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What can the Amish tell us about working together? I watched an Amish barn raising last night, and reflected…

I was way behind in my laundry, so last night was designated Laundry night. In between running up and down the stairs, and some picture hanging, I watched the Harrison Ford movie “Witness”. It’s an excellent drama set in Philadelphia (my home town) and the nearby Amish Country.

The movie is an exploration of cross-cultural conflicts set within a police procedural drama. The movie manages to give us an outsider’s view of contemporary Amish life while maintaining its dramatic pace.

There is an interesting scene in the middle where Harrison Ford goes to an Amish Barn raising with his adopted Amish family. The scene has many interesting details, from the ropes and poles used to erect the structural beams to the augers and pegs used to secure the beams together. While watching, I couldn’t help but reflect on the project management aspects of the Barn raising.

- As a project event, the Barn raising has a very well defined goal – erect a Barn.

- Its schedule is time boxed, in that it must be completed in one day – dawn to dusk.

- It is multi-disciplinary – many participants with varying levels of skill, all of whom bring their own tools and participate.

- The project is strongly sequenced – first the main structural elements are assembled, then siding and roof work is done.

- There is plenty of pre-work done – the movie showed wagons bringing pre-fabricated beams and planks to the workplace

- This implies a well-defined design – pieces can be externally fabricated and fit into the whole

- There is work remaining after the barn raising – most of the internal finish work is done by the owner. But after the barn is raised, with roof and siding, the finish work can be done inside, out of the rain.

- The elders provide direction, the skilled carpenters provide expertise, and many hands provide manpower

- There are subsidiary goals – developing and maintaining a sense of community, training the next generation, and creating an opportunity for all to participate in a joint accomplishment.

- The team is divided into at least three sub-teams: The construction team (the men), the support team (the women, who provide for food and drink) and the training team – the boys and girls who are learning from their elders how to raise a barn.

All in all, a highly organized, integrated, and effective project.

So, in our endless quest to improve the IT project management process, what can we gain from watching the Amish raise a barn? What would a software barn-raising event look like?

Well, it would be an event that all could participate in, and would support a sense of accomplishment and community. It would involve everyone working together on a set of tasks. It would be carefully structured, and use the expertise of all. It would have a well-defined goal. It would be a teaching opportunity.

At first glance this seems worlds away from most IT projects. Many have just the opposite characteristics: One group does its thing, then throws it over the fence to the next group. The process breeds finger-pointing, not togetherness. The goal is not well-defined. Rather than build community, the process often produces departure and turnover.

How can we take a small step to use the barn-raising model? What events would work? An example that I participated in was an application mock-up walk-through. After requirements had been documented, the developers prepared functional screen mockups. When all the screen mockups were ready, the group rented out a meeting room, and did an all-day walkthrough of the application. All the interested parties – analysts, developers, testers, installation, support, infrastructure were in attendance. There was a definite sense of progress, community, and excitement.

Other events that might work would be JAD sessions, or group testing sessions. Anywhere that many can participate, and overcome the separateness inherent in most structured project models. So look for opportunities to do a “Barn Raising” in your current project – bring everyone together for an all-day event, build communication and community, and accomplish something.

A few notes on the movie Witness:

- the early scenes are shot in Philadelphia’s 30^th street train station – a grand public space

- Many scenes are recognizable today, including the waiting room with its interesting Bas-relief mural – the march of transportation. Done before the Wright brothers flew, it never-the-less includes an interesting facsimile of what a future “air-ship” might look like.

- One of my favorite public sculptures is featured, the monumental Angel at the east end of the hall – with a dying railroad worker enfolded in his arms. The sculpture recognizes the sacrifice made by America’s railroad workers in World War II

- And, in the lunch scene during the Barn Raising – is that a strapping young Viggo Mortensen (Aragorn of Lord of the Rings) sitting next to Harrison Ford?