Slack: Getting Past Burnout

Quotes From Around The Web

• "...I have a ten-year rule on management books: if they're still around in ten years, then I read them. Slack has something importan"t to say..."
• "[Slack] is an outstanding management book full of wisdom about corporate culture, change, failure, learning, quality, risk management, productivity, and managing people..."
• "...Want to be an effective leader who gets the most out of the team.  This book holds the key to how to accomplish that.  I say that not out of theory but as a former leader..."
• "...If you are a involved in software management, buy this book.  If you are a software developer, buy this book for your boss.
  Much of what DeMarco says goes against "traditional" management practice, but that is the point of the book.  Software development - or the broader term knowledge work - does not present a traditional management problem.  Trying to use such an approach robs organizations of their ability to change in response to the situation at hand as well as burning out their developers...."
• "...I certainly don't agree with everything DeMarco presents, a lot of the ideas do seem very well founded in reality and are just plain all-around good concepts. I think it's worth a read and discussion with your colleagues if you manage people in polo shirts or neckties, but I don't think this is the end-all of management books...."
• "...Over the past several years this is the single management book I keep rereading. This is a brilliantly rationalist book arguing that maximizing the busyness of individual knowledge workers minimizes the effectiveness and productivity of the organization as a whole. This concept is promoted by Eliyahu Goldratt and his Theory of Constraints and in his books like The Goal..."
• "...some have misunderstood DeMarco's main point.  Efficiency and flexibility are opposite ends of the spectrum.  If you want real agility, you have to give up some efficiency, and the opposite is true too.  This isn't a matter of work less and get more done (aside from issues of long-term overtime, where it is a valid point) but rather work a little less and regain some capacity to change direction..."