I’ve been pre-occupied lately, with the familiar notion that ‘action‘ has its moment.  How much planning did the chicken do, before crossing the road?

I have seen two kinds of software development outfits.

One was all chaotic action, with apparently little method, yet who always managed to deliver something. Some thing went into production.   Some thing of some value was up and running.  The plan, if one can be said to exist, was often brutal but effective, like clearing a minefield by having your platoon walk across it.  Quality was an alien concept, little more than a pretty thought.

The other development shop is all talk, with little to show for it.  Good people, talented, even competent individuals, who collectively can’t seem to program their way out of a paper bag.  They have worked two, three years on something, nothing of which is in production.  The waste is heart-breaking. Some thing, some essential bloody-mindedness, is missing.

If I were a business person, I would have to pick the former team every time.

Delivery is an essential, like the food you put in front of a starving man. Quality provides long term value, with long term benefits, and requires constant application – it is putting healthy food in front of a starving man, and continuing to feed him healthy food, even after he stops starving.