The Final Review of Maverick Software Development

I just deleted the Maverick Software Development group. I had ran it for three or more years. It had nearly 150 members. I posted many thoughts and ideas on how I felt a software company should be ran.

I captured some of the posts and put them in this blog.

I did a lot of work on that group trying to change some ideas on how business can be ran and how software can be developed. When I reflect back on the effort I can not see that I effected any change. It seemed that everyone fell into two camps. Those that already believed in the ideas and those that felt the ideas where not practical. So I feel that I have caused no change and thus done no work.

Is part of the problem that I did this for free? Maybe if I had written a book and charged for it things would have been received better. Maybe if I had went around as a consultant or something. I don't know.

The current "players" in the software process space never seemed to get on board with any of my ideas. Either they they would say nothing or would say, "Oh, what you have proposed is something we did years ago and we called it XYZ-ABC-123".

When I started the Maverick group it was because I had gained renewed hope for improvements when XP and Agile came on the scene.

I had originally proposed Semco style changes years before Agile. Those "Maverick" ideas were rejected and my professional reputation had suffered because of my public alignment with those ideas. So I focused on programming, design, object oriented modeling, and other related fields and kept my head down.

Well, I have came full circle once again. The evangelizing of the Maverick ideas seems to have done me no good and probably harm. So, I go back to what pays the bills and I leave the problems of process and improvement to those that have the book deals, the conference appearances, and the consulting companies. Clearly their financial success in their respective areas indicates that they are truly the most knowledgeable in the field of software development.