The build or buy debate

As an inhouse developer, I, of course, am all for building things ourselves. It not only keeps me a job, but saves everyone money and gives us control over everything. I’ve talked about inhouse development before, but as some events unfolded this week I have focused my argument for building instead of buying. And it all has to do with the Little man.

An article over at Mike-O-Matic got my gears turning on the issue. He talks about some cases on when to buy software versus when to build it yourself. He gives some tips for fighting this debate, which I tend to agree with - like open source options - but he doesn’t really touch on scale.

There is overhead to inhouse development and for the most part (in my world) it is time. Other costs are minimal, typically just the expense of a PC. My focus recently has been on the Little Man - the wee department of group of people that has almost no budget and always gets overruled.

Several of the applications I’ve made have been for groups of 10 or less. In a somewhat organized company, purchasing software is a decision above most people in a department. It depends on the department’s budget, if they have any, and on where their need falls in the priority listing defined by the Boss and Tech Boss, for resource allocation, etc.

These departments are the people that need inhouse development. Purchasing is not a choice for them. The go look and find that a package is way outside their budget. Without inhouse development their only option is to continue to things the way they always have - which is probably extremely inefficient and slow.

It’s about productivity. It’s about making what you have worth more.

The only way to make small groups more productive and to give them a chance is to build them the software they need.

Not only is package software too expensive for them, but you more than likely can’t find software that does what they specifically want anyway.

So…build or buy? Well, if you can’t buy you don’t have many options. But don’t assume that building is expensive or not worth it.