I. M. Wright’s “Hard Code”: A Decade of Hard-Won Lessons from Microsoft®

Chapter 1. Project Mismanagement

In this chapter:
June 1, 2001: “Dev schedules, flying pigs, and other fantasies”
October 1, 2001: “Pushing the envelopes: Continued contention over dev schedules”
May 1, 2002: “Are we having fun yet? The joy of triage.”
December 1, 2004: “Marching to death”
October 1, 2005: “To tell the truth”
September 1, 2008: “I would estimate”
May 1, 2009: “It starts with shipping”
September 1, 2009: “Right on schedule”
May 1, 2010: “Coordinated agility”

My first column was published in the June 2001 issue of the Microsoft internal webzine, “Interface.” I wanted a topic that truly irked me, in order to get into the character of I. M. Wright. Work scheduling and tracking was perfect.

The great myths of project management still ...