Make It So (How to Know When to Build the Thing You Can't Find)
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The Big Idea
Picard gives the order last. Most of us say "make it so" before we have asked a single question. Five checks, run in order, tell you whether to build it, borrow it, hand it off, or go do the hard thing first. Can you say it in one sentence? Is the gap real? Does anything already fill it? Do you want the work? Can you start small? If the answers hold, the crew has spoken, and you get to give the order.
"Sometimes building is the most productive-feeling way to avoid the thing you actually need to get done."Jess Webber · Episode 36
Featured Resource
The Make It So Handout
The five checks with plain names and Star Trek names, space to write your own answers, and the preteen magazine quiz version. Built to print.
From This Episode
The BEAT Method Guide
If an idea keeps hitting you at 3 a.m., this free guide walks you through hitting the brakes and auditing before you build anything.
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Full Show Notes ▼
In This Episode
- Why the tool that does 60 percent of what you need leaves you living with a 40 percent gap, and what changed about closing it
- The car seat story: why Jess's mom never got to ask "should I?"
- A fitness plan that worked for plenty of people and still did not fit Jess, and how that became the idea for a new tool
- Why you do not need to be a coder to start: describe it, check what comes back, adjust, repeat
- Check 1, Say It in One Sentence (Captain's Log): the "I need something that does blank for blank" test
- Check 2, the Dodge Check (Holodeck): a real, repeating gap or a more fun way to avoid the hard thing
- Check 3, Look First (Scan the Sector): 30 minutes, not three weeks, and the 80 percent rule for using what already exists
- Check 4, Do You Want the Work (Captain's Chair): wanting it to exist versus wanting to build it, and who owns it after you move on
- Check 5, Build Small, in the Gaps (Engage): a tiny budget, a finish line, and one real person who can use it
- Where you stalled and what it means, so you know exactly what to do next
Memorable Lines
- "Should I is the hardest thing."
- "Sometimes building is the most productive-feeling way to avoid the thing you actually need to get done."
- "You're not naming the gap, you're naming the feeling. And your feelings are valid, but they're not buildable."
- "Please do not build a worse version of a good thing that's already existing out of pride."
- "Done doesn't mean perfect. Done doesn't mean polished. Done means one real person could use it and tell you what worked on it."
Key Themes
- Build, borrow, or hand it off
- The 40 percent gap in one-size-fits-most tools
- "Can I" versus "should I"
- Building as avoidance
- Specific beats fuzzy
- Wanting the result versus wanting the work
- Side quests that do not take over the main quest
- Non-coders building with AI
