Software Management Myths. Pressman describes managers' beliefs in the following mythology as grasping at straws:

• Development problems can be solved by developing and documenting standards. Standards have been developed by companies and standards organizations. They can be very useful. However, they are frequently ignored by developers because they are irrelevant and incomplete, and sometimes incomprehensible.
• Development problems can be solved by using state-of-the art tools. Tools may help, but there is no magic. Problem solving requires more than tools, it requires great understanding. As Fred Brooks (1987) says, there is no silver bullet to slay the software development werewolf.
• When schedules slip, just add more people This solution seems intuitive: if there is too much work for the current team, just enlarge it. Unfortunately, increasing team size increases communication overhead. New workers must learn project details taking up the time of those who are already immersed in the project. Also, a larger team has many more communication links, which slows progress. Fred Brooks (1975) gives us one of the most famous software engineering maxims, which is not a myth, ``adding people to a late project makes it later.''