In a recent conversation, a friend mentioned he creates proof of concepts and then discards them after testing their viability. I’ve done the same in the past. This time it didn’t feel right. I cringed when he said he threw away to the code. Maybe my days as a business owner has turned me into a froogle goat, but it felt like he was throwing away value.

Why don’t we continue forward with a proof of concept?

Generally when I think of a proof of concept its hastily assembled. Many of the “best practices” are short-cutted if not downright ignored. The goal is to test the feasibility an idea. At some point you’ll realize if the solution will work. Then you’ll decide if it’s time to walk away from the idea and ditch the proof of concept or move forward with the idea. If you move forward with the idea, why not keep coding and turn the proof of concept into the real deal?

I’ll be honest here, it seems ridiculous that you’d create a solution and then throw it away just to create it again. That’s like poorly painting an entire house just to see if you like the color. “Yep, the color is good. Let’s paint the house for reals this time and this time we’ll do a good job.”

There is another way. Evolve the code. Add in the missing infrastructure. This has the possibility of growing into a long term healthy solution.

Walking away from a proof of concept costs you value (time and money) that might otherwise be captured. Even if you don’t capture 100%, you’ll still be better off than just chucking everything and walking away. So next time, give it a try. See if you can morph a proof of concept into a sustainable project. I think you might be surprised at the end result.