The long journey of the short chapter in the project has finally come to an end. Three months may seem like a very short period to develop a prototype product, but it is definitely a gruesome ordeal for all of us.
In knowledge management, there is an emphasis on the lessons learned. So I guess this will serve as some kind of AAR (after action review) for me.
To me, this project has another meaning to it. To stand in for my PM who departed for his studies, it was about daily fire-fighting and earning the respect.
You don't really have a choice to back down, when the project seemed to be doom right from the start. A few of my teammates joked that I could write a thesis or case study on how a project can fail. And it would be really really thick. We were working against a ridiculous deadline with changing requirements. And it was not helpful to hear some superior telling me that we were taking high risk and should admit we were unable to deliver. But who were we to admit so? We could only and were already doing our best, hoping someone would understand our situation, if not appreciate what we were doing. To make it, we would earn the respect. To fail, we would carry the black woks and labeled as villains. What's worse, being the stand-in, I was told that I had to bear the consequences. I wondered how on earth was I, with my pay grade, and role, was to hold such responsibilities.
It started out with doing a couple of demo presentations. Doing the last minute presentation with expectations of great potential was not easy. It was a little stressful, but having really low expectations myself, I just presented and answered questions to my best abilities. It was certainly great help with my team mates covering their respective sections.
Demos are like marketing or sales talk. And we had to make one after another. The implications of demos were that we had to scramble to put up a pseudo working prototype while still having alot of real work to be done. We had to work till 2am the night before demos.
After the demos, it was hell deployment for almost one month. In between, there were many ad-hoc presentations, more demos, training, testing, bug fixing, mostly fire fighting. I vaguely remember the past midnight dinner at KAP McDonald's, and the taxis racing out of PIE into Dunearn Road like racing cars in Daytona.
Some users were very understanding about the fact that it was a prototype, while some who did not really need the system, gave less than flattering comments. I would have told them that since I myself don't think they need the application, why don't we cut the nonsense, remove the applications from their machines, and forget about the demos to them.
At the end of the day, it didn't seem so tough anymore. In fact, as I got on with my life catching up with my school assignments and exams, the hell experience seems so long ago now.
And when the exams are over, and last assignment is handed up, I will go for a break. All is unknown at the moment. Are we heroes or villains? Did I screw up big or score big? Or nobody really care anymore now that it is over? I will slowly contemplate what the future lies for me... and what's next for me.
In knowledge management, there is an emphasis on the lessons learned. So I guess this will serve as some kind of AAR (after action review) for me.
To me, this project has another meaning to it. To stand in for my PM who departed for his studies, it was about daily fire-fighting and earning the respect.
You don't really have a choice to back down, when the project seemed to be doom right from the start. A few of my teammates joked that I could write a thesis or case study on how a project can fail. And it would be really really thick. We were working against a ridiculous deadline with changing requirements. And it was not helpful to hear some superior telling me that we were taking high risk and should admit we were unable to deliver. But who were we to admit so? We could only and were already doing our best, hoping someone would understand our situation, if not appreciate what we were doing. To make it, we would earn the respect. To fail, we would carry the black woks and labeled as villains. What's worse, being the stand-in, I was told that I had to bear the consequences. I wondered how on earth was I, with my pay grade, and role, was to hold such responsibilities.
It started out with doing a couple of demo presentations. Doing the last minute presentation with expectations of great potential was not easy. It was a little stressful, but having really low expectations myself, I just presented and answered questions to my best abilities. It was certainly great help with my team mates covering their respective sections.
Demos are like marketing or sales talk. And we had to make one after another. The implications of demos were that we had to scramble to put up a pseudo working prototype while still having alot of real work to be done. We had to work till 2am the night before demos.
After the demos, it was hell deployment for almost one month. In between, there were many ad-hoc presentations, more demos, training, testing, bug fixing, mostly fire fighting. I vaguely remember the past midnight dinner at KAP McDonald's, and the taxis racing out of PIE into Dunearn Road like racing cars in Daytona.
Some users were very understanding about the fact that it was a prototype, while some who did not really need the system, gave less than flattering comments. I would have told them that since I myself don't think they need the application, why don't we cut the nonsense, remove the applications from their machines, and forget about the demos to them.
At the end of the day, it didn't seem so tough anymore. In fact, as I got on with my life catching up with my school assignments and exams, the hell experience seems so long ago now.
And when the exams are over, and last assignment is handed up, I will go for a break. All is unknown at the moment. Are we heroes or villains? Did I screw up big or score big? Or nobody really care anymore now that it is over? I will slowly contemplate what the future lies for me... and what's next for me.
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