[Elecraft] Wait times... [OT]

[Bill W5WVO]

No engineering project is EVER on budget. Forget about that one. And no 
engineering project is EVER allowed a reasonable development schedule by 
Marketing and Executive Management. Forget about that one too. The best you 
can hope for is that EVENTUALLY it actually works as intended and specified --  
hopefully before the customers get tired of you and your 
not-quite-ready-for-prime-time product and go to the competition (if there is 
any).

Please note, I am not talking about Elecraft here -- rather all the companies 
I've ever worked for. I have never worked for Elecraft.

If I sound pessimistic and cynical, I'm really not. Those are just the 
realities I've encountered in 35 years in high technology companies, both 
small and large, as a hardware engineer and as a technical writer working 
intimately with hardware and software engineering groups. If any of you have 
actually had more positive REAL-WORLD experiences in this realm, I'd like to 
know where! Seriously.  :-)

I've heard and read of military contractors in the World War II era like 
Douglas Aircraft and others bringing in a new warplane on spec, ahead of 
schedule, and under budget. They say it's true, and I believe it, I guess. But 
whatever they were doing right in those days just doesn't happen any more.

Bill W5WVO


WILLIS COOKE wrote:

> I have heard it as On Time, On Spec, On Budget, pick
> any two!.  This applies for any engineering project,
> not just software, however, it assumes that the
> schedule, budget and specification are reasonable.  If
> you give marketing or upper management total control
> you may be able to have only one or maybe none of the
> three.
>
> In the case of Elecraft engineering, upper management
> and marketing are all the same people, so I am
> counting on getting two.  I pick On Spec and On
> Budget.
>
>
> Willis 'Cookie' Cooke
> K5EWJ
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