Give and Take

One of the things we hear from time to time is that something is worth doing if it will just save one life (usually presumed to be a child). This is, of course, utter foolishness. We make trade-offs all the time. These trade-offs are necessary parts of leading others to do anything -- including building websites -- for without them, we could never decide what should have greatest importance.

Do You Know How Fast You Were Going?
Economist Walter Williams often uses the example of speed limits. If we were to lower the speed limit to 15 mph, we would almost eliminate traffic-related deaths. However, someone, somewhere has determined that the risk is worth increasing productivity by getting people and materials from point A to point B faster.

You believe it, too, or else you wouldn't speed. Ever. (Yes, I'm talking to YOU.)

A Science-Fiction Example
What if we were to somehow develop actual teleportation technology?

You know, of the "Beam me up, Scotty" variety.

Presume that teleporting from Washington, D.C., to Beijing, China would cost half as much as a plane ticket, and it is 100 times safer, expressed as a passenger-to-destination ratio. Plus, transportation time is virtually eliminated. A plane trip that would ordinarily take the better part of the day is wiped out.

How grotesque would the few failures that do occur need to be before people would be too frightened to use the technology?

What is More Important?
I can't count the number of disasters that I've seen on a websites that were caused by too many people wanting a stake in it for their department, but who have an overinflated idea about how important their department is to the grand scheme of things.

The manager for the project, in spite of having agreed to the strategy beforehand, goes along with this scheme in order to maintain a positive work environment.

Sadly, the quality of the work suffers, because the web team, attempting to give numerous things equal prominence, are unable to give anything sufficient prominence.

How Can We Fix It?
If there was ever an argument for executives needing to know about Web technologies, this is it. We tend to assume that managers can delegate this authority to people who do know, but in fact they typically don't give them the proper decision-making authority to quell disputes.

If I had to have one or the other, I'd choose a decisive manager who is quick to change when data proves him wrong than one who is so afraid of internal conflict and initial failure than he cannot make a decision.

On the Web, many failures are relatively easy to fix. As Drew said yesterday, "Pretty darn good trumps perfect every time, if it means you get to the market faster (or at all) with your message."

But in order to get there, executives must vest sufficient apparent authority to instill the confidence they need to make the decisions they must to get the job done -- to deliver results that are focused without needing to sacrifice clarity for the sake of someone's ego. - Cam Beck