Managing Technical Debt: Interest Rates, Impact, and Continuous Payments

This episode picks up from the last episode, episode 27, Advocating for Refactoring: Prioritization in the Context of Business Goals

We continue the conversion advocating for a proactive approach to managing technical debt, suggesting that teams treat it like a financial loan. I support making continuous "minimum payments" by regularly refactoring code, similar to making minimum payments on a loan, rather than waiting for large-scale cleanups. We also discuss prioritizing technical debt based on its "interest rate," or the cost of inaction, and its impact on business outcomes. The conversation based on my article emphasizes the importance of communicating the business value of addressing technical debt to stakeholders and integrating refactoring into the daily development process. Ultimatel ...