Executives charged with creating custom digital solutions are faced with a seemingly endless list of decisions to make: which problems to solve, where to invest time and budget, and how to go about solving problems to name a few.
When you pick the wrong project, you can waste months or years on an effort that never pays off. Recently, one of our clients thanked us for pausing to help him pick the right work by stating:
“I’ve spent more time in the last month having you help me understand why I shouldn’t be doing certain projects than I have in my entire career because most vendors just do what I tell them to.”
Like many executives at enterprise organizations, this client has work coming at him in all directions all the time. With limited resources, he must prioritize projects that can actually get done. So when this client came to us with a backlog of work for our team to complete, he was excited. These were all wins, work we all understood, and work that would get done promptly.
But our team asked a few key questions:
- What is the underlying problem we are trying to solve?
- Who is impacted?
- What is the ROI in solving this problem?
Very quickly, everyone realized that the work identified - and that we were on the edge of spending time and money to solve with some of his most valued team members - would not bring the desired results. This executive was moving so fast, focused on getting some work done, that the bigger picture became blurred.
Ultimately, we agreed on a piece of work that would not only provide results but would deliver measurable results.
We recognize that a vendor that executes the orders given is a powerful tool. If that is what you need, there are a lot of vendors to choose from.
However, if you find yourself building solutions that aren’t adopted, or if you find yourself treating symptoms instead of solving the root cause, or simply wanting more thought leadership for your dollars, please know that there is a group of local executives who are finding a partnership with 1904labs helpful in achieving better outcomes.
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Read more about our work with clients, and if you're dealing with these frustrations, I'd love to talk with you.
