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How Project Management tools kill more companies than any other SaaS out there

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Re: How Project Management tools kill more companies than any other SaaS out there

#11

Post by sbarre »

Dirlewanger wrote: post #10

You'd think this would be common sense. The fact that it's an article and it's getting traction here shows how many incompetent asses there are in the world who thrive on micromanaging. That said, facing the world with a dearth of any organization and direction will leave you penniless in the long run. Small companies need lightweight tools to outline the promises they intend to fulfill for the business side in a giv…

> Small companies need lightweight tools to outline the promises they intend to fulfill for the business side in a given time period.

This is an excellent summary of the problem. The only thing I would add perhaps is an easy ability to look back and see how much reality diverged from the plan, so you know where you planned/estimated correctly and where you need to make adjustments (and why)..

Re: How Project Management tools kill more companies than any other SaaS out there

#12

Post by alphadogg »

So, let's exaggerate the bad of PM tools, ex. "Tasks hierarchy to the 5th level", and let's fly to the other extreme as some sort of saving grace.

I've been in three startups. We typically use Kanban boards in a simple way to, ironically, show purpose (think of Osterwalder's book but on Trello), communicate (distributed individuals across timezones), keep focus (tops board) and alignment (hey everyone, the tops all work together!). It doesn't directly help with hiring, except maybe to show we aren't mismanaging ourselves. Nothing scarier to someone taking a chance on a startup than to not see a cohesive picture...

Has nothing to do with micromanagement. But, I understand from experience that there isn't one magical unicorn to ride to success. This has worked for me with one successful exit so far, one imminent and a third going strong.

Re: How Project Management tools kill more companies than any other SaaS out there

#13

Post by michaelochurch »

I think of PM tools like I think of guns. Guns aren't bad things, innately. Police need them, in many places, for self-defense. Thousands of lives are saved annually by avalanche shootdowns using very large guns. On the other hand, I wouldn't want a gun to be in my place of work... especially not if it's pointed at me by someone just waiting for my "velocity" to drop so he can shoot me in the head.

I don't know that PM tools are inherently bad or even useless. I do know, from observation, that most uses of them are negative. You don't hear talented programmers jumping for joy when they hear that their jobs will depend on their ability to haggle for story points. This stuff might turn 0.5x developers into marginally employable 1.0x, but it brings the 10x way down.

Finally, this Tweet from @SwearengenCD: https://twitter.com/SwearengenCD/status/56070701622374400

"If God made the earth with a PM, we'd have 100 small piles of dirt, each completed in a 4-hour coding increment, but no fucking planet."

Re: How Project Management tools kill more companies than any other SaaS out there

#14

Post by mratzloff »

highmastdon wrote: post #9

This might be a little off-topic: The thing I miss in almost every Project Management Tool (SaaS or not) is the connection with the customer. Say we are a company building software for a customer of us, we want the customer to put in the request and we would like to tell an estimate time that would be needed. This would also represent the cost of it. If he's allright with the costs, he can accept it. In that way you…

This vastly oversimplifies what goes into project and client management. It's a feature that no one really wants on the business side of things.

Re: How Project Management tools kill more companies than any other SaaS out there

#15

Post by thecolorblue »

"I believe that focusing your time around Project Management tools is a premature optimization and probably #1 killer of many startups."

You lost me when you said probably.

I have been at companies where project management has not been a priority and it was a nightmare. I understand focusing on the tools is a bad idea, but it is dangerous to suggest that project management is not important. There is even a chance focusing on the tools will make the entrepreneur think about how they are being productive, which is the true problem these tools are trying to solve.

Re: How Project Management tools kill more companies than any other SaaS out there

#16

Post by skylan_q »

Dirlewanger wrote: post #10

You'd think this would be common sense. The fact that it's an article and it's getting traction here shows how many incompetent asses there are in the world who thrive on micromanaging. That said, facing the world with a dearth of any organization and direction will leave you penniless in the long run. Small companies need lightweight tools to outline the promises they intend to fulfill for the business side in a giv…

You'd think this would be common sense.

The common sense is metric tracking when dealing with incredibly intangible things in order to use data and statistics to make informed decisions. In my experience, it's almost always a complete waste of time adding overhead that's never recouped. It works best when you're producing X widgets where X is at least 10. When it comes to building something that hasn't been built before or doing custom work, most of that data can just be thrown out the window. A pessimistic guess is almost always better than trying to infer meaning from data into an existing narrative.

Re: How Project Management tools kill more companies than any other SaaS out there

#17

Post by matwood »

Focusing on PM tools is a symptom and not the cause of a failing company. When a company is focusing on things like PM tools, they are avoiding working on the project because they either a) do not know what to build or b) how to build it.

Re: How Project Management tools kill more companies than any other SaaS out there

#18

Post by hobs »

malanj wrote: post #4

Sad but true. I've been part of startup teams who spent an embarrassing amount of time choose, customising or changing project management tools. None of it seemed to have mattered at all in retrospect. Now we start off with a whiteboard and post-its, and when people work remotely we use the simplest task tracker (like Asana) we can find. That solves the problem in the first 5 minutes of a new project, and leaves the…

Agreed, working for some medium sized software companies I have seen them change their project management software 3 or 4 times and because they are so process happy it takes them months to get their workflow the way "they" want it, and then they start looking for new ones.

I understand a good PM tool is useful, and can make it clear what your next objectives is, but it seems to me a lot of people like tinkering with options over doing the work on the product.

Re: How Project Management tools kill more companies than any other SaaS out there

#19

Post by noir_lord »

mratzloff wrote: post #14
highmastdon wrote: post #9

This might be a little off-topic: The thing I miss in almost every Project Management Tool (SaaS or not) is the connection with the customer. Say we are a company building software for a customer of us, we want the customer to put in the request and we would like to tell an estimate time that would be needed. This would also represent the cost of it. If he's allright with the costs, he can accept it. In that way you…

This vastly oversimplifies what goes into project and client management. It's a feature that no one really wants on the business side of things.

> It's a feature that no one really wants on the business side of things.

Not to be obsequious but clearly at least one person wants it.

Re: How Project Management tools kill more companies than any other SaaS out there

#20

Post by JonFish85 »

matwood wrote: post #17

Focusing on PM tools is a symptom and not the cause of a failing company. When a company is focusing on things like PM tools, they are avoiding working on the project because they either a) do not know what to build or b) how to build it.

Agreed, many times over! I'll go further and saying that I've seen some times when a focus on purely processes & project management (not just the software) can really bog down a team. If you're so worried about finding the "perfect process", you'll never get anything done. Whether it's putting together code style guidelines or information flow processes, sometimes it's best just to move forward and use common sense. I understand that it can fall apart, especially in a larger company, but in a startup environment, I find it especially frustrating when a company has weeks worth of meetings to decide the best way for a specific process to go. Sometimes things just need to be done.
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