Workshop:
Professional Development
of Software Engineers
Hazzan Orit
Department of Education in Technology and Scinece
Technion – Israel Institute of Technology
Homepage:
http://edu.technion.ac.il/Faculty/OritH/HomePage
What can be done?
Workshop plan
 Personal stories

Tell your story (past and future)
 Role models

Tell the story of a role model
 Case studies

Construct a case study that illustrates one aspect of the
topic
 Development environments

Analyze a team meeting

Describe a preferred development environment
 Personal development plans
Analysis of a team meeting
Observe one of your team meetings in the Cave. If you
do not have a meeting during the workshop, based the
following analysis on your memory. Identify the main
characteristics of the meeting: atmosphere, leadership,
topics discussed, etc. Analyze your description:
• Do you like the environment you have described?
• If yes, what do you find attractive in that development
environment?
• If not, which of its elements would you change?
Analysis of a team meeting (cont)
Based on the above analysis and other impressions:
•Describe characteristics of a software
development environment in which you would like
to participate.
•Explain each of the components you mention.
•How will you establish such an environment
when you become a software project leader?
Class discussion:
eXtreme Programming fitness to women’s style
of management.
Can Extreme Programming Help
in Recruiting Women into the
Software Industry ?
 Connection between XP and the recruitment of
women into the community of software
developers.
 The suitability of XP to women’s styles of working,
managing and living.
 XP may help in partially closing some of those
gender gaps that exist in the software industry.
Can Extreme Programming Help
in Recruiting Women into the
Software Industry ?
 Extreme Programming (XP) is accepted as the
most commonly used agile software
development method.
 XP is based on four values that are expressed
by twelve practices which support each other.
 Kent Beck, Chrysler, 1996.
Can Extreme Programming Help
in Recruiting Women into the
Software Industry ?
 The four XP values: communication, simplicity,
feedback, and courage.
 The twelve XP practices: planning game, pair
programming, refactoring, simple design,
continuous integration, test driven development,
collective ownership, coding standards, short
releases, a metaphor, sustainable pace, and an
on-site customer.
Can Extreme Programming Help
in Recruiting Women into the
Software Industry ?
 XP aims at increasing software quality and reducing the
inherent risks of software development processes.
 XP is based on the wisdom derived from accumulative
experience in the software industry and the
acknowledgement that perhaps the development of
quality software systems should be conducted on the
basis of following very specific procedures.
 The attraction of XP over the other agile SDMs is partially
explained by the latter fact.
Can Extreme Programming Help
in Recruiting Women into the
Software Industry ?
 Argument: XP values and practices fit very well
women's style of management.

First, some observations about women’s
management style are outlined.

Second, it is illustrated how women's management
style is suited to XP development environments.
Can Extreme Programming Help
in Recruiting Women into the
Software Industry ?
 Software development is a management activity.
 Both in management and software development one
has to make decisions, to consider alternatives, to
communicate ideas, to gain both a global
understanding of what one does and familiarity with
the details, and to be sensitive to customers'
requirements.
Can Extreme Programming Help
in Recruiting Women into the
Software Industry ?
 Women's management style (emphasis is added):

“Women's management style is more equal and
collaborative, often described as 'transformational',
in contrast to the traditional 'transactional' style
preferred by men who rely on power position and
formal authority.” (Vinnicombe and Singh, 2002).
Can Extreme Programming Help
in Recruiting Women into the
Software Industry ?
 Women's management style (emphasis is added):

"Recent research indicates women's
management style, which is centered on
communication and building positive
relationships, is well suited to the
leadership paradigm of the 90's." (Peters, 2003).
Can Extreme Programming Help
in Recruiting Women into the
Software Industry ?
 Women's management style (emphasis is added):

"The women's management style builds very
much on participation by the employees
and mutual trust, and they become very
disappointed if the employees do not live up
to that trust." (Kjeldsen and Nielsen, 2000).
Can Extreme Programming Help
in Recruiting Women into the
Software Industry ?
 XP suits to women's management style

XP supports communication, information sharing and
sustainable pace, in addition to heavy testing, short
releases and customer satisfaction.

