Learn early to under promise, over deliver.

It is that time of year where many young people are completing their educations and venturing out for the first time into the work force. Whether it be in sales, marketing, engineering, technology, business, or any other endeavor, they will begin the long and tedious process of not only perfecting their craft, but perfecting the personal interactions and professional demeanor that will define their careers and reputations.

I would therefore share the following with anyone who cares to get some insight from my almost 32 years in the information technology business. These are insights which are universal to all business and professional endeavors, and which I myself often learned later than I could have and at a corresponding cost to my career and professional standing.

I have since roughly the start of the year been working hard to create a client interface to a complex web application. This product leverages the power of other tools and systems and allows administrators and medical professionals to leverage the vast amounts of data collected by the Defense Health Administration. With it, they will be able to quickly find, correlate and most importantly understand the ramifications of information to help fund and coordinate their efforts, consolidate and disseminate their findings and better understand their patients.

 This has been complicated by the fact that, since my requisite security credentials have not yet been finalized, I don't have the clearance to see the actual data or existing systems, and I have been working off of a simple wire frame. I was therefore unable to see the resources this interface exposed, and had to mock up all of the test data to get it done and surmise much of the functionality and navigation.

Also complicating the issue was the fact that the government makes extensive use of older technology into which this new product must integrate, and therefore limits the tools that can be used to create the desire functionality.

 Nevertheless, I demo-ed the interlace today, which is far from complete but completely functional, to rave reviews. I was pleased that most of the remarks were about how surprised the client and management were that I was able to accomplish the functionality, navigation, and look and feel EXACTLY as envisioned in the nonfunctional mock ups, despite my lack of access and my brief exposure to the subject matter.

 This was a great relief, since, as is so often the case in our professional lives, I was asked to do something for which the desired end result was obscure and not clearly defined, and which I barely had any real grasp of, with few details, few people who could get those details for me. And, again, without the access to dig in and get them for myself.

 As anyone who has built a career in business will tell you, this is OFTEN the case in our professional lives. We are called upon to do things that have often been over promised by people who won't have to make those promises a reality themselves. People who make overly ambitious time commitments despite not understanding the efforts involved in making them happen, if that is at all possible. People who also extract a toll because they require a precise accounting of time and efforts, which of course is sometimes more time consuming and detrimental to creativity and productivity than the work itself. And all of this is justified because of competition and the drive to get the contract, get the work, make the money.

And the more experience we have, the more impressive our resume and the more successful projects we deliver, the more the perception that we are capable of delivering the near impossible overnight increases. It doesn’t get easier, but hopefully the challenges, not to mention our salaries, keep pace with these expectations, which is why we all do it..

 Early in my career, I was led to believe that the way to impress was to ALWAYS commit, always promise, always agree, and never say no to someone who had to in turn take that no back to a client, a VP, a director or a marketing rep.

 But in time, I learned a few things, things I will share with you in the hopes they will make someone’s professional journey a little easier.

First, the impression you make is the result of what you DELIVER, not what you promise, envision, mock up or imagine. And the PEOPLE you benefit from impressing or fail to impress that MATTER are not always the ones you might think.

After spending a decade or so, let alone 3, plying a trade, you will find that no matter how big your field may be, or how big a country it is, it’s a small world. When it comes to your reputation, you NEVER have the LUXURY of writing one off. Because all of your efforts, good, bad or indifferent, will eventually find their way back to you.

And no amount of excuses or justification will assuage the perception that you failed in a project.

For that reason, number two is this, and it is a lesson that was a hard one for me to learn.

The people you REALLY need to impress are the people that make it rain, not your colleagues who work in the trenches with you. Sure, you can impress your peers, your associates, salesmen, programmers by being a good coder, knowing a lot of different technologies, knowing all the answers, being a persuasive speaker, having a good work ethic and readily sharing knowledge and information. All of that is CRUCIAL.

But it is all for naught if the people where the rubber hits the road cannot count on you to give them HONEST information, candid opinions and realistic appraisals of what is possible in a time frame and within a budget. Without that information, they cannot win and keep the business that keeps you gainfully employed.

Good intentions NEVER made any project succeed. And the idea that someone in charge of making a project succeed would rather hear sunshine blown up their butt and find out weeks later it isn’t going to happen instead of getting real information, real solutions, alternatives and possibilities up front is foolishness.

 Which brings us to number 3, which you will hear TIME AND AGAIN, and is a double-edged sword. That is because there is ALWAYS someone who will try to look good in the short term at your expense by ignoring it and getting you to do likewise, but ignoring it will NEVER end WELL in the long run.

ALWAYS. And I mean ALWAYS, under-promise and over deliver. This is not to say that you can cover poor work ethic, procrastination or just plain incompetence by padding your estimates. But instead, it is to say that if it can’t be done in the allotted time or with the given technology or the way it was promised, it won’t. Not today, not tomorrow, not 10 weeks from now. And promising it will only make matters worse. Sure, it’s important to have the right skill set, to plan, to design, to find the most efficient alternative. But even at the speed of light, the sun’s rays take over 8 minutes to reach the earth. No amount of good intentions can change that.

And I am not talking about whining, complaining, not being a team player or being a quitter or someone who unloads difficult tasks on others. I am talking about not wasting time, effort, patience and personal credibility on efforts that are doomed from the start by an over eager goal or time frame for fear of giving a realistic assessment by someone telling you you’ll “figure it out later”. That later will never come, despite the fact that you will spend long frustrating hours trying to make it materialize or make it happen by some impossible deadline while that person who suggested you try will be home in bed or on vacation. And the worst part is if you agree, its YOU who failed, not them. Because they secured a commitment from you, one you were not comfortable with or even confident you could hope to fulfill. And the negative result on the project and those charged with delivering to the end client will be just as real, so you won’t be doing anyone any favors, despite the fact that some may be able to deflect the blame 

I don’t think ANYTHING could have improved my work life balance, my track record or my professional standing in the eyes of my peers or my former employers MORE. Learning to be more efficient in my assessment and candid in my communication much earlier in my professional career than the point where I actually became good at it would have been invaluable. And even then, it is still never easy and often contentious, but the result of honest communication and accurate assessments is worth ALL the push back and ALL the second guessing.

And that is because of another thing you should ALWAYS remember. What is valued in your professional career, what is remembered and repeated, is the part you played at the END of a successful project, not your optimism, insights or enthusiasm at the start of one that ultimately fails. Success and meeting or exceeding realistic deadlines will ALWAYS override and blur all the hard feelings, the push back, all the implications made when someone is trying to get you to make them feel better by promising something you know you can’t deliver.

And you need to care about that. Because in the end what is remembered is what comprises your professional reputation, and as I mentioned before, it is often carried forward by the people you least expect.

SO if I can offer one piece of advice for those at the starting gate of their careers, it is this. ALWAYS strive to be as professional, as candid, as creative and as honest in your communications about your commitments, limitations and what is being asked of you as you are in your skills, your work ethic, your collaboration, and your vision. Strive always to improve your contribution to the project as much with your honesty, ability to communicate, to assess and to offer realistic estimates and alternatives as you are with your abilities, work skills, subject area knowledge and experience. Cultivate improvement in those areas of communication with the same eagerness and fervor with which you work to master new skills, new technologies, new techniques of your chosen profession. It will serve you well.