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There are still people who develop software in traditional projects? As software can easily changed according to changing business needs, software is never rea
by nednar 6y ago
There are still people who develop software in traditional projects?
As software can easily changed according to changing business needs, software is never really done. So, it's unnecessary to put it in a project.
While you do a factory building project and decide a point at which you are done, you wouldn't do a car manufacturing project.
Software development is more similar to building cars than to building factories. So instead of projects it is better to think of assembly lines (sprints, kanban boards, etc) and throughput (e.g. burndown). The question is how many business changes come in every week and how many can you solve every week.
Measuring and viewing things the right way then also shows how successful you actually are as a development team.
PS: If your company isn't working like this yet, you might consider getting some external help quickly. This is the standard for quite some time now, but admittedly it's hard to find out what the standard is if you rarely get new people added to your team.
- triggercut 6y agoDon't get confused between Projects and Operations. What you are describing is actually akin to operational projects (albeit at the risk of bespoke designing and building each car). Projects in the traditional sense produce new assets with new value with new benefits meant to be operationalized. You need to segregate associated costs so that you can depreciate the value of the asset once it's operational. Usually the cost is considered an investment and funded by separate finance. Operational Projects support, extend, enhance existing business assets. This is the assembly line mentality and is more aligned with continuous improvement for which there is usually a fixed budget for the year and is completed during the normal course of business. Yes there is some grey area but both are necessary.
- nednar 6y agoI see, so the financial side between projects and operations is also different. When would you choose to do software as a project, coming from that perspective? Maybe the budget for operational things is more limited, and so you choose to do something as a project, although you know later on you also want to still change it?