My wife and I have been thinking about some new audio equipment. We’ve been a little unhappy with our Bose soundbar because of the software flakiness and sporadic network connectivity issues. In looking around, I saw a Sonos product, but after reading a bit about the company’s recent history, I decided to look elsewhere.

Sidebar: if any of you have recommendations that aren’t high-end $$$$ audio, let me know.

I saw this article about some of the problems Sonos has had, and it resonated with me. I’ve been in a place where I’ve worked on software that had a lot of technical debt and needed to be changed/improved to help grow the company. Management was pressing everyone to get the software ready quickly, without more concerns about the customer experience or the quality.

That seems to be what happened with Sonos, where they released new products and new software, with the software missing functionality that their customers needed. There were bug reports, bad press, lower sales, and canceled raises/bonuses. Those last ones, to me, ought to be completely focused on executives and managers, but I’m sure that’s not the case. Management rarely takes the blame, but ultimately they are responsible for hiring, training, steering the employees, and deciding to launch.

The story reads like a summary of The Phoenix Project. Technical debt, poor project management, and pressure to increase sales combine to create a disastrous launch. It’s always hard to know where to assign blame, but clearly, good software engineering wasn’t a priority, nor was reducing technical debt. I know it can be hard to balance the need to alter software with the need to keep it maintainable, but in this case, they made poor decisions.

The article says there were yelling and screaming in meetings, and concerns from developers about pushing back on senior leadership on the timelines and demands. Some of us might have been in those situations, and my experience has been if there is management that doesn’t value software engineering, any particular developer is vulnerable to a layoff or termination if they complain. If management doesn’t value software, they don’t value developers and think they can be easily replaced. I’ve seen quite a few companies start to fall quickly with this attitude when developers are not valued. I also see constant job openings and employees constantly looking for other opportunities at these organizations. People only stay long enough to find another job.

Software is complex. It’s going to have some bugs. There are always tough decisions about which things to work on now and which to delay. I hear those conversations, and I find myself trying to balance the needs of sales and engineering. We need both, and we also need to ensure we can change directions in the future. Paying down technical debt should be a regular occurrence to ensure the software is maintainable and adaptable. I know that when we look to quickly take advantage of new opportunities, this can mean we’re adding new technical debt. Walking that line is the key to success.

Steve Jones

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