Seeking the best way to work on the web

I've recently started working with our web team at EQO, which has been quite fun.  Web developers and designers tend to be quite interesting people, usually more trendy and social than your typical engineer type (me).  At EQO, our web team is dually focused on product development and marketing content pages, which has produced some interesting contentions.  No one was hurt, nothing serious!  But I've since become interested in how to optimally produce web services and work with web developers and designers.

A friend recently pointed me in the direction of Getting Real, a free 37Signals ebook on the best ways to build web applications.  I now consider myself a disciple and recommend that anyone and everyone in the tech field, not just web people, read this book.  It's short and simple message is pure gold and is well worth the few hours it might take you to read it.  Seriously, every page either taught me something new, prompted change in my behavior, or affirmed some of the good things that I do.  Their message in short is keep it small, keep it focused, be honest, and make it simple!

Another precious gem that has caught my eye of late is Brook's law, which states "adding manpower to a late software project makes it later".  This is contrary to conventional wisdom, but my experience has generally proven this to be true.  I thought this was a great concept to grasp and being mindful of it will surely help me in the future.

Lastly, this Seth Godin post about working with designers was very humbling in a good way.  While professional design is not an art contest, designers do like to do their own thing.  Micromanaging and constraining designers is a surefire recipe for disaster.  The fact that I suck at design is why I'm not the designer; it's all about trust.

Chris
EQO Customer Evangelist