I have stated this in previous posts but will reiterate: Acknowledge emails and messages even if purely to confirm receipt. Allow the sender serenity in knowing their message was not lost in the ‘clouds’.

Communication is key to most aspects of life, from marriage to business transactions. It is as important when attempting to build a product.

If planned appropriately, a product should have a launch date (you can read my post on Agility for more on this), and if you are focused on a launch date, you should understand the state of your product at a glance.

As much as it may be against the nature of a stereotypical developer, there has to be continuous team engagement and communication. Product owners should be aware of the challenges a developer is facing and engaged in scope discussions to ensure the product can launch. This can’t be achieved without communication.

These simple communication steps will help you launch:

– Prioritize tasks as a team. This sets expectations and ensures each team member is delivering to the same goal.

– Deliver bite sized chunks. Developers need to deliver consumable amounts of code daily, even if not an entire solution. This provides progress insight and topics of conversation.

– Be available. Decisions should be documented as tasks but the road to a decision is fluid. Keep the communication going, whether vocally or through a message thread, just reply timely even if  “to confirm receipt”.

– It is ok to “spin your wheels”, it is important for learning but don’t let this delay launch. Discuss issues with your team and learn from them. Redefine scope if a solution can’t be achieved.

The team should understand how the project is progressing, and this is only achieved by communicating. Share frustrations and take ownership as a team, it is not you versus them, share the goal and the reward.