Stop Delaying: Tackle Technical Debt and Documentation Right Now

After the Spring Festival, it’s time to refocus and get back to work.

We often tell ourselves “I’ll do it later,” creating excuses as priorities shift and days turn into weeks without completing the task.

To feel better about procrastination we may fabricate reasons, but the fact remains that the task is unfinished.

When is "now"?

Honestly, "now" isn’t truly present, and "later" never arrives. The present follows the actions you take, but don’t let it slip into a vague future you’ll never have time for.

Three Types of Action

Three behaviors influence whether you truly “do it later”:

Write it down immediately – use a planner, sticky note, or an app.

Trust your memory – sincerely believe you won’t forget the task over time.

Speak it out loud – you may be lowering the task’s priority and likely won’t act on it.

In this framework, I rank actions by the visibility of the task, from most to least visible. The more visible a task is, the harder it is to postpone because you receive more reminders (or annoyances) that it’s unfinished.

Memory is a limited resource affected by cognitive load, age, stress, and fatigue, which reduces both recall and motivation.

In short, the longer a task stays in your mind, the less likely it becomes visible and gets done.

Technical Scenarios

These behaviors appear most often in two technical contexts.

Technical Debt

Technical debt is inevitable in project ecosystems. While the term sounds negative, debt itself isn’t always a problem; it’s how we handle it.

When we ignore technical debt or assume we’ll remember to fix it later, we create no concrete action plan. Over time, the effort required to address it grows, and deprioritizing it can make it the worst‑case scenario – never getting resolved.

A purposeful approach can increase the chances of reducing or avoiding debt. Debt won’t disappear overnight, but intentional actions accelerate progress.

When you notice technical debt, record it and share it with the team. Encourage a habit of documenting debt, perhaps in a dedicated meeting space, and incorporate the outcomes into sprint planning for conscious resolution.

Taking deliberate steps to reduce technical debt creates real momentum and makes work more manageable for you and your team.

Documentation

Developers often postpone writing documentation, viewing it as boring and unnecessary until someone urgently needs it.

If I claim I’m not guilty of this behavior, I’m lying. When I’m in a flow state, I’ll eventually return to add inline comments or update the README, but that delay can cause loss of context.

Documentation is never excessive; it is one of the ultimate safeguards in software development. Without it, knowledge about why code was written can disappear, making onboarding and future work harder.

Writing documentation after building a feature is painful, but acting now prevents future headaches.

Take Initiative Now

If you struggle to act immediately, that’s okay—just don’t fall into the “I’ll do it later” trap.

Make work visible and apply calendar pressure to it. If you want to finish something, act now!!!

Author: 大雄