Deadlines vs. Technical debt

Dilemma: We don't want to incur more technical debt, but we do have an important business partner that needs a bunch of development done within (too short of) a time period, which means that we'll need to take shortcuts. What should we do?

This reflects a recent discussion within a group of colleagues. After some back-and-forth, we decided to declare a payback period up-front, giving each development team something akin to a credit which they could use up to get their deliveries done in time. During the development period, the teams will create time-estimated backlog items for any technical debt they incur, thereby discussing the debt on a regular basis and also motivating them to keep their debt low.

Finally, visualizing the period after the deadline, will enable management to reorganize teams as needed to deal with debt spikes.

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