“Ambiguity implies unresolved conflict”– Chapter 16

--Originally published at Meeting the Deadline

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For me, this chapter is special, because it gives us a perspective not many people have, or at least one that many ignore or doubt the truth behind it. And it is important because it applies to the real world and to our very lives.

As the title of this post says, ambiguity implies unresolved conflict. But what does this mean?

It means that, instead of resolving conflict (regarding projects, among people, or even in oneself) people paper over it with ambiguity; because ambiguity evades commitment, responsibility. It’s like a patch that “works” for political reasons, or just for making a deadline. But there is no real value to it, and when the time comes to really understand the situation, one can only get confused.

That’s the case with documentation the gang is analyzing and reviewing about a very important project that never saw the light of the day.

The documents are large, they say nothing, and they are supposedly specification documents.

In reality, a specification is a statement of how a system (a set of planned responses) will react to events in the world immediately outside its borders. It is basically a set of inputs, outputs and the reasons behind that transformation.

Sometimes, people can enter conflicts, of interests, ideas, you name it. When that happens in a project and a specification must be delivered, ambiguity is the most used tool because it allows the creators to avoid being specific and technically “get the job done by not disagreeing with nobody”. But his is dangerous.
Not only the documents are useless, but the whole project; that ambiguity can lead to failure, in both project management and the real life and real relationships.

For that, one must avoid it. How, you could say? Continue reading "“Ambiguity implies unresolved conflict”– Chapter 16"

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