Sometimes shortcuts are great. They make it easier for us to move quickly from one point to another. When it comes to technical endeavors, shortcuts are not always such a great thing. The corners you cut while building your website can create problems later as you scale your business. How so? Let’s take a closer look at technical debt and why you should avoid it.
What is Technical Debt?
According to Parker Software, “Technical debt is a programming concept that stems from making ‘quick and dirty’ development decisions. It reflects the implied costs of reworking the code in your program due to taking shortcuts. Most commonly, technical debt comes from dashing out code that’s fine for the short term, but can’t scale with you long term. The implied cost of your quick and dirty code includes the time, money and other resources that you’ll need later down the line.” In other words, it’s like building an office and adding only one electrical outlet. As your business grows, you will have to tear down and build back walls to add more outlets for additional employees. Had you planned ahead and started out the right way, with multiple electrical outlets, you would not waste time fixing issues that hinder your business’ growth. Start your website with the end in mind. Don’t do what is easy now; do the right thing first.
How to Avoid It
There are several things you can do to avoid technical debt. Good planning and smart decisions will help you launch your online business successfully. Here are things to avoid:
- Being in a rush: You cannot launch a well designed website in a week, or even in a month. Plan appropriately and accordingly for a reasonable time frame for your site build.
- Bad code: Make sure you hire a developer with a proven track record. Mistakes happen, so hiring a team ensures that multiple eyes are on a project, and coding errors can be caught early in the process.
- Lack of reviews: pull requests and code reviews early and often in the web build process to catch errors.
When it comes to technical debt, it’s important to avoid or minimize it as much as possible. The experienced team at Houndstooth Management Group can help you design and build a website that is professional and follows good architectural coding practices. Contact us to learn more.