Software Consultancy is hard, especially when you’re the most expensive option and supposed to be the best.
Working with the best does have its benefits. Technical challenges aren’t the big problem anymore. Sure, building software is still hard, but handling HBO’s streaming, Finair’s digital services and Adidas’ e-com proves we can do that. This rings true in my personal experience as well. Reaktor developers are amazing. Their second class on reactive programming for their summer interns was hard for me to follow 😅. So how come the customer isn’t always smiling?
Software Consulting really has two parts, the tech, and the customer relationship. Since tech isn’t a challenge and I appear to have potential talents especially on the relations side of things, I’m now having a lot of fun exploring how to be awesome at dealing with people. Here are some of my first insights!
Complex systems require robust teams. ‘Mission critical teams’ figured out that while breaking up complicated systems is great, breaking up complex systems leads to disaster. To deal with this they put together robust teams that can deal with issues instead. Robust teams have all the needed expertise, access to all the information they need, the freedom to make decisions and finally trust in access. Both between each other and their superiors.
Food for thought: robust teams don’t scale. So how does one make sure multiple teams still stay aligned? Purpose.