewing (a) the end product of the project and (b) the performance of the project team. I recommend these chapters to discerning experienced project leaders as a supplement to a comprehensive book on project management. The early chapters, on the other hand, are loaded with naive misconceptions, e.g. on what a "successful project" is and an obsession with measuring "lines of code". They could actually do harm if taken seriously by a naive manager. The self-indulgent writing may approach a record for use of the first-person pronoun.
Rating: 
Summary: Good reference
Review: This book is intended as a manual for software developers intending to hold a project retrospective at the end of a large project. A retrospective is a little like a post-mortem. Much is learned during the course of a large project, and a project retrospective is a way to preserve that knowledge for use in later projects. A retrospective is different than a post-mortem in that a post-mortem sometimes implies that the project was a failure. Kerth makes it clear that as long as knowledge is gained from mistakes made, and that steps are taken to avoid the repetition of those mistakes, then no mistake is a total failure. Much of what Kerth writes about involves the tools and techniques of a facilitator. A facilitator is something like a psychotherapist for project teams. The facilitator's purpose is to get the members of the team, who sometimes do not work closely together either out of circumstance or preference, to share their opinions and observations about different aspects of the project in a non-threatening way. A facilitator must be an excellent communicator and should not offer his or her own opinion, only help others to express their own. In Kerth's opinion, much of what makes a project successful involves interpersonal communication and through a project retrospective a facilitator can help a project team improve their communication skills. I felt that the book offered some excellent suggestions. In particular, I liked Kerth's suggestions for illustrating to management of the value of a project retrospective. He provides an excellent checklist for preparing a proposal to management. I also liked his suggestions for demonstrating to project teammembers the value of failure. One suggestion is to have everyone watch a movie that involves project management, such as Kerth's favorite, Flight of the Phoenix. Another of Kerth's suggestions is to discuss the explosion of the space shuttle Challenger. Kerth suggests pointing out how the fact that four of the five books written on the explosion are oriented toward children shows how our culture shuns failure, and then discussing how analyzing the causes of the explosion helped NASA prevent similar accidents in the future. The book is intended for those intent on performing in-depth project retrospectives or project post-mortems. Much of the book consists of specific tips and techniques for those facilitating retrospectives. If I have a criticism of the book it is that much of the book is at a very practical level and that too little time is spent discussing how to make use of information garnered from project retrospectives in future projects.
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