Talk details

Pair programming dates back to at least 1991, yet it still has, shall we say, "unpredictable" results. Some teams find it transformative, saving untold time, creating amazing products, and eliminating tons of process overhead. Other teams find it a total waste of time and boring or painful to do. The pat answer is that the effectiveness "depends on the team" and "isn't for everyone." But there's a better answer.

It turns out that although all those teams were pairing, they were not all pairing the same way. Many variations don't matter; anything works. But a few create critical differences. It turns out that different teams get different results because they are doing different things. They only call them the same thing!

In this talk, Arlo will present data about the differences that turn out to matter. Most of them aren't the things you expect - which we know because teams tend to argue about the irrelevant parts and ignore the few things that matter. Whether you pair, mob, work solo, or mix your approach based on the problem, come learn about which habits are actually worth arguing about.