Jim Konandreas

Must Read: A Software Design Manifesto

2008-02-12T10:36:00.001-05:00

An absolutely must read for anybody in software development, from newbie junior programmers to seasoned software designers, is A Software Design Manifesto by Mitchell Kapor.

The essay is almost 20 years old, and it still holds true today.

Roadmaps and Features and Enhancements - Oh My!

2008-01-22T21:43:00.000-05:00

The 37 Signals blog about how you don't need a product roadmap spawned a great discussion in my company. We all sorta kinda all agreed that while having a published roadmap is dangerous, we do need to communicate a product "vision" to our customers. The function of aggregating and analyzing all the features that go into a roadmap is also still necessary for product planning stages. Especially the features that clients have submitted themselves.

I personally argued that having a running list of client submitted features not only tells you what your clients want in the software, but you could also possibly glean patterns of how they use the software simply by analyzing what they've requested.

I don't feel that way anymore, and here is why.

I've had the most mind-numbing task lately. I've had to review a list of approx. 200 feature requests for the product planning phase of our next release. As I'm reviewing each and every complaint...I mean feature request, I realized something. None of these are real feature requests. Sure, technically, renaming a button from Submit to Save or adding a column onto a report are feature requests. But those are more like product improvements then real features.

I attended a webinar from KnowledgeInfusion the other day, and Jason Averbrook said something that really crystallized what we really need from our customers. I'm paraphrasing here, but the message essentially was that the real winners in enterprise software development are not the ones who automate existing business processes, but are the ones who revolutionize existing business processes.

That got me thinking. Feature requests that clients submit essentially try to improve the product so their existing business processes run smoother. They don't tend to submit requests to change their business process because the people who have permissions to log in and submit a request are so focused on the project (i.e. go-live), it forces them to think short sightedly. I have yet to really come across a feature request that says "Look, we've been doing this like that for so long, and it ain't working. What we really would like to see is.......".

So I want to stop reviewing the list of "features" now. But I can't because, you know, management would kick my ass. But I have to admit I truly believe I'm wasting my time here. This is what you get when you don't work for a company driven by research. If your company depends on your customers telling you what next to build, you're probably an enterprise software company that does not employ thought leaders in that space (which is actually OK if its run properly). However if you have industry leaders who simply know the space inside and out, I'd wager that relying on them to drive your product forward is just as good as asking your clients.

thoughts?

Wanted: Software that helps you make money

2008-01-09T14:55:00.001-05:00

Can enterprise software help companies actually make money?

Most enterprise software is designed to automate business processes with the hopes to drive down cost. I understand that when costs decrease, net revenue increases. However costs are finite. Can software be designed to help accelerate revenue on positive side (as opposed to decrease the negative)?

My peers and I could only think of the marketing apps that based on purchase history, user profile, or surfing history, can directly advertise things that you might be more interested in. But are there any more?

Software shops that focus on this aspect of the world have to be the wave of the future in my eyes, otherwise the software industry is doomed to remain marginalized as the cost centers of the business world.

Let me know your thoughts....

Where's the Privacy?

2007-11-28T08:05:00.001-05:00

I hate it when people assume that if you're online and they send you an instance message, then you have to respond.

The problem I find with IM, and many Web 2.0 software like Facebook and MySpace, is that it puts the power in the person querying for information, and not in the person providing the information. (or in the IM world, the power is in the person initiating the conversation, and not the person accepting the conversation).

This construct has fostered a culture where if you don't respond to an IM, or if you don't add a person as a friend, then that person feels that they are being ignored and you look like a jackass.

So what do I do? I want to use Facebook, but I don't want to accept every friend invitation sent to me. (And FYI folks - there is a reason why we lost touch). I also want to use MSN, but I have work to do and can't chat on every message - not to mention that damn flashing window is such a distraction.

I think I'm going to uninstall my MSN at work. The distractions are significant enough where it has affected what I was doing at the time, but I feel that it is also changing work culture to the point where people think that MSN history is some form of official documentation used for decision making - which is really scary (and lazy and full of potential errors and misinterpretations) - but that is a topic for another date.

I Love Microsoft Software

2007-11-13T21:11:00.000-05:00

There...I said it. I love Microsoft software.

Living in the software industry as I do, I just have grown to respect how they've solved all the secondary requirements that go into building software. I'm not talking about the core software solutions here. I'm talking about all the other software requirements that, while at regular software shops are afterthoughts that are frequently cut from a schedule, are never forgotten and consistently completed with a high degree of quality. And those are the requirements that so often impact the user's experiences and opinions about software.

Requirements like:

Usability
Too many times developers without any training in Human Computer Interaction (HCI) and without a basic understanding of usability paradigms are left to their own devices to develop the screens that people use.

Help
Thanks to Microsoft, the F1 key is now synonymous with getting help, so much so that other software vendors are forced to use F1 as their help as well.

