← Scope & Feature Creep

The Parking Lot: Saying "Not Now" to Feature Creep

Every feature is code you have to keep forever. Three questions, one rule and a weekly ritual to stop scope creep.

Beginner 7 min read Free lesson

Feature creep doesn't feel like creep while it's happening. Each addition is small and reasonable, and the AI makes each one take only ten minutes. But ten-minute features add up, and every one of them is code you now have to test, secure, and maintain forever.

The rule

Nothing gets built unless it's in the current spec. Everything else goes in the parking lot.

The parking lot is just the "Not in v1" section of your spec, or a label in your issue tracker. Writing an idea down means you won't lose it, so it's easier to say not now.

The three questions

Before anything moves from the parking lot into the build, ask:

  1. Who asked for it? A real user, or you at midnight? Count actual requests.
  2. What breaks if we don't build it? If the answer is "nothing", it waits.
  3. What will it cost to keep? Not the cost to build it, the cost to keep it. Every feature needs tests, adds screens for support to learn, and adds surface for security bugs.

Watch out for AI "helpfulness"

Coding agents love to add things you didn't ask for: a settings page, dark mode, an export button, a caching layer "for performance". Each one is unreviewed scope.

Add this to your project instructions file:

Only implement what the current task asks for.
Do not add features, settings, or abstractions that were not requested.
If you believe something extra is needed, stop and ask.

Then read the diff before you accept it. If the change touches files that have nothing to do with the task, reject it and ask again with a narrower prompt.

A weekly ritual

Once a week, spend 15 minutes on the parking lot:

  • Delete ideas nobody has mentioned since last week.
  • Merge duplicates.
  • Promote at most one item into the next spec, and only if it passes the three questions.

Signs you're creeping

  • Your v1 launch date has moved more than once.
  • You're building admin features before anyone uses the main feature.
  • You describe the product with "and" more than twice.
  • The AI session started as a bug fix and ended with a new page.

If two of those are true, stop, re-read your spec, and ship what you have.

Next lesson

Git Is Your Undo Button →