The Mythical Man Month
This is one of the oldest of the classics in regards to software project management, written in 1975 and reviewing the development process at IBM for OS/360. One concept - in the software industry five smart people will out produce 25 average people. Not because those five smart people are so much smarter, but because as teams sizes grow, management consume a larger proportion of resources, and a lower and lower percentage of human resources are actually involved in getting the project to fruition. In fact, his data even shows how adding more people to a project that is behind schedule will make the project go even slower, not faster!
In my experience over the years, this concept also applies to any type of organization from government to the private sector, and across all industries. It certainly explains why so often small companies are at the lead with both innovation and with time-to-market for innovative products in the technology sector.
The Mythical Man Month is an easy read, and I would highly recommend it to anybody in the technical field whether you are a junior level programmer, project manager, in charge of product development or a Cxx.
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