Installation
Maybe its just me, but installing Microsoft products tend to be some of the easiest products to install.

Backwards Compatibility
I have no real proof on this one - its just a gut feel. I do however get a warm cozy feeling inside when I have no problems opening my Excel 97 spreadsheet into Excel 2003.

So before somebody tries to convince you that installing a software product using apt-get that has its UI written in Swing on some abstract Linux distro is the wave of the future, give them an install CD for Microsoft Word. They'll be typing their first Word doc in minutes.

From Metrics to KPIs

2007-11-11T22:10:00.000-05:00

Asking the question "So what?" should be on the top of everybody's mind when either reading a report, or developing a report for consumption. I've been involved in many reporting and analytic product meetings where glossy eyed product managers want to hear all the buzz words like "role based dashboards", and graphical reports that show "trends over time". (my personal favorite is "should we look into using OLAP?") What they fail to see is that if they don't focus on delivering true information to the user, the system will just be a pretty operational reporting solution that won't be able to tell the user anything intelligent.

Lets say you have a report that shows you have accumulated $500.00 of sales in a day. In my eyes, that report relays a metric. Metric tells you what "the number" is. But what does that really mean? It doesn't tell the user if they're doing well or poorly. Are they doing well against yesterday's sales? A week ago? Against a forecast? Nope - it only says you've made $500 bucks in sales in a day.

So what?!

A very simple way to make metrics more meaningful is to come up with some way to define targets to compare them against. In the example above, if the system had a defined target for $600 of sales per day, a report could now show that you haven't met your target by $(-100.00). Seeing that number tells the user a hell of a lot more information, and screams back "THATS WHAT!". By my definition, that would be a Key Performance Indicator (KPI). It gives more then just the number; it tells you how you are performing.

Doing something as simple as defining targets to measure the metrics against will take your BI solution from its basic state to a state where you actually start providing answers to your users.

Jim on Technorati

Innovation Motivation

2007-11-07T21:22:00.001-05:00

Biggest thing I've been struggling with is where and how to begin the process of starting something on my own. Do I look for small, simple and easy to solve business problems? Do I search for a complex business problem to solve? Or do I look to build the next generation of tools for problem solvers to use?

Each have their own pros and cons. Small and simple ideas are the low hanging fruit that are ripe for the picking. You might not need to quit your day job, and you might not need too much cash to get it going. Something tells me though that they aren't exactly the highest paying jobs, and because they are simple, the idea probably already has hundreds of solutions flooding that market space. It would be a good experience, but it might not be worth the time and effort.

Building solutions for complex business problems would be highly rewarding, both monetarily and creatively. The playing field is also probably less saturated, as now you're competing against the big boys - and if you can get into the market before the big boys do, they'll probably just buy you. The problem here is though this budding idea would need to take up 100% of your time. You would also most likely have to quit your day job. But for somebody who is married with a kid and a mortgage, that just might not be an option. You would also need some VC $, so be prepared to give up control of much of your company to get the idea off the ground.

How about building tools? Forget about building the house. Let the builders deal with that. What if you focused on building the newest and best hammer? Web 2.0 is a concept that essentially allows user communities to build, collaborate, share, etc stuff over the web. The software behind that, e.g. wikipedia, facebook, youtube, myspace, flickr, etc are just the tools that give the true content providers - the people - the ability to add real value.

I've realized something however. For me, this is not about weighing the advantages and disadvantages, and choosing the most profitable course of action (although that might be the way some people do it). Sure an entrepreneur's job is to identify problems and solve them to make a profit, but for some strange reason, I want to care about what I'm doing. I want it to matter. I want it to make a difference.

Therefore I've come to the conclusion that I've been going about this the wrong way. Ozzie Goldschmied and I have thought about dozens of ideas in all of the above three buckets - all of which are interesting, and could probably amount to some minuscule amount of success. However the one thing I think we've lacked is the passion and drive to make something of those ideas, and I think its because we both really in our heart of hearts couldn't give two shits about it.

I think the bottom line is - the people who succeed in what they do, like own a business, run a marathon, paint a painting, really care about what they are doing. If I want to be, and most importantly feel, successful in my profession, I need to care about what I'm doing.

Jim on Technorati

The first blog

2007-11-05T18:49:00.000-05:00

Hi all - welcome to my first post.

Not too sure what I'm going to be writing about here. Theoretically, its supposed to be the avenue to bring my expertise and become the thought leader on specific topics. Then when people want to read opinions, comments, and discussions on those topics, they'd come to my blog because I was so well respected.

Perfect. So when I become an expert in something, I'll be sure to write about that.

What that means is that this blog will be a bunch of thoughts (and complaints) on what I do every day professionally: Build software, work in the software industry, and trying to come up with ideas to make (lots of) money in software.

Hopefully you'll find it interesting and come back for more.