1
2

O
c
t
o
b
e
r

2
0
0
5

There is another way

Joel Spolsky writes:

“Custom development is that murky world where a customer tells you what to build, and you say, “are you sure?” and they say yes, and you make an absolutely beautiful spec, and say, “is this what you want?” and they say yes, and you make them sign the spec in indelible ink, nay, blood, and they do, and then you build that thing they signed off on, promptly, precisely and exactly, and they see it and they are horrified and shocked, and you spend the rest of the week reading up on whether your E&O insurance is going to cover the legal fees for the lawsuit you’ve gotten yourself into or merely the settlement cost. Or, if you’re really lucky, the customer will smile wanly and put your code in a drawer and never use it again and never call you back.”

There is another way: you build a relationship with your customer, essentially making yourself part of their company. You find out in minute detail why they do what they do, acting both as custom developer and business consultant then, using agile development techniques, give them a ‘look-see’ at appropriate points in the development.

Later: “So if you want to get things done, you positively have to understand at any given point in time what is the most important thing to get done right now and if you’re not doing it, you’re not making progress at the fastest possible rate.”

Yes, indeed. That’s how come I work less hours than I used to, but end up with a better relationship with our customers, delivering better software that more closely meets their needs. Oh, and forget about specs.

Permalink | General Musings

Leave a Reply

Grab the RSS feed, or have a wander through the archives

copyright ©2006 and so on, ninthspace.org, except quotations, lyrics and some images which are the rights of their respective holders