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What are the best practices for managing technical debt and legacy code in product engineering?

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If you are a product engineer, you know that technical debt and legacy code are inevitable challenges that can affect the quality, performance, and maintainability of your software products. Technical debt refers to the accumulated costs of shortcuts, compromises, or outdated decisions that make your code harder to modify or extend in the future. Legacy code is any code that is no longer aligned with the current requirements, standards, or technologies of your product. Both technical debt and legacy code can slow down your development, increase your bug rate, and reduce your customer satisfaction. How can you manage them effectively and avoid letting them derail your product engineering goals? Here are some best practices to consider.

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Leon Godwin

Principal Cloud Evangelist | Azure, AI, Power Platform

1 Identify and prioritize

The first step to managing technical debt and legacy code is to identify and prioritize them. You can use various tools and methods to measure and visualize the technical debt and legacy code in your codebase, such as code analysis, code reviews, testing coverage, or debt metrics. You can also solicit feedback from your stakeholders, customers, and users to identify the most critical pain points or issues caused by technical debt and legacy code. Once you have a clear picture of the technical debt and legacy code in your product, you can prioritize them based on their impact, urgency, and feasibility. You can use a matrix or a backlog to rank and categorize the technical debt and legacy code items according to their value and cost.

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Yoav Levy

Network Simulation Software Engineer
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It is very seldom that a product is developed with no or negligible debt. Legacy code is a prominent suspect, but even a best-selling new feature implemented may add debt, or drag, as many a time the product or development team had been forced to compromise on quality, scalability, or maintainability. Every member of the IPT (integrated project team) should make it a habit to document and assess the total cost associated with any such compromise agreed upon along the way. The project lead(s) should assess the risk associated with NOT addressing the debt in due time and allocate matching resources, otherwise that drag might cause the product to fail to reach its target market.

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2 Plan and allocate

The next step in managing technical debt and legacy code is to plan and allocate the resources and time needed to address them. You can use refactoring, rewriting, or repaying strategies to integrate technical debt and legacy code management into your product engineering process. Refactoring improves the design, structure, or quality of your code without changing its functionality. Rewriting replaces your code with a new version that meets current requirements, standards, or technologies. Repaying allocates a specific amount of time or budget to reduce or eliminate your technical debt or legacy code. When planning and allocating these activities, consider your product engineering goals, constraints, and trade-offs. Additionally, ensure that you communicate and align your plan with your team, stakeholders, and customers.

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Leon Godwin

Principal Cloud Evangelist | Azure, AI, Power Platform
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To manage technical debt and legacy code, first assess your codebase and product roadmap. Adopt the "extend" method for less risk, gradually refactoring or rewriting components while keeping the application live. If needed, undertake a rewrite, starting with a lean requirements workshop and moving through the full development lifecycle, focusing on innovative solutions. Technical spikes can help understand complex legacy problems, leveraging tools for language migration and adhering to best practices. Execute changes in an Agile manner to minimise risk and deliver swiftly.

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Yoav Levy

Network Simulation Software Engineer
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Technical debt, like its financial associate, is anything but static. Work is needed to be done to re-assess its potential (added drag to cadence, risks on product quality, impact of an urgent unscheduled patch). Lean methodologies enable us to cut costs associated with items and steps within the development pipeline. We need to invest some of it back into making the codebase itself lighter, more robust and resilient by constantly pruning it.

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3 Execute and monitor

The final step to managing technical debt and legacy code is to execute and monitor the results of your activities. To ensure the code works as expected and does not introduce new bugs or errors, you should test it thoroughly before, during, and after your management activities. Additionally, you should document your code clearly and consistently, as well as document your decisions and actions to keep track of your progress. You should also review your code regularly to evaluate the quality, performance, and maintainability of the code. Furthermore, you should review your outcomes and feedback to measure the impact, value, and satisfaction of your management activities. When executing and monitoring these activities, you should have a continuous improvement mindset and a customer-centric approach. Lastly, celebrate and share your achievements and learnings with your team, stakeholders, and customers.

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Yoav Levy

Network Simulation Software Engineer
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A live and evolving regression facility is key in containing the investment and ensuring stable quality of your codebase. A good regression suite is sometimes (wrongly) associated with debt, but to me it's as essential a tool as your issue tracker or source control.

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4 Here’s what else to consider

This is a space to share examples, stories, or insights that don’t fit into any of the previous sections. What else would you like to add?

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Yoav Levy

Network Simulation Software Engineer
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While reviewing merge-requests of my team members, I used to add extra bonus points for removing dead code, or going the extra mile in refactoring sections of or even whole modules. Leaner codebases prove easier to maintain, especially when a bug is to be hunted at the dead of night.

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What are the best practices for managing technical debt and legacy code in product engineering?

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1 Identify and prioritize

2 Plan and allocate

3 Execute and monitor

4 Here’s what else to consider

Product Engineering

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What are the best practices for managing technical debt and legacy code in product engineering?

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1 Identify and prioritize

2 Plan and allocate

3 Execute and monitor

4 Here’s what else to consider

Product Engineering

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