Common misunderstandings about large software companies

Post by otoolep » Sun, Jan 18, 2026, 2:11 AM UTC

danabrams wrote: post #37

The author talks about how software creation processes at large organizations are an artifact of how large organizations operate, but in all 3 of the 3 cases, I would ask “why does the large organization need to be that way?” Most obviously, why do executives need to be the proxy to customers? Why can’t development teams simply talk to real customers? This isn’t just an abstract idea in agile, it grew out of actual J…

Post by heyitsdaad » Sun, Jan 18, 2026, 2:34 AM UTC

keyshapegeo99 wrote: post #17

Many of the author's rebuttals hinge on the assumption that everyone in an organisation is acting in its interest first - and not their own, often conflicting, self-interest. As such, they are not particularly convincing. Large organisations absolutely do, as a function of their scale, produce pockets where slackers and incompetents can hide. They'll surround themselves with a web of process, pointless meetings, and…

Post by simonask » Sun, Jan 18, 2026, 2:46 AM UTC

saagarjha wrote: post #38

simonask wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think I've ever worked at a company where slacking off was the problem. The vast majority of people want to do good work. What I _have_ seen is several companies afflicted by this really strange characteristic of the software development industry: We appear to be the only industry on the planet where it is common to pick leaders (executives) that know nothing about the product or how it's made. You can't run…

Knowing how your product works does not actually solve the problem of running a large company.

Post by saagarjha » Sun, Jan 18, 2026, 3:58 AM UTC

simonask wrote: post #45

saagarjha wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Knowing how your product works does not actually solve the problem of running a large company.

No, but how are you going to run a sausage factory when you haven’t the slightest how the sausage is made?

Post by nunez » Sun, Jan 18, 2026, 6:16 AM UTC

andrewflnr wrote: post #12

aleph_minus_one wrote: post #11

> “There are too many meetings” At very large software companies, programming ability, technical expertise, and raw resources are not the limiting factors. Coordination is. In my opinion there exist much more efficient ways for coordination: for example, write down some really good documentation and explanations that are then read by the other stakeholders, so that these, at the end, also have a very deep knowledge a…

> Nearly all employees have studied at a university, so the people are very used to writing texts (papers, seminar papers, lecture notes, thesis, ...). I wish. Most people I've known in universities seem to read and write the absolute minimum to get by. But I tend to agree that writing is preferable to meetings in most cases. I want to try out a policy that all meetings of more than two people must produce a written…