-management mismanages your project
-Sales sells customers on a new feature within a vastly reduced time frame..without consulting the development team
-Management decides to change around the current goals of your project, without changing the deadline
I once was brought on to a new project as a consultant that originally had a deadline of a year, this was reduced to 3 months after management dragged their feet, and I was expected to get it done..with the same amount of features in that new time frame.
I got it done in 6 weeks..but I had to work lots of extra hours to accomplish this. Luckily, I was able to bill them as a consultant...and not as a regular employee.
The crazy part is the company that gave me the project had a staff of salaried developers that only work on these sorts of death march projects. They charge a premium as a business..and probably do very well..but the stress of it has got to be pretty bad.
He's right. You really don't need to work long hours..when you have a good management team. But this is the exception to the rule in my experience.
> Sales sells customers on a new feature within a vastly reduced time frame..without consulting the development team
This was my life for years. We need this giant feature/product, because we sold it, yesterday! We'd have jokes like "what startup are we building this week?". I guess at least I can thank that atmosphere for being able to work super fast.
The CEO at the time didn't really say no to any sale. But I didn't understand why sales couldn't sync with product or engineering.
I worked for a company where the product manager asked me to work into the evening to meet another deadline which he mismanaged (and which I flagged weeks before).
He was met with a firm no (which ensued some very strange plaintive messages from his side). I resigned about a month later.
I'm of the opinion that perpetually mismanaging deadlines, not only shows a lack of expertise - but also a complete lack of professionalism (in regards to the greater team).
6 comments
[ 0.13 ms ] story [ 33.6 ms ] thread-management mismanages your project -Sales sells customers on a new feature within a vastly reduced time frame..without consulting the development team -Management decides to change around the current goals of your project, without changing the deadline
I once was brought on to a new project as a consultant that originally had a deadline of a year, this was reduced to 3 months after management dragged their feet, and I was expected to get it done..with the same amount of features in that new time frame.
I got it done in 6 weeks..but I had to work lots of extra hours to accomplish this. Luckily, I was able to bill them as a consultant...and not as a regular employee.
The crazy part is the company that gave me the project had a staff of salaried developers that only work on these sorts of death march projects. They charge a premium as a business..and probably do very well..but the stress of it has got to be pretty bad.
He's right. You really don't need to work long hours..when you have a good management team. But this is the exception to the rule in my experience.
This was my life for years. We need this giant feature/product, because we sold it, yesterday! We'd have jokes like "what startup are we building this week?". I guess at least I can thank that atmosphere for being able to work super fast.
The CEO at the time didn't really say no to any sale. But I didn't understand why sales couldn't sync with product or engineering.
He was met with a firm no (which ensued some very strange plaintive messages from his side). I resigned about a month later.
I'm of the opinion that perpetually mismanaging deadlines, not only shows a lack of expertise - but also a complete lack of professionalism (in regards to the greater team).
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21892492 (489 points/217 comments)