I woke up at four this morning gripped with fear. The first
iteration of our company's first XP project is set to begin a week
from Monday. It is my first official XP project and I am the Coach.

The Planning Game has gone well, but the closer we get to that start
date, the more my fear grows. The team consists of six developers
(of which I am one), all with more experience than me. My fear is
focused mainly on maintaining disclipline with TDD.

I have confidence that my pair and I will be able to stay disciplined
with TDD, but the four people in the other two pairs will all be
doing TDD for the first time. I have been preparing a demo of TDD on
the platform we are using (ATG), but I don't think it is realistic to
simply walk the team through a contrived example and then send them
merrily on their way.

The thought crossed my mind this morning that it might be better to
start the project with two people, myself and another person. Once
we feel confident enough, we can bring in two other people, with the
two newbies alternating between the two original developers. Once
one of the newbies feels confident enough, we can bring in the final
two people.

This idea relieved my fear but raised another question. How would we
do our Iteration Plan with so much uncertainty about when people come
on board?

Dave Hoover
http://redsquirrel.com/dave/