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Yesterday at 6AM I was on my daily meeting with Boris, a software developer from our East European branch. He's a really good developer. Four days ago, I asked him to develop four screen for the demo application. This was not meant to be a real project yet - just the pilot.
Yesterday, while answering my boring question, "How's the demo?", he simply said, "I need a little more time, because I got stuck with this auto-complete component - it doesn't works properly on holidays".
I knew it. Another one got carried away. Software developers from former USSR need special treatment - they are different.
THEY KNOW BETTER THAN YOU WHAT HAS TO BE DELIVERED.THEY WANT TO DO BETTER.
The problem is, that I don't need better product tomorrow. I need a mediocre demo today, otherwise I won't get money for development of this project at all.
I said quietly to Boris, "Boris, imagine a minefield...I need you to get to the other field safe and sound and not later than Thursday! Just strictly follow this path....Step to the left, and you'll lose your leg. Step to the right, and you lose your balls. Please, please, please don't try to fix things at this point. I'll give our demo application to a marketing person and explain her how to walk the walk and present the functionality of the system-to-be".
I went on,"Boris, don't be a sapper at this point in the game. Just go to to the other side of the minefield. Agree?"
Boris said "OK", but I was not convinced.
I was right. This morning Boris told me about another issue that took a little bit more time than expected..." I repeat my song about the minefield again, and hopefully the things will get start moving. I'll see tomorrow.
There is a big difference in managing local and remote project developers. If Boris would be sitting in the cubicle next to me, I'd figure out a lot sooner that during the last three hours he's disarming a sophisticated mine jeopardizing his life...oops, the success of our project. If you won't talk to each of your offshore developers AT LEAST ONCE A DAY, the chance that you'll lose your balls on that minefield are very high.Trust me. Been there. Lost them.
Perhaps too simple a solution, but it really helps in such situations:
Remote Screen Access. It should be required that offsite developers either
have a video camera set up that views their workspace or they have simple
remote access set up so that the manager can pop on at any given time and
check the status of work. This is a privacy issue for sure, but if the
developer wants to do other things then they should accomplish them outside
of the working schedule.
@ylluminate - Are you going to install remote access on computers where
these "top notch developers" you are looking for will work? If I'm doing my
job and meet deadlines, do good quality work, you don't need to monitor me.
If I'm not doing my job, you don't need to employ me. Big Brother does not
work in IT (not talking for gov jobs).
I agree with Alex. There should be trust between the team members even if
they are located across the ocean. I don't really care when exactly the
offshore developers work - as a one 8 hour piece during business hours or
late at night. As long as the job is done, I'm happy.
If I need them to be available for a meeting at a particular time, we can
always schedule it.
But if you are managing sch project, you have to check for the results
daily not because you don't trust them, but to get exactly what you want
and not what they think you want.
