The Velocity Trap: When Moving Fast Breaks Things.
'Move fast and break things' makes for a great poster. It makes for a terrible business strategy. The SMBs that scale sustainably understand something the growth-at-all-costs crowd doesn't: speed has diminishing returns.
The Illusion of Velocity
Activity isn't progress. Many fast-moving companies are running hard but going nowhere—shipping features nobody uses, chasing deals that don't close, pivoting so often that nothing gets finished.
True velocity is measured by outcomes, not outputs. Revenue growth. Customer retention. Market share. If your velocity isn't moving these numbers, you're just busy.
The most dangerous version of this trap: mistaking fundraising milestones for business progress. Raising money feels like winning, but it's just borrowing future expectations.
Busy ≠ Progressing
The Debt Accumulation Problem
Moving fast always creates debt—technical debt, organizational debt, cultural debt. The question isn't whether to accumulate debt, but whether you're accumulating it intentionally.
Technical debt from shipping quickly can be repaid through refactoring. But organizational debt—unclear responsibilities, inconsistent processes, knowledge silos—compounds faster and costs more to resolve.
Cultural debt is the worst. Every shortcut in hiring, every toxic behavior tolerated, every value compromised for speed creates cultural debt that can take years to repay.
Speed creates debt
Finding the Right Pace
The right pace isn't the fastest possible—it's the fastest sustainable. Sustainable means you can maintain it without burning out your team, compromising quality, or accumulating unmanageable debt.
Different stages require different speeds. Early-stage product development rewards rapid iteration. Scaling operations rewards careful execution. Forcing startup speed on scaling challenges creates chaos.
The best operators have a clear sense of what speed is appropriate for each initiative. They move fast where speed matters and slow down where precision matters.
The Speed Audit
Ask yourself: What are we moving fast on, and why? What debt are we accumulating? What would happen if we slowed down by 20%?
Often, the answer to that last question is revealing. If slowing down by 20% would break your business, you're dependent on unsustainable speed. If it would make no difference, you're probably not as fast as you think.
The goal isn't to move slowly—it's to move deliberately. To know when speed creates value and when it destroys it. To choose your pace rather than let your pace choose you.
Deliberate > Fast
The companies that win long-term aren't the fastest—they're the most sustainable. Build for durability, not just velocity, and you'll outrun the sprinters in the marathon.