In SaaS development, almost all delivery deadlines are artificial. The code won’t be burned onto a chip, CDs don’t go gold, and no physical media will be created or sent anywhere. Outside of regulatory changes, SaaS companies simply don’t have external deadlines.
And yet, almost every project I’ve ever worked on had a deadline. Usually an aggressive deadline.
Artificial deadlines are social contracts; you have to commit to needing the work and you have to commit enough people to get the work done on time.
In the SaaS world, missed deadlines are management failures. The work didn’t need to be done, as evidenced by the fact that it wasn’t done and the sun still shines. Management didn’t allocate enough people or time, otherwise the work would have been completed. Every missed deadline breaks trust and erodes your teams.
The alternative is simple, don’t set artificial deadlines.
