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I found the article to be an interesting look into an approach to project management at a small, successful software product shop. You may not find Basecamp re

by dangoor 10y ago

I found the article to be an interesting look into an approach to project management at a small, successful software product shop. You may not find Basecamp relevant, but they still offer a service that people pay for 10+ years after they started. How many of the Kanban board-based project management tools that exist today will still be around in 10 years?

deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
dbg31415 10y ago
Their strategy... TL;DR: They dig in like ticks with marketing folks and saddle everyone else with dated and inefficient tools. The make integrations next to impossible, exports messy, and seemingly strive to fracture teams by providing duplicate services to tools like Slack, Asana, JIRA, GitHub... etc... that all do everything Basecamp does, but better, AND also offer integrations so all your teams can play nice and work seamlessly. Basecamp is cancer. I'd be surprised if they're still around in 10 years if they don't open their platform up and make it easy to swap components in and out of their closed system. If a team already has Slack, or Skype, or Flowdock, or HipChat, or Fleep... or any of the other 200 chat tools... now with one instance of Basecamp introduce to a team they also have to check that system for messages from the one team that uses Basecamp in their company. Not even sure you can turn that feature off... but it's inefficient to not have integrations. "One-solution-fits-all" is dead, open APIs and modular tools lead to happy teams.
- beejiu 10y ago
  I don't know enough about Basecamp, so I cannot comment on their product. But, that aside, your comment is not fair. You make it sound like competing with other products (even if they are better, in your opinion) is somehow malicious. Using terms like 'tick' and 'cancer' is just not appropriate.
  - dbg31415 10y ago
    If you had wasted as much time as I have using Basecamp for the last 12 years you'd understand. I was a HUGE proponent of their software up until like 2008... when better tools came out, and each new revision of Basecamp I feel like they are doubling down on their backwards-facing, lock all the data in one place, never play nice with any other tools mentality.
- whitepoplar 10y ago
  I think you're overlooking who, exactly, their product is built for. Most people don't want to use ten different tools. They don't want to optimize every aspect of product management--they just want the basics to work. Most people don't understand what integrations even are. I happen to think it's a fantastic product, and so do many others. If they didn't, Basecamp wouldn't have so many paying customers! There are certain things that I don't like about Basecamp, but I marvel at their ability to give people what they want. Instead of thinking, "This product is shit!" I think to myself, "Wow! This really taps into a need I didn't know existed in the world! I can learn from this to make better tools myself!" I also really respect them because they've built a real business. They're profitable, are here to stay, and generally look out for their customers in the long run. They're not a company that treats their users like livestock waiting to be slaughtered for profit.
  - dbg31415 10y ago
    New Basecamp Pitches: Do you enjoy not having any sort of best practices process defined in the tool because something is either "done" or "not done"? Does the concept of phases, or different disciplines working together on an issue sail over your head? Do you frequently ask things like, "Why do you need UX, and QA?" Would you rather just say, "F'in Devs are late again" without being called out on not having requirements or copy or design ready in time? Great, Basecamp is your tool. Do you love hearing yourself talk in your daily status meetings where you go around the room asking people who would rather be working what the progress of each item is? Secretly, do you feel a tool that clearly showed the status of issues to everyone any time they logged in would threaten your job security and prevent you from looking busy when the VP came around? Great, Basecamp is for you. Does the thought of actually understanding what is going on, getting a handle on the complexity of the modern office terrify you? And do you hate change, so much so that you still use your AOL account? When you go out to dinner, do you insist that they bring you a bladed-spork at every meal no matter the restaurant so you don't get confused as to which tool is for eating soup or cutting your steak? You'll love Basecamp! Do you want all of your data in one place, free from being updated, or updating, or syncing, with other systems? Do you enjoy manually entering in information twice, or reducing highly skilled developers to typist / copy-paste bots? Is your favorite thing when you get to yell at others because you updated the dates or requirements in your tool, but not theirs? And, do you have no concept why tying issues to code checkins is valuable and productive for the company as a whole? Oh man, Basecamp is for you!
- sgslo 10y ago
  Do you consider yourself to be an empathic person, able to understand their needs? I sincerely hope not. The inability of tech-focused people like yourself to understand that the group of people really give a about the latest tools is astounding. While there are thousands of companies who want an open, modular system, there are tens of thousands more who could care less about what an 'API' is, what an 'integration' is, or getting fancy SAAS tool A to work with fancy SAAS tool B. These companies only care about how a tool can help them run a better business, and for that, they're going to look for a single solution that does everything they want. They absolutely will not be looking for 5 tools they can string together to make some Frankenstein 'solution'. And hat's off to them for that, the sooner they realize their business is not a special snowflake the better.
  - deleted 10y ago
    [deleted]
  - dbg31415 10y ago
    Through contracting, I've been exposed to just about every tool, and combination of tools out there over the last 20+ year as a project / product manager. Basecamp is cancer. There isn't a team around that wouldn't be better off on Asana, or GitHub + ZenHub, or Atlasssian, or Trello... or anything else. Would gladly dedicate 5 hours per week in training people on alternatives for free, if it meant I never had to go into a client's office who used Basecamp. The amount of busy work and slop and inefficiency it allows... I get people are blind to better options, but seriously spent a few hours researching and trying the tools. A stitch in time saves nine... measure twice, cut once... Please compare it to using other tools and see for yourself.
    - danpalmer 10y ago
      It looks like Basecamp would fit really nicely into our product process, and I think we have a relatively good process. It might not be for everyone, but I don't think it's fair to rule it out for all give your personal experience.
    - dasmoth 10y ago

