Best-practice project management advocates nominating dates for the release of your product or service and, as we all know, having firm committed dates are good; right?
Wrong; because not all dates are created equal. Here’s some examples: Public holidays and religious holidays. Let’s imagine a scenario. We’re going to deliver our next software release for Christmas. That’s a committed date and it’s problematic. What happens if we slip? Do we work extra hours? Are we working through Christmas?
In general people take vacations around Christmas and productivity drops. So why arrange a delivery at a time when we know everyone isn’t fully engaged? Christmas is just a well-known example, the same logic can be applied to other religious festivals and Public Holidays.
We’re aren’t done yet. Every weekday present us with a challenge; Mondays and Fridays. Setting delivery dates at the beginning and end of a week isn’t smart because on Mondays people are re-engaging with their work and disengaging on Fridays. So that leaves us with Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays. Fortunately most Public Holidays are on Mondays or Fridays so we feel less impact.
This discussion has been framed in terms of our delivery to a customer but the reasoning applies to our Customer too; they may not be willing or able to take delivery on Holidays or the beginning or end of the week.
So here’s your challenge. Look at your delivery dates and days and then ask yourself “will people be fully engaged around the delivery date?”. If the answer is no make a change.
