A few random thoughts about a web development company working on its own web site….

First and foremost - it’s hard.

Client work always comes first, we have hundreds of other related obligations, it has to be good, creative, effective - which makes it a little scary. At the end of the day we’ve spent all our juice working on our client’s sites, there’s not a lot left over for our own stuff.

A few things I’ve learned that either helped us or that I wish we had done.

1. Create a small group responsible for working on the site. Set a regular (weekly or more frequent time) for the group to meet.
2. Set roles and responsibilities within the group - minimally architect, designer, writer, programmer, project manager - it’s OK for a person to wear more than one hat. Keep a detailed task list tracking progress from week to week (as you would any project).
3. Create a budget and deadline up front - the work will tend to sprawl to take all the time you allow it, a finite budget helps to keep us creative types focused.
4. Vision - if someone has a vision or idea for a section and you don’t, go with it, explore it, let it flow. Don’t debate it unless you also have a clear vision.
5. When you’re done, celebrate.

I’ve laughed a lot during this latest revision of ArcStone’s site. Being our own customer has made me really appreciate the great people I work with (and I’m not just saying this ’cause it’s a blog and all that). Viva la ArcStone!

This entry was posted on Thursday, May 24th, 2007 at 8:53 pm and is filed under General. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.