Bonne Chance to you

Due to company's privacy, I will not elaborate, perhaps a snippet of it will be sufficient for me to blog what I want to say and for you to understand what I want to blog over here.

2 months ago, I was asked to come up with a Scope of Work ( SoW ) document and along with some other legal documents to be given to our Chinese counterparts in China. The purpose of this SoW is to perimeterise the work involved between the KL teams and outsourced-chinese teams. The plan was to give them the scaffolding code and make them build some modules on top of it. Everything went on course to the plan until we realise things were not taking shape as planned and the project was running slightly behind the schedule. For this matter, they got enormous pressures from Mr XYZ. Now conflict arises, they are venting out their pent-up frustration by accusing and claiming part of the works assigned to them were not stated in the SoW when on the contrary to their claims, we did stated it and what happened this morning is that, Mr XYZ and them were ragingly exchanging words in the emails, arguing about the why and wherefores of the delay and what WAS and what WAS NOT the "thing" written on the contract, and if you read through the contents of the mail, one would think for a moment they were engaging in a world war 3, in what you would see it as a heated rift you feel there was no call for it. why? Reason being is that on one hand, the chinese architect in China misintepretted what I wrote in the SoW and asserted the focal point of the clause has not been clearly put in place and on the other hand, Mr XYZ was as his usual - busy as a bee and as much as I suspected, he probably did not read through or even flipping through the legal and SoW documents before the contract was put on seal between their solicitors and us.

The main talking point is that any changes to the framework and hence its amendment of scaffolding code should not be in any way held responsible by them. Their argument is that they are already overloaded with works assigned and if they are asked further to analyse and digest what the framework code is doing, it would most likely prolonging the project timeline, a situation which they don't want to be, whereas our argument was that if they are accepting our outsourced project, which they have already had, then it's implied that they will be solely held liable for the whole project shall there be any unforeseen circumstances arise. This means, if it requires any changes to the system architecture in order to fulfill a better solution, it's a job of theirs to carry out and not us. Im not sure if they are using this as an excuse but we do feel sometimes they are using every ways and means to pass the buck just so they can escape the penalty clause and run a losing money project. Yes, the company I am working for has the right to activate the penalty clause - a day to day compensation for every day of delay if the delivery date is not met. As I mentioned, they claimed the responsibilty of making changes to the framework code was not stipulated in the SoW, but after revising back the SoW, I happily found out that I had my efforts and claims vindicated as we did indeed specifically wrote a clause:-

1. If there is a change to the system architecture, it should be first informed to or consulted with KL team

I must admit the clause written was an ambigious and a vague one as it doesn't draw a clear line as to who will or should be amending the framework code if or shall there be any changes on the system architecture or issue arises on the system architecture but I must say too that it looks like an implied clause to me. It's not hard to fathom if you read through the clause again! Does it mean to you that if there is any changes to the system architecture, it will mean you can do it without changing the framework code? And if not so, does it mean to you the clause implies - changes to the framework code is the job of theirs since they need to seek permission or consultations first from the KL teams? I was not born yesterday in the IT software engineering world and I firmly believe it's absolutely a mission impossible that if the system doesn't fulfill the way of doing things and somewhat require a change of system architecture, you can achieve it without changing the framework code. It is not an incomprehensible clause afterall. For a proficient and experience software architect like him, we expect one would naturally reflect and understand changing to the system architecture will mean changing to the framework code. The clause was written with the mind of and presumption that they will come to a point where changes to the system architecture will be required, considering the framework code is just a foundation to the system and not a full-fledged system code. If you read in between the lines, the clause written simply means if it deems necessary to make changes to the system architecture, hence any changes of framework code made should be reverted back to and seek consent first from KL team. As much as I understand of the clause written, it warrants and provide adequate ground for them to hold accountable for changing the framework code should there be any emergence of unforeseen system architecture changes. Otherwise why do we even outsource in the first place, right? Looking at the timeline and their progress so far, it looks to me like, they will have a mountain to climb still, a huge way to go before the project will bear any fruits. As to whether penalty would be imposed upon them or otherwise if the deadline is not met, I am not sure what will happen, the prerogative is still lie in the company I m working for, at end of the day, it's still at their discretion to impose it. Anyway hope lady's luck will turn on them ( chinese developers ) so that they would be granted with further extension without bearing any incurred or penalty costs. All I can say to them now is "bonne chance" :)

That's all I can spill the beans of.