Re: [extremeprogramming] Pairing styles

On Tue, Oct 29, 2019, 15:26 J. B. Rainsberger <[email protected]> wrote:

> On Tue, Oct 29, 2019 at 2:20 PM Jeff Langr <[email protected]> wrote:
>
>> In 2003, I paired daily on a fairly strict XP team as a traveling
>> consultant at HEB in San Antonio. Well, not quite daily--many of us did
>> 9/80 (80 hours across 9 days) so that we could salvage more weekend time
>> with family. Most days stretched to 9 or 10 hours of pairing as a result. I
>> learned a lot about pairing during that stint--much of it in the form of
>> "what not to do." Such as: pair for 9-10 hours straight.
>>
>
> Ooh! Do tell more. :)
>
> Pairing helped keep me engaged and energized across such long days, but it
>> did pretty much wipe me out regularly. (I was 39 at the time.) After HEB I
>> started pushing no more than  5-6 hours of pairing daily. I did near 8
>> hours remote pairing daily from 2013-2016, but found that I really wanted
>> to be done after about 6-7 hours.
>>
>
> How much of that, would you say, did the technology contribute to draining
> your energy?
>
> Over the years I noted a few more benefits, but also began to gather a
>> list of "management overhead" elements that pairing incurred. When I
>> started doing more mobbing, I realized that it generally eliminates of a
>> lot of these concerns: troublesome pairings, context switching overhead
>> (which does bring some positives), what to do with the odd pair, what to do
>> with solo-dev'd stuff, etc. Nowadays I greatly prefer to mob, though I
>> once again find that 6 hours is plenty.
>>
>
> I would never have guessed 20 years ago that mobbing would be easier to
> accept than pairing, given the common objections at the time. We talked
> about it at the XP Toronto user group and mostly dismissed it as a pipe
> dream. "If 2 is good, then surely 3 would be better...."
>
> What's also interesting: Mobbing seems to foster a lot less active
>> resistance from both devs and managers.
>>
>
> Any insights there?
>

I've noticed the same.

I often introduce mobbing in a limited/targeted context: learning,
knowledge sharing, or solving difficult problems (ie code that people are
scared to touch). Maybe that's easier to accept than a general change to
the way if working?

Or maybe developers are less intimidated than with pairing, and the
resistance wasn't originating from management after all?

Wouter

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