Handling the small details

We've discussed the necessity to fulfill your small commitments as a stepping stone for fulfilling larger commitments. We can expand this thinking -- handling the small details well enables you to focus on bigger things.

In product development, we have many details to be concerned about:

• consistent code formatting
• testing new code
• testing the system
• ensuring there are no errors or DRC violations on a PCB layout
• generating a documentation package (including BOM) for each PCB release
• generating documentation for each project release
• notifying relevant people when things change
• reviewing code changes
• organizing parts in the lab and in production
• deploying software updates
• publishing various communications
• ensuring everyone on the team has access to needed information

We can do all of the above manually, and it is not a big deal to do once. However, these details soon start to pile up until pretty soon that can be all a person does. Fortunately, there is a better way -- all of the above can be handled to some degree with intelligent workflow, automation, and tooling.

We have so many good options for automation available today -- scripting languages, APIs, CI/CD systems, flexible DRC engines in CAD tools, Git based workflows, commercial tools and services, etc. Implementing and using these tools is not always easy and requires an investment in time and learning. However, this is much easier than manually managing tons of details forever and frees you to focus on more important things.