The parable of the managers

And it came to pass that there arose two software managers in the land of the Wellington-ites.

And the manager Ahimelech and the manager Balazar did meet, even at a sushi bar, and did contend mightily in faith. For both purported to follow the way of the profits, but could not agree how best to follow the teachings. And they agreed to go forth, and to tend their vineyards, and to meet again on this day to see who wouldst be the victor.

And in that year the manager Ahimelech had one servant, and the manager Balazar one servant likewise.

And Ahimelech said unto his servant, "Go thou quickly and set thyself to toil in the codebase, forgetting all else. For we must maximise our chargeable hours, and have not the time or leisure to waste on that which does not profit us. For we could spend even unto half our lives writing the tests of unit or setting up the build of nightliness, and for this the customer payeth not."

And Balazar said unto his servant, "Go thou likewise and toil in the codebase, but before thou goest, write thou thine documents of design and set up thy server of continuous integration, and as thou goest, do not fear to tarry by the roadside and write thy comments of documentation."

And the servants went forth, and the year did pass.

And Ahimelech and Balazar did meet and did exchange company confidential financial information, for despite being managers they were also of the tribe that is called Software. And Ahimelech had realised a profit of a hundred shekels, and Balazar only fifty.

And Ahimelech did patronise Balazar mightily, even unto putting a hand onto his shoulder and saying, "Thou seest, friend, thy servants wasteth half of their time on the tests of unit and the builds of nightliness, while my servants bury their heads in honest toil. Heed thou my words, for I am commercially focused, and despise the ways of the heathen."

But the manager Balazar would not relent, and did say, "If my servants spendeth half their lives on the hygiene of source control and the tracking of bugs, yea my heart rejoices, for such I believe to be the way of the profits, and though the CFO sendeth great memos against me and the customer waxeth sore wrath against my timescales, I remain steadfast in my faith."

And Ahimelech and Balazar did agree to meet again.

And in the next year Ahimelech had two servants, and Balazar two servants likewise, and both gave their servants the same orders and sent them forth to toil in the codebase.

But the servants of Ahimelech, mightily though they strove, failed to obey their master, for the new servant did trouble the old servant mightily, saying, "How worketh the module of logging?" and "Why buildeth not the adapter of database?" And the old servant replied, "Go read the documents of design, though I warneth thee that they may be aged and feeble, and thou must read the code to be sure, for I had not the time to keep them in sync with the code; and by the way, be thou aware that some of the paths in the code are obsolete, but I had not the time to clean them up," and "It buildeth upon my machine, go forth and figure it out for thyself, for I must toil to keep my chargeable hours up." And the new servant went forth and did figure it out, and did toil in the codebase, but when his changes were deployed, lo, they broke the existing code in obscure ways, and both servants had to toil mightily to find and fix the problem.

But the new servant of Balazar did not trouble the old servant, for all he wished to know, he found in the web of wiki and the comments of documentation and the tests of unit. And when he trampled on the codebase, the tests of unit did send a red bar to warn him away from sin; and he laid on hands and did heal the problem even before he performed the check of in.

And so it came to pass that Ahimelech and Balazar met again and did again exchange confidential financial details. And the company of Ahimelech had profited by one hundred and fifty shekels, and that of Balazar by one hundred shekels. And Ahimelech, though his heart rejoiced not at the decline in per-developer profits, did again gloat, saying, "See, thy tests of unit and builds of nightliness avail thee not; the profits bless my enterprise. For my servants toil full-time in the codebase, well, almost full time, while thine tillest for much of the day the profitless soil of the Best Practices."

And Ahimelech and Balazar did agree to meet again.

And in the next year Ahimelech had four servants, and Balazar four servants likewise, and both gave their servants the same orders and sent them forth to toil in the codebase.

And the new servants of Ahimelech did trouble the two old servants mightily, and both of them promised to send the new servants the documents of design and the instructions of build, for they were not to be found on the network, but only in their local C:\DOCUMENTS folders (for the old servants trucked not with the sissy "My Documents" folder, yea even though the sagacious IT group had mapped it to a network drive where it would be placed on the tape of backup). But under pressure of a customer delivery they forgot, and the new servants had to reverse-engineer the design from the code, and figure out the process of build on his own. And these activities so delayed them that the delivery date slipped by two months, and the customer was much vexed, saying, "At what playest thou, you said the end of February for certain, and now thou takest twice as long; and I say unto you, I am not bloody paying any more, thou canst do it for the price thou quoted." And the oldest servant quarrelled with the middle servant, complaining that his design supported not a scenario that the oldest servant knew of, but had written not, and did spend many weeks rewriting the middle servant's code. And the Lord sent a head crash to punish the oldest servant for his rudeness, and he did lose even unto six weeks of work, for he practised not the hygiene of the source control. And the newest servants, like he who had gone before, did again trample on the delicate codebase, but left footprints so light that they did not come to light until the system had been in production for a week, after which it crashed like a Volvo upon the motorway, and stayed down for two days; and the customer waxed sore wrath, saying unto Ahimelech, "Lo, thy servant has cost me a thousand shekels, and I invoke the clause of penalty."

But the new servants of Balazar troubled not the older servants, but instead placed their trust in the web of wiki and the documents of design and the server of build and the tests of unit and the bar of green. And though the Lord sent a thief in the night to nick the oldest servant's laptop while he waited for the train of mainline, it impacted the project little, for due to the hygiene of source control, only a few hours of toil were lost. And though the Lord insinuated a bug into the new servants' code, the tests of unit and the bar of red did smite it before it could reach production; and the customer looked upon the availability ratings, and rejoiced, and did renew the contract of maintenance.

And so it came to pass that Ahimelech and Balazar met again, and the company of Ahimelech had profited by one hundred and eighty-seven and a half shekels, and that of Balazar by two hundred shekels. And Ahimelech did wax sore defensive, saying unto Balazar, "Lo, perhaps we had a bit of bad luck this year. But my servants toil one hundred percent in the codebase, while thine spend half of their time drinking and making merry at the tavern of the Best Practices. Things will be different next year."

And Ahimelech and Balazar did agree to meet again.

And in the next year Ahimelech had eight servants, and Balazar eight servants likewise, and both gave their servants the same orders and sent them forth to toil in the codebase.

And, to cut a long story short, the servants of Ahimelech spent an exponentially decreasing amount of their time toiling, and the rest of their time arguing, explaining, fixing, firefighting, figuring out and generally not toiling; while the servants of Balazar spent a constant 50% of their time toiling, and a constant 50% on the tests of unit and the hygiene of source control and the web of wiki and, in general, drinking and making merry in the tavern of the Best Practices.

And, yea, even unto this day, the manager Ahimelech sayeth unto his servants, "Toil ye harder, and be not tempted astray; for those who tarry with the tests of unit and the builds of nightliness and the hygiene of source control and the web of wiki do sacrifice their chargeable hours willy-nilly. Like fools they give up their time, so this year for sure the profits will be ours." And for ten years, and twenty, and thirty, he hath been saying this. And ye who wish thy businesses to scale, do thou the sums and follow the true path of the profits.

-- Book of Profits, with apologies to Verity Stob. And to God, of course, but mostly to Verity.