Speed matters because it lowers the activation energy needed to start a task. If tasks feel quick, the perceived cost of doing it is lower and you are more likely to do it. Conversely, if tasks feel like a slog, you are much less likely to do it because the perceived cost will feel higher.
Organizations operate like this too. The parts that are slow are unlikely to be improved without major effort and even then, it could get worse. One of the highest leverage things you can do is increasing the speed in which changes can be made to previously slow tasks.
Read Speed matters: Why working quickly is more important than it seems.
See also:
- Work faster not smarter is a similar observation that speeding up the things you spend a lot of time on increases overall productivity
- I tried to sum this up (poorly before) in speed is undervalued
- Typing fast is thinking with your hands
- How to write software fast
Links to this note
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I read Speed x AI from Nfx. It says that founders need to move much faster or those leveraging generative AI will leave you in the dust.