In the novel Sophie’s Choice by William Styron, the author tells the story of a mother who must make the choice between saving one of her two children, a boy, and a girl, or letting them both be killed by Nazis. She takes the
Thank you for this. I'm listening to Lincoln and His Team of Rivals. He had to make many many hard choices and was arguably one of the finest leaders the world has ever seen.
My team and I are often faced with a serious technical problem or issue and the optimal solution is either not available or is unknown to us. As a leader, I have had to push them to identify and decide to implement the best sub-optimal solution available today rather than let them continue to toil in pursing the optimal solution. I like to say, there's a hole in the boat and water is pouring in. We need to find the hole and plug it with whatever we can to keep the boat from sinking. It does us no good to continue to search for the perfect patch if it means we find ourselves lying at the bottom of the lake.
Yes, but each time becomes a gentler push. Documentation really helps. Over the past couple of years we've gotten a lot better at documenting the issues, identifying and listing potential root causes, and whatever the fix we put in place. Gives them a workflow to build habits and writing it down helps people think. Plus, I'd say 5 times out of 10, the optimal solution eventually becomes available or presents itself and because we documented it, we can quickly go back and improve it.
Thank you for this. I'm listening to Lincoln and His Team of Rivals. He had to make many many hard choices and was arguably one of the finest leaders the world has ever seen.
Great book!
My team and I are often faced with a serious technical problem or issue and the optimal solution is either not available or is unknown to us. As a leader, I have had to push them to identify and decide to implement the best sub-optimal solution available today rather than let them continue to toil in pursing the optimal solution. I like to say, there's a hole in the boat and water is pouring in. We need to find the hole and plug it with whatever we can to keep the boat from sinking. It does us no good to continue to search for the perfect patch if it means we find ourselves lying at the bottom of the lake.
Much better than going on a witch hunt on a sinking ship.
Do you find this needs to be reminded every time? Like the group dynamic default is always to address the larger problem while you're still sinking?
Yes, but each time becomes a gentler push. Documentation really helps. Over the past couple of years we've gotten a lot better at documenting the issues, identifying and listing potential root causes, and whatever the fix we put in place. Gives them a workflow to build habits and writing it down helps people think. Plus, I'd say 5 times out of 10, the optimal solution eventually becomes available or presents itself and because we documented it, we can quickly go back and improve it.
Documentation ... it's the tree you planted 20 years ago.