Problem-Solving Archives - Page 11 of 29

The Highest Possible Batting Average

On March 9, 1933, Congress passed the Emergency Banking Act, and President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed it the same day. Many members of Congress had no chance to read it. Only one copy was available on the floor of the House.

In a fireside chat on May 7, 1933, Roosevelt described his method in baseball terms: “I have no expectation of making a hit every time I come to bat. What I seek is the highest possible batting average, not only for myself but for the team.” He added: “I do not deny that we may make mistakes of procedure as we carry out the policy.”

In his first 100 days, Congress passed 15 major bills. The first 100 days became a benchmark for measuring the early success of a president.

Fixed Time, Variable Scope

The software company 37signals, maker of Basecamp, publishes its working method as a book, Shape Up, by Ryan Singer, free to read online. Its rule is “fixed time, variable scope.” Teams work in six-week cycles, and a project gets at most six weeks. “Six weeks is long enough to finish something meaningful and short enough to feel the deadline from the beginning.”

When the work does not fit, the team cuts scope, not time. “Shipping on time means shipping something imperfect.” A project that does not ship in the time set for it “doesn’t get an extension” by default.

SMART Goals

In November 1981 George T. Doran published a short article in Management Review. Its title was “There’s a S.M.A.R.T. way to write management’s goals and objectives.” His five criteria were Specific, Measurable, Assignable, Realistic and Time-related. The letters have changed over time. A common version today reads Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant and Time-bound.

A federal regulation sets the rules for a child’s Individualized Education Program (IEP) in special education. The IEP must contain “a statement of measurable annual goals.” It must also say how “the child’s progress toward meeting the annual goals” will be measured. A guide for parents explains why: “The IEP team must be able to tell if the goal has been reached.”

Gold Plating

Project managers have a name for giving a customer more than the plan calls for. They call it gold plating. Wikipedia sums up the standard project management guide, the PMBOK, this way: gold plating “means the addition of any feature not considered in the original scope plan.”

In 2002 PM Network, the magazine of the Project Management Institute, discussed the practice. It wrote that giving the customer extras, such as bonus functions or better components, “usually is frowned upon in project management circles.” It quoted an exam guide by Rita Mulcahy: “Often such additions are included based on the project team’s impression of what the customer would like.”

The same article questioned the rule. Its subtitle reads: “A certain amount of ‘gold-plating’ in software development projects actually may produce more satisfied customers.”

The First iPhone Had No Apps

The first iPhone went on sale on June 29, 2007. It had no App Store. Users could not copy and paste text. In October 2007 Steve Jobs wrote: “Let me just say it: We want native third party applications on the iPhone.”

The App Store opened in July 2008. In its first weekend, users downloaded more than 10 million applications. Copy and paste arrived with iPhone OS 3.0 on June 17, 2009. When Apple announced it in March, the TechCrunch headline read: “iPhone to finally get cut and paste.”

With All Its Faults

On September 17, 1787, the last day of the Constitutional Convention, Benjamin Franklin brought a written speech. James Wilson read it for him. Franklin began with an admission: “I confess that there are several parts of this constitution which I do not at present approve.” Then he said: “I agree to this Constitution with all its faults, if they are such.”

He explained why. “I doubt too whether any other Convention we can obtain, may be able to make a better Constitution.” He asked each delegate who still had objections to “doubt a little of his own infallibility” and sign.

Of his own doubts he said: “The opinions I have had of its errors, I sacrifice to the public good.”

Craigslist

Craig Newmark founded Craigslist in 1995. In 2017 The Ringer described it as a basic HTML website that rivals saw as “an outdated mess of hyperlinks.” Its mobile app came out only in 2019.

In 2022 a reporter asked Newmark why the site still looks the same. “Because that serves people better,” he said. “I’ve learned that people want stuff that is simple and fast and gets the job done.” The Ringer estimated the company’s revenue at $690 million for 2016. The company had about 50 employees.

Indiana Jones and the Swordsman

In Raiders of the Lost Ark, a swordsman challenges Indiana Jones and brandishes a large sword. Indy draws his pistol and shoots him. Entertainment Tonight called it the moment “considered by most fans to be the funniest moment in the franchise.”

The script called for a long fight. Harrison Ford later said he was “quite ill with dysentery” and found the planned fight “too much.” He recalled asking Steven Spielberg why they did not just shoot the man. Spielberg answered: “I was thinking that, too!” Ford’s stunt double, Vic Armstrong, tells it differently. In his account, David Tomblin, who worked on the film, suggested the gun.

The Effect It Purports

Before 1962, a new drug in the United States only had to be safe. Amendments passed that year added a second test. The FDA must find that a drug is both safe and effective. The proof must come from “adequate and well-controlled investigations, including clinical investigations.” Experts must be able to conclude that the drug “will have the effect it purports or is represented to have.”

The law does not ask how the drug works. Derek Lowe writes on drug research. He states: “There is, in fact, no requirement that a new drug’s mechanism of action be known at all.” The diabetes drug metformin reached the market without a known mechanism. Its mechanism is still debated.