Your start-up has started up -- the engine is cranking, revenues are substantial and growing, things are working. It's exciting! Now it's time to conduct some wild experiments and screw things up royally!!...
... no, sorry, I don't know what came over me there ... really, now is the time to plan and measure our new initiatives. We don't want to screw things up; so we'll put a process in place, and we'll only approve projects that meet all our criteria, including budgeting, cost and revenue projections, etc. This is the perfect complement to the general growing-up process we've started.
It's hard to argue against this logic. It sounds like you're being impulsive and childish if you try. Doesn't it make sense to grow up?
Yes, growing up is a good idea. But the question is, what kind of adult are you going to be?
Should your organization mimic the "best practices" of the slothful old organizations whose cluelessness gave you the opening to start, grow and thrive?
Strangely enoughly, that's exactly what vigorous organizations tend to do when they try to "grow up." I used to find it shocking, but now I just expect it. The net effect is simply awful. The practices they attempt to mimic are, after all, bad practices -- and the aspiring organization typically executes them badly. So what's that? Bad squared?
There are ways to "grow up" and avoid disaster without losing your soul. I'll just mention a couple of the key ideas.
Cost tracking
Yes, cost accounting. Sounds old-fashioned, doesn't it? But time after time, when organizations find out how much money they spent last month on exactly what, there is shock and awe: you mean I spent that HUGE sum on THAT??; and one of our supposedly most important initiatives got THAT paltry effort?? Actually knowing where the money is going often has an amazingly salutary effect. Simple but effective.
Planning: broad goals, lots of feedback, iterations
An effective planning process in an agile organization does not lay out what you're going to get, when you're going to get it and exactly how much it will cost before the "real" work starts. In fact, as I've been known to say, dates are evil. An effective, light-weight planning process is one that:
- Has broad goals. The goals include measures of success so we can tell how we're progressing, but a minimum of predictions. Instead of predictions, we have the simple edict: as fast, well and inexpensively as possible. And success isn't measured by how good people feel about the effort, but by the numbers.
- Incorporates lots of feedback. The feedback should be from both inside and outside the organization. If possible, it should be a combination of asking people what they think and having trials so you can see what they do. The feedback should be continuous, and should apply to every step of the effort.
- Has lots of small iterations. This is the key to replacing the old heavy-weight planning process. Mistakes are catastrophic if they are long and expensive. If they are short and cheap, they are simply part of how you learn. You don't have to be perfect if you have loads of small trials, which means the trials can be quick. It's not like a slow march across an open field; it's like running the ball in a sport, in which success is a combination of speed and effective reaction to changing conditions and sudden challenges.
Growing with Cost Control and Real-time Planning
It is important to grow up in business and get past the startup phase. But what do you grow into exactly? Knowing where your money is going and having a planning process that emphasizes speed, agility and feedback are two critical factors in becoming a vigorous adult organization, and avoiding the sclerosis that can so easily lead to an early demise.
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