This document discusses common "red flags" or issues that can arise in the workplace. Some of the key issues mentioned include uncontrolled scope creep where project features and requirements continuously change, lack of proper documentation, unclear goals and planning, strained communication, and not getting paid on time or at all. It provides advice on how to avoid these problems such as defining requirements early, having milestones, emphasizing the costs of new features, writing documentation, and following up aggressively if paychecks are late.
Decision making is fundamental to any professional activity. The study of “decision bias” is a fascinating subject. These studies show that the root cause of most faulty decision making is a wrong assumption.
One of the most common faulty assumptions in the product development world is that the development budget and time is an obvious thing. This assumption leads to a world of trouble
Eduhacks was a youth hackathon focusing on improving education through technology. I facilitated the hackathon's design thinking workshop. We cover IDEO's design thinking model, and practice diverging/converging design processes through a facilitated "design studio" activity. The challenge prompt can be found live on my twitter and blog. Feel free to use example and activity!
This talk will explore three key components to creating great products: understanding customer needs, rapidly prototyping and testing ideas, and true cross-team collaboration.
- How to discover customer needs through observation
- Rapidly test and iterate on new ideas without wasting development cycles
- Fostering cross-team collaboration that leads to customer empathy and a unified vision
During the current basic track at the School of Design Thinking at the HPI in Potsdam I had the pleasure to run several sessions with the students regarding the importance of prototyping during a design thinking project. For sure for early testing but also as important and powerful way of develop and iterate ideas inside the team. Sometimes without even words.
I combined this short input with several exercises, where the students created in several iterations and with very strikt time-boxing different prototypes based on a certain challenge.
Interesting to see how effective athe hand-over from a first version of a prototype to another team worked out in the end.
Decision making is fundamental to any professional activity. The study of “decision bias” is a fascinating subject. These studies show that the root cause of most faulty decision making is a wrong assumption.
One of the most common faulty assumptions in the product development world is that the development budget and time is an obvious thing. This assumption leads to a world of trouble
Eduhacks was a youth hackathon focusing on improving education through technology. I facilitated the hackathon's design thinking workshop. We cover IDEO's design thinking model, and practice diverging/converging design processes through a facilitated "design studio" activity. The challenge prompt can be found live on my twitter and blog. Feel free to use example and activity!
This talk will explore three key components to creating great products: understanding customer needs, rapidly prototyping and testing ideas, and true cross-team collaboration.
- How to discover customer needs through observation
- Rapidly test and iterate on new ideas without wasting development cycles
- Fostering cross-team collaboration that leads to customer empathy and a unified vision
During the current basic track at the School of Design Thinking at the HPI in Potsdam I had the pleasure to run several sessions with the students regarding the importance of prototyping during a design thinking project. For sure for early testing but also as important and powerful way of develop and iterate ideas inside the team. Sometimes without even words.
I combined this short input with several exercises, where the students created in several iterations and with very strikt time-boxing different prototypes based on a certain challenge.
Interesting to see how effective athe hand-over from a first version of a prototype to another team worked out in the end.
[DevDay2018] So you wanna be a project manager - By: Steve Choi, Program Dire...DevDay.org
You’ve worked on projects in the past and now you feel like its time to make a change. Project management doesn’t look to difficult to you and so maybe you would like to try it because it looks exciting or you want to be the person in charge and lead successful projects. So what does a Project Manager actually do and what characteristics does he/she need to have to be successful. Come and find out if you have the skills and personality to join the club of being a successful project manager!
Slides of my Pecha Kucha short talk at #ALE14 in Krakow.
There's too much noise around software estimation, and one of the problem is that we try to use the same approach, when we're in practice estimating totally different things.
Rethink Drupal Support. Stop the Bleeding!Anne Stefanyk
Support work can range from being a furious fire-fighting activity to a careful unraveling of someone else's code. An engagement often starts with an anxious client and an impossible timeline… just get it fixed asap. But what if this type of ad hoc approach is just throwing fuel on the fire and making things worse?
There are some recurring themes in Domain-Driven Design applications, and distant domains show more similarities that differences, especially when you start taking into account peculiarities of specific Bounded Contexts. This is where a different type of design could happen.
Due to an expansion of the number of innovation tests Bromford wish to conduct - we need an additional Lab Designer. If it sounds like you please apply at www.bromford.co.uk/jobs
Ways to reduce product development costSteve Owens
Small companies do not have significant sales volumes to offset development cost. They must keep product development budgets reasonable, without sacrificing quality.
