Tell HN: My project is turning into a death march | Hacker News Reader

Tell HN: My project is turning into a death march

9 pointshoodoof6 comments

Ugh. My software project is turning into a death march.

  It is not ending.  
  The todo list goes on and on.  
  Things always take longer than expected.
  I'm losing faith in the project ever coming to completion.
  I'm now just grinding through the tasks in a state of numbness.
  I seem to add three tasks for every task I complete.

Classic deathmarch.

Unfortunately it's MY project and I'm the only developer.

It's disheartening. I have reduced scope once already. I think maybe I need to do so again.

I need a few slaps on the back and cheers of support from other developers to spur me on to completion....

View on HN

There are some typical things that apply to just about any software project that you can try.

Avoid feature creep by writing down the exact list of things you need to do, and if you come up with more ideas, put them on a separate list.

Try to build a Minimum Viable Product, which is a vertical slice of the most minimal version of your product that works.[1] If that doesn't work out, build some feature-complete tech demos and refactor them into an MVP.

Find a friend to help you with it. A fresh pair of eyes can help you validate your project and see what you could be doing better!

Experiencing friction means you're learning. Too much friction, however, can burn you. Don't burn out. Take a break. If you find yourself feeling unable to finish a task today, either try a different task on the todo list, or do something that relaxes you instead. Worrying about when you'll finish won't get you any further, nor will pushing yourself past your limit.

Best of luck in your endeavor!

1: http://blog.crisp.se/2016/01/25/henrikkniberg/making-sense-o... (has a really nice infographic that might help you understand!)

P.S. It's okay to fail. Fail forward.

Thanks for the helpful support. Good link.

A friend of mine thinks of an MVP as throwing anything out the door as soon as he possibly can. "Hello World up and running? There you go, that's an MVP, let's ship it!" Well not quite, but he's certainly more minimal than viable.

I think of an MVP as Minimum Valuable Product - i.e the minimum that allows execution of the core concept.

Part of the problem for me is that alot of stuff needs to be in place for the concept to hold together. It's quite a technical product - the sort of thing where you couldn't deliver a plane without a rear tail. First customer: "Hey nice plane! I like your innovative tail-less design, lets take her up for a flight!" Me: "Errr, how about you go on your own and I'll keep working on the tail."

ROFL Yeah! let others fly the tail-less plane. Isn't that a different way of describing v1 (aka beta test) of many products?

All projects look like this for a while as you discover the full scope of what you are building.

One day it will actually start to burn down, and you will look at your task list and it will be empty. You will not believe it for several days.

But, yes, it will happen. Just keep going, but expect it will take 2-3x whatever you thought it would.

I can understand how you feel. I embarked upon a 3 year project which after 8 years is 3 weeks to completion.

Knowing when to persevere vs pivot vs fold is hard - but an essential skill.

Perhaps if you shared about your project some others might see its brilliant value and be willing to lend a hand to see it to completion.

You need to limit the scope of the work.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com