Essay on Development of Customized Software - Survival of the Fittest, not the Fattest
The Research & Development area of expertise is confined today to giants on the software development industry. The purpose of this discipline is to research the processes that drive the company and develop tools (hence the R&D name) that enhance the productivity by minimizing time spent on repeatable activities and management control, thus allowing the company to spend more time in its main activity and become more competitive.
This discipline is fairly common in other industries, such as automobilistic and other manufacturing sectors of the economy, due mainly to the huge competition that those companies undergo and to the high standardization that they have adopted. Being competitive equals survival in those companies (Survival of the fittest, not the fattest – I know this title has been used before, but it fits me well).
In the software development industry, my expertise is actually confined to what I´ve seen and done, and mainly to the country I live in – Brazil. I´ve worked my entire career (not much, but ten years give you some insight), in the customized software development industry, so I don´t mean to say that this it´s applicable to every single IT sector, since there are so many that one cannot speak on behalf of them all (one is hard enough).
In this field of expertise, as opposed to the industries afore-mentioned, there seems to be a kind of inertia around the R&D discipline. The “productivity-enhancement” task has been put today as some sort of Holy Graal, that companies cannot achieve, unless they are huge, like Google or Microsoft, to say some in the area that I´m speaking of. This inertia stops us from formulating standards and developing tools that enhance productivity along the industry in general, and in the companies we work for in particular.
This behavior, I believe, can be credited on the account of a few (well, maybe more than a few) individuals that take R&D studies (like methodologies, if you will), and distort them, and abuse them, and overuse them.
There is no Holy Graal of productivity. There is no tool that Microsoft, or Google, or anyone for that matter, will build, not today, not ever, that will be this productivity-solving one! And you know why? Because when this “WOW-Factor” tool comes out, then our needs will be others. Man never will be happy with his own productivity, because once we can enhance it, we´ll want even more. Productivity is an addiction, and one that won´t cease existing any time soon. And that´s really good, since this addiction helps mankind move forward, not only in our industry, but in every other one.
What I´m trying to say is, that enhancing the way we work isn´t new and it´s not a magical process. It´s a HARD WORK process, one done by smart individuals and that must be supported by the companies they work in. Achieving higher productivity is not impossible, neither out of grasp for small, medium or large companies. It just takes different amounts of money, people and time.
We shouldn´t feel discouraged to try to research ways to perform better, even if we fail many of the times when we try. Research and Development is a hard task, but it´s a very rewarding one. When you research a process and develop the tools to enhance it, you can count that you will be rewarded and your environment improved.
I´m writing this because the company I work for, Perlink Consulting, has took the *WISE* decision to spare 20 of my monthly hours as a consultant to research new technologies, processes or tools that can help in achieving all of the above. Kudos to they, since there are many companies that don´t even worry about researching improvements. Now you tell me: are those 20 hours going to make me less productive (they correspond to roughly 10% of my monthly work-hours)? Or are they going to make the whole company more effective?
#70