[xpe2e] Re: Practice: Sit Together - on-site customer?

In this Sit Together practice, do you include the wider project team 
including other roles such as Customer, Testers and perhaps even 
Project Manager? Or does this only apply to Developers?

Rachel

--- In xpbookdiscussiongroup-hHKSG33TihhbjbujkaE4pw@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx, 
"kentlbeck" 
<kent@xxxx> wrote:
> 
> Sit Together (from XP Explained, 2nd Edition):
> 
> Develop in an open space big enough for the whole team. Meet the 
> need for privacy and "owned" space by having small private spaces 
> nearby or by limiting work hours so team members can get their 
> privacy needs met elsewhere.
> 
> I was called to consult at a floundering project on the outskirts 
of 
> Chicago. Why the project was floundering was a mystery, because 
the 
> team consisted of the best technical talent in the company. I 
walked 
> from cubicle to cubicle trying to figure out what was wrong with 
> their computer program.
> 
> After a couple of days, it struck me: I was walking a lot. The 
> senior people of course had corner offices, one in each corner of 
a 
> floor of a substantial building. The team interacted only a few 
> minutes each day. I suggested that they find a place to sit 
> together. When I returned a month later, the project was humming 
> along. The only space they could find to sit together was in the 
> machine room. They were spending four to five hours a day in a 
cold, 
> drafty, noisy room; but they were happy because they were 
successful.
> I took two lessons from that experience. One is that no matter 
what 
> the client says the problem is, it is always a people problem. 
> Technical fixes alone are not enough. The other lesson I took was 
> how important it is to sit together, to communicate with all our 
> senses.
> 
> You can creep up on sitting together, if necessary. Put a 
> comfortable chair in your cubicle to encourage conversation. Spend 
> half a day programming in a conference room. Ask for a conference 
> room for a one-week trial of a more open workspace. All of these 
are 
> steps towards finding a workspace that is effective for your team.
> Tearing down the cubicle walls is not the place to start with XP. 
If 
> the team members' sense of safety is tied to having their own 
little 
> space, removing that sense of safety before replacing it with the 
> safety of shared accomplishment is likely to produce resentment 
and 
> resistance. With a little encouragement, teams can shape their own 
> space. A team that knows that physical proximity enhances 
> communication and that has learned the value of communication will 
> put two and two together and begin to open up their own space.
> 
> Does the practice of sitting together mean that multisite teams 
> can't "do XP"? Chapter 21, "Purity", explores this question in 
more 
> depth; but the simple answer is no, teams can be distributed and 
do 
> XP. Practices are theories, predictions. "Sit Together" predicts 
> that the more face time you have, the more humane and productive 
the 
> project. If you have a multisite project and everything is going 
> well, keep doing what you're doing. If you have problems, think 
> about ways to sit together more, even if it means traveling.
> 
> Copyright (c) 2004, Kent Beck and Cynthia Andres





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