Suppose you check out some new code from source control, and the exact number of new errors the compiler gives you is so large that the digits forming that number don't even fit on your wide-screen monitor. Suppose a sprint planning meeting has been joyfully performed without you, despite your repeated and almost desperate instructions to be invited.

Suppose someone carried out a product deployment, skipping half of the mandatory release instructions, and doing the other half in Chinese order. Suppose your customer complains about your testers having failed to recognize that the development team built the product on the wrong platform. Suppose you appear to be both the first and the last to arrive in a meeting room, because the other people invited are all locked up in six other meetings.

Suppose people are not doing what they had agreed upon, and without good reason.

Then it's time for one thing, and one thing only…

DISCIPLINE

I did a little searching on the topics of discipline and software development, and after shoveling away all the crap I was left with the following 4 articles. I consider these the only good ones on this topic.

READ THEM!!! (please)

The Discipline of Agile: Agile isn't about code-and-fix development (Scott W. Ambler)

Six years later: What the Agile Manifesto left out (Brian Marick)

Discipline Makes Strong Developers (Jeff Atwood)

Discipline versus Motivation (Chris Spagnuolo)

And if you disagree, or if you have some other (good) articles to share, feel free to abuse the comments section. In an orderly fashion. Thanks.

(photos by kaibara87 and army.mil)

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