UX for E-learning: Designing the Learner ExperienceMajid Tahir
Discover how to ensure that your user experience meets the expectations of your users. Discover how you can quantitatively evaluate your UI to determine if it will resonate with users.
Create foolproof research plans with risk vs. effort mappingKea Zhang
Create great UX research plans using risk vs. effort mapping. Here's a practical framework with concrete examples showing how to apply it in any project.
[DevDay2018] So you wanna be a project manager - By: Steve Choi, Program Dire...DevDay.org
You’ve worked on projects in the past and now you feel like its time to make a change. Project management doesn’t look to difficult to you and so maybe you would like to try it because it looks exciting or you want to be the person in charge and lead successful projects. So what does a Project Manager actually do and what characteristics does he/she need to have to be successful. Come and find out if you have the skills and personality to join the club of being a successful project manager!
Slides of my Pecha Kucha short talk at #ALE14 in Krakow.
There's too much noise around software estimation, and one of the problem is that we try to use the same approach, when we're in practice estimating totally different things.
Rethink Drupal Support. Stop the Bleeding!Anne Stefanyk
Support work can range from being a furious fire-fighting activity to a careful unraveling of someone else's code. An engagement often starts with an anxious client and an impossible timeline… just get it fixed asap. But what if this type of ad hoc approach is just throwing fuel on the fire and making things worse?
There are some recurring themes in Domain-Driven Design applications, and distant domains show more similarities that differences, especially when you start taking into account peculiarities of specific Bounded Contexts. This is where a different type of design could happen.
Due to an expansion of the number of innovation tests Bromford wish to conduct - we need an additional Lab Designer. If it sounds like you please apply at www.bromford.co.uk/jobs
Ways to reduce product development costSteve Owens
Small companies do not have significant sales volumes to offset development cost. They must keep product development budgets reasonable, without sacrificing quality.
UX for E-learning: Designing the Learner ExperienceMajid Tahir
Discover how to ensure that your user experience meets the expectations of your users. Discover how you can quantitatively evaluate your UI to determine if it will resonate with users.
Create foolproof research plans with risk vs. effort mappingKea Zhang
Create great UX research plans using risk vs. effort mapping. Here's a practical framework with concrete examples showing how to apply it in any project.
These slides were part of a 30 minute presentation. The focus was on creating common (design thinking) ground between design, marketing and sales people inside a company.
These slides include a bit about me but mostly function as a backdrop I refer to during my oral presentation.
I do not read my slides :-)
Top 10 Things To Do If You Want To Get Fired Over A WordPress ProjectWilliam Bergmann
A rundown of 10 of the most common ways to wreck a WordPress project, along with tips to avoid them for Project Managers on both the Client and Agency side.
Get things done : pragmatic project managementStan Carrico
Bitovi summer training camp presentation on communication and project / task management.
Roleplay dialog:
Version 1 (not the best)
PM : How is this new chart progressing? You have been working on it for two weeks and it needs to be complete by end of week.
Dev round A:
I'm working as fast as I can! I'm trying to get it done by the end of the week.
PM : Well, I'll check in with you again in a few hours.
Dev round A : I need more time than that, why don't you give me a day and then try me again?
PM : I need this to be done by Friday and it's already Thursday. How much longer do you need?
Dev round A : I don't know, but longer than a few hours..
__ Version 2 (better)
PM : How is this new chart progressing? You have been working on it for two weeks and it needs to be complete by end of week.
Dev round B : The chart consists of the plot, the axes and the css styles we're applying from the design mockup. I have completed the plot, and I estimate that the axis and applying styles will each take about 6 hours to complete. The plot took me longer than I expected. I think we should plan to demo the full chart on Monday.
PM : Can you update me when the axis and styles are done?
Dev round B : Sure. Does the business need to give us feedback on the plot, axis or styles? We can demo the plot now, the axis will be ready in the morning, and the styles will be applied and ready to demo on Monday morning.
PM : No, I think we need the complete product. I'll verify the don't need to give feedback on the pieces.
Dev round B : Ok, I'll send you a note when they are finished tomorrow evening, or I will update you before that if I run into any blockers.
References
The Pragmatic Programmer 1999 By Andrew Hunt and Dave Thomas
Team Geek 2012 By Brian W. Fitzpatrick, Ben Collins-Sussman
Head First Object-Oriented Analysis and Design 2006 By Brett McLaughlin, Gary Pollice, David West
The Agile Samurai 2014 Jonathan Rasmusson
Behind Closed Doors 2014 By Johanna Rothman, Esther Derby.
