4 ms·

Fascinating to see an article about IS&T, definitely not something I ever expected to hear about on HN! I was part of a team inside Apple that developed intern

Fascinating to see an article about IS&T, definitely not something I ever expected to hear about on HN! I was part of a team inside Apple that developed internal-facing tools for the retail teams. Our team was formed because of the extremely high cost in dollars and time that IS&T wanted to charge to develop some fairly straightforward tools. My team was taken from the departments that used the tools, and we developed things that were very custom-fit to what those departments needed. Eventually politics overcame us, and IS&T finally managed to take over our team. We all became contractors in order to support the migration to their infrastructure, and continue development of the tools. A bit later we all became fired as our project was outsourced to contractors in India, managed by IS&T PMs who had no idea what our tool was used for and had never been inside a retail store. The tools all died shortly after that, some killed by IS&T, some petered out due to lack of use now that they no longer worked correctly or were a good fit for the users. As far as we could tell, IS&T was run as a unique company inside Apple, which did it's fair share of price gouging in order to make itself money to keep going. Its purpose never appeared to be helping Apple customers or Apple employees, it was simply to get bigger, absorbing more money and power wherever possible, with no apparent reigning in from the parent org. Although my experience is several years old, everything in this article rings true. The contracting companies they had us working for were taking a huge cut, the quality of the code they produced was dismal, (as soon as we were no longer allowed to re-write their code major things began breaking almost immediately) and people getting transferred around constantly and having no time to understand any one project was common. (rkho's comment about their hiring process seeming like it was simply a beard for a nepotistic contractor conversion was something we definitely saw a number of times.) All in all it was an extremely eye-opening experience. Considering how "do it the Apple way" every other department we interacted with was, being in the IS&T buildings was like landing on an alien planet.

_bxg1 7y ago
When will companies learn that cheap development labor always ends up being more expensive than starting with quality? This same story has been playing out over and over for decades.
- girvo 7y ago
  Our remote team (in SEA) adds a tonne of value to our local Australian based team; but they mostly do maintenance work and are heavily integrated into our local team (they’re quite literally just treated as remote devs, rather than their own company). It’s worked really well for about 6-7 years now
  - _bxg1 7y ago
    I didn't say Asian labor, I said cheap/hasty labor. As the article makes clear, you can get that in the States too.
    - peteretep 7y ago
      You didn't say "cheap/hasty" you said "cheap", and I can assure you teams in Australia outsourcing dev work to SEA are doing it because it's cheap(er).
      - astrange 7y ago
        A lot more people live in SEA than Australia, so it's probably both easier and cheaper to find people. SEA also speaks English and I'm sure there's good programmers around there somewhere. Another good reason to have remote support in Asia is it's a different time zone. Not for Australia obviously, but that's a harmless thing for a US company to do.
        peteretep 7y ago
        > SEA also speaks English South East Asia’s a big place, and outside of some of the Philippines, Malaysia, and Singapore, English is bad.
  - ksec 7y ago
    Would love to read more details how the integration and management works within these organisation.
- 7y ago
antipaul 7y ago
I would like to ask _why_ does this nightmare exist, but is that the right question? What is the right question to ask here.
- m463 7y ago
  I wonder if it is because it lacks critical importance and sexiness. So it lives out of the limelight. Also expectations of internal tools are low. Think about the sexiest jobs in tech. They are working with the newest technology, or developing the funnest resulting product. If you have someone working on the latest machine learning technology, management has a vested interest in keeping those folks happy. If you have someone working on computer games, the employee has a vested interest in working hard because they're doing something really cool. But internal tools development? Expectations from the rest of the company are low, it is viewed as a necessary evil by management but not a revenue generator, and to many employees working there, it is a stepping stone. Which is really a shame. Good internal tools can really foster a good culture. Shitty tools really take people's minds off the ball. The worst is when some shitty off-the-shelf tool is site-licensed and shoehorned into an organization and people just suffer. I vaguely remember working somewhere where some sales tool was used as the bug-tracker or trouble-ticket system. gah.
  - antipaul 7y ago
    Yep, that's what I mean. Wouldn't it be better for all and everything to have a higher-functioning tools team?
- csours 7y ago
  This is the ad-absurdum[0] conclusion of the "Cost Center". Cost Centers don't make money, they cost money. Therefore any money you spend on them is lost. Along with this you have the Iron Law of Bureaucracy - organizations tend (tend!, it's not absolute) to further themselves ahead of their stated goals or directives. The right question everyone should be asking is how does the parent organization actually make money, and how to help them do that? 0. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reductio_ad_absurdum https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reductio_ad_absurdum 1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jerry_Pournelle#Pournelle's_iron_law_of_bureaucracy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jerry_Pournelle#Pournelle's_ir...
sunkenvicar 7y ago
Offshoring increases the labor supply and lowers our wages. Companies who offshore disrespect their employees and their country.

