How the pressure for immediate results drives tech teams to accumulate technical debt that ultimately costs the business far more.
The Paradox of “Fast” Code
In many companies, productivity is often mistaken for speed. As long as new features are released quickly and the business keeps running, everything seems fine. But behind this illusion of performance lies an invisible burden — technical debt.
As Martin Fowler reminds us in Refactoring: Improving the Design of Existing Code:
Any fool can write code that a computer can understand. Good programmers write code that humans can understand
The “It Works, So It’s Fine” Bias
In many organizations, a dangerous bias quietly takes root — the belief that if the feature is live, then everything must be fine. The business tends to value visible results: as long as a new feature is released and customers can use it, the goal seems achieved. Engineering managers often value speed: delivering faster appears to mean higher productivity and better business outcomes. But in reality, this approach produces code that is often tightly coupled, fragile, and bloated with mixed responsibilities. What seems like a quick win in the short term slowly becomes a long-term trap. Each new feature takes longer to integrate, each bug becomes harder to fix, and the system as a whole starts to move slower and slower.And the money that companies believe they’ve “saved” through the supposed productivity of early development is eventually lost — swallowed by the slower pace of future development and the countless hours spent fixing bug tickets, as new features trigger endless chains of regressions.
The Vicious Cycle of Technical Debt
It often starts with good intentions: the team wants to move fast. Deadlines are tight, the product roadmap is ambitious, and everyone feels the pressure to deliver. So the code gets shipped — quickly, but not cleanly. There’s little time for proper architecture, testing, or documentation. At first, everything seems fine. The feature works, the business is happy, and the sprint review looks great. But soon, small cracks begin to appear. Bugs start to pile up. Fixes take longer than expected. The team slows down, not because they’ve lost motivation, but because the foundation itself has become fragile. Management, seeing the slowdown, pushes to “go faster” to catch up — which only makes things worse. More shortcuts are taken, more compromises are made, and the debt keeps growing. Eventually, developers burn out, the product becomes harder to maintain, and the time saved in the beginning is lost tenfold later.
The Cultural Misunderstanding
Why does this pattern keep repeating itself?
At its core, it’s not just a technical issue — it’s a cultural one.
There’s often a disconnect between product, business, and engineering.
Product teams focus on delivering value to users.
Business teams focus on growth and results.
Engineers focus on building reliable, maintainable systems.
Yet, when these perspectives fail to align, quality becomes the first casualty.
Part of the problem comes from a lack of education about what clean code really means.
Clean code isn’t about elegance or perfectionism — it’s about sustainability. It’s what allows teams to move faster over time, not just this sprint.
Many developers know the buzzwords — SOLID principles, separation of concerns, clean architecture — but few truly understand their depth or feel empowered to defend them when delivery pressure hits.
And so, compromises pile up. What begins as a temporary trade-off turns into a long-term norm.
Finding a Better Balance
I truly believe that speed and quality don’t have to be opposites.
They can — and should — coexist.
Achieving this balance requires more than new tools or processes. It’s about a shift in mindset across the organization:
Building genuine collaboration between product, business, and engineering teams.
Recognizing the real cost of technical debt — not just in code quality, but in lost time, morale, and innovation.
Embracing a culture of continuous refactoring, instead of treating code as disposable.
Educating teams about design principles, not as abstract theory, but as practical tools to sustain long-term agility.
And above all, understanding that clean, testable, and maintainable code isn’t a luxury — it’s what makes long-term speed possible.
When teams adopt this mindset, they stop fighting between “shipping fast” and “building right.”
They start doing both — sustainably.
Code as a True Lever for Productivity
The goal isn’t to write “beautiful code” for the sake of it.
It’s to build a sustainable technical foundation — something that lasts, evolves, and supports the business instead of holding it back.
Clean code isn’t a luxury or an idealistic dream. It’s a long-term productivity strategy.
The day companies realize that clean, well-structured code is an accelerator — not an obstacle — is the day developer productivity will stop being sacrificed on the altar of short-term results.
Because in the end, code isn’t just about making things work.
It’s about making them work better, longer, and together.
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