This month I want to highlight a blog, 5 arguments to make managers care about technical debt, by Nicolas Carlo. Although often maligned, technical debt is not objectively bad. Technical debt is similar to monetary debt; they are tools that enable us to borrow today in order to accelerate tomorrow. In practical terms, a business may consider forgoing automation to prioritize speed to market. Also like monetary debt, too much technical debt will leave you bankrupt. You will decelerate business progress due to the accumulated technical debt overhead. Addressing technical debt is important to keep the business running smoothly, although not all technical debt is worth addressing; the value must offset the cost.

This blog helps frame how to connect the pain of technical debt to the business impact. The blog touches on the topic lightly, so while the message is spot on, the examples may not directly apply to your team’s technical debt. Use high judgement to evaluate cost vs. benefit, and then use that data to surface the problems that negatively affect your business.

https://understandlegacycode.com/blog/5-arguments-to-make-managers-care-about-technical-debt

“As a developer, it’s quite common to be confronted with managers who don’t seem interested in fixing what’s already here. New features. Emergency releases. Bug fixes! There’s always an excuse to postpone the refactoring of that messy codebase. Even when you explain the merits and benefits of clean code, they still not seem to understand, or care. Focus is always on cost and time instead of quality. And there you are, feeling powerless to address the accumulating technical debt.”