5 ms·
We are in a situation where the client wants some enhancements, we know to an order of magnitude how hard they are - ie more than a few days, less than a month
by tragomaskhalos 12y ago
We are in a situation where the client wants some enhancements, we know to an order of magnitude how hard they are - ie more than a few days, less than a month - but cannot be more accurate without actually diving in and basically doing the work itself. But they will not green light us without an estimate. Result = deadlock. I dream of a world where (a) customers understand that this is an art, not bricklaying, and (b) realise that always demanding a number up front is just going to cost them more money because the s/w folks will always highball it to cover themselves for unexpected issues.
- dustingetz 12y agoI think it's widely understood that product teams write higher quality software than consulting teams
- jakejake 12y agoI would say that is probably true but isn't exactly fair to the individual developers on those teams. Product teams tend to be stable, were hired for their domain expertise, and have been working on the same product for a long time. So naturally they are a well-oiled machine for producing one specific product. Consultants are a mix of whoever is available at the time. They may or may not have any previous domain experience. Each programmer might be working on multiple projects of totally different companies at the same time. Developers might get rotated in/out of projects mid-way. So it's not that consultants are crappy developers and product teams are excellent developers, it's more the situation that they're thrown in.
- tragomaskhalos 12y agoSorry if I'm being dense, but how does that relate to what I wrote above?
- dustingetz 12y agoI guess I was alluding that if one is in a consulting situation where he can no longer estimate, one possible solution may be to increase quality by being more like a product team, and the resulting clarity of thought will help out his estimates