Software is hard: things get lost in translation

It’s a euphemism to state that software is hard. It’s hard work. Anything seriously worthwhile is going to take grit and toil. Don’t let all the self-help marketing tell you otherwise, if you do you would actually make it even harder for yourself.

One reason software can be hard is that snowball effect is very common and can quickly result in avalanche-like consequences. So I wrote one reason, not the only reason, not the main reason, just one reason. I am not going to produce long studies, hard numbers or anything of that kind here. Instead, I give an oversimplification of the way the snowball effect, the trickle down with an ever-expanding area of influence, can be visualised.

Whenever something goes wrong, which is to say very often, a good way to go about finding solutions is in re-examining things all the way from the top and work your way down. Which place to start, which direction to go (top-down, or bottom-up ) is a matter of taste, choice, context, but usually just a personal one. Since, quite clearly, it is a complex matter, looking for solutions in a random manner can be extremely inefficient and may never yield any result.

A corollary of this situation is that, software can result in ever-expanding benefits if things go well. Such benefits could be much more than winning the lottery for example. If you revise the diagram, take expressions like “things can get in the way”, “human condition”, “distraction” and turn them respectively into “things can contribute”, “human insight”, “epiphany” or “serendipity”, and you have a different diagram and positive outcome.  Concerns like “fear”, “doubt”, “politics”, “unexpected changes” typically have a double-edged sword effect to them. These can have positive effects when properly leveraged, or negative effects when they actually lead us to inaction or unproductive behaviour.

With software, bad things and good things, don’t only travel top-down or bottom-up, they typically start somewhere and expand like fluid dropped on a piece of absorbing cloth.

Whether are a manager or a doer, next time people rush into quick explanations or laying blames, invite them to look just a little further, to take a deep breath, to just sleep it over, and reconsider their positions. More often than not, the outcome could be different. Taking that chance to just delay conclusions a tad is usually a good bet, a profitable investment strategy.