It starts with a simple idea.
“Let’s tweak the website.”
“Maybe I should start a newsletter.”
“It’s time to launch a course… or add a shop…”
Every one of these thoughts has come out of my mouth. And every one of them has led to a project that was way bigger than I expected.
The challenge? Starting all of these projects…only to realize they’re much more involved than you thought.
What you thought might take a few hours of your brain space is taking weeks - or months - of thinking.
Yet the projects don’t stop being added.
Things pile up.
Half-started projects clutter your workspace, your brain.
Until suddenly, every time you sit down to work on the business, you’re faced with anxiety, decision fatigue, and an overwhelming question:
Where do I even begin?
Because you’re drowning in Zombie Projects.
“Zombie Projects” are projects that refuse to die.
You start them, but they never really end. Why?
Because they have squishy scope and no defined end state.
What is a squishy scope?
For example, updating your website.
- Are you updating the brand? What elements of the brand?
- Are you restructuring the site organization?
- Are you updating the copy? Are you updating the offers, or just homepage copy?
A website refresh can take a few hours. A quick copy update, a couple of tweaks, done.
But my current “website project”? It’s a total brand reset—branding, copy, offer structure, site architecture.
Started in November. Wrapping up in April.
I'm investing at least 5 hours per week of my time, alongside a number of expert partners, with tight deadlines to avoid the whole project stalling out. But I knew that would be the case and planned for that at the beginning when I hired everyone.
But when projects have a squishy scope, you’re never really sure how to start, and never really clear when to end.
What is an undefined end state?
An example project I often encourage is a client research project.
The start is clear: find a handful of your ideal clients and do a series of interviews with them about why they chose you and/or made a decision, what were the alternatives they were choosing from, etc.
But the the end can be murky.
- Did I use the right questions, or should I go back with different questions?
- I did 5 interviews, but my goal was 10? Should I keep going?
- Is it enough to read through my transcripts or notes, or do I need to create a formal Voice of Customer document?
Without a firm "you can stop now" signal (which I often provide for my clients) these projects can end up floating in the state of “not quite finished", even if you actually got the majority of the results.
How to avoid “zombie projects”
- Don’t start complex projects until you’ve defined your scope. Collect ideas, collect resources as you come across ideas, but leave those projects in a “backlog” state. Don’t actively start projects until you’ve thought through the scope and steps involved.
- Come up with your minimum viable end point. What’s the smallest chunk of work that you can do to make progress? Instead of one amorphous project, plan instead to tackle smaller, more concrete chunks.
- Declare a finish line before your project drags you down. Focus on completion of what’s there, rather than perfection. Like many people, I don’t always like the end point of projects, finishing the documentation, dotting the final Is. I get bored and want to move on. And in most projects? The final 5% might not matter. Depending on the project, it’s better to close it out at 95% complete than let it linger for weeks or months until you’re ready for 100% completion. You can always come back to that final 5% when the time is right, if you need to.
In a world full of distractions, we always want to take on more. But where can you cut scope or declare "good enough", so you can keep moving forward instead of staying stuck, putting those Zombie Projects to rest.
If your "projects list" is full of Zombie Projects and you need a plan to tackle them, join this month’s Deeper Business Dialogue, where we’ll talk about project definition, prioritization and delegation so you stay in motion instead of stuck.