Working Up

by Dwayne Phillips

Systems are built to satisfy the requirements of the user. Sometimes, engineers want to add things, i.e., they desire to add things. Such are “desire-ments,” and they can kill projects.

I walked into an existing project. Well, I  wasn’t in the middle of the project, but I was to work with a company on a new project. They couldn’t start the new project until they had finished an existing project. There were a couple of problems on the existing project. Solutions were necessary for the world to continue orbiting about the sun.

We investigated the problems. After several hours of heated discussion and filling and erasing the white board and filling it again, the conclusion was:

There were no problems.

The prior project was finished, and we moved to the new project.

Miracle? No. Then what? The answer was that the project was crippled by

Desirements

The system that had been built and it met all the requirements of the eventual users. The engineers on the project wanted to add a few more functions. The key word is that they “wanted” to add functions. The extra functions were not required, but desired. Hence, the term desire-ments.

Engineers should strive to not only satisfy the users, but thrill them. Extra features are great, but – and I have to add a B I G  B U T here, extra features cannot kill the project.

Let’s state something that we have to remember from time to time:

Projects at work are meant to accomplish necessary work.

That does not always equate to fun. That does not always equate to including my favorite things because that will increase my job satisfaction. Work is work. Hobbies are hobbies. Let’s try not to confuse the two, and let’s try to keep the desirements from clobbering the requirements.