Chapter 3. Wasting Money

It's harder than you might think to squander millions of dollars, but a flawed software-development process is a tool well suited to the job. That's because software development lacks one key element: an understanding of what it means to be "done." Lacking this vital knowledge, we blindly bet on an arbitrary deadline. We waste millions to cross the finish line soonest, only to discover that the finish line was a mirage. In this chapter I'll try to untangle the expensive confusion of deadline management.