Quick Now is Slow Later

Introduction

This week I have been thinking a lot about the conflicts in interest between short term and long term goals. A good example of a short term goal might be to implement a particular feature or piece of functionality. These can be market or customer driven and usually require quick turn around. Longer term goals are typically farther reaching across a product, range of products, processes or a combination of the two. A good example of a long term goal might be to integrate unit testing into legacy code or to ensure portability across platforms.

The Problem

In my experience project managers, salesmen and directors are more interested in goals which provide tangible products e.g. short term goals. This can mean that long term goals are over-looked as resources are directed to short term goals which tangible products. As such long term goals which require continual investment are over-looked and over-shadowed by short term goals. This leads to the situation where long term goals are placed on a 'to-do' list which more than often grows exponentially and never gets done.

The Effect

The overall effect is a negative one in which the product/code-base gradually deteriorates and the back log of technical debt and 'to-dos' mounts up. This usually means that the development of new features takes longer as integration is more difficult; hampered by under developed processes and a sub-par code base. This also deteriorates the mental attitude/state of staff as they become frustrated and irritated as they do not feel that they are moving forward in a positive and constructive way.

The Solution

Try your level-best to convince those who are influential that long term goals require continual investment. This may be difficult and require a large amount of justification, but if successful this is by far the best way to ensure continual investment. Only those in influential positions are able to guarantee that time is regularly/continually allocated for the implementation of long term goals. Break down long term goals into sub-tasks so that they are less threatening to tackle. Use short term goals as an excuse to perform part of a long term goal and clearly outline the benefit of doing so. This is an easier way to ensure that progress is made (however limited) without the endorsement of influential characters.