Is Eighty Percent Too Much?

Since we started working together, I’ve heard a few people ask me questions along the lines of, “You’re not looking for a perfect solution, are you?” or “you’re not looking for a hundred percent answer right out of the gate, are you?”

My answer is an emphatic, “NO!”  I’m proud to say that I’ve never delivered an IT solution that was a one-hundred percent solution.

In several recent conversations with flag officers as we start framing the new acquisition strategy, they have reminded me we aren’t looking for perfection in the first increment.  One of the advantages of a spiral development methodology is that you have a placeholder for requirements that aren’t satisfied in the current spiral.  We certainly need to have an complete implementable increment, and in the first increment we want to be able to replace all of ACMS so we can brown out the first system, but we’re not looking for perfection.

I’d be happy with an eighty percent solution.

Several months ago I read a book called The Contrarian’s Guide to Leadership by Steven B. Sample.  One of the ideas that stuck with me is that anything worth doing well is worth doing poorly.  That’s not an exact quote, but the idea is that we shouldn’t let the quest for perfection stand in the way of doing what we know is right, even if we can’t execute perfectly.  No, it’s not an excuse for poor performance, but it’s the recognition that 80 percent answers are better than no answer at all.

Here are the author’s exact words:

Anything worth doing at all is worth doing poorly. It may be worth more if it’s done well, but it’s worth something if it’s done poorly.

In my April 27, 2000 ALMIS Gram, I shared the same thoughts with the team back then, and it’s worth re-reading now. I’m pleased the work done by the ALMIS team has withstood the test of time. We were guided by some of the ideas I stole from Freedman’s book.  Some of the key ideas will be harder to apply in a major acquisition environment than they were with ALMIS (a non-major acquisition), but it’s guidance we’ll be well served to follow.

Feel free to add any comments below.

And if you’re running short on time, skip to the bottom and just read the four bullets.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

From the April 27 ALMIS Gram:

I read an article in the April 17 edition of Federal Computer Week. I take everything I read there with a grain of salt, but now and then I come across something relevant to the project that I think is worth sharing.

There was a review of a book written by David Freedman called Corps Business: The 30 Management Principles of the U. S. Marine Corps. The book was written by a technology journalist, and some of the lessons are relevant to the rapidly changing world of software development.

From the review (full text no longer available online):

Freedman, who observed a Marine Expeditionary Unit in action aboard USS Tarawa, does a superb job of outlining the Marines’ rapid planning cycle. “The Marines consider indecisiveness a fatal flaw,” Freedman writes. “Fast and bold is where it’s at.”

But they “do not advocate shoot-from-the-hip decision-making,” he cautions. “Marine decision-makers not only allow disagreement but practically demand that every member of the staff try to shoot holes in the decision, taking yet another opportunity to catch something that everyone has missed.”

The overall lesson: Aim for the 70 percent solution, Freedman writes. “When time is of the essence, Marines act as soon as they have a plan with a good chance of working.” But once the plan is agreed to, all Marines put 100 percent of their effort behind achieving its objectives.…

In practical terms, this means that the Marine Corps organizes to the task at hand and concentrates on four primary competencies: impact, speed, versatility and proficiency with complex situations. But two of these — speed and proficiency with complexity — are of particular relevance to today’s business environment, according to Freedman. “It’s getting harder and harder to envision a company that can achieve and sustain success without staking out these two competencies.”

As a real-word industry example, Freedman offers the example of former Marine Robert Lutz. Lutz relied on a 70 percent solution as his “signature strategy” while a corporate officer, first with Ford Motor Co. of Europe and later with Chrysler (now DaimlerChrysler), according to Freedman. Lutz is credited with pushing production of bold new designs that received both high praise and harsh criticism.

Other examples include Federal Express, run by former Marine Fred Smith; former Marine Capt. Dan Caulfield’s consulting firm, which encourages decision-making at the lowest levels; and even Netscape Communications Corp., which was founded by former Marine James Clark, who said his company became too enamored of its flagship product to realize that the company’s value had shifted away from its product to its Web site.

Here are four of the thirty management principles that I believe can be applied to what we’re doing here.

• Aim for the 70% solution. It’s better to decide quickly on an imperfect plan than to roll out a perfect plan when it’s too late.
• Find the essence. When it comes time to act, even the most complex situations and missions must be perceived in simple terms.
• Manage by end state and intent. Tell people what needs to be accomplished and why, and leave the details to them.
• Keep plans simple and flexible. It’s better to have a few options that can be easily adapted to changing situations than to try to make specific plans for every contingency.