Code Vs. Software

People use either “Code” or “Software” as if they were synonyms. Sales-engineers often use “code“. Sales-non-engineers always use “software“.

The distinction between Code and Software is subtle. Programmers write codes, the list of statements that give instructions to computers. The software is the end product: what the users perceive.

When demoing the software, the above difference can be significant. It’s software what our customer is buying.

There Is Never Only One Consumer

I’m wondering who is my customer.

In our Interlocked world, identifying the customer is not easy. From a sales person perspective, the customer might be the engineer who uses the software, or the IT person who tests it, or the manager who decides. There’s a whole team behind every customer. Users,  influencers and buyers are Linked-In, ruling other buyers.

From a sales manager’s point of view, the primary customer is the sales representative. Sales people are the intermediate buyers; they might see product benefits you have not considered yet.

The Customer Lies

An engineer of a company called me saying: “Our COO wants us to evaluate your software for our product design”. Then we set a meeting with him and the COO.

This morning I went there; a first technical meeting with the designers, before seeing the COO. They said the software would be used as an on-off application on a single project. They found the software difficult to learn, therefore they asked me for a quotation for a consultancy project. Then, the COO joined the meeting. I resumed what I was asked by his engineers, and this is what he said: “I don’t need you to design my product, I want my engineers to do that for all our products”. His engineers nodded in agreement.

Customers lie, for many personal reasons. Rephrasing the Newton’s law of inertia:

An object (an engineer) at rest (working in Research & Development) will remain at rest (will use the same technology, methods) unless acted upon by an external and unbalanced force (unless their boss twists their ears).

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