When my mother looked at the prices of new hats, studied their features, and then went home and tried to remodel her old hat with feathers or lace to look like those fancier models, I saw the value of doing things yourself—for my mother, an attitude perhaps shaped by her own parents and their experience with Depression-era shortages.

Even earlier, Michel Guillaume Jean de Crèvecœur, a French visitor to the 18th century United States, commented on U.S. citizens’ resourcefulness, doing things for themselves rather than relying on others. “From his own resources, the farmer fashions new shoes for his children,” Crèvecœur marveled.

Although this kind of resourcefulness and independence may be an admirable trait in individuals, it can often hinder organizations from moving ahead, costing far more in the long run than what it may save in the short term. This is especially true of software development.

Organizations with software programmers galore often decide that their own application needs can be met by depending on the skills of these programmers, rather than by purchasing from a firm that specializes in a particular type of software.

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