Thursday, January 19, 2012

Sickness and Maintaining a Schedule

Being a lead on a project and finding yourself in the hospital can be detrimental to your team and your project. However, there are ways to make sure that your business doesn't come to a complete standstill in this type of emergency.

1. Make sure that there are tasks that anyone on the team can accomplish. That way the only thing that comes down to the lead and the lead only is the final word. This final word can be given from anywhere considering the ease of communication and cloud. If there is a submission process that you and you alone can handle, then it will simply have to wait for your return... Which leads me to

2. Have other projects that are a lower priority that the team can work on simultaneously. If, by miracle, the top priority project was completed in your absence and simply awaits your submitting it, it's worthwhile to have secondary or tertiary projects that are SMALL in scope that can be finished quickly and without much micromanagement. These projects might keep your company afloat in a serious emergency. They could also be that 1/1,000,000 intellectual property that just happens to strike a chord with the gaming community!

When you're Indie, your not confined by publishing dates, but you are confined by your own strengths and weaknesses as a person who starts and finishes things. Teams like to finish things! Give your team something to finish and take your time working on that "big idea".