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I disagree with the fundamental conceit of the article: > But in terms of the only measurement that really matters—satisfying requirements on time and within b

I disagree with the fundamental conceit of the article: > But in terms of the only measurement that really matters—satisfying requirements on time and within budget—I haven’t seen any methodology deliver consistent results. What matters is delivering value to the organization, and doing so in a cost-effective, sustainable way. Making plans and then meeting them is incidental to this, and quite often opposed to it.

ibejoeb 4y ago
Absolutely. It's entirely possible to develop a bad budget or schedule. You don't find a lot of material about that. Hey, I just invented eXtreme Budgeting. If you buy my book, attend my conference talks, and hire my firm the coach your organization through implementing it, you'll be among the A-tier companies that have decided to take budgeting seriously by practicing XB! Who wants to go in on it? "Double-entry bookkeeping is just pair programming for accounting" -me
- fmajid 4y ago
  Sam Bankman-Fried beat you to it.
lanstin 4y ago
Well, I agree but people make investment decisions based on rough estimates of expenses and when the expenses are wildly different from the estimates, often projects are finished that in retrospect would not have been started. Classic example, this system is 99.8% reliable. Polish the last bit or re-architect it? If the rearchitecture is six months with five people, ok do that. When it takes well over a year, maybe more polishing would have been good. Especially when the year was half polishing the new system.
SpeedilyDamage 4y ago
This was one of my biggest issues with a team I used to work on; they prided themselves on "doing what we said we would do" but just could not grasp how rigid and impossible to work with that becomes when an adjustment is needed. What you said you would do is based on old information!
- fisf 4y ago
  The concrete problem here depends on when and how often adjustments are needed. If adjustments are needed every week, then the root problem lies deeper.
  - someweirdperson 4y ago
    The trick is to work on the things that won't need adjustments first, and delay the rest until information is more stable.
  - SpeedilyDamage 4y ago
    The root problem is usually that customers are fickle and you need to constantly adapt to what they're telling you.
    - convolvatron 4y ago
      this is something you have to manage. your customers and your salespeople by proxy. yes, absolutely you should respond to the market. no, you should not drop everything to let your customer bikeshed.
commandlinefan 4y ago
> What matters is delivering value to the organization No, what _should_ matter is delivering value to the organization. But that's impossible to measure, so what actually matters is what they can measure, which is "on time and within budget".

ibejoeb 4y ago

Absolutely. It's entirely possible to develop a bad budget or schedule. You don't find a lot of material about that. Hey, I just invented eXtreme Budgeting. If you buy my book, attend my conference talks, and hire my firm the coach your organization through implementing it, you'll be among the A-tier companies that have decided to take budgeting seriously by practicing XB! Who wants to go in on it? "Double-entry bookkeeping is just pair programming for accounting" -me

fmajid 4y ago
Sam Bankman-Fried beat you to it.

lanstin 4y ago

Well, I agree but people make investment decisions based on rough estimates of expenses and when the expenses are wildly different from the estimates, often projects are finished that in retrospect would not have been started. Classic example, this system is 99.8% reliable. Polish the last bit or re-architect it? If the rearchitecture is six months with five people, ok do that. When it takes well over a year, maybe more polishing would have been good. Especially when the year was half polishing the new system.

SpeedilyDamage 4y ago

This was one of my biggest issues with a team I used to work on; they prided themselves on "doing what we said we would do" but just could not grasp how rigid and impossible to work with that becomes when an adjustment is needed. What you said you would do is based on old information!

fisf 4y ago
The concrete problem here depends on when and how often adjustments are needed. If adjustments are needed every week, then the root problem lies deeper.
- someweirdperson 4y ago
  The trick is to work on the things that won't need adjustments first, and delay the rest until information is more stable.
- SpeedilyDamage 4y ago
  The root problem is usually that customers are fickle and you need to constantly adapt to what they're telling you.
  - convolvatron 4y ago
    this is something you have to manage. your customers and your salespeople by proxy. yes, absolutely you should respond to the market. no, you should not drop everything to let your customer bikeshed.

commandlinefan 4y ago

> What matters is delivering value to the organization No, what _should_ matter is delivering value to the organization. But that's impossible to measure, so what actually matters is what they can measure, which is "on time and within budget".