Completely agree, but you're implicitly assuming that developers have a lot of leeway in doing this design in the first place. Many non-technical managers seem

Completely agree, but you're implicitly assuming that developers have a lot of leeway in doing this design in the first place. Many non-technical managers seem to assume that developers should not have any say in the design and functionality of the product. I think this is a huge mistake -- I think software engineers are the best people to ultimately make decisions about how the product should work (with heavy input from stakeholders and users, of course) -- but the reality is that managers often don't trust them to do this and don't cede this power to them.