Product Launch

Launches fail in two opposite ways. Some get a date before they are ready, and the work that was not done gets squeezed into the last week. Others are not launched at all: a real change ships as a line in the changelog and nobody notices.

Both come from skipping the same first question - how big a launch does this deserve? - and then setting a date before checking whether the work behind it exists.

When to use

The user is planning a launch, choosing a launch date, deciding whether something is worth announcing, or has a launch that keeps slipping.

Do not use this to make every release into an event. A launch is a claim on your audience's attention, and spending it on small changes trains people to ignore the one that matters.

Before you start