Measuring the Productivity of Developers
McKinsey: Yes, you can measure software developer productivity
McKinsey adds five metrics to the DORA and SPACE metrics (see also the book Accelerate by Nicole Forsgren et al.). It claims that these additional metrics are much better suited to measure the productivity and performance of organisations, teams and developers. McKinsey targets non-technical C-level executives like CEOs and CFOs. The goal is to make the performance of software engineers as easily measurable as the performance of sales people, recruiters and factory workers.
Gergely Orosz and Kent Beck teamed up to write an insightful critique of the McKinsey article in their newsletters The Pragmatic Engineer and Software Design: Tidy First? Before I summarise and comment on Orosz’s and Beck’s responses, I’ll try to give you a quick overview of the McKinsey metrics.