Noblesse oblige

Any webified software worth the name has to have some back door for They Who Know What They Doeth. It's just a given. Why? Because someone needs to make things easy for everyone else. That's the idea, anyway.

The problem (for the workaday programmer, anyway) is that now two audiences are involved:

1. Joe or Jane User
2. They Who Know What They Doeth

Yet, the project specifications are--in my relatively limited experience--written solely with Joe/Jane User in mind. You watched Pirates of the Carribean, yes? The scene where the Interceptor is trying to outrun the Black Pearl and has to throw everything that's not vital overboard and fire everything with sharp points from the cannons? That's precisely what a software deadline is all about.

So when it comes to the choice between smoothing the experience for the customer and saving They Who Know What They Doeth a few clicks/keystrokes, it's the customer who always comes first, right?

Riiiiiiiiigt?

Sadly, conference rooms can become a bit of a battlefield on this point. If you're a programmer and have to fight for pitching vital resources into the customer experience, that's probably normal. If, on the other hand, you're expected to stretch what little time's left to serving both masters, it's as good an excuse as as any to refurbish your resume. If this lack of choice is standard operating procedure for each software release (or even a simple majority of them), maybe it's time to release that resume into the wild.

Mainly it boils down to this: It's perfectly natural to believe that all users are created equal, no question. But the uber-users can usually be trusted to be aware of the damage they can do. Thus, bullet-proofing the system should focus on Jane/Joe User's interaction with the software, simply because s/he isn't privy to why things are done in a specific way. Trust me: It's nearly impossible to underrate the "why" of things.

But that's another touchstone: If the software development cycle doesn't allot time to make life easier for the uber-users after the customer is tended-to, that's another sign that resumes need to be floated with all appropriate discretion. I'm fortunate enough that the first responsibility of They Who Know What They Doeth is the care of our customers. And I'm more fortunate to have realized that it's a synergy to look for, should I ever need or decide to look for another employer. Lesson learned...and duly passed on to anyone who might find it constructive.