Marketing fail redux, the Agile Process edition

I was reading a web-site from a "well know" process person/company in the software field (which will remain unnamed) and found the following quote (names changed to protect the guilty):

XYZ corporation senior management decided that ABC Unified Process is the way for better quality, higher productivity and lower cost.

I can't begin to describe how many ways such a quote makes my back shiver in disgust, but I can't resist to share this one.

In the quote the VP of XYZ corporation is endorsing ABC's unified process, which in ABC's view is a good thing because that's what they sell. However, they forget that it is not "senior management" that makes decisions about what process affects "quality", gives you "productivity and lower cost" and cure cancer, serving coffee and toasts to boot (the ABC's marketing people will have you believe). It is reality and the market out there that decides what processes work!

Look, dear ABC marketing people: senior management are the worst people to decide on what software processes to use! They haven't coded for a whiles (if at all) and are probably a lot more worried about sales, revenues, turnover, etc. They don't know about how the software process helps their workers.

If you want an endorsement for a process go to the Gemba! Ask the people that have to code/test the software products or the tech support staff that has to flee angry mobs when the software craps out on the customer!

Please, please don't push any more senior management endorsement quotes to software development processes. There's a lot more that senior management could endorse like, for example, the best off-shore tax evading finance advisor...

Only build products you would *NEED* to buy!

This may be the reason why so many people love Apple. This thing is that those that build Apple products love the products they build! If it happens to be a failure? So what? Let's build another one that will not be a failure.

Steve Jobs clearly has an influence on this culture because he did the same at Pixar!

So, in summary: the only way to build great products is to get the people that build them to be excited about the product (truly excited, not "corporatese" excited).

Why Apple should watch out or lose it's newly acquired customers

Apple had a considerable amount of credibility when they started they iPod "offensive" some years ago. So much credibility that people were willing to overlook critical customer-back stabbing such as the iTunes being DRM ridden, the iTV (ooops, apple TV) being more expensive in Europe even if there's no content for it at all in most countries (seriously!) or even the latest MobileMe quality problems, not to mention the least than honest statement by Apple about the "push" feature in MobileMe.

Now, they've stooped to a new low. They have started outright lying (or "hiding the details" if you listen to PR).

Apple, come on! We love your products, but there's only so much back-stabbing we can take! Get your act together and start honoring your promises of creating great products for those of us that have a "digital life". Seriously, our patience is running out...

Apple vs. Nokia, spot the differences

Being in Finland I'd love for Nokia to continue to be a big player in the mobile phone and mobile Internet access market. I lover their N810 device (just don't get why they did not put a GSM chip in it...), and have been a loyal customer of their mobile phones.

But that is about to change (and I'm not talking about me being a customer). Indeed, more and more Apple is showing Nokia how late they are to the "consumer" game and to the whole "digital life" ecosystem. It's not enough to have a product, you have to have the right product, the one your customers want. Check this article for a comparison of Nokia's and Apple's stores in London. The pictures in the post say it all...