220. Pre-Mortem

The Rabbit Hole: The Definitive Developer's Podcast

Are premortems as morbid as their name suggests or are they difficult but necessary measures to take for identifying possible future threats? This is the topic we explore today and we have our guest extraordinaire Sophie Creutz back on the show to help us tackle it. Our discussion is filled with strong arguments from both sides of the table. On the one hand, premortems could be seen as pointless for the most part because they take up precious time focussing on threats everybody is already aware of. On the other hand, they allow teams to get the challenges that lie ahead into the open which builds the psychological safety that is so vital to the development process. We also explore the most appropriate times to run premortems and how they should be structured so that threats can be placed in three buckets, tigers, paper tigers, and elephants. Tune in and dive down the rabbit hole of premortems with us today!