Morning friend ☕️

Welcome to the finale of Project Heisenberg, Episode 5 of 5. If you're joining now, today's question stands on its own. The earlier episodes are linked below.

I find it hard to say “we delivered it, but I can't show it helped yet” after people have worked so hard.

That's where I wanted to end this series: what benefit can Richard actually show the executive committee?

Grab your coffee. Let's chat!

Richard Vale, the CIO, and Anand, Head of Software Engineering, belong to the fictional world of my Scary Management novel. Their project began with a bottleneck: a finished product change waiting for three other teams before it could reach customers. Richard approved an experiment with this team to assess the wider migration. Then he moved its forecast to make room for an AI evaluation.

This is an imagined review after that first experiment. The wider migration is still ahead of them.

Richard opens the executive pack at Benefits: Faster delivery. Earlier customer feedback.

“Exco wants your recommendation on the wider migration,” he says.

Anand puts the release report beside it.

“Proceed. The first team got its change into production faster, without waiting for the other three. Product collected customer feedback earlier-”

“-which shapes what we build next,” Richard finished his sentence.

“Yes. That's the benefit we wanted to test.”

Richard turns to Rollout.

“And the shared library? Won't everyone end up waiting again?”

“We still need shared code and services,” Anand says. “We'll name an owner and let product teams contribute. Teams can adopt library versions separately. We'll keep service changes compatible with existing users, and automate checks against what those teams actually use.”

“So they don't all have to release together.”

“For compatible changes, yes. Breaking changes need an agreed upgrade window. And the owner needs time to maintain it. Otherwise we've built another queue.”

“Put that capacity in the rollout plan. What else are we carrying?”

“Support still has the old platform and the delayed self-service work. The AI evaluation's total effort isn't in yet, including setup, review and correction. We can’t claim any benefit to using AI yet.”

Richard writes Proceed with wider migration.

“I'll take that recommendation upstairs.”

“And the migration date?” Anand asks.

“Bring me the forecast for the whole programme.”

Richard closes the pack.

“We have the reason to proceed. Let's get the plan behind it.”

Richard started with a migration proposal. By working through these five questions, he can now explain why the business should proceed:

The answers belong together. They shape what the business should fund, promise and make room for. Finance, Product, Operations and other dependency owners still have work to do; these five questions are a way into their conversation.

In the trailer, I said I wanted to understand the CEO, CIO and Engineering Head's thinking so I could support my Engineering Head more usefully.

Writing these conversations is how I explore the connections between management, training, the characters and what I've lived through.

Project Heisenberg has helped me connect the delivery conversation with what Richard has to answer for upstairs.

For a project you're part of, try writing a short note with these five lines:

We're investing in _____, because _____ matters now.

The constraint this approach should remove is _____; it will leave _____.

The next commitment covers _____, on the understanding that _____.

To make room, _____ moves or costs more, affecting _____.

The evidence so far is _____. I recommend _____ next; _____ owns that decision, and we'll revisit it when _____.

An empty line is useful if you name who could help fill it. You may hold delivery evidence without owning the investment decision.

A project recommendation connects the business reason, the proposed intervention, the commitment, its trade-off and the evidence for what happens next. The five questions help you bring your part of that conversation into the room.

Which of those questions does your next project update help answer?

We began with Richard circling a finished change that couldn't reach customers. We leave him with customer feedback shaping what gets built next, and a migration recommendation he can defend.

Thanks for following Project Heisenberg with me. I hope the next conversation about your project makes a little more sense from both sides of the table.

Until next time, friend ☕️
Vaugan

Fiction note:

Richard Vale and Anand are fictional characters from Scary Management. This is an imagined project review, not an account of a real employer.

Walter White and Breaking Bad appear here as pop-culture parody. This newsletter is not affiliated with or endorsed by the show's creators or rights holders.