As developers, we’re optimists. As Craft developers, we’re very hopeful optimists. “Build that from scratch? Of course! I’ll have it done in 2 months.” Sometimes we’re right and sometimes we’re wrong.
But what happens when our optimism is wrong? What happens when it’s really wrong and the project that was supposed to take 2 months is entering its 12th?
As a freelancer, agency owner or department lead, these hopeful estimations that go wrong can be devastating. You might have to go find a “real” job or close your agency or lay people off.
As an agency owner for over 10 years, I’ve been wrong too many times. I’ve nearly run my agency into the ground. When things went really wrong, I quickly discovered that hope and hard work weren’t enough. It was then that I learned an invaluable lesson that has forever changed how I think about work, management, and finances.
I’ll share what I learned and how I put it into action to save my company from me.
This will be a talk about hope. It’ll be about how to have more right than wrong, more calm than chaos, and more clarity than confusion. It just might give you the tools to save your next project too.