Title :
An initial exploration of the relationship between pair programming and Brooks´ law
Author :
Williams, Laurie ; Shukla, Anuja ; Antón, Annie I.
Author_Institution :
Dept. of Comput. Sci., North Carolina State Univ., Raleigh, NC, USA
Abstract :
Through his law, "adding manpower to a late software project makes it later,\´\´ Brooks asserts that the assimilation, training, and intercommunication costs of adding new team members outweigh the associated team productivity gain in the short term. Anecdotes suggest that adding manpower to a late project yields productivity gains to the team more quickly if the team employs the pair programming technique when compared to teams where new team members work alone. We utilize a system dynamics model which demonstrates support of these observations. Parameter values for the model were obtained via a small-scale, nonprobabilistic, convenience survey. Our initial findings suggest that managers should incorporate the pair programming practice when growing their team.
Keywords :
groupware; human resource management; labour resources; productivity; project management; software development management; team working; training; Brooks law; manpower cost; pair programming technique; software project; system dynamics model; team productivity; Collaborative work; Computer science; Costs; Fires; History; Productivity; Project management; Stress; Time measurement; Velocity measurement;
Conference_Titel :
Agile Development Conference, 2004
Print_ISBN :
0-7695-2248-3
DOI :
10.1109/ADEVC.2004.6