STOP WORKING IN TEAMS! TEAMWORK IS CRAZY!

Summary

In this talk, the speaker reflects on Fred Brooks' theory from 'The Mythical Man-Month,' highlighting that adding more developers to a software project often slows down progress due to increased communication and collaboration overhead. Comparing software development to art rather than engineering, the speaker emphasizes that it's more efficient for a single developer to manage a project. They critique the concept of teamwork in software development, noting that splitting larger tasks into independent projects can sometimes help but rarely solves the core issue. Ultimately, the speaker advocates for smaller teams or solo work to optimize productivity.

Takeaways

• 💡 Fred Brooks' insight from 'The Mythical Man-Month' suggests that adding more developers to a software project often slows it down rather than speeding it up.
• 🧑‍💻 The speaker believes that adding more developers to a project reduces velocity exponentially, making the project take longer as more people are involved.
• 🎨 Software development is compared to art, not engineering, meaning that multiple people working on a project can complicate the creative process.
• 🎼 Like composing a symphony, having multiple people collaborate on a software project requires significant communication and synchronization of vision.
• 📉 Communication overhead is a key reason why adding more developers to a project doesn't improve speed and efficiency, often causing delays.
• 🍕 Jeff Bezos’ 'Two Pizza Team' rule limits the size of software development teams to those that can be fed with two pizzas, typically four or five members, to avoid excessive team size and inefficiency.
• 🤔 The speaker argues that it's better for a single developer to handle an entire project, minimizing the need for coordination with others.
• 🔀 Decomposing large projects into smaller ones can, in theory, allow multiple developers to work without needing to collaborate, though this approach has limitations.
• 🚫 Microservices architecture, while a way to break down projects, adds complexity and doesn’t fully eliminate the communication challenges in large projects.
• 🙅‍♂️ The speaker concludes by rejecting the idea of hiring additional developers, believing it would increase costs without improving productivity, due to the teamwork overhead.

Q & A

What is Fred Brooks' famous formulation from his book *The Mythical Man-Month*?

Fred Brooks stated that 'one man can do in one month what two men can do in two months,' highlighting the inefficiencies of adding more developers to a project.

What is the speaker's personal experience regarding software development velocity?

The speaker suggests that the velocity of a software development project decreases by the square of the number of developers added, meaning that as more developers are added, the project takes disproportionately longer to complete.

Why does the speaker argue that software development is more like art than engineering?

The speaker believes that software development is more similar to art because, like composing a symphony, it requires a singular vision and seamless execution. When more people are involved, communication and coordination problems arise, just as multiple composers would struggle to create a cohesive symphony.

What example does the speaker use to illustrate the problem of multiple people working on the same artistic project?

The speaker uses the analogy of composing a symphony. If one composer handles it, the vision is clear, but if five composers work on it, they must constantly communicate and align their vision, making the process much more complex.

What is Jeff Bezos' 'two pizza team' rule, and how does it relate to software development?

Jeff Bezos' 'two pizza team' rule states that no software development team should be larger than what can be comfortably fed with two pizzas, typically four or five people. This aims to minimize the overhead and complexity that come with larger teams.

Why does the speaker consider the problem of team communication and coordination in software development unsolvable?

The speaker argues that the problem is unsolvable because as more developers are added to a project, the communication and orchestration overhead increases exponentially, making it inefficient to scale a team.

What does the speaker suggest as the best approach to handling large software projects?

The speaker suggests that large projects should be broken down into smaller, individual subprojects where each software developer works independently, minimizing the need for communication and collaboration between developers.

Why does the speaker express dislike for the term 'microservice architecture'?

The speaker dislikes the term 'microservice architecture' because it adds complexity without fully eliminating the communication overhead, which is the core issue in large projects with multiple developers.

What is the speaker’s opinion on hiring software developers for a team?

The speaker refuses to hire software developers because they believe that adding more developers only increases costs and decreases project velocity due to the added communication overhead.

What analogy does the speaker use to explain the problems of teamwork in software development?

The speaker uses the analogy of marriage, comparing teamwork to having multiple wives. Just as having five wives would not make someone five times as happy, adding more developers to a project does not improve productivity and can create more challenges.