When Thomas Edison was in quest of inventing the electric light bulb, he didn't get it right the first time. In a well-documented exchange, Edison was told that he had failed 700 times in his attempts to make the breakthrough he sought. In response, he said, "I have not failed 700 times. I have not failed once! I have succeeded in proving that those 700 ways would not work!" What we can learn from the king of perseverance is that failing often and quickly is one of the best ways to increase the likelihood of success, and do so sooner.

However most developers and architects, especially those building services, want to minimize the number of times they spend rebuilding anything – and for good reason. Development is expensive. Architecture takes time. So, doing things over is rarely an option. Indeed, while we often hear the refrain, "I don't have time to do it right, but I have time to do it over" we tend to shake our heads in disdain. Yet, perhaps there is a kernel of truth in that refrain. From the Edisonian perspective, trying to get things right increases the penalty for failure. If you can only afford to do things once, it had better be right or you just wasted a lot of time, money, and resources.