| I've been involved in a product review at my work. The tool hits a sweet spot of identifying a real problem and demoing impressively. I have little doubt we will purchase this tool unless the beancounters simply reject the expense. But I find myself against it. This is somewhat ideological; the tool is, at its core, a telemetry tool, and I don't believe we have the maturity to manage and leverage that data effectively. And the data and features to product enables? We already know where the problems are and have other tools to address them. It's just that everyone is always "too busy" to actually listen to the customers and do anything about it. Pondering how to express this then, I ended up labeling the product (at first a "luxury", but realizing people want those and doesn't help my argument) a "toy," like a jewel-encrusted hammer: It's pretty, but if a plain hammer isn't solving your problem this isn't going to either. Worse, the extra time and care needed to maintain this tool, in an organization that's already "too busy", is likely going to be even less effective if not a net loss. However, it occurred to me, knowing one of the people trying to push this tool, calling it a "toy" would only be an opportunity: Toys can be incredibly powerful in the hands of a good imagination. And, I agree. And this is where I struggle. Collectively, we don't have a "good imagination." We're all too busy being busy to do anything creative and solve the problems we have. But individually there is a lot a creativity that just lacks the means to express itself. And enabling these people is why _I_ do software. I'm still not sure this tool is the right way about it, but that fact we're even here is testament that the current technologies aren't inspiring anyone. |