Technical Debt

In this time of the ‘cost of living’ crisis my guess is that we don’t want to hear about yet another kind of debt.

So (briefly please) what is technical debt?

It can be thought of as the cost of:

• Not fixing problems
• Lack of information sharing
• Not modernising to use newer tools
• Quick fix solutions

The list is not exhaustive.

The term is often used when thinking of computer applications. It can also apply to working practices and procedures that perhaps were good in their day but now no longer handle the current situation in the best way. I’m sure we can all think of examples of this in our own work and home lives. There is a cost to updating, but there is also a cost of not updating – technical debt.

Okay PacSol, do you have technical debt?

In truth, yes. In a sense that isn’t the headline because it’s something that is universal. We all have it, and I suspect have always known about it. The real question is …

What are we going to do about it?

Now it has a name it is much easier to talk about it. It is often those at the coal face (there’s an anachronistic saying if ever there was one) who realise there is something that needs to be worked on. Explaining that to management who have a keen eye on resources and results (for good reason) can be a challenge. Now that it has a name, something we can all grasp and understand, it is much easier to have a fruitful discussion. It’s not just an isolated problem, it should be part of a broad strategy – now we’re talking!

Solutions please

Whether we have a huge debt or a small debt, or we simply don’t know, we need to be reducing ‘technical debt’ as we go. This might include:

1. Adding time to projects to clear up past quick fix solutions.
2. Being conscious that the decisions we make might increase technical debt, and choose a different approach.
3. Setting aside time to reduce specific debt. For example:
   1. Revise a specific work process
   2. Move to a modern source code control system
   3. Implement a document management system.

Summary

Technical debt is something that we all have, but we can reduce it. It’s not rocket science but calls for honesty and a long term view.

Mark Wheadon, Managing Director. February 2023

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