The family came over for thanksgiving yesterday, which meant I had to clean.
As I was cleaning, I found myself using my own 80% rule. The rule is to do about eighty percent of the job and then move on. So, if you're dusting, do most surfaces, but don't worry about the little crevices behind the lamp in the farthest corner of your bedroom or reaching behind the the television. After you do eighty percent of a job, move onto the next one, be it dishes or sweeping or whatever.
If you finish all of the jobs, or 80 percent of your job list, you can go back through your list and do 80% of what's left, and so on and so on ... While things don't end up perfectly, after every passing iteration, the job percent completed goes from 80 to 96 to 99.2 to 99.84 ...
This is basically the same strategy I use when I'm coding. Although you always want to cover the corner cases so that you're program or api works well and feels professionally polished, it's often a better practice to get 80 percent of the job done. If your clients notice the missing 20 percent, or maybe the word is "when", then you can go back to the drawing board then.
Luckily, there's another rule of nature, the 80/20 rule, which says that 80 percent of any effect is caused by 20 percent of any cause. So, if I clean up 20 percent of what feels messy, then that'll end up doing 80 percent of the job. Combine this with my rule and I really don't have to do any work at all!
Disclaimer: I'm sure there are cases where this doesn't apply, but I'll just throw in one more cliche and say that it's just a rule of thumb.
If you finish all of the jobs, or 80 percent of your job list, you can go back through your list and do 80% of what's left, and so on and so on ... While things don't end up perfectly, after every passing iteration, the job percent completed goes from 80 to 96 to 99.2 to 99.84 ...
This is basically the same strategy I use when I'm coding. Although you always want to cover the corner cases so that you're program or api works well and feels professionally polished, it's often a better practice to get 80 percent of the job done. If your clients notice the missing 20 percent, or maybe the word is "when", then you can go back to the drawing board then.
Luckily, there's another rule of nature, the 80/20 rule, which says that 80 percent of any effect is caused by 20 percent of any cause. So, if I clean up 20 percent of what feels messy, then that'll end up doing 80 percent of the job. Combine this with my rule and I really don't have to do any work at all!
Disclaimer: I'm sure there are cases where this doesn't apply, but I'll just throw in one more cliche and say that it's just a rule of thumb.
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