Project Development Knowledge: Sharing and Enduring

The previous entry introduced the problem. The following is a discussion around practices that can help address it.

Standups

Daily standup meetings [1], aka daily scrums, are a great way for the team to share information about the current tasks being implemented by different team members. It's a quick forum, at the end of which, each team member will have basic knowledge of what other team members are up to. This can be very effective in eliminating duplicate efforts, as well as helping team members relate to other work affecting their own. Team members who notice the potential for cooperation and knowledge sharing during the standup, should get together after the meeting to carry on with further, more detailed examination of their work.

Pair programming

Controversial as it may be, this practice is very effective in achieving higher team productivity through continuous knowledge sharing. The risk of the knowledge leaving the team is greatly reduced. And if we enhance this practice by frequent pair rotation, it's even more effective, as it spreads more knowledge throughout the development team, and it encourages cross-pollination of ideas.

Colocation

Having to communicate information to other team members highlights a hand-off transition, that is better avoided. It's much better if all the team is there, witnessing and participating firsthand the effort underway, rather than being communicated what happened. Colocation of the team, or as much of the team as possible, is very effective at eliminating that need. And when information is communicated within a co-located team, it's at least an order of magnitude more effective, efficient, and complete, compared to other means.

Code reviews

When a pair spends a day modeling a piece of functionality, or refactoring a key part of the system, they are likely to want to tell other team members about it. Invariably, everyone in the team is interested to know what others are doing, and how certain problems are being addressed. While pair rotation helps here, getting the whole team to participate in a code review session can achieve some of this benefit to a wider audience. It's also a great forum for seeking guidance, sharing opinions, and exploring novel ways to address issues.

Automation

Automating a certain task is an excellent way of sharing how it's done. Automation enables other team members to achieve the task, as well as serve as a documentation on how to accomplish it. For example, instead of me asking you how you query for the balance sheet, I can either use an automated script to get the information, or I could learn from the script how it can be done.

Self documenting, readable code

Code can be considered a misnomer in this regard. We'd like to have code that does not require deciphering. We'd like to be able to know what the code is doing, and how it's done, clearly, with minimal effort. Herein lies an argument against clever programming techniques, that make it harder to reveal intent and side effects. Use code reviews to highlight less than obvious techniques, and have the team workout what it's most comfortable with. For example, if multiple team members are having issues with a piece of code that uses reflection, consider first informing more members how the piece works, and if necessary, consider an alternative implementation. Enabling higher team effectiveness is valued higher than programming cleverness.

Good check-in comments

These can go a long way in telling the story of project development. A check-in delta tells you what changed. The comment tells you why. When a developer has to go through source code history to understand the rationale behind a certain change or design decision, these comments can be very helpful in that regard. Try to be helpful to the consumer of the comment. For example, instead of typing "implemented story #123", provide more information: "Story #123: added capability to classes x and y to access context z to achieve a and b."

Wikis

Project wikis have been around for while. Dare I say that they are the norm these days? Wikis are an excellent source of day-to-day knowledge needed by the team. For example, database connection information, URLs to local servers and useful documentation, pointers to tools, project and domain specific acronyms, etc. They are also useful in documenting repetitive development tasks, that are yet to be, or are difficult to automate.
One particular use that I wish to highlight is documenting errors that are encountered during development, whether or not they are corrected. For example, if while starting a server we notice that we are getting an exception, we should start by documenting this fact. We then add the solution once we figure it out. Certain problems have the tendency to re-occur, while some are unlikely to occur once fixed. Nonetheless, a similar issue might arise and the fix may prove useful beyond the original use.

A searchable, archived email list

I have not seen this one on many projects. However, a sizable portion of the project information is exchanged using emails. For example, feature discussions between developers and BAs, the resolution of design issues, technical announcements, in the form of the introduction of a new build tools or code libraries, and project course-changing decisions, to name a few. An automatically archived project specific email list that is searchable can be very valuable for future development. Using this knowledge base can aid in understanding why things came to be the way they are.


This list isn't exhaustive, and each one deserves its own discussion. I meant to hint and introduce. None of these practices preclude another, and you can attempt all of them.
A bit of warning though: do not over do any of these, and keep the practices light. After all, we are after agility. Don't let these, or any other practices slow down the gemba.

As usual, I welcome, and appreciate, the reader's feedback.


[1] http://martinfowler.com/articles/itsNotJustStandingUp.html