_bxg1 7y ago

When will companies learn that cheap development labor always ends up being more expensive than starting with quality? This same story has been playing out over and over for decades.

girvo 7y ago
Our remote team (in SEA) adds a tonne of value to our local Australian based team; but they mostly do maintenance work and are heavily integrated into our local team (they’re quite literally just treated as remote devs, rather than their own company). It’s worked really well for about 6-7 years now
- _bxg1 7y ago
  I didn't say Asian labor, I said cheap/hasty labor. As the article makes clear, you can get that in the States too.
  - peteretep 7y ago
    You didn't say "cheap/hasty" you said "cheap", and I can assure you teams in Australia outsourcing dev work to SEA are doing it because it's cheap(er).
    - astrange 7y ago
      A lot more people live in SEA than Australia, so it's probably both easier and cheaper to find people. SEA also speaks English and I'm sure there's good programmers around there somewhere. Another good reason to have remote support in Asia is it's a different time zone. Not for Australia obviously, but that's a harmless thing for a US company to do.
      - peteretep 7y ago
        > SEA also speaks English South East Asia’s a big place, and outside of some of the Philippines, Malaysia, and Singapore, English is bad.
- ksec 7y ago
  Would love to read more details how the integration and management works within these organisation.
7y ago

antipaul 7y ago

I would like to ask _why_ does this nightmare exist, but is that the right question? What is the right question to ask here.

m463 7y ago
I wonder if it is because it lacks critical importance and sexiness. So it lives out of the limelight. Also expectations of internal tools are low. Think about the sexiest jobs in tech. They are working with the newest technology, or developing the funnest resulting product. If you have someone working on the latest machine learning technology, management has a vested interest in keeping those folks happy. If you have someone working on computer games, the employee has a vested interest in working hard because they're doing something really cool. But internal tools development? Expectations from the rest of the company are low, it is viewed as a necessary evil by management but not a revenue generator, and to many employees working there, it is a stepping stone. Which is really a shame. Good internal tools can really foster a good culture. Shitty tools really take people's minds off the ball. The worst is when some shitty off-the-shelf tool is site-licensed and shoehorned into an organization and people just suffer. I vaguely remember working somewhere where some sales tool was used as the bug-tracker or trouble-ticket system. gah.
- antipaul 7y ago
  Yep, that's what I mean. Wouldn't it be better for all and everything to have a higher-functioning tools team?
csours 7y ago
This is the ad-absurdum[0] conclusion of the "Cost Center". Cost Centers don't make money, they cost money. Therefore any money you spend on them is lost. Along with this you have the Iron Law of Bureaucracy - organizations tend (tend!, it's not absolute) to further themselves ahead of their stated goals or directives. The right question everyone should be asking is how does the parent organization actually make money, and how to help them do that? 0. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reductio_ad_absurdum https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reductio_ad_absurdum 1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jerry_Pournelle#Pournelle's_iron_law_of_bureaucracy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jerry_Pournelle#Pournelle's_ir...

sunkenvicar 7y ago

Offshoring increases the labor supply and lowers our wages. Companies who offshore disrespect their employees and their country.