Doing things right doesn't matter unless you do the right thing. "Specification by Example" by Gojko Adzic is about delivering the right software. Adzic has interviewed many successful teams and discovered that their ways of software development are quite similar. These ways or processes are based on a close collaboration between all the parties, including business representatives. It begins by understanding the business goals. It continues with creating a specification and utilizing it for software development and verification. It is finalized by providing living documentation which reflects the current software state and behaviour.

"Specification by Example" helped me to understand how to do behaviour-driven development (BDD). It is an excellent reading for a software craftsman.

Refactoring is a book by Martin Fowler about what a fellow developer might describe as "a process of improving the code quality."

I highly recommend this book to software professionals who want to improve and formalise their refactoring skills.

"Turn The Ship Around!" is an exceptional book. It narrates a story of a poor-performing submarine becoming the best in a short period of time. It teaches the mechanisms of such transformation which involve the leader and the team alike.

Are you familiar with the gut feeling that the software development practices around you could be better? What if I told you that there is a solid scientific study on practices of low and high performing technology organizations?