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Let me ask an unpopular question: in which sense did it "go badly"? You indicated a large amount of technical debt and issues, which the techie in me 101% empa

Let me ask an unpopular question: in which sense did it "go badly"? You indicated a large amount of technical debt and issues, which the techie in me 101% empathizes with and shares your pain. You also indicated morale and hiring practices issue, which the person in me empathises with. What you didn't indicate however was the business outcomes: Were there unhappy clients that left? Did the costs rise? Business fold? Everything you mentioned, unfortunately, is also the case for some wildly profitable/successful businesses.... :-<

pytester 7y ago
They had one large customer lined up. I didn't really follow what happened with them after I left but I don't think that customer was particularly happy and calls with this customer were fraught and somewhat terrifying. It certainly wasn't the case that this project was wildly profitable. Not sure if it will ever make money at all in fact. I have worked for profitable businesses who have behaved like this too and it's usually the case that they have some kind of inbuilt unfair advantage (legal, governmental, monopoly/size/clout, etc.) that compensated for sucking at tech.
ozim 7y ago
...Their abilities centered more around, say, pricing insurance and regulatory issues... You have to know how to price software, know how it is built and know what are challenges. It is just like I would want to open restaurant right now. I have enough money to do it, but I am going to be ripped by suppliers, chefs, staff. Bad devs just sucking out salaries over time is one thing. Then you get silly project managers who want to prioritize FCKN EVERYTHING and don't understand project and don't care, just want their features in. Maybe even conflicting feature requests from multiple customers.
crumpets 7y ago
Sounds like costs rose if they threw more engineers at the problem.

pytester 7y ago

They had one large customer lined up. I didn't really follow what happened with them after I left but I don't think that customer was particularly happy and calls with this customer were fraught and somewhat terrifying. It certainly wasn't the case that this project was wildly profitable. Not sure if it will ever make money at all in fact. I have worked for profitable businesses who have behaved like this too and it's usually the case that they have some kind of inbuilt unfair advantage (legal, governmental, monopoly/size/clout, etc.) that compensated for sucking at tech.

ozim 7y ago

...Their abilities centered more around, say, pricing insurance and regulatory issues... You have to know how to price software, know how it is built and know what are challenges. It is just like I would want to open restaurant right now. I have enough money to do it, but I am going to be ripped by suppliers, chefs, staff. Bad devs just sucking out salaries over time is one thing. Then you get silly project managers who want to prioritize FCKN EVERYTHING and don't understand project and don't care, just want their features in. Maybe even conflicting feature requests from multiple customers.

crumpets 7y ago

Sounds like costs rose if they threw more engineers at the problem.