The Benefits of Delaying Decisions - Mike Cohn
I'm sitting in a hotel right now. I won’t fly home for several days.
But once I arrive at the airport near home, I have a choice of two routes to get me all the way back to my house.
Both routes start the same. But then I have a decision to make. I can either stay on the side streets or get on the highway. Usually the highway is the faster way home.
But, depending on a number of factors, sometimes taking the highway takes longer.
Fortunately, when I first leave the airport, I can catch a glimpse of the highway and decide: highway or side streets.
And so, I defer the decision until I see the traffic on the highway. There is no reason for me to decide today (as I sit here in my hotel) how I will drive home from the airport several days from now.
There is tremendous value in deferring decisions, yet we often rush to make decisions that don't need to be made.
Lean refers to the "last responsible moment" as that time at which a decision will be made for you if you don't decide. When I leave the airport, I am in the rightmost lane. Unless I explicitly change lanes, I will end up on the highway by default.
The last responsible moment is that moment at which the decision becomes made for me. If I don't change lanes by then, I'm taking the highway home.
As you make decisions on your project, be aware of both the power of deferring decisions and the last responsible moment. Doing so will help you succeed with agile.
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