Brooks Law - Management Span of Control Advisor

[Links updated 9 Dec 2018. Google discontinued their "Knol" feature so some of my links no longer worked. I've redirected them to copies of my former Google Knols that I uploaded to my WordPress account.]

Way back in 1975 Frederick Brooks wrote a famous book, The Mythical Man-Month, stating: "Adding manpower to a late software project makes it later."

Other than the now-all-too-obvious sexist nature of his words ("manpower", "Man-Month"), Brooks Law has stood the test of time. Three graphs from the original book with their original captions are reproduced in the figure [the yellow, non-sexist annotation is mine].

The first caption suggests and then dismisses the idea that "If one man takes 10 months to do a job, 10 men can do it in one month" saying "This may be true of picking cotton." (OOPS, is the mention of picking cotton racist? Perhaps he should have used the more familiar "nine women could produce a baby in one month" but that would be sexist again. OY! :^)

He then notes that "even on tasks that can be nicely partitioned among people, the additional communication required adds to the total work, increasing the schedule." That is the well known Law of Diminishing Returns, which does have a mathematical formula. But, as his second graph indicates, more people will still speed the job.

Finally, he says of his last figure (called the "Bathtub" curve) , "Since software construction is complex, the communications overhead is great. Adding more men can lengthen, rather than shorten, the schedule." That seems like verbal flailing of his arms - but, nevertheless IT IS TRUE! And it applies not only to software engineering, but to any complex engineering or business or political or legal or medical task that requires significant interaction between professionals. But, look at Brooks graphs - there are no numbers on the axes! How can a Law be unquantified?

Since my PhD is in Hierarchy Theory, I have considered this a personal challenge and have written a couple of [former] Google Knols about Management Span of Control Advisor and Quantifying Brooks Mythical Man-Month, between them garnering over 6,000 page views! A few months ago I received an email from a very smart Knol reader who was utilizing my work in planning the management structure for a project at his company and he wanted an Excel spreadsheet to help with the task. I sent him an old spreadsheet I had used to make some graphs for my Knol and he used it (giving me credit in the PowerPoint charts he asked me to review and that he presented to his management).

But, my old spreadsheet -while useful to this one very capable and perceptive person- was not easy to use nor did it apply to multi-level hierarchies. I knew I could do better! That triggered me to create a Management Span of Control Advisor that would put my theory into a form so simple that even a manager could use it (:^).

The happy result is my just-published [Former] Google Knol Management Span of Control Advisor and a comprehensive yet easy to use spreadsheet to go along with it.

The illustration from my new spreadsheet shows how Brooks Law applies mainly to a One Level department (BLUE bathtub curve), but it can be "drained" with a multilevel hierarchy (Two Level structure - PINK curve and a Three Level structure - GREEN curve).

Please feel free to have a look at my new Knol and download and try out the companion Excel spreadsheet. As always, comments are appreciated!

Ira Glickstein

PS: My students at the University of Maryland University College will be using this new Knol and spreadsheet in the online grad course in System Engineering I teach there and which starts in a couple weeks. Most of them are professionals in the Information Technology (IT) industry (or related military work) and many are going for their Masters Degree to help them become better IT managers or move from technical work to IT management.

Exercise in Bed

Something different for this Blog

Easy exercises you can do in four minutes flat in bed. Energize yourself for the day. Relax yourself for some solid sleep every evening. If you do this every morning and evening for 120 years I guarantee you will live long :^)

I've recently written a Google Knol Exercise in Bed - Do Your 4's that describes some easy exercises I have done almost every day for the past six or seven years.

Why not give them a try?

Ira Glickstein

Aristotle's Physics - the Four Causes

Joel posted Is PowerPoint Anti-Intellectual? last month in which he claimed:

"If Socrates, Plato and Aristotle had had PowerPoint available, there might not have been any western philosophy handed down to us."

I replied:

"I'm not sure what Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle would have done with PowerPoint. I guess Socrates would have avoided it. Plato would have used it grudgingly, but Aristotle -OH! ARISTOTLE- he would have been (almost) as good as me!"

Well. that remark has cost me dozens of hours during which I have been researching Aristotle's books on Physics and Meteorology and building the PowerPoint charts I think he would have created had they been available in his time, some 2300 years ago. In particular, I tried to explain Aristotle's view of the Five Elements (Aether, Air, Fire, Earth, and Water) as well as his take on the Four Causes (Material, Formal, Efficient, and Final).

MY KNOLS ON THE FIVE ELEMENTS AND THE FOUR CAUSES

Once I made the PowerPoint charts I decided to go the extra step and use them to construct two new Google Knols. The first Knol, on the Five Elements was published last month, along with a related Topic on this Blog. The other Knol, on the Four Causes, is now available for your amazement.

