By: Codeweek Staff Writer

The ball point in your pocket is mightier than the sword. You want to kill the rickshaw driver with it. And just before you poke the pen into his back, you remember the article you read in Codeweek. This makes you look back at where it all began.

Six hours ago, you landed at the Karachi Airport. This was your first visit and you didn't know anything about the town. You just wanted to get to North LaluKhet for a job interview. You saw a well dressed guy at the airport terminal. He was chewing paan and sipping tea. "Hmm..this guy must be a local." You asked him how far was North LaluKhet. He said, "15 minutes."  And walked away.

You hail a Rickshaw at the curbside. You ask him how much for North LaluKhet ?  He says it is two thousand Rupees. "What?, are you sure it is that much for North Lalukhet?" The Rickshaw driver says yes it is two thousand. You tell him North LaluKhet is only 15 minutes away. He laughs at you. He asks you where you got this information. He thinks you are crazy. You don't know what to do. You start haggling. He gives in a little bit. His last offer: 1800 Rupees. Since he is the only option available, you take him up on it. You don't trust this man. You are not even sure he will take you to the right place. But you have to make it to the interview on time. You get in the Rickshaw and it takes off.......

Let’s pause the LaluKhet story and go to Los Angeles California where Joe Guitarist is thinking about getting into business for himself.

He wants to develop a facebook replica for left handed guitarists. He thinks he has some cool ideas. He puts his ideas into a Word document and meets a software engineer friend, Mr. Software Man, who looks at the Word document and comes up with a real-time estimate. He says this application should take about 2 weeks to develop. He says it is basic stuff. And anyone using CakePHP and a good code editor can crank it out easily. Of course Mr Software Man himself is too busy with other stuff. So he asks Mr. Guitarist to look offshore and find a good team of developers. One thing leads to another, which leads to your company signing up Mr. Guitarist. Now the ball is in you court.

You find yourself talking to Mr. Joe Guitarist on skype. He has a one page Word document with a lot of fuzzy concepts. In reality he doesn't really know what he wants in the software. He doesn't know anything about software development. He is only interested in one answer from you: "How much will it cost and how long will it take?"

You go to your company management. You tell them that it’s hard to make an estimate based on a one page spec. Your management wants the money. They say, "Come on yaar. Just get something done. This guys doesn't know what he is doing. Just give him a quick estimate. After two weeks, the customer will find out how much work there is. He will adjust."

So you start the project with an unrealistic estimate. Two weeks deadline comes and goes. You keep doing your best but the project keeps dragging out farther and farther. Your customer is cooperating with you but at the same time he is angry because this was all supposed to take only two weeks. One fine day everyone realizes that it has been 8 months already. The customer has paid 10 times more money than the estimate on day 1. He is ready to kill you with his ball point pen.

What went wrong here? And what went wrong in your trip to Lalukhet?  You'd be surprised that this is the same story. There are lessons to be learned from both.

Lesson 1: Do your research.

In your rickshaw trip, you should have done your research on Google Maps. If you did, you would have found out that there is no such place as North Lalukhet. If your customer did his research, he would have found out that one cannot develop a facebook replica in two weeks. He should have talked to more people but he didn't. If you ever find yourself talking to someone who has not done software development before, you need to take the initiative to talk to them and explain to them how development works. They will trust you more and be prepared for a long term commitment. So do your research, before you kick off !

Lesson 2: Don't agree to an unrealistic destination.

The rickshaw driver knew that North Lalukhet did not exist. But he needed the money. He took you for a ride around town for 5 hours. In your case, you knew that this was an unrealistic deadline, yet you started the project. Solution: You should have talked to the customer candidly, explained to him that even though your company wishes to partner with him, his expectations are unrealistic. You could have given him the second best alternative upfront. There is a good chance that your customer would have re-evaluated his expectations.

Lesson 3: If you find yourself in a hole, stop digging.

Maybe the rickshaw driver himself was new. He didn't know what he was doing. But when he found out, he should have told you that he could not find such a place. As for your project, if you started out believing that the project could be finished in 2 weeks, and then you found out that it could take more time, you should have communicated this immediately. There is no substitute for timely and honest communication.

Back to your own story:

Eventually the Rickshaw driver stops. You are back at Karachi Airport. He says he could not get you to your destination but he has successfully burned fuel for six hours and spent that time with you. He wants to be paid for his time or else he won't give you back the brief case which is tucked in the front section. You have no choice. You need to get to your destination. You pay him 1800 rupees and get your briefcase back. You look around the terminal building and see a well dressed guy chewing Paan and sipping tea. You think he is a local and surely he should know. You approach him...

"Excuse me Sir, Do you know how far North Lalukhet is?............."