Making decisions - the Last Responsible Moment
We sometimes get stuck in the mud making decisions or over-planning - there's a balance
to be had around big design up front.
If we wait longer we will gather more information and context so we can make more informed decisions.
- Deciding too early is a risk.
- Waiting too long and accumulating technical debt, deciding too late is also a risk.
There is a pivotal moment called the Last Responsible Moment where the cost of waiting any longer detracts from the benefit of pausing and gathering more information.
At JustEat, I was taught to wait and watch a little bit. Sometimes I would rush into trying to fix a problem earlier than waiting for the systems to react and scale up. Hanging back and letting the services settle often more than not solved the problem. Also if there was a problem it was better to fix it the next day when everyone was fresh eyed, and rely upon the call centre to handle the edge case rather than try and change a production system during peak usage hours, after a full day of work when you're tired and everyone else in your team have gone home.