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in reply to Re: All I Ever Needed To Know About Computer Programming I Learned In Shop Class
in thread All I Ever Needed To Know About Computer Programming I Learned In Shop Class

I've encountered lots of reasonable people willing to do a good job that's well-planned, in a reasonable amount of time, at a reasonable cost.

The trouble seems to come from marketing and management people who promise customers 16,000 square foot palaces, then allocate four guys in three months with a budget of $200,000. They always seem to outrank the reasonable people, so unreasonable demands get made and the project is doomed to failure from the start. Six months later the team size has doubled, the budget has tripled, and we have a deliverable that most of the team is ashamed to have been involved with.

At least that's been what I've seen - the people in charge are either non-technical and have no idea what they're asking for and no knowledge that would let them figure what the proper time and resource allocations should be, or they're so worried about pressure from management that they make commitments that they know are probably not reasonably possible, or marketing promises the customer a gold-plated Rolls-Royce at a Hyundai price just to make the sale and the technical people get stuck trying to deliver (and get blamed if they can't).

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