We are currently thinking about a big project for the coming months. And because it’s so big already we want to launch in two steps. One quick first shot to get something out the door and then think about the second one in more detail.

Only that’s not really sensible.

Two flaws are in that approach.

Firstly you can not make sure that the first step is in the right direction when you don’t know about the second yet.

Secondly the first step can not be a quick shot when it has to be  the foundation for a much bigger step.

We currently have a rough plan of what we would like to build and already there is a stripped down first version and an amazing second. Our chats about realizing it however always started with lets only focus on the first step for now, we’re not ready anyway.

For developers this makes things much easier as there are much less requirements. But in the long run this could easily lead to architectural decisions that block stuff from the second step making things much harder for developers and more frustrating for product managers.

So it’s vital to talk about the second step. Even if nothing is fixed yet you will be able to judge which parameters need to be made flexible and what final decisions does your architecture need to allow for.

Getting developers and architects into the discussion early and use them as constant sparring partners can only improve the reliability of your roadmap.

architecture

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