Hello,
Can I be honest with you? I hate this time of year. No, I am not a grinch. I love Christmas, but I am not a fan of the year’s end.
But before I explain why — a quick announcement. On the 31st, I will stop accepting new students for my Encouraging Clicks Masterclass. It will return later next year, but it will be at a higher price so if you want to enrol, now is the time!
Okay, back to why I hate this time of year. It is because every year-end I get asked to predict the future. People email me asking me to contribute to posts about the top trends for 2020. How am I supposed to know?
It is the same as when your boss asks you to produce a five-year digital strategy or a client asks you to quote on that complicated and sprawling project.
I work on digital transformation initiatives that involve programmes of work that will take years to fulfil. I also advise on redesigns of enormous, challenging websites, with so many moving parts that it is impossible to predict the final scope, let alone the outcome.
I know I am not alone. One of the most common questions I get asked by those I mentor is how to quote accurately on projects. It is something we all struggle with regularly.
We work in a confusing, involved and rapidly evolving industry. Things are unpredictable, and I find myself immediately suspicious of anybody who claims to know what is to come.
For me, this delusion of control is best summed up by the project Gantt chart. That fictional timeline that pretends the process is controllable and outcomes are predictable.
Where then does that leave us? What use are we if we cannot predict digital outcomes?
Our value lies not in our ability to predict the future, but rather in our skill at navigating it as it unfurls before us. I may not be able to see the future, but I know a process that will get me to my desired destination.
Take, for example, your typical large redesign project. I would find it hard to quote on exactly how much it is going to cost or how long it would take. There are just too many variables to be accurate. However, I could easily lay out the step-by-step process to get the best result for the lowest possible price.
Management and clients will complain that they cannot do financial planning without that magic number. However, that magic number is a delusion that is never the final figure. At best, it is a guess, yet organisations treat it as an absolute.
What I can give them is an accurate quote for a discovery phase. A small exploratory project that will, in turn, allow me to provide a quote for a prototyping phase. That prototyping phase will then put me in a position to predict the cost and timeline of the next step, and so on.
So, let’s stop trying to predict the impossible. We do our clients and colleagues a disservice by allowing them to believe fictional numbers. Instead, let’s break these big and complicated projects into a process of smaller, more manageable steps that we can provide more realistic numbers around.
However, most of all, let us start to be honest about what exactly we can and cannot predict in 2020.
In the meantime, Have a wonderful Christmas, and I will speak to you again in the new year!
