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This article is about salary negotiations, not software-engineering negotiations. I was hoping this would be about negotiating feature sets and timelines, whic

• inglor 11y ago
  The key difference is that software engineering negotiations aren't adversarial and no one wants you to overestimate or underestimate. There are numerous books on estimating software time, I recommend Fred Brook's The Mythical Man Month if you're looking for a classic.
  • seiji 11y ago
    software engineering negotiations aren't adversarial Put 4 angry software developer men with wildly different opinions on The True Way Forward in a room and see how long it takes for the yelling and physical altercations to start.
  • crpatino 11y ago
    > software engineering negotiations aren't adversarial There's a certain book you should go and read... I think the fact that it does exist is proof itself of how adversarial relationships can get in Software Engineering: http://www.amazon.com/Death-March-Edition-Edward-Yourdon/dp/013143635X http://www.amazon.com/Death-March-Edition-Edward-Yourdon/dp/... Metaphorically speaking, the only way a negotiation does not end up in a fight is when one side sucker-punches the other.
• seiji 11y ago
  It would be nice if we had actual software engineering negotiations instead of endless fighting over tiny architecture details. But, the first rule of software engineer negotiations is — don't work with cowboy programmers who refuse to listen to others. Once we've reached a formal "we need software negotiations" stage, it seems we've already lost. We only reached that stage because there's such an adversarial environment that regular discussions were fruitless. Then it turns into a giant ego battle—the winner becomes whoever has the most political leverage, regardless of technical merit.