What I've picked up

Lessons learned, written to be argued with.

These are the beliefs I've bumped into hard enough that I can't shake them. I still test them on every new project.

  1. 01

    The brief is never the brief.

    Every meaningful project I've shipped looked different at the end than at the start. The trick isn't guessing the ending — it's designing a process that survives the pivot.

  2. 02

    Taste is a skill. Argue for it.

    The 'this is subjective' move is a cop-out. If you can't defend a design decision in a language your engineers respect, you don't understand it well enough yet.

  3. 03

    Ship the sketch, not the specification.

    Working software is the fastest way to disagree productively. I'd rather have a rough prototype in a room than a beautiful deck.

  4. 04

    Great managers protect the middle.

    Kickoffs are exciting. Launches are exciting. The month between them is where every project I've watched fail actually failed.

  5. 05

    Hire for the second draft.

    Anyone can produce a first draft. The people who make teams great are the ones who can take feedback without losing their voice.

  6. 06

    Small teams, small meetings, small docs.

    If your artifact is too big to hold in your head, your team is too big for the problem.