Sustainable pace as a design constraint

Wednesday, February 5, 2025

I’ve always been a believer in maintaining a sustainable pace. Many organisations, especially in agency-land, fail to prioritise it, leading to unhappy teams, high staff turnover, and - most critically - missed opportunities to build the institutional knowledge and strong culture of delivery that high-performing teams rely on.

I’ve heard some take a mercenary view, arguing that the cost of burnout can be offset by a strong recruitment function. But I think that stinks. People are not objects. And it doesn’t solve the main problem anyway: that churning through staff erodes culture and institutional knowledge, which are the real foundations of long-term value.

A sustainable pace benefits teams by providing reassurance that working hours and the pressure to deliver will be reasonable. Rightly, it’s often discussed alongside team welfare, mental health, and work-life balance. But it shouldn’t be mistaken for simply “doing less” to preserve those things. It doesn’t absolve us of our responsibility to work efficiently, deliver value for money, and achieve good financial results. Our clients and stakeholders rightly expect those things.

Sustainable pace is a scary idea for some clients, especially those who come from a culture of overwork. Those clients might need a parallel reassurance that we’re not simply insisting on prioritising our own interests by doing less in a billable day. (By the way, if you are doing this, stop - it’s a trap - and a competitive disadvantage against your less scrupulous peers.)

Instead, think of sustainable pace as the driving reason to improve ways of working. As the primary reason to make the investments you make in tools, training, collaboration, and refining your delivery processes. As a design constraint you impose on yourself to drive long-term value.

Delivery is a marathon, not a sprint - but marathons require training.