I am often wrong
- ID
- 26785
- Status
- summarized
- Published
- 21 Sep 2026, 12:41 AM
- Fetched
- 22 Sep 2026, 8:17 PM
- Provider
- Hacker News
- Category
- dev-community
- Original URL
- https://borischerny.com/management,/product/2026/09/19/I-am-often-wrong.html
- Source URL
- https://hnrss.org/best
Summary
- Score
- 4.5
- Created
- 22 Sep 2026, 9:25 PM
- Tags
- Audience
- developersvibe_coderssaas_founders
What happened
Boris Cherny shares a six-step iterative problem-solving framework—understand available info, gather missing info, define the problem, define a simple approach, define a goal, act with urgency—and argues that being wrong is valuable because new data forces redefining steps 3-5. He identifies the most common failure mode as poorly defining the problem or choosing an overly complex approach.
Why it matters
The concrete takeaway is a checklist you can apply today: before building, explicitly write down the problem definition and the simplest possible approach, then get feedback in real time before acting. If your plan feels complex, that's a signal you've skipped step 3 or 4, not that the problem is inherently hard.
Discussion angle
Where does 'define a clear and simple approach' break down when building with AI agents—does the speed of iteration make the churn healthier or just noisier?