The Perfect Test Suite for the Wrong Features
Over-engineering will kill your startup
Last week, a founder showed me their “bulletproof” testing suite.
100% code coverage. Automated everything. Tests for features they hadn’t even built yet.
Their MVP was already two months late. When users finally saw it, the feedback was …… OH — WAIT — it’s two months late, NO ONE HAS SEEN IT.
All that perfect testing? For a product that yet to see the light of day.
Ok, well, that was not true — I WAS THE FOUNDER. I had built this beautiful science experiment of complexity and had this awesome three tier test suite of over 500 tests and not ONE customer had put their hands on it. I looked in the mirror and thought — IDIOT! While I was ahead of the curve in many aspects because the ide had been properly validated, I had still wasted many hours that could have been time getting valuable feedback.
Ever heard the joke about the mechanic who was always late for work because his car kept breaking down?
I told this story to a fellow founder (whom I adore) and it became the inspiration for this little ramble.
Over-engineering isn’t just writing too much code.
It’s building elaborate legal structures before your first sale. Creating detailed employee workflows when you’re still figuring out what business you’re in. Designing approval processes for two people who share a desk.
I learned this the expensive way (sad truth - as humans, we mostly learn after it hurts).
In my corporate days, and before the Agile Movement had really taken shape (yes, I am that old) we would spend months building the “definitive” technical architecture. Every system, perfectly integrated. Every edge case anticipated. Documentation that would make enterprise architects weep with joy.
We built it exactly as designed. It was technically flawless.
Customers didn’t care. The market had moved. We’d solved yesterday’s problem with tomorrow’s complexity.
The real trap isn’t complexity itself — it’s complexity at the wrong time.
Your early legal structure should match your current revenue, not your exit fantasies (insert my rant on building Ft Knox around a $5 bill). Your first processes should handle today’s chaos, not imaginary scale problems. Your initial tests should catch the bugs that actually break user experiences.
Start with duct tape and clear intentions.
Build the minimum structure that lets you learn fast. Everything else can be refactored when you understand what you’re actually creating.
The most dangerous question in early-stage building IS “how will this scale?” -
SMACK whoever asks it and instead ask:
“should this exist at all?”
What’s the most beautifully over-engineered solution you’ve built for a problem that didn’t matter?