Decisions by Doing
Remember how we're all bad at decisions? One of the points I made in that piece was that we have too many doers and not enough thinkers.
What if we used the first problem to solve the latter?
At first glance this seems like circular logic. But what I'm talking about here is experimental implementation. Instead of over-planning, we move with the intention of taking action on what we think the next right steps are, learn from it and then adjust as we proceed.
The reason this works is not just that we're taking action but how we're taking it. With a little more intention and design around our actions, we can build as we go and evolve our processes. Here's a high-level overview of how you can go about it…
Gauge the risk
While an experimental approach can be applied more often than not, it doesn't fit every scenario. If the stakes are incredibly high or there is the possibility of irreversible damage, then this isn't the right approach.
Consider the endeavor of building a skyscraper. You can't just figure it out as you go. It requires careful planning and meticulous calculations in order to keep people safe.
There is no perfect universal framework for making this determination as it requires independent judgment of those most familiar with the situation. With that said, I've found that the possibility of irreversible damage is a good starting point for me to consider more thoughtful approaches.
Have a loose plan
The whole point of this kind of experimentation is to avoid over-analysis and learn by doing. Of course, you'll still need some sort of loose plan as to how you are going to proceed.
Start by initially defining the problem (which may end up changing later on) and then mapping out the initial steps you'll take to gain better knowledge of the situation and eventual solution. By initial steps, I mean no more than five.
Be careful here to not plan too far out as we are expecting adjustments to be made as we learn more. Plan out the broad strokes of what you are trying to accomplish. These plans are almost guaranteed to change later down the line.
Set expectations
The other part of planning is identifying what you are hoping to achieve. What results are you hoping to see? What are you hoping to learn? What is the ideal outcome?
Again, we don't want to overdo it here. We also don't want to make perfect the enemy of the good. It's quite possible that you'll get different results than you expected while still reaching a positive outcome. For now, we're just trying to get a general sense of what we're trying to achieve knowing that we're very likely to end up at a slightly different destination.
Establish feedback loops
With a loose plan and general expectations in place, you'll want to ensure you have real-time feedback loops established to let you know if what you are doing is having positive results. The design and delay of the feedback loop will depend on the context of the situation but the shorter the delay the better.
Rinse and repeat
Once you have the feedback it's time to evaluate what's working and what's not. Keep what's working and adjust what's not. Then you repeat this entire cycle until you have met your goal.
Frame failures as learnings
As a reminder, this approach is designed with the assumption that there will be mistakes and missteps. That's the whole point. We're doing this because we're inherently bad at decisions which makes it incredibly difficult to design the perfect solution at the onset of a project.
This Week's Action Items:
Gauge the risk to ensure that experimental implementation is right for your scenario.
Plan no more than the next five steps before pausing to assess how things are going.
Identify what you expect the outcome of those initial steps to be.
Establish feedback loops to test your assumptions.
After you've taken the initial (no more than 5) actions, review the data via your feedback loops to see if they produced the results you expected. Adjust accordingly before repeating the process.
Remind yourself that there are going to be missteps and unexpected outcomes. That's part of the process.
