The ovethinking and multiple miracles over the real life

Yesterday I read an article about the “overthinking” problem and just four minutes after I read another article about the “miracles” of a startup, and why startups that are based on multiple miracles de facto are failing.

In simple terms, I want to give my two cents about this. I have both problems that I cited previously, or at least I had because in the last period I’m trying to overcome this and make my life better and simpler.

But, let’s go in order.

Overthinking

The problem of overthinking is a problem that struggles many software developers, above all in the last years. That is because there are many frameworks, many CMS, many technologies to choose that you can remain paralyzed in front of, and in the end, your projects never start or never end (this is related to the second problem);

This is called by expert “analysis paralysis” because you can’t choose anything without struggle yourself before, and maybe you continue to struggle with the result that you never choose things.

I know, you want that your project is perfect, that it has the best architecture, the best software based on, the best platform, and so on… but while you think all the best for your creature, you are missing the most important thing: the start!

I read something on the Internet about the “good is better than perfect” for the simple fact that a good product is a released product that can be improved over time, while a perfect product is a product that you will never launch!

Miracles

The second problem is about the miracles under a startup or a project.

Every startup is based on a specific “miracle” that made it great, and we can consider a miracle like the core business of a company, the thing that the company focus on for a long time: Amazon initially wanted to create the biggest online bookstore, for example.

It started with a miracle, and warning: a single miracle. It is the secret, the single miracle.

This is related to the first problem because if you starting to overthink the problem that you will add more and more and more features to your product and, in the end, you will never release the first version.

“If You’re Not Embarrassed By The First Version Of Your Product, You’ve Launched Too Late”

are the words of Reid Hoffman, the founder of LinkedIn, and maybe these are the most real words about how to create a memorable company.

These are the problems, and these are the problems I struggled with about one year ago. But I start to solve them with some specific behaviours:

1. During my “programming sessions”, I’m not trying to create the perfect code that will never see the light, but I try to make the best possible code at that moment, reducing significantly the bugs (also with tests, and others), so I can deploy a really good product fast. Every product is perfection able, of course, and it will be perfected over time.
2. I reduce significantly the choices that I make during the day, an example: what I will wear a day. I’m not Mark Zuckerberg and I do not wear the same shirts and the same pants every day, but you can do the same making a list of what you will wear during the week (we care about our look in the end :D) or, another example, make a list of what you will eat during the week, or make a priority list of what restaurant to go and check an element every Saturday evening, and so on.
3. On a project, focus on a single “miracle”, or in other words, focus on a single problem and try to solve it with a single “shot”. You want to focus on a specific feature so you can deploy your application/software in a short time, and train the first users (you do not need one million users in the first month or at the first year) and only after you can add more features when you have consolidated the previous with a good solution.

There are other methods to reduce the choice-stress of daily life and not only, but at the moment, these are the method that makes me live my life simpler.

Bonus: you can (or try) eliminate the responsibility of choice using a random app that chooses for you the restaurants or the place you should visit. About this, there is a really good video on Ted: Two Years of Living Randomly

Sources:

• https://kerkour.com/blog/overthinking
• http://blog.eladgil.com/2012/10/startups-miracles.html