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independenceone source · 2 more authors in those circles
applies to

b2b and consumer, no audience needed

confidence

medium

evidence

12 claims · 9 articles · 4 receipts

window

2012-10-08 → 2016-11-29 · nothing since 2016

a single source, nothing corroborates it

Fix the ship date and cut scope to fit it

Decide when it goes out, then let the calendar decide how big it can be, since an open-ended timeline means the thing never ships. Book the specific hours in the week rather than trusting spare time to appear, and subtract the dead zones and the packaging work that always overruns.

The method

  1. 01

    Fix a hard deadline for launching and hack the scope down to whatever fits inside it, since an open-ended timeline means the product never ships.

  2. 02

    Box the scope by fixing the time: give yourself one week to build a small product, so the deadline decides how big it can be.

  3. 03

    If you can build it yourself, add the constraint that it must be finished within a month working only weekends.

  4. 04

    Give yourself a deadline with quitting attached: a fixed number of days to produce something you can actually sell, or you abandon the idea entirely.

  5. 05

    Pick the launch date early, when you work for yourself nobody imposes a deadline, and an invented one is what creates focus

What it returned

  • 30

    The author wrote the entire first version of Storemapper across a single 30-hour flight to Buenos Aires, citing Parkinson's Law

  • 20

    Justin's worked example sets 20 December as launch day from a 20 September start, with blocks like Saturdays 6-10am and Fridays 8-11pm.

  • After more than a year and three failed attempts, the author allowed himself ten days to build a sellable product or walk away, and had it working in eight

  • Justin abandoned a full book that would have taken at least a year and shipped a smaller book with resources instead; he estimated three weeks and it took three months, but it launched.

Sources

the second source

Three plays a week, for the phase you are in

No roundup of links, no news. Three tactics more than one builder arrived at separately, with the numbers each one returned and the disagreements left in.

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More in product

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the second source

Three plays a week, for the phase you are in

No roundup of links, no news. Three tactics more than one builder arrived at separately, with the numbers each one returned and the disagreements left in.

963 corroborated plays to draw from · 3 a week

One email a week. Unsubscribe in one click, and the address is used for this and nothing else.