TABLE OF CONTENTS In producing websites, Web services, and Web applications, the decisions and practices of managers are at least as important as those of designers and implementers. Often, bloopers by developers are caused by bloopers by their managers.
This appendix summarizes the three biggest bloopers development managers make and how to avoid them. For more details see Johnson (2000, Chapter 8).
Imagine you're planning your dream house, you want state-of-the-art electrical wiring, so you hire a top-notch electrician to design that aspect of the house. But your budget is limited, so you also ask the electrician to design the house's plumbing, heating, insulation, frame, roof, and foundation. While you're at it, you ask the electrician to decorate the interior and paint the exterior.
Ridiculous as this scenario sounds, it's precisely what many organizations do with properties far more valuable than any dream house: their websites. People who are professionals at certain tasks are assigned additional tasks for which they are not. This amounts to entrusting the design of a site partly or mostly to amateurs.
One increasingly sees job announcements seeking a combination of programmer, graphic artist, interaction designer, usability tester, and technical writer all in one person. Take the following for example:
BankOfTheWeb seeks a Web designer with extensive experience in task analysis, interaction design, focus groups, user studies, DHTML, XML, JavaScript, Java, PhotoShop, Dreamweaver, and Flash. Excellent writing skills a plus.
Such people are extremely rare perhaps nonexistent. Certainly, some people think they know everything.
