Information Technology in Italy: a hard cohabitation!

This is a reflection about the Information Technology in the land in which the “DOTCOM bubble” has never arrived.
Information Technology in the world is feeded with a lot of money, with a lot of people working in and with a methodology that does not simply looks to the “application” and the “development”, but that enhances the computer world to something really useful.
Maybe I’m a little cryptic, but I will try to explain you some little things.

Most of the people I’ve told what my job is has immediately told me:
-What do you do?!?
-I am an Analyst and Software Developer. I take the needs of a customer, I analyze it and start a project with a group of people to create an application…
-Ah! Ok, now I understand…- the all finished -You are one of those nerds that knows computers and write that code that make the computer works!

The problem is the ignorance. No one must feel himself/herself offended by my words, because ignorance means only that someone ignores the real world I am talking about. (I am ignorant in a VERY large number of things…)

So, what am I doing and WHY Italy is a “field ploughed with salt“?

If I would ask you: “What do you think a Computer Appliation is and what do you think has to be done to create it?” What would you answer me?
Most of the people knows that to create an application there is the need of someone (usually called “Nerd“) to create a code (that will be understandable only by other “Nerds”) that will show you what you need (or what you don’t).
The main part of the application seems to be the coding.
Nothing more wrong than that!

An IT application lifecycle: the truth.
Let’s start telling that usually an application is created to fulfill a someone need. If you have to write a note, you will Need something that will let you input information and allow you to store that information somewhere, to be recalled later.
Of course the needs can be (are) more detailed than this silly example, but this is the first hard task: how do you get those needs?
We start from the facts that the “IT Men” speak a strange language no one but them understand, but they must understand what the custmer wants…
Here you find the first step of a “Project“: understanding the real needs of your customer. A lot of time you have to deeply dig to understand what he is expecting, because of the different languages they speak: TechnoInformatic the IT Men and IKnowWhatINeedIsItClear the others. It is not easy to find the right way to build the exact thing the customer is expecting, but this phase is Very Important.
Then You will have to translate the customers’ need to a real technical language, in order to explain your group what the real goals are.
Once the ideas are clear, you have to build a structure that will fulfill the needs, giving you the opportunity to create something usefull and flexible, granting your group to be able to modify everything you need without trashing away you time (and money).
Only after the project has been perfectly understood, translated in technical words and diagrams and planned you can start the development.
Here you will find the “Code“. There are good codes, bad codes, bugged codes and whatsoever… but it’s only “code”.
Try to think as the code was only the expression of deep ideas.
I can stop my little introduction here, without showing you the subsequent tasks.
The whole structure has a lot of costs, that start from having a good “translator”, able to understand the customers’ needs, a good Project Manager, able to describe what the goals will be, and then a good Development Group.
It seems that the costs are clear in the whole world.

An IT application lifecycle: the Italian job.
In Italy the customers first goal is not to have the right tool to fulfill their needs, but to have a cheap application: after all it is only a computer application, isn’t it?
Too many times I have seen people asking to talk directly to the developers, because it seems they are the only component of the process phases.
Of course if you take a loot to a slimmer structure (removing all the “useless characters” in the picture) you cannot believe in such high prices.

I think that Italy will never be a good place for my job unless the common ideas will change, and it will be possible only if there would be a good instruction. No one had ever told me those things, because it was normal to believe that the application was created by some “Nerds“.
A good information, that will help to understand how much important is the sotware market, will help the growth of Italy. Pushing hard on the sotware houses to achieve good standards and promoting those who can grant you a complete clean process is a step in this direction.

I think I am a black sheep, because I don’t want to stop myself where the others are, because I want to create something really good, but too many times a good software is unrecognized here.
Why?

Well, I’m Ignorant, because I cannot understand this.
Can anyone help me in understanding this?

(This post has been the result of a deep thought and not of a deep language attention, so please forgive me if is a mess! ) :)