Idea meets Client, a massacre by definition
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Today i realized, again, that sometimes I should keep my ideas for myself. As some may still know, I am currently developing (solo) a Project-Management-Tool that is perfectly set for the company i work at. There is a lot to do and I came up with some pretty cool ideas but now after looking back those 1,5 years of programming and headaches for implementation i faced a new fear. After the first "prototype presentation" to project leaders the workload did more than double itself. Well now it's not only projectmanagement but also a complete workspace for everyone with integrated messenger and notification system. Displaying all Vacation, Meetings, Tasks in a fully customizable Shedule and a lot of additional stuff that is a huge load to break your brain. I estimated another 2 man-years to come up those changes, that's not even overestimated, i think it's to low if they come up with anything new. Mondays are bad X| Anyone has some advice how to pull the brakes if superfancyweneedthaturgentZ ideas come up again?
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}HobbyProggy wrote:
a complete workspace for everyone with integrated messenger and notification system. Displaying all Vacation, Meetings, Tasks in a fully customizable Shedule
Just tell them to use Google. What else do you need? Calendar, messaging, phone notifications of events... Marc
Imperative to Functional Programming Succinctly Contributors Wanted for Higher Order Programming Project!
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Today i realized, again, that sometimes I should keep my ideas for myself. As some may still know, I am currently developing (solo) a Project-Management-Tool that is perfectly set for the company i work at. There is a lot to do and I came up with some pretty cool ideas but now after looking back those 1,5 years of programming and headaches for implementation i faced a new fear. After the first "prototype presentation" to project leaders the workload did more than double itself. Well now it's not only projectmanagement but also a complete workspace for everyone with integrated messenger and notification system. Displaying all Vacation, Meetings, Tasks in a fully customizable Shedule and a lot of additional stuff that is a huge load to break your brain. I estimated another 2 man-years to come up those changes, that's not even overestimated, i think it's to low if they come up with anything new. Mondays are bad X| Anyone has some advice how to pull the brakes if superfancyweneedthaturgentZ ideas come up again?
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}Launch what you have and do bi-weekly sprint meetings. So launch on day 1 and decide on what feature/features to release in two weeks. Then sprint toward those and only those features, leaving your yourself some time to fix bugs and then do it all over again. Some weeks might not have "features" but might be bug fix weeks. The important thing is that Management, with your input, decides what features are delivered each sprint. If a feature will take multiple sprints that break the feature up into smaller parts. This helps to avoid the software death march: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_march_%28project_management%29[^] My two cents.
Eric
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Today i realized, again, that sometimes I should keep my ideas for myself. As some may still know, I am currently developing (solo) a Project-Management-Tool that is perfectly set for the company i work at. There is a lot to do and I came up with some pretty cool ideas but now after looking back those 1,5 years of programming and headaches for implementation i faced a new fear. After the first "prototype presentation" to project leaders the workload did more than double itself. Well now it's not only projectmanagement but also a complete workspace for everyone with integrated messenger and notification system. Displaying all Vacation, Meetings, Tasks in a fully customizable Shedule and a lot of additional stuff that is a huge load to break your brain. I estimated another 2 man-years to come up those changes, that's not even overestimated, i think it's to low if they come up with anything new. Mondays are bad X| Anyone has some advice how to pull the brakes if superfancyweneedthaturgentZ ideas come up again?
