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Contemplating What Constitutes an Organizational Crisis It can be hard to envision what would constitute a crisis for your organization until you’re facing one. But defining what events could be disastrous for your company is the first step toward planning for them—and having an emergency plan could be the difference that helps you respond in time. |
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The Art of Giving Feedback Your Team Will Act On Giving good feedback is hard. A common pattern we follow—especially when we have to give negative feedback—is starting with something positive, addressing the problem, and ending with something else positive. But it turns out this "feedback sandwich" method isn't the most effective. Here are some better ways. |
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Go-Live Lessons: The Path from Software Development to Production On systems integration projects where a vendor is building or configuring a system for a client, you sometimes cross the canyon from development to production and maintenance in several smaller bounds rather than one big leap. A warranty period after go-live can help stakeholders confidently monitor quality. |
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Spot the Warning Signs an Employee Is About to Quit If you’re a manager who doesn’t want to lose key people, how can you detect that they may be looking elsewhere for a job? Naomi Karten details some changes and behaviors that may indicate an employee is contemplating quitting. You just need to pay attention to the signs. |
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Dealing with Chronic Complainers in the Workplace At work, you don’t always have the option to steer clear of chronic complainers. If you're kind (and patient), you can listen and empathize. But if that doesn't sound appealing, there are other options. Read on to learn some suggestions for deferring and discouraging complaining coworkers. |
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Software Project Management: The Responsibility of Communicating Quality Trade-Offs Some requirements are negotiable, even if it sounds like they aren’t. But expectations have to be managed carefully to avoid problems. Payson Hall explains that when executives agree to sacrifice quality in order to hit a deadline, it's up to the team to ensure they understand the tradeoff and possible risks. |
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Finding the Right Ratio of Software Testers to Developers for Your Team Many organizations struggle with finding the optimum ratio of testers to developers. Linda Hayes explains that there's no one right answer. It depends on your needs for planning, test environment and data management, requirements analysis, test design, execution, diagnosis, reporting, and defect management. |
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Agile Methods for Tackling the Work You Don’t Want to Do We all have work we don't want to do. Some of it is boring or unpleasant, but there's another type: work we don't know if we can finish to our satisfaction. It's hard to tackle a task you're not an expert at. Johanna Rothman offers two classic project management approaches to face the work you're putting off. |