Big, bold, expensive initiatives sometimes fail. Mine did.
I was a young leader trying to make a difference in a new parent company after an acquisition.
I had learned the new company’s core development platform. I had also heard many challenges reported by other developers and project managers as they managed the nuances of different clients’ expectations.
My resolution to fix those challenges for everyone inspired me to create a new application development layer on top of the company’s existing core platform.
And how many application teams do you think adopted my framework?
One. Mine.
And how many applications did we build on to of it?
One.
Sure, it solved a lot of the challenges people had.
But it replaced them with other problems we didn’t already have.
The next time our company was acquired, my team’s application was cut from the portfolio.
Our VP of Software Engineering explained, “It’s not sustainable to maintain two ways of building applications. Sometimes it doesn’t matter WHAT you decide. But it definitely matters THAT you decide.”
And the sooner you decide, the less costly it is to make the cut.
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