You Can Always Get What You Want

Agile, waterfall, iterative, staged, gated, phased-none of it really matters if all you create are a few early "wins", mediocre solutions, and quick fixes. Many organizations twist the time pressure screws so tightly that creative thinking can only be done after work or surreptitiously during the five-minute coffee break or the fifteen-minute lunch at your desk. We often are told that “good enough” software is what the company needs. Although “good enough” is acceptable when the systems we create neither differentiate us from our competitors nor are critical to our mission, why do we waste precious resources creating those kinds of systems? Tim Lister knows that there is hope because many organizations do create superior systems-systems that set them above their competitors and wow their customers. What are these organizations doing to yield innovative, superior results from their software development? If you are in one the “good enough” organizations, how can you find the time to explore and invent? Hard times are here, and that brings great opportunities for change. Just maybe it's time to start a revolution inside your organizations and finally get what you want-and your company needs.