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}First, please admit that you chose a dangerous path. When it comes to buying software vs. writing software, always buy! Unless that is the product you are going to be selling to others. Second, this is nothing more than feature creep. In managing projects, the most important task is to manage expectations. In order to do this, features have to be labelled as such, and requirements labelled as such. This new calendar piece sounds like a feature and not a requirement. Write it up, push it aside, and move on. Having these ideas are great. Derailing a project for them is not. At this point, I would reconsider the buy vs. write. Any significant change in the production cost requires reviewing past assumptions about buy vs. write. Review products again that exist and are close to what you need. They may be a lot closer now. The other thing that happens here, is you realize there may be a simpler way to accomplish what you are trying for if you push ahead. Finally, be agile enough to get a working product in peoples hands as early as possible. This will help you focus on the value proposition (what can I do today that eases the most pain for the users). Good Luck
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Today i realized, again, that sometimes I should keep my ideas for myself. As some may still know, I am currently developing (solo) a Project-Management-Tool that is perfectly set for the company i work at. There is a lot to do and I came up with some pretty cool ideas but now after looking back those 1,5 years of programming and headaches for implementation i faced a new fear. After the first "prototype presentation" to project leaders the workload did more than double itself. Well now it's not only projectmanagement but also a complete workspace for everyone with integrated messenger and notification system. Displaying all Vacation, Meetings, Tasks in a fully customizable Shedule and a lot of additional stuff that is a huge load to break your brain. I estimated another 2 man-years to come up those changes, that's not even overestimated, i think it's to low if they come up with anything new. Mondays are bad X| Anyone has some advice how to pull the brakes if superfancyweneedthaturgentZ ideas come up again?
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}It is simple. Add every feature they requested to your Story board. Cost the new stories in both time (remember everything always takes longer than you think) and money. Make sure stories have prerequisite stories. Have a meeting where you display the additional time and the additional money it will all cost. Just be honest. Example: X feature requires a custom calendar control, two-three weeks . . . just for the Calendar control. Hooking up the calendar control is a different feature. Of course, the Calendar is a prerequisite story to hooking it up. Then they have the stories, and the time each will take. Let them worry about which ones to play first.
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Today i realized, again, that sometimes I should keep my ideas for myself. As some may still know, I am currently developing (solo) a Project-Management-Tool that is perfectly set for the company i work at. There is a lot to do and I came up with some pretty cool ideas but now after looking back those 1,5 years of programming and headaches for implementation i faced a new fear. After the first "prototype presentation" to project leaders the workload did more than double itself. Well now it's not only projectmanagement but also a complete workspace for everyone with integrated messenger and notification system. Displaying all Vacation, Meetings, Tasks in a fully customizable Shedule and a lot of additional stuff that is a huge load to break your brain. I estimated another 2 man-years to come up those changes, that's not even overestimated, i think it's to low if they come up with anything new. Mondays are bad X| Anyone has some advice how to pull the brakes if superfancyweneedthaturgentZ ideas come up again?
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}Big ideas are large in scope and devoid of details. Then everyone has an idea that would make the project so much better. The reality being they just want credit for showing up. Most of the people who have these wonderful ideas have no tech skills thus you have to figure out how to make the damned unlikely (read impossible) work. "I opened your web app and it doesn't look good on the 600 X 800 resolution."
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Kornfeld Eliyahu Peter wrote:
You are lost...
I expected this :~ Maybe my demand for assistance gets heard
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}HA HA HA HA HA ha ha ha ha ha!!! Management?? Listening?? Giving you more assistance! :laugh: :laugh: :laugh: :laugh: :laugh: :laugh: Oh, you just made my day! Just about ruptured my spleen!
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Today i realized, again, that sometimes I should keep my ideas for myself. As some may still know, I am currently developing (solo) a Project-Management-Tool that is perfectly set for the company i work at. There is a lot to do and I came up with some pretty cool ideas but now after looking back those 1,5 years of programming and headaches for implementation i faced a new fear. After the first "prototype presentation" to project leaders the workload did more than double itself. Well now it's not only projectmanagement but also a complete workspace for everyone with integrated messenger and notification system. Displaying all Vacation, Meetings, Tasks in a fully customizable Shedule and a lot of additional stuff that is a huge load to break your brain. I estimated another 2 man-years to come up those changes, that's not even overestimated, i think it's to low if they come up with anything new. Mondays are bad X| Anyone has some advice how to pull the brakes if superfancyweneedthaturgentZ ideas come up again?
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}Tell them that they have to come up with the charge number. That always puts a huge break on people asking for features in tools.
