There are many times in life where we can either wait to get more information or we make a choice and see what comes of it. A good number of these choices are not always the correct or optimum choice, but the key is you proactively chose to move forward, knowing full well that the choice may be the wrong one. Why is this ok? It is ok because we can fix it or make it the right one.
Sunk Cost
Too many times, people commit to an idea because they already are part way into it and it "wouldnt be worth switching." This is know as sunk cost fallacy. This is the idea that you already paid some amount and because of that you are stuck with the choice you have made. In designing any kind of product there is a chart (shown below) that illustrates that the sooner an issue or bug is identified the cheaper it is to fix. The sooner you identify an issue, the easier it is to correct any mistakes or errors.
How to make it right
Many times the hardest part after finding an issue is trying to figure out how to fix it. There are many times that what you currently have can be saved, fixed, or repurposed. This is a good option, on occasion the best choice is to dump the current effort and walk way and try something new. Yes this might require additional rework and time, but can often yield phenomenal results.
Our struggle
Here at Scabbard Media, we have had problems finding the right tool to record our podcasts remotely and edit them. The first tool we tried (and paid for) kept crashing and was too unstable to record and edit videos. The second tool we tried (and paid for) the video editor was clunky and exporting raw recordings was painful. We then found a video editor that works differently than what we are normally accustom to for video editors, but it provides features we were looking for. After some learning and sampling other options we decided to stick with this video editor and have built processes to optimize our work with it. As for recording software (as of writing) we are still trying and paying for options. We learned after the first one that while sampling tools, if you aren't sure about it don't pay for the whole year, even if you get a really nice discount. Paying for a full year of an untried tool may break you or cause great headaches. Now in some cases getting stuck with a tool may help you in ways that you might not have imagined. You may find the tool is a better fit than you thought after trying it for a bit. Or the tool might be acquired by a better brand and you are then upgraded to the preferred tool at no additional cost. For us this learning opportunity taught us how to evaluate and commit to tools better. In this example, the lesson required paying for something that turned out was not a good choice, but we learned to pay for smaller samples of tools before we pay for the larger discounted rate.
Another example we had to struggle with was a tool to manage our social media platforms. The first approach was by doing it all by hand and this took hours to do. This is one of the sunk costs that you are happy to walk away from, don't just do it a way because that is how you have always done it. You can always try new ways and be surprised what you will find. We then found an ad for a tool that offered insanely low price for a tool to manage our social media platforms. Come to find out this great price was limited to only queuing up five social media posts at a time. This wouldn't work if we wanted to be able to queue up a full week or even the next couple weeks of posts. Which led us to look for new tools. But this showed us what features we wanted in a tool vs just looking at tools and saying "that looks nice." We then found a tool that cost less initially but so far appears to do exactly what we need, on all of our social platforms. This experience taught us try something, figure out what you don't like, and then find something that can help with the original needs with the addition of things you found problematic.
Learning from others
One of the best things you can do is seek knowledge from those who have recovered from what you are having problems with. They may not know exactly what is going on but they may have insights on how to course correct and resolve the current issue and maybe even how to avoid the next problem. This can be done by reading blogs like this, or asking someone directly.
Failure to success
One of my favorite examples of making a problem the right option, is a little known company by the name of Slack. The business that originally built Slack was known as Tiny Spec which was a video game development studio. As their game development struggled the owner tried to figure out how to save their game. Years later, as the company was failing they realized they had built a custom internal communication tool that really worked and that they loved. The game development failed but the byproduct of this was a tool that they then sold and grew to be the defacto tool for a large number of businesses for internal communication.
There are dozens of stories like this. The key is to try to make one problem right, but keeping in mind that making it right might be by using the thing right next to what you are trying to make work. This is one reason why I love playing early access video games. These are games that you can watch the growth of them real time. One day you might be playing the game and loving it and the next day an update comes out that completely changes how the game works. Yes you might hate the update but in time you find that these changes made the game far better and able to grow and adapt better than the old format. And in some cases a new video games is spawned from a small change. One example of this is PUBG (PlayerUnknown's BattleGrounds) which was a mod to another game, and eventually grew into it's own game and spawned a whole genre of games.
Don't be afraid
Don't be afraid to put something down and step away. You might see things that you couldn't see when you were actively trying. Problems are opportunities to grow. They are not always signs of failure. Going back to the opening line where you can wait for more information or jump right in. There is something know as opportunity cost. If you avoid doing something what is the lost cost of not trying. Sometimes it is success, other times it is lessons learned.
I signed up for a really expensive coaching course for what some would say was a snake oil scam. I wanted to know if it was or not. Thousands of dollars later I learned a lot about an industry that was previously unknown to me. It hasn't failed me yet but it also isn't what it was advertised as. It was advertised as simple easy cashflow with great opportunity. I didn't buy in because of the easy cash, I bought in because of the opportunity. I can say the opportunity is there, I just haven't figured out how to maximize it with the resources I have put in so far.
The wrong choice is just the right one wearing a mask.
Image credit:
https://susanjeffers.com/2023/03/09/there-are-no-mistakes-when-you-course-correct/
https://azevedorafaela.com/2018/04/27/what-is-the-cost-of-a-bug/