Why do we use the word “sunsetting”? What other words could we have used?
Decommissioning: We could write about decommissioning. Decommissioning captures some of what we mean. It is a process. But it sounds sterile and formal. Are we docking a naval vessel into port and filling it with mothballs?
Shut down: We could say we’re talking about shutting things down, but that’s just a technical piece to the work. “Shut down” is about the mechanics involved but misses too much of the human. Sunsetting something isn’t as easy as flipping a switch.
Winding down: Gives the impression that projects and services are just wind up toys and then just continue to walk under their own power until they wind down. This one minimizes the ongoing, often hidden, work that happens in order to maintain something.
Killing off: We could say we’re killing off projects, but that sounds too brutal and bloody. In some cases this
Pulling the plug: Continuing on with the gruesome theme. This one is too traumatic. Such a difficult choice to make.
Death: In some ways we are writing about the death of projects and services.
A lot of the options for naming this kind of activity are insensitive to the social aspects of the work. We want to recognize that this can be uncomfortable and emotional work. In some cases you’ll be considering sunsetting a product that was someone’s successful idea or that they put months of effort into. It is difficult to consider killing off someone’s “baby”.
For these reasons we prefer the term sunsetting. Sunsets can be beautiful. We’ll cover more later about how to soften the blow. They can be gradual–you’re not just pulling the plug but making the necessary plans. Sometimes there’s a twilight period for a project before its day is over.
By trying to pick our terminology carefully we hope to break through some other barriers in our thinking. We work in libraries and archives, so our natural inclination as librarians is to preserve. Pulling the plug on something isn’t an option without considering preserving it in some way. Preservation can certainly factor into approaches selected, but we need to modify our expectations on what can be preserved and to what extent.
Page Updated: 2018-04-08