Right now, I am sitting in my loft apartment, trying to work. I write "trying" because on the roof above me is a jack hammer (and operator) removing the roof. I'm excited that the building I live in is going to get a 14,000 sq ft roof deck that I will definitely be using next year; however, I'm not happy about this noise or how I can't use the rooftop pool. My tan is seriously fading.

But I doubt you really care about this faded tan…so what's my point?

Under construction = inconvenience

And inconvenience can vary.

However, when you think about it, everything in life is under-construction and nothing is "final." Roads are always being repaired. People are always doing home improvements – or self-improvements, practicing more patience, understanding, or acceptance.

Even Web sites, apps and customer experiences are always under construction.

Talk to anyone working at some dot-com, app or in a corporate Web team and they are always working on the next release. No one can see the "construction" (development) team, but back at their offices on a staging environment, there are a number of updates and enhancements being tested by team members, busy making sure things work.  

Or else, people are launching new features as a "test." There may be 2, 3 or more versions of a page or workflow out there that users are actively using to give active feedback. Version testing can make users comparing their experience go mad – how can a site have 2 looks? But it is a great way to see which approach is best for an audience.

It's under construction. Workflow. Page design. Color palette. Word choices.

Call centers are also always under construction. Someone may redo the IVR to optimize call routing, or a script may get updated to resolve caller issues faster. New processes are always being tweaked and adjusted based on metrics and performance. 

But should under construction mean inconvenience if everything is always changing? Shouldn't we expect a good experience – or at least a notification of the inconvenience – so it can be avoided? Imagine if Web changes were happening on the fly, all the time, all day long. And I'm not talking about refreshed news articles – how about navigation updates by the second? Or let's say a purchase flow on an e-commerce site that breaks when you purchase because they keep fiddling with it?

We are inconvenienced with construction updates because that is "expected." It's ok to have weird, ill-labelled detours. It's ok for dirt and dusty to fly around. It's ok for these equipment items to be noisy. What if we were in a world where construction was quiet and it didn't make noise? What if a building went up quietly without a lot of fuss? Just something to think about…

What if we didn't expect anything under construction to be an inconvenience anymore?

What are your thoughts?