Why Are Designers And Programmers Incapable Of...

[Lee]

Sticking to a fucking schedule?

If they tell me a design will be finished in 48 hours, guess what, i expect it to be finished in 48 hours, then ill send you any changes i might have and you can tell me how much longer it will take.

If a programmer tells me 3 weeks to have a script written, i expect it to be written in 3 weeks time so i can test it and let them know if anything is missing or needs fixing.

Why do most designers and programmers seem incapable of sticking to a schedule?

Regards,

Lee

[chadknowslaw]

Because programmers are a goofy, unpredictable lot.

I advise that programmers be paid either salary or wages, never be promised ownership shares for their efforts, never paid upfront, and that someone else always have a back door into your programs. I also advise not to hire "independent contractors" as programmers, or if you feel you JUST HAVE to hire a particular independent programmer, for gods sake contact his previous customers before you pay a cent or give out access to your server.

[DEVELISH]

Hey

I's second Chad but want to add this...

The issue is that programmers & designers simply can't estimate the amount of work which needs to be done on a system / graphic right.

A programmer needs to understand you, then explain it back to you, then code it, experience issues or problems, overcome them, you dislike something and want changes... sometimes the coder needs to redo a LOT of code for a minor change... and so on and so on...

almost the same applies to a designer... if you make a minor change it could mean that the designer needs to redo great parts of the graphic.

DEVELISH

[gaybucks_chip]

When I was a management consultant, I sometimes had project management responsibilities.

One of my mentors many, many years ago told me to take any quote given to me by a programmer and multiply by a factor of 2, and in most cases, I would then have a reasonably reliable delivery date that included debugging and having an actual product that works.

It's painful to do that sometimes, but my experience is that this turns out to be a pretty reliable way of estimating time on programming projects.

We've had less problem with graphic designers that way, since design is a less complicated task (no real "debugging", just corrections.) If you're getting wildly inaccurate time quotes from your designer, you probably need better designers.

[A_DeAngelo]

we remain flexible - that's our key to staying sane and reasonable without disrupting the team spirit which can in turn result in damage to the overall intent of the project

I always build in extra time (but nobody should know that - woops)

I am a reasonable and patient person and know that things do take time - however, if a person continues to put the project in jeopardy, they're outta here in a heart beat - people are very replaceable in this business - on the other hand, people who ARE good need to be nurtured, rewarded and given some extra leash from time to time....