Within the last 24 hours I decided I was tired of paying for Typepad and moved my blog to a custom Wordpress installation. Typepad is a good product, but not good enough for me – in fact, I think it was actually detrimental to my blog posting frequency. The backend tools aren’t very responsive and user friendly to me, and the frustrations I went through made blogging a chore.

So, I’ve joined the flock and moved to Wordpress.

Everyone wants to be successful. Entrepreneurs want successful businesses. Athletes want to win. Engineers want to build perfect solutions.

The problem is that most of us try to be successful through grand strategies and big plays. Entrepreneurs hold off on starting a business until they have that "killer app" idea. Baseball players try to hit the home run. Engineers try to design a solution that will address any possible situation. Meanwhile, another company comes out with a better "killer app", the baseball player strikes out trying to "swing for the fence", and the engineer ends up with an over-complicated solution that has to be scrapped because it doesn't work.

As JD Meier reminds us, the key to winning isn't the big play. The key to winning is to build momentum off a series of small wins. By focusing on small goals, small tasks, and small features, we allow ourselves to adapt to change, to measure tangible progress, and to celebrate successes early and often.

Not to get the “details” train started, but I had to laugh when I came across this post at the Business of Software Blog. Bottom line:

“Grand visions are great, but easy. It’s the details that count, and they’re hard.”