Beautiful Teams: Inspiring and Cautionary Tales from Veteran Team Leaders (Paperback)

~ Andrew Stellman (Author), Jennifer Greene PSE (Author)

Editorial Reviews

Product Description

What's it like to work on a great software development team facing an impossible problem? How do you build an effective team? Can a group of people who don't get along still build good software? How does a team leader keep everyone on track when the stakes are high and the schedule is tight? Beautiful Teams takes you behind the scenes with some of the most interesting teams in software engineering history. You'll learn from veteran team leaders' successes and failures, told through a series of engaging personal stories -- and interviews -- by leading programmers, architects, project managers, and thought leaders. This book includes contributions from:

Tim O'Reilly Scott Berkun Mark Healey Bill DiPierre Andy Lester Keoki Andrus Tom Tarka Auke Jilderda Grady Booch Jennifer Greene Mike Cohn Cory Doctorow Neil Siegel Trevor Field James Grenning Steve McConnell Barry Boehm and Maria H. Penedo Peter Gluck Karl E. Wiegers Alex Martelli Karl Fogel Michael Collins Karl Rehmer Andrew Stellman Ned Robinson Scott Ambler Johanna Rothman Mark Denovich and Eric Renkey Patricia Ensworth Andy Oram Tony Visconti

Beautiful Teams is edited by Andrew Stellman and Jennifer Greene, veteran software engineers and project managers who have been writing bestselling books for O'Reilly since 2005, including Applied Software Project Management, Head First PMP, and Head First C#.

About the Author

Andrew Stellman and Jennifer Greene are both veteran software engineers and project managers. They created Stellman & Greene Consulting in 2003, with a focus on project management, software development, management consulting, and software process improvement. Andrew and Jennifer have worked in a wide range of industries, including finance, telecommunications, media, non-profit, entertainment, natural language processing, science and academia. Their first book, Applied Software Project Management, was published by O'Reilly Media in 2005 and has been widely praised by project managers, software engineers and academics. Their second book, Head First PMP, was called "the very best basic education and training book that I have read" by Dennis Bolles, the project manager and lead author of the Project Management Institute's PMBOK(R) Guide. And their third book, Head First C#, is one of the most popular book for learning C#, Windows programming and object oriented programming and design. They regularly speak at schools, companies and professional organizations on project management, quality, software development and process improvement.

Jennifer Greene, has spent the past 15 years or so building software for many different kinds of companies. She's worked for small start-ups and some huge companies along the way. She's built software test teams and helped lots of companies diagnose and deal with habitual process problems so that they could build better software. Since her start in software test and process definition, she's branched out into development management and project management. She's currently managing a big development team for a global media company and she's managed just about every aspect of software development through her career. Jennifer founded Stellman & Greene Consulting with Andrew Stellman in 2003, initially to serve the scientific and academic community. They have worked in a wide range of industries including finance, telecommunications, media, non-profit, entertainment, natural language processing, science and academia. They do speaking engagements, provide training on development practices, manage teams, and build software. Together, they've written two highly acclaimed books on project management (Head First PMP and Applied Software Project Management), Head First C#, and most recently just finished up Beautiful Teams. For more information about Jennifer, Andrew Stellman, and their books, visit http: //www.stellman-greene.com.

Product Details

• Paperback: 482 pages
• Publisher: O'Reilly Media; 1 edition (April 6, 2009)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0596518021
• ISBN-13: 978-0596518028
• Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 7 x 1.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.8 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (10 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #64,046 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Something for absolutely everyone, June 28, 2009

By	Jim Brosseau - See all my reviews

This is a brilliant book, capped off with an excellent interview with record producer Tony Visconti, who reveals that the principles behind great teams transcend the genre of software development. From the value of knowing his people to diligent tracking of work charts built by everyone and collaboration in general, it is no surprise that that Tony's experience with musicians sounds a lot like a great software project. He admonishes that we should all devote our downtime to learning new stuff, and this book provides plenty of insights for any of us.

The many contributors step back from advancing their usual prescriptions to celebrate their own successes (and yes, challenges) within teams. In this celebration, they provide some of the best insights that we can carry forward into our own careers.

Whether Jennifer Greene draws wondrous team memories from the ashes of a dot-com failure, Keoki Andrus' shares a healthy respect for innovation and creative play to inspire a team, or engaging stories by Karl Wiegers and many others capture great team experiences, the variety in Beautiful Teams will keep you rapt like few other technical books.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Brilliant Collection!, July 13, 2009

By	Tanya Bhasin - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This book is great! It's a very quick read, and it was actually fun! I've been looking for insight into teamwork and software teams, and I was definitely not disappointed. To be honest, going into it I wasn't really sure what to expect. It dives straight into an interview with Tim O'Reilly about leadership, and he immediately starts talking about teams, creativity, design, open source, but in a way that all tied together and made sense. Then came an essay called "Why Ugly Teams Win," by Scott Berkun, who wrote about his experience on a team at Microsoft. I thought the combination of "higher" ideas and practical, real-world experience, right next to each other, worked extremely well.

The book is divided into sections called People, Goals, Practices, Obstacles and Music. When I first saw that, I was surprised by the last section. But it turned out to be one of my favorite parts of the book. It's got an interview with Tony Visconti, and what he says about working with musicians actually made a lot of sense, and I could see exactly why it made sense as the last chapter in the book. All of the chapters stand on their own, and they all make different points about teams. It's easy to just go right through them, from front to end. It's a unique collection, and in my opinion it's definitely worth your time.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A wonderful collection of stories about beautiful teams, July 8, 2009

By	Abby Fichtner "The Hacker Chick" (Moultonborough, NH USA) - See all my reviews

Beautiful Teams is a wonderful collection of stories by great names in software about their experiences with teams. From Mike Cohn, Scott Ambler, Grady Booch, Steve McConnell, Scott Berkun, Johanna Rothman, James Grenning... And even a few non-software folks who make the stories that much more compelling because they transcend discipline.

The book is broken into 4 main sections - one each for the primary themes that come up when talking about beautiful teams: People, Goals, Practices, and Obstacles. One of my favorites is Scott Berkun's Why Ugly Teams Win, which proclaims "real heroes are ugly. They are misfits." Citing as examples The Ramones, The Dirty Dozen, and The Bad News Bears. "Once the members of an ugly team have earned each others' trust, they will outperform the rest of any organization."

It's a book that can't help but make you smile as you think of your own experiences with great teams and what makes them so awesome to be part of. I don't know that there's the answer to how to build a beautiful team in here, it is more a book of tales. But it is definitely a topic we will do well to be thinking more about in software development and a fun book to read.

And, again, I love Scott Berkun's advice, "Stop complaining about your coworkers. Instead, get your team and your boss to read Beautiful Teams." Indeed!