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Speaking as someone who is currently a contractor dealing with arcane legacy code without documentation (as is usually the case in my experience), institutional
by donaq 16y ago
Speaking as someone who is currently a contractor dealing with arcane legacy code without documentation (as is usually the case in my experience), institutional knowledge matters.
- bombs 16y agoTo you or to management?
- MJR 16y agoBoth. First, Your job is harder if you have to turn over every rock in a company looking for an answer, only to find the only people who had the answer left last year. Second, management's job is harder because no one ever has the answer. They are constantly stuck training every employee on the most basic historical project knowledge. I would wager that most projects are enhancement projects - moving from one version of something to another and not replacement projects. In enhancement projects historical knowledge is vital, in replacement projects it isn't. There are more than these two reasons - bottom line, it's important all around.
- Tichy 16y agoBecause employees never have to work on arcane legacy code?
- donaq 16y agoMy point was what MJR said. Employees who understand said arcane legacy code are important. Do you disagree with that or did you misunderstand the point of my reply?
- Tichy 16y agoI agree, but on the other hand I don't think it is a viable long-term strategy to rely on irreplaceable employees. Not that contractors don't create arcane code, but at least they should feel professionally obliged to leave understandable code behind. They know they'll be leaving, whereas employees can count on being around.
- Tamerlin 16y ago"They know they'll be leaving, whereas employees can count on being around." I don't agree with that. A lot of employees don't expect to be around that long, because they know that they can get better raises by leaving than by staying. Also, as the employee's institutional knowledge rises, that employee has a higher likelihood of getting shunted onto "critical" maintenance projects and support, which tends to make them dissatisfied with their work and therefore prefer to leave. I've run into that one very often.
- mgkimsal 16y agoYour point has some merit, but just by being an employee some place vs a contractor doesn't mean you'll automatically have that institutional knowledge. The only benefit I've had in some employment situations is knowing early on that the people with answers had already left, rather than spending time researching who would know the answers to XYZ.
- ollysb 16y agoMost developers only tend to stick around in a job for a couple of years. Going the employee route isn't a guarantee that you'll always have the original developers available.