Diverse teams are more successful than homogenous ones An extreme case of when a homogenous group got it right was the Cuban Missile Crisis. We’re… Read More »We should aim to create diverse student teams in software engineering
More short tasks mean more frequent dopamine hits This is a busy week for me doing a week of all-day workshop sessions for students starting… Read More »Short tasks are better than long ones in student teams
Working in the open should be a default position in a team Twice a year I guide our MSc software engineering group project teams, who… Read More »Teach students to work in the open to improve collaboration
You grow when you teach others. You also grow when you ask for help when you’re stuck. We need to teach students to accept both… Read More »Teach student teams to be humble
Shift left to learn more quickly about your work What follows is a story that repeats itself every academic year in our year-long software engineering… Read More »Teach student teams to shorten their feedback loops
Every student should be taught how to build a cake slice by slice When student teams, and hackathon teams get their hands on an idea… Read More »Teach Students to Build Slices of a Cake
Build thin vertical slices instead of horizontal layers Students tend to think in horizontal layers as described in the textbooks. The books show the nice… Read More »Software Engineering Students Should Collaborate on Features
A team or project canvas can focus the effort of a student team Student teams seem to fall into a variety of categories when they… Read More »Team and Project Canvases Focus Student Collaboration
These collaboration rules will guide your student teams Students always ask me what to do next, or how they should approach a situation in their… Read More »10 Collaboration Rules for Your Software Engineering Student Teams
Real clients provide surprises that students don’t expect A question that goes around again and again when course organisers meet from different institutions is whether… Read More »Seek real clients for your student teams