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Managing with the Web

Quite some people may have the experience that managing a distributed project can be tricky. Small clubs governed from regular meetings at a pub are barely different from large multinational software development projects. One organization has - in my humble opinion - really come to terms with distributed co-operation: The World Wide Web Consortium. No wonder: its Director, Tim Berners-Lee, has himself invented the suitable techincal tools: the World Wide Web. Nevertheless, without a suitable working culture, the technology is of little use. On the contrary: the technology is, once you look close enough, only a tool to enable this working culture. I myself was lucky enough to work for the World Wide Web Consortium for several years, and to learn and appreciate this culture. The presentation linked from this page summarizes the core characteristics of this working culture and its symbiosis with technology. It consists of three chapters:

1. Managing People
2. Managing Groups
3. Managing Tools

A still pending fourth part will explain under which circumstances a project can actually be distributed according to this methodology (or, possibly, whether the project can succeed in a distributed manner at all). One of the fundamental assumptions is that the project in question ir novel, in other words: it does not fit into existing schemes or preocesses.

Managing People

The first part mostly deals with dealing with people. The fundamental assumption there is that distributed projects by their very nature require more creativity and improvisation than their localized counterparts. The reason for that is simple: distributed projects must cope with a much wider range of unexpected events: dropouts of phone lines, travel trouble and/or difficulties with the organization of meetings etc. etc. There, processes tend to get in the way more often than with localized projects - at the same time, the individual responsibility of every single member of the project team is much higher. While in a localized project one "simply knows each other" (and therefor trusts each other), people simply do not know each other in distributed projects - and every mishap, no matter its cause, comes back to one's own credibility. Therefor, one's own credibility is the single most important asset of every member of the project team without exception.

Managing Groups

The second part shows how to make a group work, how to make it work so that the whole is more than the sum of the parts. There is only a very small list of criteria. Sticking to the spirit of this list (as opposed to the letters) takes care of creating a strong community in the group and enables it to work towards a common goal.

Once the group works this way, experience shows that dealing with meetings is the biggest challenge, be it with respect to face-to-face meetings or telephone conferences. Therefor, a working meeting culture is the focus of the rest of this chapter.

Managing Tools

The World Wide Web is probably deserves the title as most widely used and least well understood technology of our time. Therefor, the third part of this presentation deals with some popular misconceptions and the benefits of well-arranged systems. It explains how to leverage Web and Internet technologies so that the computer works for the people and not the other way 'round. Some simple recipes demonstrate the principles.

In summary, the presentation demonstrates an integrated approach to distributed projects. Experience shows that the methods described lead to reliable distributed projects, while violating the principles given as reliably causes trouble. In this sense, the presented methods constitute the least common denominator of successful distributed projects.

On to the presentation "Managing With The Web" (PDF, 64KB)