How to make team collaboration suck less!Brian LaMee
Working with people can sometimes suck. You know how it goes, you have to get a team together, you hold countless (or pointless) meetings, nobody knows what the tasks are and who was supposed to do what, nobody can find the right documents or the right version and nobody can access any of the tools to share documents when you need them. This is usually the point where you just throw your hands up and scream, “FORGET IT, I WILL JUST DO IT MYSELF!”
But for most things, you can’t do it all by yourself. You need to collaborate with other members of your team, or other teams in the company or maybe even people outside your organization. Tools have always helped us make things suck less. The airplane made it suck less to get across the ocean, calculators made it suck less to do complex mathematical calculations and now the Cloud and Collaboration tools are making it suck less to work on projects and stay connected as teams.
Building a $100k and flexible design careeradambcarney
This book is a step-by-step overview to how to build a 100k and flexible career in graphic design. It was written by a group of people who actually do it, and is loaded with practical information.
With the pace of business as fast as it is, it’s easy to feel overwhelmed. Demands and deadlines stack up quickly and the way forward gets quickly obscured. It can be paralyzing.
In those moments, a new perspective can feel like a breath of fresh air, which is why we created this guidebook to help you envision clear business goals with an architected approach.
If you're interested in approaching your work with an architect mindset, reach out to us at connect@oxygenexp.com or oxygenexp.com/contact/
"A scenario is a description of a person’s interaction with a system.
Scenarios help focus design efforts on the user’s requirements, which are distinct from technical or business requirements.
Scenarios may be related to ‘use cases’, which describe interactions at a technical level. Unlike use cases, however, scenarios can be understood by people who do not have any technical background. They are therefore suitable for use during participatory design activities." http://infodesign.com.au/usabilityresources/scenarios/
Troubleshooting Yer Busted-Ass Design ProcessDan Willis
This talk presents five specific, actionable tactics to shore up design processes ravaged by the vagaries of your organization. You will gain the tools necessary for managing problematic stakeholders; analyzing your organization’s design tolerance; and defining problems in ways that design can successfully address.
Design thinking myths - valuing terrible ideas doesn’t mean all ideas are sam...Stephanie Beath
No matter how well you know one another, I have yet to be with a single team where people had clarity about language without first directly addressing it in a workshop.
Take any word and ask people what it translates to in terms of activity – what it looks like when you see it in life.
1. When is something ‘complete’, ‘high quality’, ‘innovative’?
2. What does it look like when you have ‘trust’, ‘integrity’, ‘empathy?
3. How about being ‘bold’, ‘unique’, ‘professional’?
The variation is huge. Unless you nut it out, people agree to something with different expectations of what it means.
You pour your blood, sweat and tears into creating sublime UX designs for your carefully researched audiences, but you might be forgetting one very important one: Your developers. If you want your design vision to really come to life, though, this is one of the most important relationships you can foster. And one surefire way straight to the heart of a developer is to write amazing specs (another is pizza). Get some tips from a former server-side developer turned UX designer, and you and your favorite nerd pack will be besties in no time, knocking out improved work in fewer cycles with way less frustration. Win-win.
Presentation given at Madison+ UX, 2015 (http://madisonpl.us/ux)
Resumes, Cover Letters, and Applying OnlineBruce Bennett
This webinar showcases resume styles and the elements that go into building your resume. Every job application requires unique skills, and this session will show you how to improve your resume to match the jobs to which you are applying. Additionally, we will discuss cover letters and learn about ideas to include. Every job application requires unique skills so learn ways to give you the best chance of success when applying for a new position. Learn how to take advantage of all the features when uploading a job application to a company’s applicant tracking system.
Exploring Career Paths in Cybersecurity for Technical CommunicatorsBen Woelk, CISSP, CPTC
Brief overview of career options in cybersecurity for technical communicators. Includes discussion of my career path, certification options, NICE and NIST resources.
The Impact of Artificial Intelligence on Modern Society.pdfssuser3e63fc
Just a game Assignment 3
1. What has made Louis Vuitton's business model successful in the Japanese luxury market?
2. What are the opportunities and challenges for Louis Vuitton in Japan?
3. What are the specifics of the Japanese fashion luxury market?
4. How did Louis Vuitton enter into the Japanese market originally? What were the other entry strategies it adopted later to strengthen its presence?
