Meeting Goals With Feedback Loops

2 minute read | Last updated 12-Jan-2022 |  Rant, Technology, Ship30for30

We use technology in almost every aspect of our lives.

The gap between the expectations of that technology and the reality of its implementation is fascinating.

The internet is held together with bubble gum and duct tape.

But it works…and we continue to see fantastic new innovations and ways of connecting to each other come to light.

Goals

When we’re building technology, we need to focus on our goals. Security and privacy are critical parts of those efforts.

Over the past few years, we’ve seen a remarkable reduction in the effort required to create technology solutions. That’s fantastic!

But it’s critical that we remember these solutions have a lifecycle and we need to set our goals to account for that.

If setting a good goal is hard, achieving that goal is even more challenging.

Spirals

Achieving your goal in tech is hard because those goals are often very ambitious. It’s easy to get swept up in the possibilities of a digital solution.

You start simple and things quickly spin out of control.

Before you know it, you’ve got from the Flintstones to the Jetsons without shipping anything to your prospective users.

One way to avoid this spiral is to use the concept of simple feedback loops.

Loops

A feedback loop has three stages; learn, build, and measure.

To be effective, a loop should be short.

The shorter the time between trying out something new (build) and learning about it, the more impactful that learning is.

This is core concept of modern solution development. When done well, feedback loops can help accelerate your work and make sure that you hits your goals.