When you have a project you want to do, there are going to be bits you really need to think about and bits that you really need to debate with people.

But there are also bits you don’t.

So do those.

I’ve been in meetings where because the overall issue was big and needed thought, people spent time on the piddling easy and obvious stuff. I realise it’s a way of churning over the detail and processing it, but you end up with people raising objections that are word for word an issue you’ve already said to them. Where you said there’s thing we’ll need to look at, they come back with yeah, but we can’t do this entire project because of this thing. It’s the same thing but they tell you it like it’s news and they tell you it like that’s the end of the deal instead of an issue to fix.

They might be right but, jaysis, it’s irritating.

You also get objections that are simply embarrassing. Again, they come from this process of churning and thinking, they’re half-formed but again you have to deal with them. I was in a meeting three weeks ago where I said “Tough tum tiddly” about a potential problem someone raised. I got the gig, too, so maybe I should say tough tum tiddly more.

When you’re in the throes of this though, give them the time to think and give them the respect that they may know more than you do. But if it looks like it’s going to take a long time and that time will be spent on the embarrassingly tough tum tiddly details, make the call. Is it good enough to continue despite this, are any of their objections useful, are they ever going to get this thing done?

Too often the answers are all no. In which case, take it away and do it yourself or do it somewhere else.

And, by the way, tough tum tiddly.