Wednesday, June 01, 2005

Developer Factory

Gotta say, I'm enjoying Object Thinking. David West is a bit of an evangelist but it's difficult to argue against many of his points.

One such point is that eXtreme Programming isn't about creating high quality software, it's about creating high quality developers. The by-product of having high quality developers is that high quality software is produced. I'm worried that tight fisted IT Managers might get their hands on this thought and start charging training costs to employees for working in an XP environment, but it is a good thought none-the-less.

It's also something that each developer should bear in mind when working in that XP environment. Every piece of work that's done is an opportunity to become a better developer. You're in full time training. Sometimes you're the trainer, other times you're the student. Most the time you're both. By sitting back and explaining certain assumptions you find flaws in the those assumptions. By teaching people what you do and how you do it, you spot problems more easily. Plus, of course, there's someone sat next to you that will tell you when you're wrong.

It's a thought I've always had lingering in the back of mind, but it's probably always been 'Me Teacher, You Student'.
I'm wrong, and I need to learn to change that attitude. We're all learning and improving the way we work through our interactions with other.

When we forget that we've got a lot to learn then we start going backwards again.

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