“The color of the bikeshed” is best defined by Wikipedia as:
“a proverbial phrase referring to the apparent ease with which one can get agreement on building a large and complex project (such as a billion-dollar atomic reactor) compared to the difficulty of reaching consensus on building something conceptually simple — because everyone involved actually has an opinion and wants to add it.”
This problem occurs around us everyday. Projects, solutions and concepts that we are unfamiliar with or don’t understand we tend to assume that they are correct and accurate because of our lack of our knowledge and understanding about the topic. However, we tend to trivialize and freely give opinions on some of the simplest solutions and projects that usually require little or no input.
Photo Credit: nicolas.boullosa
Sticking to what we do best
We should understand and appreciate the fact that each of us have our own specialized talents and strengths. Just because we can understand a problem and solution, doesn’t necessarily mean that we need to give our opinion to that solution.
An example
The best example uses building a nuclear reactor. Imagine that this nuclear reactor is governed by a board that oversees the company constructing this facility. The board of directors know about operations, management and finance, not the actual construction so they assume that all is going according to plan. They put their trust in those who are constructing the plant and offer no opinions because the board of directors have no idea how to build a nuclear reactor.
However, when the board of directors decide to put coffee in their boardroom they end up spending more time debating over what kind, what type and how much coffee, because they all understand this basic concept.
This is why the phrase “Color of the bikeshed” is used. All of us can understand how to build a bikeshed, so we will give opinions on its construction. However, once we reach ideas and concepts that are over our head (like building a nuclear reactor) we assume that all is going well.
Knowing when to give input
As mentioned above, just because we understand something, that does not mean that we need to give our advice. More often than not, we will end up dragging out the process and wasting, time, money and energy.
