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List:       extremeprogramming
Subject:    Re[2]: [XP] Re: How to build an XP-compliant office plan
From:       Doug Swartz <daswartz () prodigy ! net>
Date:       2003-03-29 15:55:24
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Friday, March 28, 2003, 9:04:56 AM, Arjé Cahn wrote:

> Kiel, Doug, Erik,

> Many thanks for your comments. Right now I think we will start with the coding \
> practices (short term) and some of the planning stuff. Strangely enough, we found \
> ourself in the pretty situation that we have a customer that insisted on being in \
> our office one or to days a week... He's doing a great job in creating the user \
> stories right now. So we have some space for him as well. My role will be a \
> coaching one - so I should be around as well.

Customer on-site is a great start! I'm sure over time he will figure out
he gets even more value for his money if he's on-site 3 or 4 days a
week.

> As I understand, Doug, you've put your programmers against the wall
> (a window). I have developers in the center around a big table
> facing eachother and all the others about 50 feet away in the same
> office (which is a big square with windows all around).
Our development space is about a 20 foot wide strip around 2 1/2 walls
of the room. We have 6 development teams spread around this perimeter.
While there aren't "table assignments", each team tends to cluster in
one area. This allows each team to focus on their own set of work, but
lets people on the different teams communicate easily when they need
to.

It's been a psychological advantage for us to have developers
able to look up from the table and see the weather outside. This is,
at least partially, because many of our developers came from
organizations where all the windows were hidden by manager offices.

If I remember correctly, you have 4 developers, or so. I'd lean
toward two or three smaller tables the developers can rearrange for
themselves. We have about 35 developers and testers and some of our
tables get rearranged every month, or so. Most of them are in clusters
of two or three tables.

> Do you think it is benificial to create a certain
> distance between the programmer's personal space and the actual
> coding spot?

Not necessarily. The physical layout of the space we have to work with
limits the number of personal spaces that can be near the development
area. We felt it much more important for project managers and
customers and coaches and conference rooms and business executives to
be near the developers, and for all the teams to be in the same area,
than for the developer personal space to be near the development space.


> Kiel, you simply don't use different coding machines at all? Is that workable? 

> I've read Peopleware, but hoped that an open workspace would create a relaxing
> environment where everyone would be equal. At least, that's what I told myself
> since we didn't have much choice. So now, I'm stuck with the open office. Maybe
> I have to put some of those paper walls in it to seperate things.
> "Put the focus of change on the work processes not the environment!" [ErikLundh]
> - I understand what you mean, but I have the feeling that some small
> adjustments can make a big difference. And I need change to get things going.

Erik is right: the processes (the things we do, and how we do them) is
where the emphasis needs to be. But you are also right: The
environment can have a large impact on whether the processes have a
decent chance to flourish. Small changes in environment can make a big
difference.

XP is primarily a collaborative exercise. The size of personal space
allocated by most large corporations doesn't enable collaborative
work. An open workspace is a good way to create an environment which
enables it. If you haven't, read Alistair Cockburn's "Agile Software
Development". It has a good discussion on these areas.

Peopleware is brilliant, though. Don't ignore the lessons there.
People need different kinds of structure in which to work. I think
it's important to give each person some control over their
environment, especially in an open workspace setting. We have one guy
who is uncomfortable unless he has a wall behind him. Whatever team
he's on has at least one table set up so he has that comfort. He and his
pair can usually be found at one of those tables. Other people like to
arrange what we call dancing whiteboards (2 to 3 foot wide whiteboards
on wheels) so their table feels like it has a little more separation
from the next table.


Doug Swartz


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