The Old Joel on Software Forum: Part 4 (of 5)

Product Management Tools

I wonder whether specific tools for this role exists.
Typically i would look for a software that lets me do version planning, new enhancements planning, beta site management etc.

InfantManager
Monday, February 23, 2004

post-it(TM) notes

hoser
Monday, February 23, 2004

a lot of the companies on the SAP ventures ( http://www.sapventures.com )blogs seem to be building products that seem (remotely) related to what you're talking about. see what IBM (Rational) tools have to offer as well

No BS
Monday, February 23, 2004

I'd read a couple of books on extreme programming and look into notecards.

THEN I'd read Joel Spolsky's articles on specifications and creating a project schedule.

After that, and only after that, I MIGHT look into some of the more mind-numbing pert/gannt chart software products.

regards,

Matt H.
Monday, February 23, 2004

Of course, hopefully, before you became a manager you had several years of exposure to these tools as someone in the trenches .... right?

Matt H.
Monday, February 23, 2004

ObJoel - try painless software schedules.

Try 'painless' in general. Process improvement using that prime directive tends toward the minimalist / stops before YAGNI sets in. Technical people respect it when they see you doing in-the-trenches work they can understand rather than being an architecture astronaut. And the simple argument -- even as a manager, the best way to convince people to try new things is to have their first experiences with it be good ones.

Mikayla
Monday, February 23, 2004

Preach it.

hoser
Monday, February 23, 2004