The Big Lie of “Good, Fast, Cheap”

One of them is never optional, and sometimes you can’t even pick two.

Surely you’ve heard it before. The iron triangle of service: good, fast, cheap — pick two. You can never have all three, as the saying goes.

Cheap + Fast = low quality
Good + Cheap = too slow
Fast + Good = expensive

I have so many problems with this popular triangle of choice. It’s built on a foundation of fallacies. One of the choices is pointless, and another doesn’t even exist.

“Good” shouldn’t be optional

Whether you’re developing a product, hiring an accountant, or just fixing your kitchen plumbing, who would intentionally choose “low quality”?

Good is the only side of this triangle that should never be sacrificed because a quality result is always expected when something is worth doing at all.

If a job’s worth doing, it’s worth doing well.
— Proverb

If you like shitty work, you’re spoilt for choice. Fast + Cheap is very desirable if you don’t care about the quality of the result. But who puts in the time, effort, and expense of doing anything without caring about the outcome?