Like me, you may find philosophy hard to understand. As my PhD advisor (Howard Pattee) told me, philosophers make simple things complex, using a language specially created for that purpose!

You may have heard about Aristotle's four causes: Material Cause, Formal Cause, Efficient Cause and Final Cause. I couldn't understand how the words "Formal" and Efficient" applied to causes - and neither would Aristotle if he lived today.

When we say, for example, "the housing crisis caused the stock market to dive" or "investors dumped their stocks because they wanted to preserve their capital" we imply a more or less direct relationship between the cause and the event or action. The Greek word for "cause" is "aition" and it is understood in a much wider sense, including both the immediate, direct causes as well as explanitory factors.

Thus what philosophers now call the Formal Cause should be understood as the form or pattern, the essence or archetype, that explains something. What they call the Efficient Cause is what we would call the direct or immediate cause of some event.

SIMPLE EXAMPLE OF THE FOUR CAUSES



I'll start with a simple, concrete example - how do building materials such as stone and wood end up becoming a house and furniture? What are all the causes and explanitory factors?





The chart at the head of this Topic shows how the Four Causes play into each other to accomplish this transformation.





The four charts that follow trace the effect of each of these causes in a step-by-step manner. See the Knol (Four Causes) for additional detail, verbatim quotations from Aristotle, and more.





In the Knol I also get into what Aristotle called spontaneity and chance as well as the fact he understood something like evolution and natural selection 2000 years before Charles Darwin - a feact Darwin himself acknowledges!

Ira Glickstein

Aristotle's Physics - the Five Elements

Joel posted Is PowerPoint Anti-Intellectual? earlier this month in which he claimed:

"If Socrates, Plato and Aristotle had had PowerPoint available, there might not have been any western philosophy handed down to us."

I replied:

"I'm not sure what Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle would have done with PowerPoint. I guess Socrates would have avoided it. Plato would have used it grudgingly, but Aristotle -OH! ARISTOTLE- he would have been (almost) as good as me!"

Well. that remark has cost me dozens of hours during which I have been researching Aristotle's books on Physics and Meteorology and building the PowerPoint charts I think he would have created had they been available in his time, some 2300 years ago. In particular, I tried to explain Aristotle's view of the Five Elements (Aether, Air, Fire, Earth, and Water) as well as his take on the Four Causes (Material, Formal, Efficient, and Final).

MY KNOL ON THE FIVE ELEMENTS

Once I made the PowerPoint charts I decided to go the extra step and use them to construct two new Google Knols. The first, on the Five Elements was published today and another, on the Four Causes, is under construction and will follow soon.

Like me, you may find philosophy hard to understand. As my PhD advisor (Howard Pattee) told me, philosophers make simple things complex, using a language specially created for that purpose!

You have undoubtedly heard about "the five elements" of the ancient philosophers. I couldn't understand how the ancients thought Fire was a basic element, or that the essence of Air was wet or of Water cold. It turns out they were not using these words according to the literal, narrow scientific meanings we employ. They were thinking about what we would now call the qualities of "energy" and "fluidity". They used Air, Fire, Water, and Earth as examples of things that had a lot or a little energy and/or fluidity.

Modern scientists dismiss the concept of Aether out of hand. However, the idea of a non-material substrate is important if we want to understand what the most intelligent and well-informed humans of two millenia ago were thinking. (If modern string theory, which says there are ten or eleven dimensions of which humans may comprehend only four, holds up to scientific examination, it may turn out that the six or seven "tightly curled up" dimensions we humans cannot comprehend might be what the ancients called the Aether!)

The graphic that appears at the head of this posting is the first chart and there are two others described in the Knol:

Have a look at the Five Elements Knol and please comment on it!

Ira Glickstein

Decisions, Decisions - Here's a Method and Tool That Could Help

I recently posted another Google Knol - a bit of knowledge. This one is a rational method for chosing one item from a group of attractive alternatives, particularly in the case where your spouse or business associates differ. It is a process we called a "Trade Study" at work.

"Buying a house, car, pet or PC? Choosing among alternative courses of action at work? Do you and your spouse or your colleagues differ on which choice to make?

"Here is how to get everyone involved to 'put their cards on the table' and make a rational choice that will best serve your needs. A relatively simple Excel-based tool helps you make the right decision, including decisions in the face of uncertainty! It is available for FREE."

The Knol is at http://knol.google.com/k/ira-glickstein/decision-aiding-tool-do-a-trade-study/3ncxde0rz8dtk/5# and it contains a link to a Decision Tool that runs atop the MS Excel spreadsheet that one of my students back at Binghamton University created some years ago and I have upgraded over the years.

If you have a decision to make, have a look!

Ira Glickstein