Interim PM Secrets for Software Teams - Workshop Notes
Earlier this year we needed an intermediate PM.
We found one who was available: Ramtin Azimi. We hired him to fix a project and also teach some non-obvious principles to the PMs of my team.
This post is a summary of workshop notes.
I will also hightlight several things, which will help if
- You start with a new software project
- You are not sure if your project will get finished
- Clients always want more and more.
Basic goal of the PM
Drive a team to a single goal, together.
Set the goal, and create a plan to get there. Along the way, the PM creates documentation and learns the business domain.
A great PM understands the customer as well as the technical constraints and architecture of the system.
Be the smooth, wide bridge
Communication gets harder as teams grow: Metcalfe’s law.
(n-1) * n / 2
Every line of code contains a probability of a bug. Too many people writing too much code too early –> Lots of bugs + too much structure.
detailed plans of what needs to happen
The PM needs to cut that down and be a center point people can ask.
Anticipate what the team will need and work 1-2 weeks ahead to prevent blocking.
- Roadmaps
- Timeline
- Dependencies
Ideally: at least one person needs to have done the job already. ONE person needs conviction.
PM needs to be very close to the developer
In Ramtin’s case: work closely with the dev, have a double-leadership.
For my agency: The PM is also a developer
Tickets need Acceptance criteria
If they don’t: the customer needs to work better (specify more)
Benefits:
- Refunds from customers will be less if they accepted the features
- No extra rounds like “can you add this thing”
- Developers can write tests easier.
One release every Friday
The approach we want to try out: always release from main, like in github flow.
The project we talked about needs a lot of refactoring, so we are not ready to always deploy from main.
Anticipating and planning ahead. A project manager should always think about goals:
- 1 month
- 3 months
- 1 year ahead and break those down into executable steps.
And if you’re interested in diving deeper into Interim PM Secrets, check out my full video.
