Creative Reaction

An insightful post courtesy of Psychology Today discusses “the planning fallacy”, the phenomenon where, despite our best efforts, and even with the knowledge that planning is often wrong, we still cannot plan accurately.

In Why Planning is Counter-productive, Pt II, we discussed one tactic, which is to simply start doing and skip planning altogether!

If you must plan, Psychology Today suggests the following steps:

1. consider how long it has taken you in the past,
2. identify the ways in which things might not go as planned, and
3. spell out all the steps you will need to take to get it done

All of the above will make the time needed to complete the project seem insanely long and you will be tempted to not to believe this estimate, however, you must condition yourself to think this way. This can be applied whether you are simply planning your day or a multi-departmental project.

In the planning fallacy, 37Signals reiterates something I blogged about last Fall; namely that despite our best efforts, and even with the knowledge that planning is often wrong, we still cannot plan accurately.

37Signals conclusion? “That messy planning stage that delays things and prevents you from getting real is, in large part, a waste of time. So skip it. If you really want to know how much time/resources a project will take, start doing it.”

Check out my earlier post, Why Planning is Counter-productive. It has better links if you’d like to look further into the planning fallacy. Also be sure to check out last month’s In Your Face, MBAs series.