Have you ever been asked to fully estimate a full project so that someone else can decide if it is worth pursuing? Did the request set off alarm bells in your head?
It should! Estimating full projects is a sign that the collaborative process has already broken down!
Estimating full projects is a trap that prevents developers from bringing their most important skills to bear. Instead of collaboration towards a common goal, estimation pushes toxic all-or-nothing demands:
- The project has a value, but it isn’t being shared with you. Instead the project owner is asking for an estimate; and it needs to be less than the project’s value. If your estimate is above the line, you’ll get pressure to revise the estimate down. Worse, your estimates will often be ignored and timelines will be dictated. All so that the project will hit numbers you’ve never seen.
- You are a professional software developer and you have to accept their diagnosis about the software solution. Is this project the best way to pursue the opportunity? Could you do it faster and cheaper some other way? Doesn’t matter; estimate this project. Your expertise and creative inputs have been rejected.
- The project will be a big bang deliverable. You’re given a scope of work and asked how long it will take. The asker wants the full project. You’ll have to fight to iterate, make small releases, de-risk, or even prove the concept.
- The project scope will always miss some requirements; the larger the project, the larger the miss. The misses will blow out the timeline, and you will get blamed for missing the estimate.
The alternative is a collaborative process!
Instead of pressure for your estimate to come in below an unknown ceiling, you can scope last.
Instead of pressure for you to accept a project, you can work together to shape the project.
Instead of pressure for you to deliver a giant project in one perfect step, you can work together to deliver iteratively.
You even save all of the time spent creating a project plan, estimating the plan, and deciding whether the plan is worthwhile!
Pushing back will uncomfortable the first few times. The first time you have a conversation that starts with “I see this opportunity, let’s talk about how we can seize it”, it will all have been worth it.