I get handed a task which has been decided by layers of several people, I complete the task and then the client comes back to me, wondering why what they want doesn't work, the problem, the task I was asked to complete doesn't solve the original client problem or only partly solves it because many people that did not understand the issue or do not have the technical understanding defined what needed to do and the issue is I had no visibility of the original issue, which I could of easily advised or sorted had I been involved in that.
What happens is they decide what needs to be done and then send me the task, I have no idea of the original problem or what this task does in relation to the chain of everything else.
Instead it's me looks bad and me the client is upset with, while the others that decided this have long gone and moved onto something else.
This is why I no longer do things when people tell me to "do X". I want to know the context: which problem do we think we are solving with X? Why do we think that is the right problem to solve? What other problems could we solve instead?
It makes me a pain in the ass, of course, but a highly effective pain in the ass, I hope, and it seems also one that customers appreciate.
Edit: Oh, and whenever someone says "the customer needs X and Y" the important follow-up is "what makes you believe that?"
Sometimes there's a good reason. Often it's "they said during a meeting that so-and-so, which makes me think that maybe so-and-so, which, if so-and-so, implies that so-and-so."
> Oh, and whenever someone says "the customer needs X and Y" the important follow-up is "what makes you believe that?"
Yeah, that. If possible, the right thing to do is go to that customer and ask "hey, a quick question, what are you trying to achieve when you use that X or Y feature your asked for?"
In my experience, the odds of they answering your question are about as large as the odds of they saying "what are you taking about? I have no need for X or Y and never asked for them." While if you keep talking to the PM, that second answer will never come through.
I'm quite fortunate that leadership at my job (IT) has a very strong "don't let the customer tell you how to solve the problem" mentality. Even stating directly that at times.
Why?
Because this is exactly what happens. IT-adjacent business customer comes and says they need X. Often via a couple conversations we can figure out that Y will do a much better job solving their problem, we develop it, and everyone goes away happy.
Of course, sometimes this results in curious escalations where the customer is frustrated that they aren't getting X, but this is becoming more rare, because aforementioned leadership knows that what the customer wants isn't always what they need (nor best for the company).
I get handed a task which has been decided by layers of several people, I complete the task and then the client comes back to me, wondering why what they want doesn't work, the problem, the task I was asked to complete doesn't solve the original client problem or only partly solves it because many people that did not understand the issue or do not have the technical understanding defined what needed to do and the issue is I had no visibility of the original issue, which I could of easily advised or sorted had I been involved in that.
What happens is they decide what needs to be done and then send me the task, I have no idea of the original problem or what this task does in relation to the chain of everything else.
Instead it's me looks bad and me the client is upset with, while the others that decided this have long gone and moved onto something else.