April 22, 2025
by Stephen T. Messenger
I was invited to speak at an event in Philadelphia last week and excitedly began the over two-hour trek from farm country to urban sprawl. The event was at 5:00 pm, and I quickly realized I was competing with rush hour traffic, three major accidents, and an afternoon Phillies game. As the cows faded to busier highways and then gridlocked motorists, my 90-minute buffer quickly shrunk to ten.
Infuriatingly, the last three miles took 35 minutes. The last mile took 15.
Isn’t that the way with many projects. We start excited to tackle a new thing, pour our energy into getting to the 90% mark, and then realize getting across the finish line is the hardest and most frustrating. Like traffic, everything converges at once with the final details, nuances, and task completion sapping our energy.
Yet while the hardest part is often closing the mission out, it’s also what separates the good from the great. A leadership imperative is to finish the task at all costs. This is not a “nice-to-have” quality, it’s required.
The Closer
In Major League Baseball, the closer is the pitcher that enters the game in the last inning when their team is up by three runs or fewer. At this point, 24 outs (89%), have already been recorded, and the closer must get the final three. The other eight innings are now meaningless, and the win or loss falls on them. Their only job is to finish.
Completing a project is much like a closer. We have one task: get the job done. When we’re facing the final three outs of our project, we must have the same mentality. Close the game out and prepare for the next one.
The Last Ten Percent
The 90/10 Rule for projects states that the last 10% of the project will take 90% of the time. One of the reasons is that most projects remain hidden from the public until completed, with the end being the first time anyone sees them. Hence, we want everything to be perfect during the great reveal which naturally induces stress into our system.
Second, we stave off the harder or less enjoyable parts of the project for the end, wanting to do the fun and comfortable tasks in the beginning. Third, last minute complications often throw a curve into our plans. Finally, the end often requires less group work and more individual detail, so the team disappears to focus on other things while we’re left holding the ball.
I’ve seen this many times in my own life. I’m currently working on an article with a coworker that took a short time to write, but the final review phase is seemingly taking forever. It has gone through three peer-review feedback rounds, each one requiring a rethink of our writing.
The stress of having it as concise as possible for the public is agonizingly painful. Moreover, editing is not my favorite part, the journal needs a different format than what we wrote, and much of my help moved on to work on the next project, along with some of my motivation. The last 10% is certainly the hardest… and most important.
Closing Out the Last Ten Percent
The four identified challenges above are real, but there are ways to prevent us from striking out in the ninth. Instead of being captured by these four pitfalls, we need to plan for them.
1. It Must Be Perfect. Going into any project, we have to accept that perfection is impossible to attain. There’s even a project management mantra that encourages us to get the project to 90% and call it good. While this satisfies our desire to close out the task, getting those last three outs are still a thing.
However, a better way of looking at this is by the value it provides. As we close it out, we should ensure the project, while perhaps not perfect, delivers the answer to the problem. For my car ride, that meant getting to the event on time, even if just barely. For a closer, it’s three outs with a walk or two. For an article, it’s a solid piece that might not be perfect but is pretty darn good. In the end, it’s about a value-driven result.
2. I Hate That Part of It. All of us have strengths and weaknesses, passions and dreads. There will be parts of the project we are naturally drawn to and parts we never want to do. It’s so important to understand where those areas are and plan for them ahead of time.
One technique is to knock out the frustrating tasks early. The beginning and middle are when we’re still motivated to be productive. For me and writing, I hate citations. A better technique is to complete full footnotes as I go instead of curse them at the end. By cranking the less desirable tasks out now, we don’t face them when we’re mentally done.
3. Surprise Complications. Life will always throw us a curveball. Honestly, there’s not much good advice besides: expect delays, plan in extra time for the unknown, and be comfortable when things fall apart.
A closer entering to take down the final three batters knows which ones he’s going to face and reads the scouting reports. But when a pitch hitter comes in, their plans have to shift. The best thing to do is know multiple scouting reports, plan for ambiguity, and attack the problem in front of us.
4. Everybody Left but Me. If we’re leading the project, it all comes down to us. I picture that baseball closer in the ninth inning when the coach hands them the ball. They will literally win the game or blow the save – there is no other option. When we’re left holding the ball, it’s up to us to get the project across the line.
A closer is what separates the leaders from the followers. If we have a bunch of 90% completed projects laying around, all we have is a pile of uncompleted work. We get paid to finish the job, and this takes heart, grit, tenacity, and an unwavering desire to finish. It’s a mindset.
Laser Focus on Closing
To complete a project, whether we’re a baseball closer, project manager, or driver of a vehicle, the best way is to have laser focus and relentless pursuit on completion at all costs. Project completion is a desired skill. Going the last mile is not nice to have, it’s a leadership imperative.
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