5. Will Louis Vuitton have any new challenges arise due to the global financial crisis? How does it overcome the new challenges?Assignment 3
1. What has made Louis Vuitton's business model successful in the Japanese luxury market?
2. What are the opportunities and challenges for Louis Vuitton in Japan?
3. What are the specifics of the Japanese fashion luxury market?
4. How did Louis Vuitton enter into the Japanese market originally? What were the other entry strategies it adopted later to strengthen its presence?
5. Will Louis Vuitton have any new challenges arise due to the global financial crisis? How does it overcome the new challenges?Assignment 3
1. What has made Louis Vuitton's business model successful in the Japanese luxury market?
2. What are the opportunities and challenges for Louis Vuitton in Japan?
3. What are the specifics of the Japanese fashion luxury market?
4. How did Louis Vuitton enter into the Japanese market originally? What were the other entry strategies it adopted later to strengthen its presence?
5. Will Louis Vuitton have any new challenges arise due to the global financial crisis? How does it overcome the new challenges?
Want to move your career forward? Looking to build your leadership skills while helping others learn, grow, and improve their skills? Seeking someone who can guide you in achieving these goals?
You can accomplish this through a mentoring partnership. Learn more about the PMISSC Mentoring Program, where you’ll discover the incredible benefits of becoming a mentor or mentee. This program is designed to foster professional growth, enhance skills, and build a strong network within the project management community. Whether you're looking to share your expertise or seeking guidance to advance your career, the PMI Mentoring Program offers valuable opportunities for personal and professional development.
Watch this to learn:
* Overview of the PMISSC Mentoring Program: Mission, vision, and objectives.
* Benefits for Volunteer Mentors: Professional development, networking, personal satisfaction, and recognition.
* Advantages for Mentees: Career advancement, skill development, networking, and confidence building.
* Program Structure and Expectations: Mentor-mentee matching process, program phases, and time commitment.
* Success Stories and Testimonials: Inspiring examples from past participants.
* How to Get Involved: Steps to participate and resources available for support throughout the program.
Learn how you can make a difference in the project management community and take the next step in your professional journey.
About Hector Del Castillo
Hector is VP of Professional Development at the PMI Silver Spring Chapter, and CEO of Bold PM. He's a mid-market growth product executive and changemaker. He works with mid-market product-driven software executives to solve their biggest growth problems. He scales product growth, optimizes ops and builds loyal customers. He has reduced customer churn 33%, and boosted sales 47% for clients. He makes a significant impact by building and launching world-changing AI-powered products. If you're looking for an engaging and inspiring speaker to spark creativity and innovation within your organization, set up an appointment to discuss your specific needs and identify a suitable topic to inspire your audience at your next corporate conference, symposium, executive summit, or planning retreat.
About PMI Silver Spring Chapter
We are a branch of the Project Management Institute. We offer a platform for project management professionals in Silver Spring, MD, and the DC/Baltimore metro area. Monthly meetings facilitate networking, knowledge sharing, and professional development. For event details, visit pmissc.org.
2. What am I
talking about?
There doesn’t seem to be a goal
Scope changes rampantly
Features creep
Buzzwords rule your life
Who’s a designer? Everyone!
“We don’t have time for docs”
Communication is strained
You’re not getting paid
What happens when:
3. Who is this for?
The lonely
Developers with good
intuition and too much
imposter syndrome
People who think they’re
project manager (a
weekend scrum course
doesn’t count)
Anyone who’s ever worked
for a 22 year old
Frustrated people
6. Scope creep is what now?
Scope creep (also called requirement creep, function creep, feature creep, or
kitchen sink syndrome) in project management refers to changes, continuous
or uncontrolled growth in a project’s scope, at any point after the project
begins. This can occur when the scope of a project is not properly defined,
documented, or controlled. It is generally considered harmful.
-Wikipedia
7. You may have scope creep if you:
Experience countless and endless meetings about what’s
been planned already
Are taking customer suggestions individually and literally
Customers are important, but they often don’t know exactly what they want,
they just have a feeling
This is the whole point of UX design, hire a UX person if this is confusing
Never know what’s going on
8. Scope creep can be avoided by:
Planning early on
Understanding user needs
Emphasising time/effort needed for features:
X will take Y amount of time and cost $Z. You sure it’s necessary?
We’ve spent 10 years on this one feature already, does it really need to
catcall my mother on page load or is that an edge case?
