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Strategies for Long Projects

by pcprincipal on 9/28/19, 11:28 PM with 36 comments

  • by danShumway on 9/30/19, 5:18 AM

    Excellent post.

    A lot of this rings true to my experiences as well, particularly being defensive about time and commitments. Really, most of the authors points had me kind of nodding along.

    On the other hand, I somewhat feel what the author is getting at with optimism, but I'm not sure optimism is the right word for what makes me productive. It's difficult to put into words, but I do agree there is a kind of strange attitude adjustment that has to happen.

    You need to reach a point where you decide you're going to do something, regardless of what problems come up, or how long it takes. There are problems in my own projects that I know I'll need to solve, and I don't currently know the solutions, but I know I'll come up with solutions for them, and whatever I need to do to pragmatically solve them will just need to happen. It's less about me feeling confident in myself, and more just saying, "well, I care about the outcome, and I don't care what I need to figure out in order to get there." I know I'll put in the time, or find the resources, or learn, or give up whatever I need to give up to make it happen.

    I don't know if I'd call that optimism though. It almost feels a bit more like stubbornness, or defiance. It's not just an assumption that things are going to work out.

  • by killjoywashere on 9/30/19, 7:06 AM

    I don't want to come across as putting down the author's work, but for the sake of everyone else, I want to reframe the definition of "long project".

    This would be a nice post if it was titled "Strategies for Quick Projects". I'm on year 8 of what is likely a life-long project (at a pace that is doubling annually). That's a fairly long project, but far from the longest. The Manhattan Project, the Human Genome Project, the Apollo project. The Shuttle program. The National Cathedral. These are long projects. They're big too. There are other long projects which might be considered "small". Learning violin is a long, small project. Cataloging all the species of flora and fauna on an island is a long, small-ish project. Cataloging all the microbiota on that island would be a medium-big project. Cataloging all the microbiota on a continent would outstrip the Human Genome Project by a factor of 100.

  • by _pmf_ on 9/30/19, 5:58 AM

    "I’m in the middle of three multi-month to a year projects right now"

    That counts as "long"?

  • by yamrzou on 9/30/19, 6:28 AM

    Great post, with a lot of helpful advice.

    I particularly found this point of view interesting, would love to hear some examples of it:

    > Moreover, I believe that choosing to feel something can make you feel that way even if the feeling is artificially manufactured. What I mean by this is that when someone asks us to label how we feel, the label we select is based on how we physically feel at the moment. But what if you said the exact opposite of how you actually felt? Is it possible the re-labeling could become reality? This seems absurd on the face of it, but my experience has been that re-labeling works and causes an actual physical response.

  • by hobo_mark on 9/30/19, 7:24 AM

    Something I have been wondering all these years I've been working on long-term projects is, how do others make relationships work with something that, almost by definition, consumes all of one's free time and energy?

  • by atrilumen on 9/30/19, 1:43 PM

    Thanks for this.

    I've been struggling to work full time on a project for a few years now. I think it's the most important thing that I can do with my life now, so I refuse to let go for any reason. (I'm a US citizen literally starving in Colombia.)

    I can't get traction the way I've been going, so I have to make radical changes immediately. Thanks for the list.

        1. Tenacity (check!)
    2. Logging  (need a lot of improvement. where has all my time gone?!)
    3. Compounding (I fear I'll be contemplating this one all day now)
    4. Defending your time (prob need to back off on this one; too lonely)
    I'm really loving Musk's rhyme: If the schedule is long, it's wrong; if it's tight, it's right. I've been moving way too slowly, spending too much time on small details.

    I need to do my thing more openly instead of hiding out with my head down; maybe I would have never done that first project reboot, and I'd have customers by now!

  • by wmij on 9/30/19, 3:26 PM

    Something that has helped me with recognizing incremental progress on long running side and personal projects where completion seems so far off is relating it to the crawler vehicles NASA used to get the Space Shuttle to the launch pad.

    https://www.nasa.gov/content/the-crawlers https://youtu.be/N1WvVRavXsI?t=60

    Incremental progress and speed seem slow (1 mph), but eventually you will get into position for launch.

    This has helped me understand how weight and physical constraints (these == time commitments to a primary project, family, sleep, etc.) impact velocity on where you start from getting to an eventual goal (starting a side project and coming to release, launch, etc.). Some things just can't travel faster than 1 mph due to external constraints.

  • by jshowa3 on 9/30/19, 2:55 PM

    What I don't get is how does one know they will solve a problem? I run into many problems that I don't have a good solution for and can't seem to figure out nor find how to get one. So I usually need to ask a co-worker for help and even then, they usually have to do it for me because they can't find time to show me how to do it. And if they do it or even show you what you need to do, are you really solving that problem?

    Guess it's one of those things no one seems to be able to figure out since most of these pieces never really describe, in detail, what their process actually is for something that's unsolvable for them.

  • by hellisothers on 9/30/19, 4:10 PM

    This article rings true of my experience with accomplishing projects both in and out of software but I think it also describes my approach to life generally (optimism + grit) which makes me think it’s less a thing learned and more a personality/behavior thing. I know several people who’s approach to life, the universe, and everything is “everything is terrible, I’m going to fail” and have built up defensive mechanisms to manage to still succeed.

    Also, I would have liked this post to touch on “what do you do when things actually fall apart” too.

  • by codeisawesome on 9/30/19, 2:32 PM

    This post couldn't have been more timely in my life.