Stop Blaming Your External Partners

We have to work together with this external partner. They have no idea what they're doing.

I frequently hear software development teams express their frustration when working with external partners:

• "These people have no idea what they're doing."
• "How can such a tiny request take weeks?"
• "Why are they so rigid? Are they incompetent?"

It masks a more profound challenge in cross-team collaboration. When we fall into this mindset, we're already caught in the “us vs. them” trap. Often, what we perceive as incompetence is the partner managing competing priorities and avoiding getting swamped. Additionally, in many cases, they lack sufficient context to make quick decisions. So, they are cautious in committing to avoid over-promising.

Instead of complaining, we can ask ourselves:

• How can we give them more context? Have we shared our roadmap and future plans?
• Do they know what we expect? Did we provide comprehensive feature passports?
• Are we genuinely collaborating or just throwing requests “over the wall”?

We must realize that teams consist of people. Almost all people mean well and want to do a good job. It's easier to complain than to have a genuine conversation. Building bridges with other teams is far more productive and valuable for our users.