Why We Need Better Ways of Working, Not Just Faster Ones

The software industry loves speed. Fast iterations & fast feedback loops. And don’t get me wrong—speed matters. But somewhere along the way, “faster” became the goal instead of a side effect of working well. This post is a reflection (and a bit of a rant) on why chasing speed without structure burns teams out, buries quality, and ultimately slows us down.

Fast ≠ Efficient

Shipping something quickly feels good. You get that dopamine hit. You close a ticket, push to production, and see it live. Done, right?

But then:

• QA reports edge-case bugs.
• Support gets questions because the UI was confusing.
• Product reopens the ticket because it wasn’t quite what they envisioned.
• Oh, and now it’s blocking another feature because of a rushed architectural shortcut.

So that “2-day ticket”? You just spent two weeks orbiting around it in various Slack threads, meetings, and patch fixes.

What went wrong?

• Lack of clarity up front: the goal was “ship fast,” not “solve the problem well.”
• No shared understanding of what done means.
• No time for testing, docs, or even a short post-merge reflection.

This isn’t uncommon—it’s a pattern. And it’s not fixed by “going faster next time.”

What “Better Ways of Working” Actually Means

A better way of working isn’t about adding bureaucracy or slowing down innovation. It’s about creating clarity so that people can move confidently.

It means:

• Clear communication over constant pings.
• Teams that document decisions—not to cover themselves, but to align.
• Ticket scopes that are realistic, not aspirational.
• Reviews that focus on intent and outcome, not just code style.

You can’t go fast if you don’t know where you’re going. Better working habits reduce backtracking, minimize “did we check this?” moments, and protect focus.

The Myth of “Move Fast and Break Things”

That phrase made sense when you were building a prototype and trying to disrupt an industry from a garage. But if you’re working on a platform used by real customers—or even just your own teammates—reckless speed is a liability.

Mature products require stability

Mature products can’t afford chaos, if you have stakeholders relying on your products, you cant just go haywire and break stuff. It takes time, especially if the product is struggling with tech debt.

Don't forget, trust takes time to earn, and seconds to lose.

Signs Your Process Needs Work (Even if You’re Shipping Fast)

You might be moving fast, but here are red flags that you're heading into tech debt hell:

• You’re constantly firefighting.
• Devs are afraid to refactor.
• Everyone’s asking “Who owns this?” or “What does this even do?”
• People are busy, but not aligned.

Sustainable Speed Comes From Better Foundations

Want to actually move fast and stay sane? Build systems that support that goal.

Small, well-defined tickets

If you can’t describe the task clearly in a couple of sentences, it’s not ready.

Async-first habits

I'm probably gonna get a lot of flak for saying this, but, not every conversation needs a meeting. Use docs, comments, RFCs or even chat tools.

Shared understanding of “done.”

Done doesn’t mean “it compiles.” It means “it solves the problem and is safe to ship.”

Tooling that supports you, not babysits you.

Use linters, tests, and CI/CD pipelines to catch mistakes early—not to enforce compliance, but to give developers confidence.