Software Sweatshop

We make business decisions based on our needs. We're a small firm and don't have tons of cash and resources to waste so everything we do has to have a measurable impact on our business.

There was an interesting question on LinkedIn today asking what one skill software developers should learn that would make a noticable difference in my business. There's a big push for agile development, so I'd show them the benefits of agile development and how it makes their job easier. We're building some consumer facing web apps so an agile-iterative mindset is crucial.

In terms of technology I'm pushing for Ruby on Rails. It's nimble and fun... and of course facilitates agile development. I handle the business development for my firm (I'm not a programmer) but I've taken an interest in RoR just because of it's ease of use. There's a good article called moving from Java to Ruby on Rails if you're interested in some hardcore facts.  Here's why we're encouraging our programmers to learn it:

1). It's Fun: We're taking on our first RoR project and the developer is stoked. He's working on a few other projects right now, but apparently this has him pretty excited. Nothing can curb offshore attrition like giving your employees fun, challenging work.

2). Less is More: Write less code, do more stuff. Need I say more?

3). It Makes Us Look Cool: If we want to survive as a business, we better be really good at what we do. There's plenty of opportunity out there so ignoring it would be to stick our head in the sand.

4). Time Is Money: Revisions, updates, and changes take a lot less time.

5). Dolla Dolla Bill Y'all: It's free!

6). It's Pretty: It has a really good AJAX stack