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Ayobami Ogundiran
Ayobami Ogundiran

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How do you set up a productive team despite management's interference?

Setting up a productive team is hard especially when dealing with management that feels software developers don't understand the business and its goals.

In this case, how do you set up a productive team of software developers?

Thanks for your time!

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Robin Palotai

Why does management think that? Are developers aligned with the domain they have to work with? Are they delivering on the goals, vs. working sideways on pet projects / infrastructure?

If they are not (and not willing to / can't spare time to get familiar with the domain), the usual solution is to insert a Business Analyst (BA) between the customer and programmers. The BA should be familiar with the domain (or trusted by the client at least) and have programming experience to translate to the programmers.

A quick way I personally used to boost management morale and trust in team performance is to give a visual demo. You can't sell the work if it has boring output (reports, sheets of numbers). But you can spice it up with colorful stuff (diagrams, statistics, etc). Maybe even make it interactive so they can try. Could that apply in your case?