Start Up Week presentation about how to work with developers

2. STARTUP
WEEK
San Diego Startup Week (SDSW)
is the region’s premier catalyst
for innovation, creativity &
entrepreneurialism.

4. Big Thank You to Our 2016 Sponsors

5. How to Get Your Idea Built:
Presented by:
Rob Kaufman
rob@notch8.com
Hosted by:
Finding the Right Dev for the Job

6. Insert Self Deprecation Slide Here
Who is This Clown?
Rob Kaufman
@orangewolf
http://spkr8.com/s/7218
Founder of Notch8 - An App Development Consultancy
since 2007
Co-Founder of LEARN Academy - A Web Development
Bootcamp
Years of negotiating on teams with customers, clients and
bosses
Still gets nervous every time he sends an invoice

7. Remember this number
7

8. ?

9. Remember this number
51234

10. ?

11. Remember this number
51234123523

12. ?

13. ???

14. Development
❖ Can’t really build something you don’t understand
❖ Agile, Scrum, KanBan, Waterfall, Wireframes and friends
❖ Object Oriented, Functional, Imperative, Declarative, MVC,
MVVM
❖ Frameworks (like Rails, Express, Spring, Zen)
❖ Is as much reading as it is writing

15. So easy even a caveman could do it
It’s Simple!
Native Mobile Apps
Real Time Interactions
The 80/20 Rule

16. The Soylent Green of Your Project
Developer
Relationships

17. Project Management Saying
“Fast, good, or cheap. Pick Two”

18. Consultants
❖ Lots of experience
❖ Usually top 10% of the field
❖ Good Advice and Connections
❖ Fast and Good

19. Consultants
❖ Expensive (not cheap)
❖ Set in their ways of working
❖ Hard to determine quality and
consistency
❖ May get “done” with the project for
various reasons
❖ Goal Alignment Questions

20. Outsourcing
❖ Cheap and Fast
❖ Easy to find, always seem to be
available
❖ Work super hard to make you
happy

21. Outsourcing
❖ Quality
❖ Communications
❖ Never say ‘no’
❖ Disappear on you
❖ Brain Drain

22. CTO
❖ Goal Alignment
❖ Vision and Execution
❖ Voice of Experience

23. CTO
❖ Hard to Find
❖ No really, so hard to find

24. Junior Dev Only
❖ “Just find a young, smart kid to do
all the work”
❖ Harder to find than a good CTO
❖ Often get in over their heads
❖ What could possibly go wrong?

26. Upwork and Friends
❖ Grab Bag
❖ Hard to build a relationship
❖ Can be cheap, can be good, can be
fast.
❖ Often not any of the 3

27. How To Make It Work
❖ Communication
❖ Meet frequently
❖ Use video and screenshots
❖ https://www.techsmith.com/jing.html
❖ Use a task tracker
❖ Email sucks for threads and longevity
❖ Build a relationship
❖ Don’t pester… even when it is hard

28. How To Make It Work
❖ Plan the Right Amount
❖ Try and have 40 hours of work in the pipeline
❖ NOT MORE
❖ Use Wireframes and sketches over requirements documents
❖ Discuss how things connect
❖ Don’t be afraid to throw away code
❖ Don’t just start over “because”
❖ Separate budgets and velocities

29. SHIP IT!

30. What’s Next
http://bit.ly/1ZUGkLn

31. is it over yet?
Questions
Rob Kaufman
@orangewolf
rob@notch8.com
http://spkr8.com/s/7218