Self story: Explore every possibility until you're out of options.

Self story: Explore every possibility until you're out of options.

Two days before my wedding in 2012, I was fixing the solar water pipe for the guest house where our guests would be staying (there were no electric geysers in that house). Initially, I thought it would be simple, but I ended up getting a plumber and visiting around ten hardware shops to find a specific connector.

At that time, I would explore all possible options for any issue, whether personal or professional. Over time, this approach became second nature and helped me delve into details. 

However, I eventually realized that this was affecting my speed of delivery. So, I started focusing on details only when necessary. For example, while designing a quick IC workbook for a client, I pushed the team to go into details because a new client contact was overseeing the plan. He asked many questions, and our in-depth analysis enabled us to quickly answer and finalize the design.

Conversely, with a tough client who needed to compare affiliation data across two sources, I advised the team to keep it high-level. The team was worried the client would question us, but I knew the affiliation data wasn't perfect and the client wouldn't delve into the details.

Learning to go in-depth on every issue taught me when to deep dive and when not to. Breadth comes easily, but only breadth will not help in today's world. Depth takes time and effort and once you have depth, you can easily flex between depth & breadth as and when necessary.

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Read past stories like above at https://lnkd.in/d9ijze8r