Reviews, was RE: Responsibility

[Amy Smith/Westford/IBM <amy_smith -at- us -dot- ibm -dot- com>]

For our last major release, I worked out a very effective review strategy 
with the project leader of my development team. 

- First, we sat down and went over the chapters/sections/topics  to 
determine who on the dev team should review what chapters/sections/topics. 


- Then we worked out a review schedule. Since D. managed the developers' 
time, he knew best when a developer would have the time to review doc. 

- Lastly - and this is the most important thing - the review task was 
assigned to the developers by D., so the developers were responsible to 
their *project leader* for completing the task. I didn't have to 
chase/cajole/beg/lie down in the parking lot in front of their cars  to 
get their attention. 

The result was a staged, steady review cycle. The reviews were probably 
more effective because they weren't done under duress (or as much duress). 


Throwing stuff out there and using non-response as an ok makes me nervous. 
:-) Call me anal-retentive, but I like being able to close the loop. 
Besides, this gives developers the opportunity to keep you up to date on 
things you might miss in the heat of reviews and deadlines. "Yup, this 
looks great. You got the hooseydinkey feature all right. By the way, did 
you know we decided to add/change/move/colorize the rumtumbler dialog?" 
(And this is long *after* the rumtumbler feature doc has been reviewed and 
locked down). :-0 :-) 

Amy

****************************************************************************
Amy Smith 
GPD Information Development
IBM Software Group/Lotus Software
Phone 978.399.5009 | Tie line: 399.5009 | Email: amy_smith -at- us -dot- ibm -dot- com
*****IBM Confidential******




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