What happens when your deployment pipeline consistently shows failing tests, but your team needs to keep shipping? In this episode, Gino and Wayne share a real-world example of how one organization created an "amber state" - where code compiles but tests fail, and treated it as "good enough" for deployment.

Wayne and Gino explore the dangerous psychology behind this common workplace pattern: when feedback becomes untrustworthy, teams stop listening to it entirely. The result? Quality silently erodes while everyone pretends the system is working.

In this episode, we discuss:

• How the amber light anti-pattern destroys test discipline
• Why "defects vs bugs" classifications create similar problems
• The connection between failing CI/CD and "almost done" Kanban columns
• When radical solutions (like deleting your entire test suite) make sense
• How good intentions around "unblocking" teams lead to quality debt

Timestamps:
0:00 - The Amber Light Anti-Pattern Exposed

1:45 - Why 90% Failed Tests Became "Good Enough"

4:00 - The Hidden Psychology of Ignoring Quality

5:14 - Defects vs Bugs: Another Dangerous Distinction

6:41 - "Almost Done" Columns: The Kanban Version

8:21 - The Nuclear Option: Delete Your Tests

Key insight: If you don't trust your feedback system enough to act on it, remove it entirely rather than work around it.

This is a shorter episode focusing on one powerful anti-pattern that many development teams will recognize. Whether you're dealing with flaky tests, unreliable builds, or teams that have learned to ignore quality signals, this conversation offers both diagnosis and cure.

Got a workplace situation where good intentions led to bad outcomes? We'd love to hear about it for a future episode.

Contact us at feedback@goodintentionsbadoutcomes.org