by dangoor 10y ago

deleted 10y ago

[deleted]

dbg31415 10y ago

Their strategy... TL;DR: They dig in like ticks with marketing folks and saddle everyone else with dated and inefficient tools. The make integrations next to impossible, exports messy, and seemingly strive to fracture teams by providing duplicate services to tools like Slack, Asana, JIRA, GitHub... etc... that all do everything Basecamp does, but better, AND also offer integrations so all your teams can play nice and work seamlessly. Basecamp is cancer. I'd be surprised if they're still around in 10 years if they don't open their platform up and make it easy to swap components in and out of their closed system. If a team already has Slack, or Skype, or Flowdock, or HipChat, or Fleep... or any of the other 200 chat tools... now with one instance of Basecamp introduce to a team they also have to check that system for messages from the one team that uses Basecamp in their company. Not even sure you can turn that feature off... but it's inefficient to not have integrations. "One-solution-fits-all" is dead, open APIs and modular tools lead to happy teams.

beejiu 10y ago
I don't know enough about Basecamp, so I cannot comment on their product. But, that aside, your comment is not fair. You make it sound like competing with other products (even if they are better, in your opinion) is somehow malicious. Using terms like 'tick' and 'cancer' is just not appropriate.
- dbg31415 10y ago
  If you had wasted as much time as I have using Basecamp for the last 12 years you'd understand. I was a HUGE proponent of their software up until like 2008... when better tools came out, and each new revision of Basecamp I feel like they are doubling down on their backwards-facing, lock all the data in one place, never play nice with any other tools mentality.
whitepoplar 10y ago
I think you're overlooking who, exactly, their product is built for. Most people don't want to use ten different tools. They don't want to optimize every aspect of product management--they just want the basics to work. Most people don't understand what integrations even are. I happen to think it's a fantastic product, and so do many others. If they didn't, Basecamp wouldn't have so many paying customers! There are certain things that I don't like about Basecamp, but I marvel at their ability to give people what they want. Instead of thinking, "This product is shit!" I think to myself, "Wow! This really taps into a need I didn't know existed in the world! I can learn from this to make better tools myself!" I also really respect them because they've built a real business. They're profitable, are here to stay, and generally look out for their customers in the long run. They're not a company that treats their users like livestock waiting to be slaughtered for profit.
- dbg31415 10y ago
  New Basecamp Pitches: Do you enjoy not having any sort of best practices process defined in the tool because something is either "done" or "not done"? Does the concept of phases, or different disciplines working together on an issue sail over your head? Do you frequently ask things like, "Why do you need UX, and QA?" Would you rather just say, "F'in Devs are late again" without being called out on not having requirements or copy or design ready in time? Great, Basecamp is your tool. Do you love hearing yourself talk in your daily status meetings where you go around the room asking people who would rather be working what the progress of each item is? Secretly, do you feel a tool that clearly showed the status of issues to everyone any time they logged in would threaten your job security and prevent you from looking busy when the VP came around? Great, Basecamp is for you. Does the thought of actually understanding what is going on, getting a handle on the complexity of the modern office terrify you? And do you hate change, so much so that you still use your AOL account? When you go out to dinner, do you insist that they bring you a bladed-spork at every meal no matter the restaurant so you don't get confused as to which tool is for eating soup or cutting your steak? You'll love Basecamp! Do you want all of your data in one place, free from being updated, or updating, or syncing, with other systems? Do you enjoy manually entering in information twice, or reducing highly skilled developers to typist / copy-paste bots? Is your favorite thing when you get to yell at others because you updated the dates or requirements in your tool, but not theirs? And, do you have no concept why tying issues to code checkins is valuable and productive for the company as a whole? Oh man, Basecamp is for you!
sgslo 10y ago
Do you consider yourself to be an empathic person, able to understand their needs? I sincerely hope not. The inability of tech-focused people like yourself to understand that the group of people really give a about the latest tools is astounding. While there are thousands of companies who want an open, modular system, there are tens of thousands more who could care less about what an 'API' is, what an 'integration' is, or getting fancy SAAS tool A to work with fancy SAAS tool B. These companies only care about how a tool can help them run a better business, and for that, they're going to look for a single solution that does everything they want. They absolutely will not be looking for 5 tools they can string together to make some Frankenstein 'solution'. And hat's off to them for that, the sooner they realize their business is not a special snowflake the better.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
- dbg31415 10y ago
  Through contracting, I've been exposed to just about every tool, and combination of tools out there over the last 20+ year as a project / product manager. Basecamp is cancer. There isn't a team around that wouldn't be better off on Asana, or GitHub + ZenHub, or Atlasssian, or Trello... or anything else. Would gladly dedicate 5 hours per week in training people on alternatives for free, if it meant I never had to go into a client's office who used Basecamp. The amount of busy work and slop and inefficiency it allows... I get people are blind to better options, but seriously spent a few hours researching and trying the tools. A stitch in time saves nine... measure twice, cut once... Please compare it to using other tools and see for yourself.
  - danpalmer 10y ago
    It looks like Basecamp would fit really nicely into our product process, and I think we have a relatively good process. It might not be for everyone, but I don't think it's fair to rule it out for all give your personal experience.
  - dasmoth 10y ago