PPT Slide
Large programming jobs must be broken into smaller subtasks and each programmer will work on a subtask.
But as a whole, the team must act like a surgical team, in other words, there would be a team leader or chief programmer (surgeon), who is in charge of the whole thing and other team members try to help him complete the project (surgery).
Chief Programmer (and Co-Pilot)
- Administrator (handles money, people, space, machines, etc.)
- Editor (Supports Chief Programmers Documentation preparation)
- Program Clerk (Maintains code and all technical records)
- Toolsmith (Serves the chief programmer's needs for utilities, proc's, macros, etc.)
- Tester (Devises system component tests from the functional spec's, Assists in day to day debugging, etc.)
Difference between a surgical team and a team of collaborating colleagues:
- In the surgical team, the whole project is the brainchild of the surgeon and he/she is in charge of the project. The surgeon (or chief programmer) is in charge of keeping the conceptual integrity of the project.
- In a collaborative team, on the other hand, everyone is equal and everyone can have input into how the project should change and how the integrity should be preserved, and that sometimes causes chaos.