people management

Remember the last time you went grocery shopping without a list and you had your toddler, your mother, or spousal unit with you? Or when you stopped by the beer store and found yourself standing in the chip aisle, dazed and confused by the choices? Did you get what you needed? Did you spend as much money as you expected to? Mary Gorman discusses the value of starting out with clear requirements when shopping for commercial off-the-shelf software.

Many managers claim to have an open-door policy. They want to be available to their employees. But do they really have an open-door policy, or is it a handy name for a commendable intention? Naomi Karten describes the flaws in open-door policies and offers suggestions for making them work.

One characteristic of agile development is continuous involvement from testers throughout the process. Testers have a hard and busy job. Jeff has finally starting to understand why testing in agile development is fundamentally different.

Michele Sliger uses a simple exercise to exemplify the changes self-organized teams cause in any company, especially with the project manager. In this column, Michele explains how to conduct this exercise and how to review and use the results to improve work relationships and communication. Above all, this exercise should help your whole organization understand how everyone's knowledge of a project's initiatives and goals affects the project's success.