Productivity vs Efficiency: Why Developers Need to Know the Difference
But is productivity all we need to create high-quality software products? What about efficiency? Is being productive the same as being efficient? What does efficiency measure that productivity doesn’t? And how exactly can you define the right metrics to make meaningful improvements?
To make targeted improvement to your development process, you need to first clearly define these terms and understand how to apply them appropriately.
Software development is a human-intensive process. Much of its success hinges upon the developers’ productivity and efficiency.
Measuring the right metrics helps you gauge performance and identify red flags early, so you can maintain high productivity and efficiency to develop products that deliver the expected functionalities while staying on time and on budget.
It’s not uncommon for people to use the terms “productivity” and “efficiency” interchangeably. This may be fine for (virtual) watercooler conversations, but to track the right metrics and improve your development process, you need to understand the differences.
