Red Squirrel Reflections Dave Hoover explores the psychology of software development

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Systemic Change
Tuesday, February 17, 2004

I was pondering the similarities between families and software development teams on the train this morning. For me, it is a comparison I have made many times: I was educated and trained to help families, while I spend most of my time working on software development teams. But this morning a new idea popped into my head. What if I compared families with larger systems, like entire corporations? Using the metaphor in this way illuminates something different...

If the company is the family, then a team could be seen as a single entity: a child, a parent, an uncle, a dog. Looking at teams as children of a larger system, it is painfully obvious why changing the process within a team is next to impossible when that team continues to live daily within the dynamics of the larger system.

It is family therapy 101: lasting change comes from systemic change. You can give a troubled child the best treatment available, but when you plunk that child back into his family system, the troubles will inevitably return.

Replies: 2 comments

I agree that systemic problems can limit external change. Members of teams do have the possibility of changing how they respond to systemic influences. And presumably adult members of software teams have more resources to draw on to act on their own behalf.

Virginia Satir said, "Even if external change is limited, internal change is possible."

Posted by Esther Derby on 02/18/2004

There's a quote by Warren Buffett I like: "When a management team with a reputation for brilliance tackles a business with a reputation for bad economics, it is the reputation of the business that remains intact."

Posted by Will Sargent on 02/18/2004

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