Software development – technology and …?

When people ask you what you do for a living and your answer is “I am a software developer”, the first thing one says is “Wow! This buddy is a technology guy!” Ok, this is true, we do love technology and can't live without it!

However, what generally people do not know is that technology alone will not help developers develop software! In a globalized world, it is almost impossible to work alone and expertises beyond technology are required to survive in 21st century reality. The point I am focusing here is the need of cooperative work and people management that we need to make an idea come true.

When we are developing software, no matter the process lifecycle we are based on, different kinds of people are together, with different experiences and beliefs, with different goals and one objective – to conclude the project. Even though the object should be primordial for the team, misunderstandings between people involved in a project are common to happen, causing delays, bugs, and, as consequence, bad software!

The challenge here is to take the singular expectations out of the group and make everybody work in a high level of commitment that will generate a great performance in the software development.

I know this is not as easy as it seems when you read it, but I do believe that some good actions between team members can elevate the success of a project. These actions do not have any relation with technology itself, but the way you behave in a group. In this post I will mention three actions that will help create this harmonic environment I am refering to.

1. Believe in communication – Transparency, assertiveness and group alignment will make your environment more loyal, and consequently, more focused.
2. Give people opportunity to feedback – either positive or negative feedback is important to any person in a team. This attitude will create a genuine group that will discuss any topic with no fear.
3. Honor the discipline your process demands – no matter the process you have, no matter the way you develop software, if everybody believes in it and follows it, the success will happen! This is related to discipline, and software development needs discipline and respect! More than that, if you respect the process the team decided, the team will like it!

In general, groups where there is bad communication, lack of feedback and no discipline, members generate false conditions that take everybody out of the main goal of the project.

I am sure that you have other good actions to suggest that are far from technology issues and should be done for software development. I will be glad to hear these suggestions from you! Hope you have enjoyed this post and be sure we will meet again soon.

I wish you a fantastic software development!