The main characteristics of women's management
style that emerge from the above quotes are
collaboration, communication, trust and positive
working relationships.
Can Extreme Programming Help
in Recruiting Women into the
Software Industry ?
 Discussion: What XP values and practices
support each pf the following characteristics of
women’s management style?

Collaboration

Communication

Trust and positive working relationships
Can Extreme Programming Help
in Recruiting Women into the
Software Industry ?
 XP suits to women's management style

Collaboration: pair programming, the planning game, continuous
integration, collective ownership.

Communication: one of the four XP values + the planning game,
pair programming, refactoring, a metaphor, on-site customer, short
releases, coding standards.

Trust and positive working relationships: XP lays out 12 very
specific practices.

This attribute of XP enhances trust and may contribute to
positive working relationships.
Can Extreme Programming Help
in Recruiting Women into the
Software Industry ?
 It seems that XP suits women's management style
very well.
 The long hours required in the hi-tech industry:

This barrier has been eliminated for women in XP
development environments.

The XP practice of sustainable pace.
Can Extreme Programming Help
in Recruiting Women into the
Software Industry ?
 The XP practice of sustainable pace.

Rationale: overworked programmers are unable to
produce qualified code.

As other XP practices (such as pair programming) ensure
productivity during the 40-hour week, XP argues that XP
programmers can work at a sustainable pace, be
productive and produce qualified code.
Can Extreme Programming Help
in Recruiting Women into the
Software Industry ?
Illustrative data: (Reifer, 2002)

31 XP/Agile-methods early adopter projects

reduction of 25-50% in time to market
Can Extreme Programming Help
in Recruiting Women into the
Software Industry ?
 XP
delivers the message that qualified
productivity can be achieved at a
sustainable pace as long as the number of
work hours that one puts in are managed
efficiently.
Can Extreme Programming Help
in Recruiting Women into the
Software Industry ?
 Hughes and Cotterell, Software Project
Management book:

"[t]here is a good evidence that productivity and the quality
of output goes down when more than about 40 hours a
week are worked. [...] Clearly, it is sometimes necessary to
put in extra effort to overcome some temporary obstacle or
to deal with emergence, but if overtime working becomes a
way of life then there will be longer term problems." (p. 226).
Can Extreme Programming Help
in Recruiting Women into the
Software Industry ?
In your opinion, why are women not
(yet) part of the XP community?

Look at the XP conferences.
Can Extreme Programming Help
in Recruiting Women into the
Software Industry ?
 Why are women not (yet) part of the XP community?

The historical development of the software
industry.

The term 'extreme' that appears in Extreme
Programming.
 Why
 The
Extreme Programming is called “extreme”?
adjective 'extreme' may be interpreted as it
is used in extreme sports.
Can Extreme Programming Help
in Recruiting Women into the
Software Industry ?
 We saw many associations that aim at promoting
women in the hi-tech industry.
 In most cases these organizations look for ways
to help women adjust to the current working
framework that characterizes the software
industry.
Can Extreme Programming Help
in Recruiting Women into the
Software Industry ?
 The presentation of XP as a software
development environment in which women
may feel comfortable without necessitating any
adjustment, is another way to recruit women to
the software industry.
Short Activity (10 Minutes)
Describe a typical day in the life
of a software engineer.
Future personal professional
development plans
 Mapping possible opportunities in the field
of software engineering
 Towards the next meeting: Formulate
personal targets and ways to achieve them.
Future personal professional
development plans
 Students’ presentations of their personal
professional development plans.
Future personal professional
development plans
 Instructions for follow up

Follow-up on the accomplishment of the
personal professional development plan +
reflections on the process.

On-line continuation: Orit Hazzan