Brooks's law
expressionops cultureprogramming
The principle that adding people to a late software project makes it later.
New team members need ramp-up and training, and every added person multiplies the communication paths, so late-stage staffing often slows things down instead of speeding them up. Fred Brooks drew it from managing IBM's OS/360, and it still punctures the myth that effort is fungible.
Also known as: Brooks's law, the Mythical Man-Month
Sources
- Brooks, 'The Mythical Man-Month' (1975)