Having milestones (both short and long term)
9. So that didn’t work…
Here are your options now:
1. See if whoever’s causing the problem can focus on something else and let
you work
a. You know what’s up, you just need time to do it uninterrupted
2. If you’re at a company with a hierarchy, and can reasonably ask for help from
higher ups, try that (mention the money they’re losing)
3. Quit
a. Find somewhere sane to work
b. Optional: worry about your ex coworkers’ families
12. What is documentation and who cares
Can encompass code details, execution, as well as planning
resources
Is immensely useful as a communication tool and common
reference
Solves a lot of the aforementioned scope creep issues
Removes the “Bus Factor”
Only one exception
13. So you have no docs...
Write them yourself
Can be a good learning experience if you’re new to a project
Ask lots and lots of questions
Write down the answers for yourself and future generations
Get hit by a bus
That’ll show them
Make sure you’re important first
14.
15. So it thinks it’s a
designer
Proof is in the pudding
16. No design is better than bad design
Design is an important part of the planning process
It’s fine to not have a designer on hand in a small company
It’s not fine to cobble things together
If you can’t make things pretty, then don’t. Make them work.
This ties heavily into scope creep
17.
18. Bad attempts at design can be avoided by:
Hiring a designer (at least part time)
Using proper tools for design
Photoshop is still great (particularly with apps like Invision)
Having examples to point to that everyone understands
Show your friends, make them be mean
Sticking to a style guide
19. So that didn’t work...
Bad design may seem trivial, but project success can hinge
on it
Try your best to magic up something attractive
CSS animations are snazzy and keep people from complaining
KiSS
Copy nice things
Convince your “designer” it was their idea
23. Oops, that transfer didn’t go through, et al.
Paychecks are consistently late
There are whispers/roars of investors pulling out
You need to find out why
Expenses aren’t being reimbursed
Pretending severance pay isn’t a thing
24.
25. Getting paid
Know everything about your employment status
Not much to be done if the company doesn’t have any
money in the bank
Follow up early and often
Stay calm but be firm. Know what’s owed.
If unresolved:
Ministry of Labour
It’s hard to speak up sometimes. You may be new at this, but if you know something’s messed up then say so, worst case is you’re annoying for a week while things are clarified
Everything thinks their way is the best, and what’s clear in one person’s head can be nonsense to someone else. A real / good PM knows how to convey information using familiar tools and procedures. A bad PM thinks that saying the words “Agile, SCRUM and Iteration” means they can get away with whatever.
Young people are the worst (sorry Lauren)
Long meetings mean people don’t know what their targets are. No agenda is a bad sign.
Customers are great and some have awesome ideas. However, there’s a special skill that comes with hearing out a customer suggestion or complaint and reading between the lines to turn it into something feasible to solve. Suggestions like “it needs more buttons” aren’t necessarily to be taken to heart.
*side note: Also beware of phrases like “Our customers want X” or “They’re used to X shitty thing, so let’s not break the mould.” Again, good UX breaks with convention where necessary in order to make things more intuitive and clear. Otherwise flash intros would still be running rampant. Old and familiar !== right.
“Iterative” means sketching out a painting before painting it. It doesn’t mean 6 attempting 6 Jackson Pollocks one after the other.
If you’re starting a project, create comprehensive user stories, plan for sprints, plan for iterations, create mockups: Do anything that minimises developer confusion and can aid in creating a cohesive picture. This doesn’t have to be the be-all end-all but thinking through things thoroughly early on can help fix issues before you come to them
Know your users, make sure people working on the project know the users, know what they’re trying to achieve with your app at a really fundamental and basic level.
Framing things in terms of dollars spent can save everyone a headache. For example, “Yeah, we can redo the entire nav to give people 100 options to get to the same page, or we can put a big ol’ button in it. Button takes 1 minute, oddly constructed nav will take a day, and set back all other development by a day. Pick one.”
KISS
Goes with planning
If nobody is listening to the above make a list of everything you’ve been tasked to do. Sit down and cross stupid things off the list. Come back with fresh list and say it’s been ‘optimised’.
So you’ve tried on your own to kibosh this and get something done. Maybe some stuff stuck, but you’re still dealing with constant reevaluations, people are getting frustrated (including the creepers), and you need to ship something yesterday.
The simple README file in github counts. A single page of “this is how you run this thing” can be immensely useful for onboarding as well as show and tells to other team members.
Keeping things commented throughout your code is universally understood to be useful. That whole “The only people who understand your code are you and god. In 6 months it’s only god.”
