Re:Counting hours doesn't make sense
by anthonyrubin on Wednesday February 25, 2009 @01:47PM
(#494725)
This type of experiment was done by the Peopleware authors. They are the source of many of the productivity numbers you see quoted for software developers.
Yes. The concept of the "10x developer" is one of those examples that describe the variance in productivity among software developers
http://forums.construx.com/blogs/stevemcc/archive/2008/03/27...
Your experiment of creating 2 teams would be an interesting one. But I think one team should be given 2 weeks and the other team should be given 1 (or less), and they cannot know of the other team or that they're trying to solve the same problem.
If teams are in direct competition with each other, you get that sibling rivalry effect that almost tore Apple apart (Machintosh vs II).
I wonder if breaking a team down into 2 sub teams that compete over 2 week periods to fix the same bugs might be an interesting solution. I suspect most people would be more productive, but less than twice as productive. However, you would then be able to directly pick the "best" output which could be vary valuable. Add in the ability to discover and drop unproductive people and you might have a net win.
Edit: Ok, you might also create a hostile, environment that is so stressful you force the most productive people to leave.