"Getting used to pain" by petrovg

Tue, 14 Mar 2006 00:46:00 PST

When you are having toothache you can either go to the dentist and have it treated, or take painkillers. Rational people choose the dentist, asap. Irrational people can act from habit or fear or just sheer laziness and take the painkiller route. The painkillers will work in the beginning, but then you’ll have to take more and more, stronger and stronger, until your whole mouth rots.

Oddly, many modern software development organisations choose to take the painkiller route every time there’s pain. As soon as the slightest pain occurs, they start digging for ways to not address the underlying problem, but cover it up instead. Processes that cause the pain are repeated with almost religious dedication. Any proposed attempt to heal the pain is faced with resentment, suspicion and fear. On the other hand, comforting words (I know it’s painful, but it’s a necessary step in…), reassurances (We have done it like this for 30 years and it’s always worked…) and yet more painkillers (If you work this weekend we’ll give four days off next year…) are welcomed, despite the unbearable pain.

The problem is, pain is expensive. If it takes you three people and five days of intense labour to build your system and deploy it in production, that comes right off your profit margin. If the result is full of bugs, because your holy cow of a process is half-manual, that costs you a lot in customer confidence. When others are changing, can you afford it?

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"Getting used to pain" by petrovg