Saturday, June 13, 2009

Shiny objects will kill you

If you can't tell yourself "No" to starting on new ideas before finishing the one you're working on currently, you're dead in the water.  I'm not saying it can't be done, but the likely hood of getting a working product out the door quickly is much lower.  The following tricks can help keep you focused, these are not new:

  • Write new ideas down immediately in a little book (I use the Pocket Moleskin for this)
  • Practice telling yourself you'll get to the projects after you complete this one
Low hanging fruit are best though. Some low hanging fruit on a new project are the features themselves.  If you practice "Getting Real" and cut features you don't really need to launch your current product you can get it out sooner.  This helps you start getting feedback immediately and also having a product that is launch-able drives you to focus on delivering more features since it's in the publics eye now.

This information applies to anything really, not just software projects.