How Long Will It Take…to Clean a Kitchen?
Whatever the size and nature of your company or day to day work, if you have customers and perhaps also competitors, you will probably have encountered a situation where someone depended on something you were doing.
In a larger company, perhaps with investors, a competitive market, sales channels and a customer base, the level of confidence you have in your development approach becomes quite important. In a smaller company or start up, you still have to eat and pay rent, there is effort and cost for marketing and product launches, with holiday season(s) and trade shows to hit. If you’re also making hardware things of any kind, you have to physically build them (lots) and get them to people (all over the place). The importance of quality, reputation and brand may vary a bit, but beyond the early adoption phase of a product, customer trust is important, and we can’t compromise there too much for too long.
Devices and workflows are increasingly inter-connected, with more features and functionality meaning that products and technologies are increasingly more complicated. To keep the workflow and UI simple, it usually belies the amount of technology and complexity under the hood and at work in the background.
So in a world where market competition is often increasing, customers increasingly expect more, and any changes to a plan you had will create extra effort and knock on impact … How can we increase our confidence when answering the question “How long will it take?”
Simon Holt
Engineering Director
Focusrite
Simon is Engineering Director at Focusrite, supporting the engineering teams and communities across the Focusrite and Novation brands.
With an early career background in electronics and manufacturing, he has since worked across a range of engineering companies and disciplines, helping teams grow and deliver exciting new products.
The love of music tech has always been his passion, with personal interests in music production and DJ’ing. He’s also a fan of the great outdoors, enjoying walking, running, cycling, and generally looking for an adventure!
Ross Chisholm
Ross is currently the Head of Embedded Software at Focusrite, responsible for the teams developing embedded software, automation, and DSP for Focusrite and Novation brands.
Ross graduated from the Music and Sound Recording Course at the University of Surrey back in 2011, initially focusing on hardware and firmware development of both MIDI Controllers and Audio Interfaces before eventually moving solely to focus on embedded software development. He now focuses on helping to develop engineering teams to deliver amazing products as well as volunteering as a mentor for The Access Project to help promote STEM subjects for the next generation.
Outside of work, Ross is a keen runner completing several half marathons and marathons as well as a musician.