> presuming everyone is working toward the same ends (NOT a given)
I have realized that in many cases neither the decision-makers at the client nor the decision-makers at the consultant/vendor are working towards the ends of a succesful product. Their ends are their careers, and benefit to their careers may be pretty orthogonal to actual product success.
Once when I was working at a place, I had a discussion:
"I think if we use this vendor solution, it's likely to not work very well for our users. I think we have a better chance of meeting our users needs doing it in-house."
"You could very well be right, but if we do it in-house and fail, it'll be our fault, everyone will blame us. Everyone is used to using the vendor for this, it's a decision nobody will blame us for, even if it fails. We're going with the vendor."
In some cases, everyone can in fact have their goals aligned... their goals simply aren't product success.
I have realized that in many cases neither the decision-makers at the client nor the decision-makers at the consultant/vendor are working towards the ends of a succesful product. Their ends are their careers, and benefit to their careers may be pretty orthogonal to actual product success.
Once when I was working at a place, I had a discussion:
"I think if we use this vendor solution, it's likely to not work very well for our users. I think we have a better chance of meeting our users needs doing it in-house."
"You could very well be right, but if we do it in-house and fail, it'll be our fault, everyone will blame us. Everyone is used to using the vendor for this, it's a decision nobody will blame us for, even if it fails. We're going with the vendor."
In some cases, everyone can in fact have their goals aligned... their goals simply aren't product success.