Thank you for the clear statement of your position. I agree that no individual metrics accurately reflect individual contribution to team performance.
The dilemma is that our sponsors want and deserve accountability. Metrics are a form of accountability. But the metrics are inadequate. One part of responding to the request for individual metrics is to respect the person making the request. They have a legitimate need and they have paid me the compliment of asking my help in getting that need met. A simple way to respond is to do what they ask us. If they want function points or lines of code, I'll find a way to give them function points or lines of code. That may bring up unmet needs on my part (that's what I hear in the violent reactions to Alfonso). I can try to hold those needs in, dump my fears on this mailing list (or the cat, or wherever). Alternatively, I can expose my needs to the person making the request: the way I work, I'm afraid that I will look bad compared to my colleagues. On my best days I manage to add functionality to the project while removing lines of code. I need some reassurance that I won't be punished for this. Then I listen to the answer. The solution to the metrics question isn't a belligerent "we don't need no stinking metrics". The solution lies in using the request as a way of exploring the unspoken needs revealed by our emotional reaction to the request, and using our response to the request as a way of deepening our work relationships. Kent Beck Three Rivers Institute > -----Original Message----- > From: Steven Gordon [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] > Sent: Sunday, November 07, 2004 6:00 AM > To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > Subject: RE: [XP] Measuring individual developer > productivity/accountability > > Kent, > > The client can certainly tell us how they want team > performance measured. The client should not tell us how they > want individual performance measured. > > The client retains the team or does not. The client can > certainly ask for the removal of a team member who is rude, > crude, or habitually tardy, but > should not be asking us to measure the LOC for each team member and > remove anybody who produce less than 100/day. They could ask the > team to boost its LOC/day, but not each individual team member. > > The argument has never been against collecting whatever > metrics at the team > level. The argument has been whether there are any valid > metrics to assess > individual productivity and contribution in the context of an > XP team. My > position is that given collective code ownership, promiscuous > pairing, and > the co-mingling of design, coding, and testing activities in > XP, there can be > no such individual metrics. To Post a message, send it to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To Unsubscribe, send a blank message to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] ad-free courtesy of objectmentor.com Yahoo! Groups Links <*> To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/extremeprogramming/ <*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] <*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
