Part 5 · 2 chapters · ~12 min

Shipping Speed vs Quality, Decided per Decision

One-way and two-way doors, which decisions deserve care (APIs, schemas, money, security, data), which deserve speed (UI behind flags, copy, internal tools), quality that is never optional (correctness of money, accessibility, privacy), and technical debt taken on deliberately.

9

Doors

Jeff Bezos' one-way and two-way doors are the most useful tool here: most decisions are reversible and should be made quickly by the people closest to them.

SPEED VS QUALITY, PER DECISION
one-way doors deserve care; two-way doors deserve speed
a decisiontwo-way doorreversible, cheap to undoone-way doorhard or impossible to undogo fastship, measure, adjustbe carefuldesign review, tests, migration plan
swipe the figure sideways, or tap expand for full screen
1/4
the question
Before arguing speed against quality, ask how expensive the decision is to undo.
how costly is it to undo?the question that settles most debates
10

Deliberate debt

taking on debt on purpose
  1. Name it in the PR: "hard-coded for one loan type; generalise before adding the second".
  2. Record it with a trigger, not a date: "when we add SME loans".
  3. Never take debt on correctness of money, security, privacy or accessibility.
  4. Pay it when the trigger fires, before building on top of it.