Chapter 0. Unknowable and Incommunicable
0. Unknowable and IncommunicableThis introductory chapter sets up two questions: "Can you ever know what you are experiencing, and can you ever communicate it?" The short answer, "No, you can't," creates the basic dilemma that this book addresses. If you can't know what you are experiencing, how can you reflect on projects, and how can you form recommendations for doing better? Both spending time on irrelevant factors and overlooking important factors will hurt you. This inescapable problem faces every person who is trying to work better: methodologist, researcher, and practitioner alike. Knowing that perfect communications are impossible relieves you of trying to reach that perfection. Instead, you learn to manage the incompleteness of communication. Rather than try to make the requirements document or the design model comprehensible to everyone, you stop when the document is sufficient to the purpose of the intended audience. "Managing the incompleteness of communications" is core to mastering agile software development. After setting up the two questions, this chapter introduces the idea of operating at different levels of expertise. A novice listens differently than an expert does and asks for different guidance. This third section discusses the importance of understanding the listening levels of the people who are involved in the project. The final section relates the abstract concepts to everyday life. This is the most abstract chapter in the book. If you don't enjoy abstract topics, then skim it for now and return to it after reading some of the later, more concrete chapters. Unknowable and Incommunicable
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EAN: 2147483647
Pages: 126