10 excuses why Techies don't deliver on time

By   Pragyan Acharya, SiliconIndia

Wednesday, 06 October 2010, 08:07 IST

Bangalore: When engineering projects are not delivered on time, whom do we blame for that? Clients are known to be the most stubborn people on earth to get their job done. All they understand is that they pay for the service and find no reason for not being demanding. Some engineers do face genuine issues but some try to take advantage of the genuine situations and it would be hard to believe that such a situation might not have been faced by the engineers.

No matter, whatever changes are incorporated in the IT sector to make it more lean and adaptive, the delivery of projects would be delayed at some point of time and the techies know how to get away with it. With India being one of the fastest growing markets in IT and ITeS space, SiliconIndia conducted a small survey to see what are the excuses which techies in India normally bet upon. And here are the top 10 reasons that make them hunt for more time to get their projects done. 

1) Requirement Slippage: "What can I do, if the client does not stick to his requirements?" Any techie you come across must have either made this excuse or must have come across it. Many times, when the team members in a particular project are about to complete the project keeping the client requirements in mind, they are insisted to either make certain changes in the project or bring in some addition to it.
Requirement slippage is a genuine problem faced by team members in a project but many times it becomes the easiest excuse for any techie if the project is delayed. This excuse is often validated by the organization and the team members can easily prove themselves impeccable.

2) Wrong Project estimation: Project estimation is usually given by a module leader who is not deeply associated with the project. He or she is the one who builds relationship between the client and the project team and integrates the module's findings into the broader project work. Usually when the project demands some more time to be delivered, the team members crib about the project not being estimated in an appropriate manner. At times, the requirement is underestimated, the time frame is not fixed in sync with the project and the entire project is not compatible with the engineers working on the project. "Most of the time the person dealing with the project estimation process is not closely working with the project team, so the deal negotiated with the client is not done keeping the project team, its strengths and weaknesses in mind," says Deepak Kumar Khandwal, Operations and Business Software Head of R&D India Middleware and Service Management. This excuse has a broader dimension as any one part of the project estimation could become a reason for extending the time for project delivery.

3) Work Overload: Attrition is no big news in the IT industry. The software professionals deal with immense pressure in coding their programmes correctly. In such a case, when one team member resigns, the existing team members are overloaded with the pending work of the ex-employee. And in such a case, the priorities of the project team members change and this becomes another excuse for team members. "It is quite a common affair in any IT services company. After an employee puts on his papers, his job is dumped on some other team member who invests his or her time in understanding the process in which he or she can advance the responsibility," says Pradeep Unni, Senior Technical Consultant, Wipro Technologies.

4) Infrastructural issues: Well if nothing works out, then this is the excuse which everyone resorts to. Blame it on the company's infrastructure. Indian IT infrastructure usually lacks with effective resources like availability of power and high bandwidth. So probably one could understand the frustration caused due to a technical snag. Each time there is an infrastructural slowdown, the efficiency of employees comes down.

5) Information does not get passed on, lack of understanding of processes: Communication of the project details seems to be another area for making an excuse. If the project is not delivered on time, the problem could be directed to the organizational processes. The discrepancy in understanding of a project requirement is one point which the techies pick on to make an excuse.  

6) Health issues: This is the most common excuse which prevails in every sector. This is one area, where the employees can't be questioned further. It has been widely seen that many IT professionals take sick leaves on Mondays because they are reluctant to work on Mondays after a relaxed weekend. 

7) Unplanned Holidays: Take the recent verdict on Ayodhya. The fear of the consequences of the judgement led all the IT companies work for only half a day. Most of the holidays are granted to the IT professionals due to bandhs at both national and state level. The major development to the project comes to a halt when an organisation remains closed for a day or half. And this is often a valid reason for the failure of delivery of project on time.

8) Lack of proper skill set in a team: The experienced team members often accountable to higher authorities blame it on the unavailability of skilled engineers in the project. The hiring of additional developers late in the software development cycle, after not meeting some deadline, is often the factor in delayed contributions from the newcomers as they take time to familiarise themselves with the project. This contributes to a great deal of time lost in coordinating their joining the group.

9) Poor planning or management: the role of project manager is not only to give the final word to the team members and to arrive at a particular timeline for the project. If the person taking on the role of project manager has poor planning and managerial skills, the team members could point this as a reason for the project fall over.

10) Quality control and documentation: The major problem of a late running project. Many engineers try to find an excuse for the sake of quality assurance. It is easy to get away with this excuse as the client is also willing to compromise with the deadline for the sake of quality.