[Mr. Douglas]

They expected to enter department code instead of employee ID.

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This is where the white board comes in for me. I “bench test” what they think they want on a white board in front of them. I say, “OK, I’ve entered the Employee ID. What should happen next? As we work through it they say, “oops, I guess the Department code is what is going to get us there.”

This happens a LOT. One time they brought in a CR on a project and I could see that it could not be done. But it was from way up the ladder, so they wanted it. No problem, I white boarded it in front of them and got to the impossible part and said, “and then what happens?”

After much discussion, they said they would get back to me. The next day the CR was cancelled.

[AppyPappy]

The users with the most needs are always the ones who either skip the design meetings or just plain assume you know what they wanted. We had repeated design meetings and they never said a word.

A wise programmer once said to me “I just wrote the code. I don’t know how it actually works because I don’t use it.” So true.