The less you have to explain the faster you can get working with someone.
IMO Scope creep is 50% forgetting what has already been decided. Having it written down clearly and concisely reminds people that features have already been decided, code has already been written, architecture has already been laid out
Docs are boring but necessary. The phrase “we don’t need documentation” will eventually lead you to drink. Any project that’s going to scale needs to have some centralised place where things are planned and referenced, no matter what PM paradigm you’re going with. Even a small project should have at least a text file with app goals, a TODO breakdown, and some instructions as to how to run in development.
Only exception is “Self documenting code”, i.e. code that’s so clear to even a beginner that it doesn’t need to be described or referenced anywhere. This only works when a single developer has done everything start to finish or has mind melded with the rest of the team, or if it’s a TODO app. Everyone knows what those do.
If your company can’t hire someone to design (preferably someone who knows good UI AND how to code html/css), or has people who think of themselves as such but maybe haven’t updated their skill set since the 90s, consider running. Design is something that nobody thinks about unless they’re doing it, and the it’s something that can bog down a project if it’s done wrong
No design vs bad design:
Design issues cause investors, clients, and unimaginative team leads to get stuck on style guides and the general aesthetic of an app rather than working towards functionality. It’s also the first thing that people comment on because visual storytelling is what people understand in general, not code (even other coders). UX is paramount, the colour of your buttons is secondary.
Story:
Worked with someone who did lots of design work in the late 90s/ early 2000s. He had a controlling roll in the company. Had no clue as to modern tools, didn’t have modern CSS skills, couldn’t contribute to actual app design, and who’s process was basically asking for vague things then getting angry it didn’t look like it did in his head.
Finally got him to put some things down in UXPin, a tool which he misunderstood, and proceeded to do things “90%” of the way design-wise but expected the app to look 100% like it plus 10% magic thought design again. His ideas were impossible to satisfy, his prototypes dind’t make any sense in terms of user flow, there was no cohesiveness, and the overall look was blander than bootstrap.
In a case like this what would have been ideal is a fleshed out user story, maybe some notes as to what goes on which page, and some examples of a general style or style library. What ended up happening was we used 3 different style libraries in 6 months, then wrote our own, then got reprimanded for taking time to write our own (which had been approved beforehand), got reprimanded for it looking too much like the (obviously) horrible prototypes, then reprimanded for making it not enough like the prototypes.
I know “no design” as a thesis is a weird thing to state, but check this out:
Case in point:
This sucks, but you know what’s going on
as someone who admittedly sucks at design, I can do these last ones to get by and launch something acceptable.
Be wary if:
Lots of companies hire workers as “contract” workers full time, then dictate things like the terms of employment, weekly hours worked, and hourly pay. Contract workers set their hourly rate beforehand and often have their own contracts drawn up. If you signed something that says you must work x hours per week indefinitely at a rate dictated by the company, you’re likely an employee and have the same legal rights as any other employee (including vacation pay and severance). If you’re truly a contract worker make sure your agreement is airtight.
Find out if that’s the case or if it’s just logistical. If a company is young and just hired a bunch of people they may be migrating payroll software. This is acceptable (short term). If they actually have no money, depends on where they are. If you’re at a startup, you believe in it, and don’t care about money, then equity is a temporary option. If there’s money that’s about to roll in in a big way and you want to wait to see if that happens, that’s always an option and could be a big pay out.
Ministry of labour can do an audit for you, but it takes time. The mere threat of it might be enough to get you what you need, but most people have already thought of that and either think they’re right or are willing to take the risk.
Legal action can get expensive and take months. Unless you have a 100% solid case that can be taken to small claims court, try to avoid. Exceptions are for lots and lots of money, where the payout is worth the time, or for gross injustices.
All of these issues are common even at good companies individually, but rarely in combination. Every one of them also needs to be considered in context.
I don’t want you to quit your job if you love it despite organisational nonsense.
A lot of the “solutions” provided mean taking more of an initiative with the company or team in order to pull it out of chaos. It takes a certain kind of personality to want to do this, and to take on the risks associated with more responsibility. Responsibility = culpability, so there’s a good chance that if the situation is unsalvageable you’ll become the most immediate scapegoat.
If this happens, you need to have a thick skin and remember what you’ve learned going through it. And if the risk of blame keeps you from trying to fix things, remember that you might still get blamed, as a developer, or just by being involved, for a failed project. Up to the individual to assess what the best thing to do is, these are just ideas.
Don’t outsource to India or get hit by busses.