Three Quick Tips for a Successful Software Project

Success custom software development projects don’t happen by accident. If you read the statistics, they fail more often than not. But they don’t have to. Here’s three quick tips that will keep ANY project on track.

1. Weekly status meetings, weekly status: Have a weekly meeting, either in person or on a conference call, at the same day and time every week. Make it a habit. Make it short, no longer than 30 minutes. For any size project. Really. Don’t let anything blow up into a big discussion-this is just the status meeting. Schedule the rest of the meetings for the next couple of weeks (if need be) at the right times and with the right people. After the meeting, have one person (usually the vendor) send out meeting notes to the group. Make sure the meeting notes get sent out within one hour from the end of the call. For one thing, you don’t want someone spending all day creating meeting notes. The notes should be sent out soon enough that the meeting is still fresh in everyone’s mind.

2. Send out an Agenda before EVERY meeting: Allow everyone to be prepared. Allow everyone to be ready to contribute early in the meeting to get the meeting over as quickly as possible so every one can get back to work. The worst meetings are when nothing can be discussed because no one has the answers, and this meeting turns into a pre-meeting for the real meeting. Then you’re in Dibert-land.

3. Have Fun With It: Not all work has to be a chore. For many people, work sucks. But it doesn’t have to. I find any new project to be the most exciting part of my day. What can be more exciting that creating new, custom, business critical software that will have a major impact on your business? So many people equate ‘new’ projects with ‘change’ and no one likes that. But embrace the milestones, the meetings, the relationships, and the people. Have fun with it. Put a little bit of yourself into every project you’re involved in.

Will the iPad kill the iPhone? Or the Kindle?

After a solid week of using the iPad every day, and almost every hour I’m awake, I finally went back to a device that I used the love-Amazon’s Kindle.

It’s hard to read books on the iPad, as there’s just too much eye strain. The Kindle feels more like a book, reads more like a book, and weighs more like a book.

I know the iPad has been out for the less than a month, but some books I wanted to buy were on the Kindle, and not in the iBooks store.

I have tried the Amazon Kindle app for the iPad, but I use if more for a reference, not so much to read a couple of chapters.

So for me, the Kindle lives on.

That said, I barely touch the iPhone now, except when I’m using it as a phone. I haven’t run an app on that thing in a week. I don’t even check my email on it anymore. The iPad has taken over. It makes me think that maybe I should have gotten the 3G iPad and just cancel the data plan on the iPhone.

No need to rush though-I’ll need a few more weeks to let the new-ness wear off before I decide how all of these wonderful devices can be used.

By the way-I went back to writing in this blog on that ancient piece of technolog called a PC. It’s just better for typing.