Your Guide to Breaking Projects Into Manageable Chunks

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Mastering decomposition—the skill of breaking down complexity into manageable chunks—can help if you're easily overwhelmed by anxiety, procrastinate, have difficulty concentrating due to depression, or face executive functioning challenges like ADHD.

Even if decomposition doesn't come naturally to you now, these strategies can be learned with practice. With these techniques, you'll complete more complex projects with less stress.

For this article, the examples will focus on tasks that take perhaps two to 10 hours to complete. First, we'll explore the benefits of decomposition. Then, I'll share practical ways you can improve your skills and start seeing these benefits today.

The Benefits of Becoming Stronger at Decomposition

• Decomposition strengthens your analytical skills and your tool use. It helps you build skills and clear thinking, in a virtuous circle.

• Decomposition gives you some wiggle room. If one part of a task feels hard, you can start with an easier one and allow your unfocused mind to figure out how to approach the harder subproblems in the background.

• Decomposition gives you more frequent rewards. Since work periods involve solving subproblems, they feel more satisfying. You get to check off successful parts along the way.

• Decomposition helps with debugging projects. It makes it easier to see where something has gone wrong.

• Decomposition allows you to test your assumptions early in a process.

• Strong decomposition skills help with applying self-improvement and learning advice. You're better able to extract the most important parts and apply them in your own life.

• Decomposition skills make you easy to work with.

Now that we've established how decomposition can transform your work and your thinking, let's turn to concrete tactics. The following nine techniques will give you specific, actionable ways to break down any complex problem, allowing you to immediately apply these principles to your own challenges.

9 Tips for Decomposing Tasks Like a Great Thinker

This approach works for both technical projects and everyday tasks like planning events or organizing spaces.

1. Define "what" before "how."

First, define what needs to be done before worrying about how to do it.

2. Imagine a tree structure of nested sub-problems.

Suppose you need to write a small program that:

• receives new incoming data daily,

• performs calculations, and

• automatically sends a daily report via email.

These are your three main subproblems. Within them, you can break things down further.

Each subproblem should focus on a single function rather than lumping tasks together. For example, automatically sending the daily email involves two parts: generating it and sending it. Start with a simple test email, like "This is a test email."

3. Start small with the simplest version.

Continuing the example: If your program was going to process 200 lines of data each day, you might first check if it's able to process five lines.

Testing with a simple case allows you to test your assumptions early and troubleshoot more easily.

4. Clear the deck with preprocessing (if needed).

Pre-processing can make it easier to break down the main task.

For example, when cleaning my child's messy room, we start with two trash bags—one for trash and one for recyclables—and remove all of that first. Then, with the clutter reduced, we make a plan for sorting what's left.

5. Set aside 10 percent for decomposition time.

Allocate about 10 percent of your task time to decomposition. This doesn't have to happen all at once—you might do it in stages, like planning your sorting after removing the trash. Expect to revisit decomposition at key points, especially when you hit a roadblock and need to break down how to overcome it.

6. Isolate modules to stay focused.

Reduce dependency through encapsulation.

Think of your task as connected but independent modules. This prevents overwhelm by keeping your focus on just one at a time.

It also keeps problems contained—if one part goes wrong, it won't derail the whole project. By isolating each module, you can tackle them in any order that suits your energy or mood, giving you flexibility without losing progress.

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7. Create reusable components.

Focusing on subproblems with a single function makes it easier to identify processes that can be reused. For example, the procedure of removing trash and recyclables first can be applied as the initial steps for cleaning any room.

8. Practice decomposition until it becomes second nature.

Practice, practice, practice. Decomposition should become your default approach for tackling tasks.

Teaching provides free practice. Teach your child or your supervisees, or write a process document at your job that details how to decompose a common workflow.

Aim to decompose any repeated tasks you do, like meal planning. Look at all your complex tasks through the lens of decomposition.

9. Consider making an AI chatbot your teammate.

To improve your skills, I recommend working on decomposing a task with an AI chatbot. I've found that this can make the process feel less lonely and daunting, as it's like having an endlessly patient and enthusiastic teammate.

If you don't have an approach in mind, ask the chatbot to generate the first plan, then refine it by saying, "That's not right because…" If its suggestions are too far off track, ask it to take a deep breath and return to first principles, or keep asking if there's a simpler way to approach the task. Use constraints as a thinking tool—ask it how you could straighten up your house in the next 30 minutes because someone judgmental is about to arrive.

While AI tools can be helpful, they're not essential. These decomposition strategies work just as effectively with a notebook, a friend, or a colleague.

Decomposition Can Become One of Your Greatest Strengths

Decomposition transforms crushing challenges into achievable steps. By breaking down complexity, you'll not only complete more tasks but enjoy the process along the way. Start with one project today and watch how this skill transforms your approach to work.