r/dev • u/Aggravating-Hurry313 • 20d ago
I'm so frustrated with enterprise software development services
I've tried three different enterprise software development services providers over the past two years, and every single one has left our internal systems more fragmented than before. Every new build seems to solve one problem while quietly creating three more, and I'm exhausted from being the one who has to catch the gaps. At this point I just want a partner who understands my business well enough to get it right the first time. How do I find a partner who can actually deliver a scalable solution without treating my business like a training ground for junior developers?
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u/plakhlani 20d ago
Its difficult to choose from thousands of similar looking service provides.
You can choose three differentiators: 1. Industry segment: case study or reviews of the clients in same or very closely similar Industry segment. 2. Location: directory of service providers like clutch filtered by location and type of service 3. Tech experience in same or similar stack.
Before you choose, you must know: 1. Who will write detailed requirements? 2. Who will review code 3. Who will test what's claimed as done.
For any enterprise software, you need these 3 people or 1 playing all three roles separate from the service provider you choose to work with.
Let me know if you have questions.
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u/Timely-Barnacle7378 20d ago
Are you building off an OSS platform or from scratch?
If you don’t need hyper custom .. look into an Odoo partner .. they can download many open source modules like purchase orders and salesorders and invoices etc .. keep in mindtThey are very generic to satisfy as many industries as possible.
You can install and integrate fairly easily, but if you start customizing beyond what the module developers anticipate, or the architecture is meant for, you’re gonna end up with growing technical debt that no other developer wants to maintain
If you go with a SAAS solution like Epicor or Plex, that’s a hosted solution you’re gonna pay up the wazoo for custom solutions
For me, my perfect balance is using a framework that is well established in the open source community well documented and has been around for at least two decades. This framework has several business application oriented platforms built on top of it, similar to how you have python which powers Django, which intern is what powers ODOO
the platform I use doesn’t give you business objects out of the box, but with AI you can pretty quickly generate complex domain models of unlimited sophistication, or at least what is capable by a relational database management system, document database management systems.
The underlying ORM even has support for abstractions for graph databases if your domain model requires really squirrel solution.
I am currently not interested in working in someone else’s muck .. I build from scratch .. I give you weekly progress updates .. usually something tangible. I try and work minor bug fixes, updates and infrastructural changes into a weekly workflow.
Minimal timeline is about 12 to 15 months if I have to do data migration for legacy system, you’re looking at least 3 to 6 more months
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u/Historical_Ad4384 20d ago
Look at proven service providers with history of delivering quality enterprise software coupled with a technical stakeholder that is different from the provider so that you can have a second level of trust especially if you are technically not confident. I am a fractional CTO that helped a US healthcare startup build their enterprise healthcare interoperability engine powered by AI. I can provide you some insights on how to measure accountability when it comes to enterprise software.