We moved into this house ten years ago, so Things Are Breaking.
Our garage door sounded sick a couple of months ago, but I’ve learned to wait until the spring breaks before fixing it. The Last Responsible Moment for fixing occurs after the spring breaks. (Very few garage door people will replace the spring before it breaks.)
However, a few weeks ago, one of our smoke detectors started to chirp. Mark dutifully changed the battery. That fix lasted a week or two and then it started to chirp again. Naturally, when he was out of town. He returned and replaced that detector.
Yesterday, the smoke detector outside the kitchen decided to die. Since my office is only thirteen steps down the hall from the kitchen, this was a Very Noisy Huge Deal. Luckily, the cleaning people were here and disconnected it from the ceiling. We pulled out the battery. Relief. And Mark changed all the smoke detectors last night after dinner.
But the original chirping arose several weeks ago. And Mark bought new smoke detectors last weekend. He was ready. However, our Last Responsible Moment whooshed by before he changed them.
Sometimes, as in the case of the garage door, we wait for the breakage to be responsible. But, sometimes we need to be responsible before the breakage. That’s the Last Responsible Moment and sometimes, it’s hard to see.
How I Manage My Last Responsible Moments
The idea of the “Last Responsible Moment” makes sense for decisions that have high costs. When I work with leaders, I discuss this idea and apply it to software architecture, corporate strategy, and the project portfolio for organizational decisions. The longer we can keep those decisions as options and not commit until later, the more information we can gather to learn which decisions make the most sense.
I even extend my last responsible moment for my books. I wait to design the book cover until after I finish the book. That’s because I often change the title and the back cover copy to match what I wrote.
For these decisions, the cost to wait is much less than the cost to redo. That’s why the idea of the last responsible moment idea is so useful:
- What does it cost me to make this decision now?
- Is there a chance I will have to make it again?
- Will that later decision invalidate all the time I spent on this decision?
You can see why the idea of the Last Responsible Moment makes so much sense when we create.
It makes less sense for ongoing maintenance, as in our smoke detectors. BTW, I’m not blaming Mark for not changing the smoke detectors. I could have nudged him last weekend, after he bought them. But I was willing to tolerate a few ongoing chirps for him to get to them this weekend.
That risk tolerance is what matters.
When we decide too soon, often as a form of risk management, we often incur the costs of late learning. (Yes, that’s the Project Lifecycles book in a nutshell.) On the other hand, if we decide too late, we run the risk of emergency work.
Patching Might Be a Sign of the Last Responsible Moment Whooshing By
Our smoke detectors gave us an early warning signal. Instead of fixing the problem, we patched it. (That’s a software term which means an incomplete but sufficient fix. Too often, those patches are not robust under all circumstances. If you’ve ever scotch-taped a hem on pants, you’ve patched it.)
That was an indication the Last Responsible Moment was either upon us or had whooshed by.
We can use this idea of patching vs fixing for the next time Things Break. Because they will.
That’s the question this week: When do we realize the last responsible moment whooshed by?