The Five Deadly Sins of Software Development

Bernhard Kappe, Monday, April 27, 2009 @ 9:08 pm

There's a list of deadly sins out there for just about anything related to information technology. Some have seven items, some have five, some even have nine. I haven't seen one with 21 deadly sins yet, but I won't be surprised if I do. Some focus on IT departments, some on unused software, some on agile software development, and quite a few on whatever they're trying to sell you.

We've seen a lot in our ten years of developing software at Pathfinder, and the list that rings truest is the shortest and pithiest, from the Standish Group:

• Ambition
• Arrogance
• Ignorance
• Fraudulence
• Abstinence

Each of these is best illustrated by example:

Ambition (or Overambition)

Example: Trying to build something too fast with too many people and designed to be all things to all users.  This is also known as boiling the ocean.  It's something we see a lot from prospects.  We've got a saying at Pathfinder:  "If the business plan is based on replicating the best features of Google, Facebook and Amazon, the agile thing to do is to run away."

Arrogance

Example: "A prime executive who overrides user input and forces implementation of his or her mistaken perception of how things should work"

Ignorance

Example: If the requirements document states that the new system must "do everything that the old system did,"  that's usually a cop out for not knowing the details of what the old system does and doesn't do, and how that's applicable to the business problem you're trying to solve.

Fraudulence

This one certainly gets your attention, doesn't it?

Example: The most common form is underestimation of costs in order to get a project approved, or giving a dead certain estimate for something that is too undefined.  Wishful thinking is a milder form of this.  (I don't want to peek too far ahead to next week's post, but agile has some great tools for guarding against this.)

Abstinence

Example:  When key people do not participate in the project.  In an agile project, when the key decision makers  do not provide feedback and decisions, the project slows down, can get off track, and money and time is wasted.   (Hint on the solution:  Designate and empower project managers.)

Keeping this little list in mind throughout a project lifecycle, and knowing how to deal with them when they occur will help keep your project on track to success.

Next time:  Patterns and Antipatterns: The Ten Factors of Successful Software Development

Related posts:

1. Review: Leading Lean Software Development
2. Ten Keys to Successful Software Development: #9: Respect the Process
3. Ten Keys to Successful Software Development: #10: Tools and Infrastructure
4. Software Development and the Construction Analogy
5. 800 on Your Math SAT, Software Development and Bugs

Comments (4)

Software Development

Comments: 4 so far

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1. 

   Very good post, seriously, I agree with all of that. Personnally, I’m overambitious and thats killing me in my project, by the side, the rest of staff suffer from arrogance… Well, knowing his default is the first thing to do.

   Comment by Jef, Tuesday, April 28, 2009 @ 1:15 pm

2. 

   Tim Bergmann over at True Solutions did a more in depth Seven Deadly Sins series back in 2008.

   Here’s the first : http://blog.truesolutions.com/index.php/2007/09/05/the-seven-deadly-project-sins-part-1-elitism/

   Comment by Justin, Tuesday, April 28, 2009 @ 1:26 pm

3. [...] last month’s post on the five deadly sins of software development, I thought it would be good to write about how you can overcome those sins [...]

   Pingback by Agile Ajax » Ten Keys to Successful Software Development: #10: Tools and Infrastructure » Pathfinder Development, Monday, May 18, 2009 @ 10:10 pm

4. 

   It’s possible to avoid these troubles if project managers follows the certain methodology of software development, implements all the stages of software development process like analysis, building of information architecture and the prototype, the development itself and quality testing.

   Comment by Itransition, Monday, October 12, 2009 @ 6:48 am

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