The tech community is overrun with jargon. And there’s plenty of it that serves a specific purpose. But there’s also a lot of jargon that’s become meaningless: Agile – is used for any new idea anyone has about software development processes, and any rehashed idea from decades ago that someone rediscovers The Cloud – seems to be the new way…
Category: Seven Figure Software
Interview: The journey to my book Commitment To Value
I sat down with Jochen Krebs of Agile.FM to discuss my book Commitment To Value: How to make technical projects worthwhile. In the interview I explain the journey that led to my book and I share some additional thoughts beyond what was covered in the book. Enjoy! Agile.FM interview – Wes Higbee
Business doesn’t change every two weeks
Iterative development processes that champion prioritizing work and deciding what to do every two weeks can be just as disastrous as planning a year of work in advance. Sure, a business landscape can change in a year, but it rarely changes meaningfully in the span of two weeks. Set your objectives based on what’s worthwhile before you dive into a…
Timing can be revealing
Time is an often neglected aspect of project planning. Probably because too many people are used to hearing: “We need this yesterday.” When in reality that couldn’t be further from the truth. Perhaps, someone wants this, as of yesterday. But want is not need. It’s ok to start out with a simple question like when should we start. But never…
Direction or speed?
Speed can only come after direction, and even then it’s usually inconsequential.
Average turn around time is irrelevant
When you’re slow to respond to customer requests you run the risk of tarnishing your relationship because you might not be getting your customer what they need, when they need it. However, measuring and obsessing over average turn around time is counterproductive. Turn around time is often measured as the time between when your customer makes a request and when…
Software should make recommendations to power users
If it wasn’t obvious in your daily experiences, research has shown that people have very short attention spans. It has to do with how our short term memory operates, or how it’s not really what we might think. We only can hold a few things in our mind at any one time. One consequence, we’re very goal oriented, and we’ll…
Value Centered Design
User centered design is a valuable approach in creating software: User-centered design (UCD) is a process (not restricted to interfaces or technologies) in which the needs, wants, and limitations of end users of a product, service or process are given extensive attention at each stage of the design process. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User-centered_design It requires putting yourself in the shoes of your users…
The revenue will follow
Many organizations obsess over measuring revenue. Both historically to see how much actual revenue was generated and estimations for how much revenue may be generated in the future. Objectives are set to increase revenue. And people lose sleep when expectations aren’t met. Which only leads to more measuring. Organizations also obsess over cash flow issues, especially timeliness of invoicing and…
Lost in software nuances
When developing software there are countless nuances to consider, about how business operates. These lead to lots of suggestions and ideas for how the software should behave in various situations. You might find yourself wondering, how do we deal with X, or what about Y, or don’t forget about Z. The extremes of these are along the lines of “What…