<story><title>How to waste time and overcomplicate things</title><url>https://ryanwarnock.me/blog/260222.html</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>kqr</author><text>Note that in this case it happened when the author had the full context of what as needed to get done.&lt;p&gt;In business, the situation is usually even worse. The customer needs some problem solved. They assume the easiest way there is to get a different problem solved. They ask a customer support-type person about that. The CS person assumes a solution is best, and then go to a project manager. The PM assumes a particular implementation is best, and goes to a developer.&lt;p&gt;By the time the developer is trying to solve the customer problem, it has been transformed into a different problem at least four times, by mere assumptions that rarely have anything to do with reality.&lt;p&gt;Always, always ask &amp;quot;Why am I doing this? What evidence do I have that suggests this specific thing absolutely needs to be done?&amp;quot;&lt;p&gt;One of my favourite quotes is &amp;quot;It ain&amp;#x27;t what you don&amp;#x27;t know that gets you in trouble, it&amp;#x27;s what you know for sure that just ain&amp;#x27;t so.&amp;quot;&lt;p&gt;----&lt;p&gt;It&amp;#x27;s not a small effect either. I&amp;#x27;ve heard serious, well-reasoned estimates ranging between 50 % and 99 % of our work being completely unnecessary busywork.&lt;p&gt;Imagine that. In the most pessimistic (optimistic?) case you could spend half the year sipping drinks on a beach and still get just as much truly useful work done.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>xupybd</author><text>I work for someone that will pick apart your every idea and make sure you are solving the right problem. The number of times I&amp;#x27;ve been convinced we had to do something for him to figure out the problem is actually in another part of the business is embarrassing. It&amp;#x27;s a skill I hope to develop myself. It&amp;#x27;s much easier to just sign off on something and say that&amp;#x27;s a great idea go for it. To make sure you understand the problem down to the smallest detail and clearly assess if it&amp;#x27;s the best solution requires a dedication and focus that many managers lack.</text></comment>
<story><title>How to waste time and overcomplicate things</title><url>https://ryanwarnock.me/blog/260222.html</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>kqr</author><text>Note that in this case it happened when the author had the full context of what as needed to get done.&lt;p&gt;In business, the situation is usually even worse. The customer needs some problem solved. They assume the easiest way there is to get a different problem solved. They ask a customer support-type person about that. The CS person assumes a solution is best, and then go to a project manager. The PM assumes a particular implementation is best, and goes to a developer.&lt;p&gt;By the time the developer is trying to solve the customer problem, it has been transformed into a different problem at least four times, by mere assumptions that rarely have anything to do with reality.&lt;p&gt;Always, always ask &amp;quot;Why am I doing this? What evidence do I have that suggests this specific thing absolutely needs to be done?&amp;quot;&lt;p&gt;One of my favourite quotes is &amp;quot;It ain&amp;#x27;t what you don&amp;#x27;t know that gets you in trouble, it&amp;#x27;s what you know for sure that just ain&amp;#x27;t so.&amp;quot;&lt;p&gt;----&lt;p&gt;It&amp;#x27;s not a small effect either. I&amp;#x27;ve heard serious, well-reasoned estimates ranging between 50 % and 99 % of our work being completely unnecessary busywork.&lt;p&gt;Imagine that. In the most pessimistic (optimistic?) case you could spend half the year sipping drinks on a beach and still get just as much truly useful work done.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>ryanwarnock</author><text>Without trying to make it sound too profound - Since I had the realisation of the mistakes I made in the process I wrote about, I have actually been going over other times I had found myself frustrated and most of them could have been prevented by doing as you suggest. Simply asking &amp;quot;why am I doing this?&amp;quot; and I think more importantly &amp;quot;what is the evidence supporting that this needs to be done?&amp;quot;.&lt;p&gt;I had a good reason to write those scripts because I thought I had a problem, if I had tried to find evidence that I actually had that problem and I needed those scripts (by just doing a test run) I quickly would have realised it was all unnecessary.</text></comment>