The Impossibility of CM

In his answer to a claim about SCM and CM, Brad described the multi-dimensional complexity faced by CM. Paradoxically, he didn't find it an impossible task to cope with it, especially in the context of CM, i.e. in a theoretical absence of tool support. It is not uncommon indeed to meet people who claim to be ready to take the challenge of matching all the constraints listed. Such people —CM experts, consultants— should be taken with suspicion, and this for fundamental reasons:

• Accepting such a wondrous responsibility is an essential departure from the humility of SCM, its concern for objectivity and thus for genericity. The intelligence built by SCM can only be objective if it is offered to everybody on an equal basis, at least for later examination, and reproduction. This is incompatible with the 'God-playing' role of managers pretending to handle a Big Picture (and thus to be allowed to ignore so-called 'minor technical details').
• All the different and specific concerns listed are not equally amenable to efficient tool support, which easily leads to resorting to a 'common denominator' de facto process, based on meetings (e.g. the infamous CCB...) The paradox becomes only more glaring in that the outmost complexity is handled in secret, with the most primitive support.

-- MarcGirod - 11 Feb 2007