There are two very important reasons why you should NOT read this book.
1. WARNING! WARNING! WARNING! This book contains spelling mistakes - hundreds, most likely thousands, of them. Why? It's a beta version and I'm not very good at spelling and I haven't paid to have it copy edited yet (that happens later). It also contains minor plot inconsistencies and 2-dimensional characters.
If that stuff doesn't bother you and you'd like to read an entertaining story which shows you how to make loads more money by using Lean, Agile and Theory of Constraints principles in your software development process then you are in the right place.
If the idea of reading a beta book, full of spelling mistaeks (did you see what I did just there?) turns your stomach ... then maybe wait until the final version comes out next year.
2. It gets worse. This book is about Corporate Software Development. The sorts of places where some of the people wear suits and ties - and don't mind. The sorts of places where most staff have partners, kids and mortgages and they go home at 5pm to be with them.
If you work in a startup then, although this book covers useful concepts, you'll be better off with that excellent book about doing Lean in Startups.
If you think managers don't contribute to software development then (good luck with your career and) this book might surprise you ... but you might not like what you hear.
3. If it bugs you that I said above there were two reasons not to buy this book but here, quite blatantly, is a third then please read point 1 again.
The third reason is that you're only getting 3/4s of the book. I'm still rewriting the last quarter now. And, frankly, it is the best bit of the whole book. It's about lifting Agile and Lean principles up to the mulit-project level and using them to save the company, the hero and his friends' jobs by using what I call Cash-Flow-Driven-Development. There's also some Irish Dancing and a story about a corn-flake in it.
4. If all this talk of making money makes you feel awkward and icky then I guess that's the 4th reason not to buy the book.
But there's a reason why I'm enthusiastically showing you how to make more money: this stuff (Agile, Lean, TOC) also makes peoples' working lifes better and more enjoyable. Trouble is, if it doesn't also make more money then no one will give anyone permission to do it.
Cash-Flow-Driven-Development is a means to an end: happiness.
Clarke Ching
(Follow updates on my blog: www.RollingRocksDownhill.com)
