What I'm Reading: Peopleware
Peopleware is a classic text on why most companies fail at software and what managers of development can do to avoid this failure. DeMarco and Lister decry the status quo of Corporate America taking on everything from building design to quality requirements and time estimates. What they say about the psychological need for quiet space and natural lighting hit home for me - these are all things we know to be true but it's great to hear someone else say it.
Most of their conclusions seem like common sense or at least conventional knowledge. I wish more of their data was collected more scientifically, but the authors are software consultants and this is just what they've observed.
Peopleware was originally published in 1987, and again in 1999. The second edition includes eight new chapters. I found the new chapters to be strikingly different in tone. By their own admission the new chapters were a result of another decade of experience and include a change in perspective. While the original content focused very sharply on identifying the things that organizations did to make software fail from an outside view, the new chapters could be considered almost a manager's handbook of how to keep that from happening.
This was a very enjoyable read, and is definitely a resource I will return to again and again for inspiration on
