As we know, in todays modern world every company is a software company. Whether you have a website, mobile app, customer portal or digital product, your business rely’s on software and therefore also rely’s on your software developers. In recent studies it is estimated that over 50% of businesses in the US find themselves outsourcing development projects abd maintenance to third-party teams to leverage specialized skills and meet tight deadlines. However, for those without any experience or knowledge of coding, managing a 3rd party development team can be akin to navigating uncharted waters. In this article, we will explore the unique challenges faced by non-technical managers in overseeing external development teams and discuss how The Code Registry’s suite of features can support in improving your ability to manage a development team’s output.
One of the hardest things about managing a 3rd party development team as a non-developer is challenging the amount of work that’s been done. They say they’ve had to re-write whole chunks of code to complete a task, I believe the tasks was simple, so how do I see the amount of effort and changes in the code?
Mark Purdy, former Marketing Director, Vivobarefoot
Why is it hard?
1. Communication Gaps
One of the most significant challenges in managing a 3rd party development team without coding experience is the communication gap. Technical jargon and complex terminology can create a barrier between the non-technical manager or business owner and the development team. Bridging this gap requires proactive efforts, such as regular check-ins, clear documentation, and the use of layman’s terms to ensure mutual understanding, the problem though is that many developers find this tiresome and time consuming themselves, so neither party end up satisfied.
2. Setting and managing expectations
Without a solid understanding of coding intricacies, setting realistic expectations for project timelines and deliverables can be challenging. Non-technical managers may inadvertently set unrealistic goals or fail to grasp the complexities involved in certain development tasks. To overcome this challenge, it is essential to consult with the development team, seek their input, and establish a clear roadmap with achievable milestones.
3. Quality Assurance and Bug Handling
Identifying and addressing coding issues, bugs, and quality assurance concerns can be daunting for those without coding experience. Non-technical managers may struggle to assess the severity of bugs or understand the impact on the overall project. To mitigate this challenge, regular testing, feedback loops, and involving the development team in the quality assurance process are crucial. However, there will always be hidden security or coding issues which are not visible through testing and can only be identified through code security scanners, and that relies on your development team to be proactive and honest in their work.
4. Managing Budget and Scope
Managing the budget and scope of a development project can be tricky without a technical background. Non-technical managers or business owners may struggle to evaluate the cost implications of certain features or functionalities. Collaborating closely with the development team, setting priorities, and maintaining a flexible scope that aligns with the budget can help strike the right balance. However, disagreements often arise through a lack of understanding or communication around development tasks that don’t have a visible output, such as upgrading security patches or updating dependencies.
5. Technology Selection
Choosing the right technologies for a project is a critical decision that often requires technical expertise. Non-technical managers or business owners may face challenges in evaluating different technologies, understanding their implications, and making informed decisions. While engaging in open communication with the development team and seeking their guidance on technology selection is normal, you will ultimately be influenced by their preference or existing skillset. Understanding your technology stack is also critical in long term planning, say if you are considering one day hiring an in-house development team or thinking about changing suppliers – You need to have an understanding of your tech stack and it’s dependencies elsewhere.
What’s the solution?
Introducing The Code Registry, the worlds first code intelligence and analysis platform designed for non-developers
The Code Registry seeks to solve all of the above challenges simply and elegantly in a single subscription. The platform has been designed specifically for the needs of non-developers with the main objective of empowering whoever is responsible for the businesses software development to have greater control and knowledge over their development.
Whether you are a CEO, Business owner, Ecommerce Manager, Project Manager, CTO or Investor, The Code Registry’s suite of tools and AI assistant are designed to empower you to make better decisions and improve your ability to communicate and manage your development team.
Join the revolution of demystifying software
development and take back control of your code.
1. Improve Communication
As soon as you start using The Code Registry you will immediately gain insights into your software that would have previously been hidden. You’ll be presented with your Code Complexity Score, giving you a greater understanding of how complex different parts of your codebase are. You’ll have visibility of any potential security issues brought back by our security analysis dashboard, you’ll see a full breakdown of who’s been contributing the most code via our code history analysis and you’ll have a full roundup of your code provided by Ada, our AI code analysis assistant. What this means is that every time you have your development review with your team you have a complete picture of whats happened in the past and what should be happening in the future. You can use our AI insights to help you drive more open and proactive conversations with your development team or partner and ultimately be able to track your codes quality and value over time.
2. Setting and managing expectations
Regardless of if your agreement with your development team or partner is based around a single project or ongoing development, one of the key facets to successful software development is reviewing code. If you know you have a team of 3 developers working full time on your code then you will have expectations on the amount of code being written, committed and reviewed. By Using the Code Registry you can set your own code replication schedules and with those receive your comparative reports with each replication. That means at regular intervals you will have visibility of how much new code has been written, how many security issues have been resolved and how much value has been added to your code. It also means you can assess more fully if your agreed expectations are being met or not, without any ambiguity.
3. Quality Assurance and Bug Handling
As we said above, identifying and addressing the severity of coding issues, bugs, and security concerns can be daunting for those without coding experience. It is especially daunting if you rely completely on your development team or partner to be the ones to inform you of any new issues. Well, by using The Code Registry you no longer have to rely on trust, our dedicated security analysis dashboard proactively detects any potential security issues in your code before they can be exploited by attackers. The Code Registry scans your entire codebase anytime a new replication is made highlighting potential security vulnerabilities that you can then pass onto your development team. This then becomes a collaborative approach to security, you can review how severe a particular security risk is via The Code Registry’s dashboard and decide how much of a priority it is with your development team. Our security scan will pull back Dependency vulnerabilities, Insecure authentications and even API security risks, so you will be left feeling more in control and aware of everything happening behind the scenes which previously would have been hidden from you.
4. Managing Budget and Scope
Again when it comes to managing budgets the single biggest areas that can adversely impact your development spend is normally around having to resolve security issues, bugs or update code which is dependent on open source libraries. While The Code Registry isn’t going magically solves these problems for you, it will allow you to better plan your budgets and work in a more collaborative way with your development team to mitigate unforeseen costs and risks. For instance by reviewing our open source component analysis dashboard you can see how many potential risks there are with components used in your code and the requirements of keeping each one up to date and compliant.
5. Understanding your Tech Stack
There are plenty of reasons why every person managing a business or development team should have an understanding of their tech stack. The first and most straightforward reason is if you ever need to move development partner or hire a developer directly, you need to know what skills and languages are required. The second reason is around understanding what your code or technology is actually capable of; a codebase primarily made of javascript will have very different properties to one made up of PHP. Lastly having an understanding of whether your codebase has been coded from scratch vs whether it is using lots of open source components will have a huge impact on your codes valuation. Luckily all of these areas are addressed within The Code Registry’s AI Analysis and Code cost-to-replicate dashboards. By using these tools you will able to answer any questions yourself about which programming languages are used across your code, how much of your codebase is made up from Open Source libraries and what it would cost for someone to replicate your code entirely.
Conclusion
While managing a 3rd party development team without coding experience presents its unique set of challenges, success is not out of reach. By using The Code Registry as your conduit between yourself and your development team you increase your own understanding of your code and use that knowledge to foster clearer communication, set more realistic expectations and actively participate in discussions around security. While you will still want to rely on the expertise of your development team, with The Code Registry non-technical managers and business owners can navigate the world of software development and overcoming the hurdles of managing a development team in the dynamic world of technology.
