Creating a disciplined development process, and environment when change is present is very difficult. If a new technique, technology, developer, requirement, etc is introduced into a project the project’s efficiency will suffer. If speed and efficiency are goals of the project, than the project must be very rigid. Change has very LARGE impact on a project.
I have seen many times that a project I had worked on in the past trending towards a big success, on time, under budget, etc. Then only to have an element of change introduced to the system… *WHAMO* the project momentum is changed and things start to slip drastically. Depending on the amount of change this can push a project from success to failure.
This not only applies to projects, it can be abstracted to larger view, such as teams, and companies. Many people and groups profess the ability to handle change, but they never talk about the costs associated with it. If a group or project is under constant change, true efficencies can never be realized.
To be continued with Part 2 The Change Paradigm
