In our quest to make the PCBs suitably small but still programmable we came up with a cost effective solution utilizing a micro footprint interface. All of our boards that require firmware to be written to an MCU now utilize this small space saving interface.To build the adapter very fine enameled wire was utilized to connect the micro spring loaded connector end to the much larger plain pins that connect to the programming device. This task was not very easy. I'm happy to announce this solution has easily programmed several hundered boards and counting. 

For reference the screw in this picture below is a #6-32 that is 5/16” in length. As you can see the programming header takes up minimal space! This picture was taken at 10X magnification. 

The adapter connected to the programming device is shown below.