Things I learned inadvertently

Over the holidays I've been doing a little bit of reading, and I inadvertently learned a couple of things that I am going to apply to my work.

The first, which I read in the book Dreaming In Code, which is about the Chandler project, is actually from the 37 Signals book, Getting Real. The exact quote is "build half a product, not a half-ass product." It's a reminder to think small, at least at first, or the thing you build won't do anything well. I can't tell you for how many projects I've been involved with this has been a problem. We always try to build the ultimate tool that will do all things for all people, and as a result it is full of holes and bugs. Instead, we should be striving to focus on the key features that will make our product the killer in its market, and then worry about adding other features only as necessary. This jives really well with other agile principles like YAGNI.

The second thing I learned was from an article in the Harvard Business Review (my father-in-law got a subscription with his soon-to-expire frequent flier miles and hasn't read a word of it) titled "Nudge Your Customers Toward Better Choices." This article provides some detail around how to provide default options (for software configuration, for example, or for add-on packages to another product). The article is not available online unless you pay the big bucks, but I'm sure you can find it in your local newsstand or library (my county library provides online access to most periodicals, and I'm sure yours does too -- that's a service of which too few adults take advantage).

These may be general knowledge in the product management field, but I'm new so they are worth mentioning.