As a veteran CIO, Hu has rich experience in projects. Along with Da Yong’s assist, he usually doesn’t worry a lot about detailed implementation. But this time, it’s a little different.
Six months ago, Yu Cong took over as the CEO of Hwatong. He soon initiated a dramatic reorganization and reform in the company. It cost him only a single month to make the transition by integrating all the departments. The company took on a brand new look afterward. He then declared that a software company should represent advanced productivity. So, Hwatong adopted something new called “agile software development methods”.
It was at this time that Hu asked Hwatong to develop a resource management system. Yu was eager to try the new “agile software development methods”. Since the project wasn’t large or critical to Hu’s company, Hu just wanted to make sure it was high quality and completed on time. He didn’t care how it was done. Of course, Hu gave his full support to his partner. And Hwatong used the opportunity to test the “agile software development methods”.
Yu decided to spend RMB800, 000 (US$100,316) to hire an American company to assist with the “agile software development”. The cost was actually far beyond Hwatong could earn from the single contract, but Yu considered it a worthwhile, long-term investment.
When Hu arrived at Hwatong, he found that the computer room looked just as it had been before the project was started. And the two American experts were back to the States. He heaved a sigh of relief and gleefully assumed that the project was completed.
However, to Hu’s astonishment, it turned out the other way round – the American personnel had left ahead of schedule.
Having realized something emergent had happened, Hu immediately rushed back to his CIO office. “Come here, Da Yong,” he yelled at the project manager. Da Yong followed him into the office, without uttering a word. Hu turned pale with anger. “Tell me the problem; I just came back from Hwatong!” he said.
The problem was that Hwatong really had a major stumble. Since the company was not experienced in the “agile software development methods”, Hwatong had all the experts employed temporarily. The chemistry was completely not good between them from the very beginning. American experts wanted to arrange tables and chairs in a circle for easier communication, while the Chinese employees just chatted with each other and were distracted from work. Human-focused agile development methods highlighted communication, but the obvious language barrier made that difficult. Consequently, the regular morning summary briefing turned into an oral English classroom. The development group also experienced huge cultural barriers. The Americans wanted everything to be clear and accurate, while Chinese staff felt that wasn’t essential.
The nudge that triggered the final breakdown was actually tiny. The foreigners insisted that everyone should stand during the daily morning briefing. But one Hwatong staff member resisted and sat on the table, complaining they were too tired from working overtime everyday. This irritated the American partners, who stopped the meeting at once and reported the dissatisfaction to their overseas headquarters. On the other side, Yu was unsatisfied and refused to pay the Americans for failing to fulfill the contract. The Americans responded by immediately pulling out their experts.
“So what about our project now?” asked an anxious Hu.
“We do have something, but it’s basically useless,” answered Da Yong, as he demonstrated to Hu an IP address in testing environment to show this system.
Hu quickly tested a few functions, which were far from his expectations. “Ask Yu to come,” he yelled impatiently.
Having heard that Hu had visited the development center in Hwatong , Yu hurried to the office, knowing the situation was bad. Hu got increasingly angry as Yu tried to explain the situation. Da Yong had never seen Hu so angry before.
After a while, both Hu and Yu calmed down. The unpleasant conversation ended. At last Hu told some staff members at Hwatong to stop their task at hand and join the project at once.
“Let’s turn back to the traditional methods. For us, they are more agile.” Hu sighed.
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中文链接：CIO故事之十七：水土不服