Hello, this article is part of my Death by 1000 Cuts series that shines shine a light on glaring software development industry problems. I'm confident you'll find 1000 articles someday.
Date Driven Development is a prime reason most software quality sucks. In the consumer software world, this is especially true.Most modern software ships continuously; it ships with loose intent at the mercy of a deadline. This scenario is soul-crushing. Why do humans believe a date provides value?
The Deadline
Death marches instill dread in software development professionals. The infamous death march is a grim reaper in the memories of the damned. If you’re unfamiliar, a death march forces software development teams to substitute life with work.
Woe to the software development professional caught in the death march. A death march should never happen.
Software development goals should be human-centered.
- Create reliable experiences
- Build rock-solid architectures
- Value users
Unfortunately, that’s not the modern software development world. As of today, the date is king.
Alternatives
Blizzard Entertainment defies the due date. Their products are a limited set of top-quality releases. Ask about the release date of a Blizzard product, and you’ll hear crickets. It defies Date Driven Development, and quality shines through as a result. They produce top-quality products with dates out of sight and out of mind.
The entire software development industry should do this.
Solutions
- Focus on human needs
- Test everything and be ready to ship now
- Deliver software value; dates don’t deliver value
- Under-promise and over-deliver