Common Threads: Planning is Good, Doing is Better#

This is a part of a series called “Common Threads”. My goal is to bring together ideas from different sources I interact with and synthesize them into a post as a means of learning in public. See the introductory post for a slightly more in-depth explanation of what this is and why I’m doing it.

Fibers#

• Think less, ship more
• Story Points are Pointless, Measure Queues
• Write It Now
• A Philosophy of Software Design

Definition#

“Everybody has plans until they get hit for the first time.”
– Mike Tyson

It’s useful to know what you’re trying to do and have a rough idea of how to get there. But, there will always be unknown unknowns that you will discover and issues you couldn’t have predicted at the time. You have two choices then:

1. Spend all your time creating an increasingly complicated and detailed plan chasing perfection by accounting for everything.¹
2. Identify the riskiest parts of the plan and start working on them so if it doesn’t work out, you don’t waste too much time.

I leave that choice up to you.