Hey Brad my project manager keeps calling me a pig should I be offended? What the heck do they mean when they talk about Pigs and Chickens?

No you shouldn’t be offended :-), they are actually saying you have high value in your project; you have skin in the game as it were.

The term Pigs and Chickens is actually in reference to an old joke:

In the above comic strip the Chicken just has to lay eggs if the restaurant fails its no harm no Fowl for the chicken (pun intended). But for the Pig he had to commit fully to the restaurant (with his life) and if it failed the pigs personal sacrifice would have been in vain. The Pig is committed fully to the project and is an integral part of its day to day success where as a Chicken is only interested in the end result; they help out when they can but in general isn’t required on a day-to-day basis.

Examples of Pigs:

• Developers
• QA
• Technical Writers
• User eXperience Designers
• Manufacturing Engineers
• etc.

Examples of Chickens:

• CEO
• Directors
• Marketing
• Team/Project Managers – really, on a self organized team the manager isn’t needed day-to-day not to say they don’t have their incredibly important roles to play in the success of the project.
• etc.

So that is what the heck Pigs and Chickens are, people who are committed to a project and people who are involved with a project. Next time your call a Pig ware that curly tail with pride.

Until next time think imaginatively and design creatively