Product Management
Behind schedule
21 Jul 2025
A team is running late. Their launch was supposed to be 6 weeks ago. They missed it. They’re still one feature short. What now?
First, dig out of the hole. Then make sure this never happens again.
The Truth About Deadlines
Your date and scope? They’re made up. Even customer commitments in contracts—someone invented those details. You already blew the deadline. Your new date is "ASAP."
That scope? It started vague. It grew as you planned. Now it’s a monster.
Ship dates and feature lists are proxies for value. Nobody cares if you hit the deadline with a useless product. But value is hard to define. It takes time to measure. So people pick dates and features instead. Those feel controllable.
They’re not.
Get Out Now
The way out? Focus on value.
What do you actually need to ship? What’s the absolute minimum before customers can use this? Can you ship today?
You’re one feature short. So what? How valuable is that feature really?
Be ruthless. Make uncomfortable cuts.
Leave things unfinished. Hide them. Delete them. Your team will want to "just finish" that almost-done feature. Don’t let them. That’s how you get even later.
"But we only need one more day!"
Great. Ship now. Finish it tomorrow. When that "one day" turns into a week, at least you’ve already shipped something.
The Real Question
What matters more—the feature or the date?
Both are arbitrary. They exist to create value. So what value are you creating?
Launching at a conference with marketing lined up? Hit the date. Cut features.
Meeting regulatory requirements? You can’t cut scope. Accept the delay.
Stop Doing This
"We’re a day late and a feature short" happens when you build too much at once. Big batches hide problems. They take longer than expected. Scope creeps.
That "quick addition" that takes two hours? You added twenty of them. Two hours times twenty is a week. Maybe two.
With big batches, some teams finish early. They get bored. They start new things. Now you have more unfinished work. More loose ends to tie up. More delays.
Ship Small, Ship Often
Ship more frequently. Learn what actually matters. Circle closer to the target with each release.
When the deadline hits, you’ll have something valuable. Every time.
The Psychology Problem
Behind schedule? Most teams make it worse. They double down. "Work harder!" they cry.
Working harder on the wrong things doesn’t create value. It creates exhaustion.
The hardest part isn’t technical. It’s admitting you were wrong. Your estimates? Too optimistic. Your scope? Too big.
That’s not failure. That’s reality.
Ship Different
Good teams use deadlines as filters. Time for three features instead of five? Perfect. Now you know which two didn’t matter.
This isn’t lowering standards. It’s raising them.
Don’t ship five mediocre features late. Ship three excellent features on time. Or ship the parts that matter from all five.
Your users will thank you. Your stakeholders will trust you.
Build Better Habits
The fix isn’t better estimates. It’s smaller batches. More frequent shipping.
Ship every two weeks, not every three months. Being "late" means a week, not a quarter.
Frequent shipping forces honest conversations. You can’t hide behind status reports when you deploy every week. Progress becomes real, not theoretical.
Ship small. Ship often. Stop being late.