4 ms·

> Of course, the above happens when you're in a market that requires estimates as a part of BOMs, which is a lot like bidding on projects and is just a race to

> Of course, the above happens when you're in a market that requires estimates as a part of BOMs, which is a lot like bidding on projects and is just a race to the bottom for the most part. Yeah this, to me, totally invalidated the rest of your example. Pick a low number to win the bid, blow the timeline/estimate, require more money to do anything at all. It is not clear to me that any "estimation" changed this calculus at all.

KronisLV 5y ago
> Pick a low number to win the bid, blow the timeline/estimate, require more money to do anything at all. Except that there are penalty mechanisms in place to prevent this from happening. So your company was slow to deliver the product and needs more time? You better be prepared to work for your own resources, otherwise the escrow won't get released, as per the contract. Or perhaps you cannot finish it at all? Get ready to either not receive a large portion of the money at all, or to be sued outright. For an example, see here: https://www.consulting.us/news/2197/accenture-sued-for-32-million-over-hertz-website-redesign https://www.consulting.us/news/2197/accenture-sued-for-32-mi... Disclaimer: i have nothing to do with Accenture or consulting in the US, though consulting, government contracts etc. all share certain similarities and bureaucratic processes in most countries that don't always align with the realities of actually developing software. If you can, steer clear of all of that and instead work for a technology oriented company that develops a product that they also sell themselves. One, in which the developers are viewed as a profit center, instead of a cog in a ROI generation machine. Ideally, an engineering led company.
- postfacto 5y ago
  Example #4 A CTO of an American company, to get a bonus of $7 million, lays off a ton-load of the company’s CRM people who knew how 20 years of architecture duct tape that ran the company was strung together. CTO then proceeds to hire a cheap, offshoring body shop to design the company’s new website, which talks to the CRM. However, there’s no more CRM people at the American company because they’ve all gotten laid off and the offshore web contractors also now have to become customized CRM experts, which is insane scope creep. The outsourcing company can’t deliver and litigation is sought, while the US company takes zero responsibility for the fact that all the CRM people were let go and there’s no chance in hell that web developers at the outsourcing can ever learn the highly customized domain-specific logic that fast that extensively. Meanwhile, CTO gets fired and a severance of $1 million for all the extreme damage he did to the company. And that’s Hertz vs Accenture, or at least how I heard it to be.

KronisLV 5y ago

> Pick a low number to win the bid, blow the timeline/estimate, require more money to do anything at all. Except that there are penalty mechanisms in place to prevent this from happening. So your company was slow to deliver the product and needs more time? You better be prepared to work for your own resources, otherwise the escrow won't get released, as per the contract. Or perhaps you cannot finish it at all? Get ready to either not receive a large portion of the money at all, or to be sued outright. For an example, see here: https://www.consulting.us/news/2197/accenture-sued-for-32-million-over-hertz-website-redesign https://www.consulting.us/news/2197/accenture-sued-for-32-mi... Disclaimer: i have nothing to do with Accenture or consulting in the US, though consulting, government contracts etc. all share certain similarities and bureaucratic processes in most countries that don't always align with the realities of actually developing software. If you can, steer clear of all of that and instead work for a technology oriented company that develops a product that they also sell themselves. One, in which the developers are viewed as a profit center, instead of a cog in a ROI generation machine. Ideally, an engineering led company.

postfacto 5y ago
Example #4 A CTO of an American company, to get a bonus of $7 million, lays off a ton-load of the company’s CRM people who knew how 20 years of architecture duct tape that ran the company was strung together. CTO then proceeds to hire a cheap, offshoring body shop to design the company’s new website, which talks to the CRM. However, there’s no more CRM people at the American company because they’ve all gotten laid off and the offshore web contractors also now have to become customized CRM experts, which is insane scope creep. The outsourcing company can’t deliver and litigation is sought, while the US company takes zero responsibility for the fact that all the CRM people were let go and there’s no chance in hell that web developers at the outsourcing can ever learn the highly customized domain-specific logic that fast that extensively. Meanwhile, CTO gets fired and a severance of $1 million for all the extreme damage he did to the company. And that’s Hertz vs Accenture, or at least how I heard it to be.