Direction Precedes Speed

Why did humanity discover the compass centuries before the clock? Because knowing the direction was more important than knowing the time.

There is no value in knowing how much time is passing... if you are moving in the wrong direction.

This is the mistake many CEOs fall into. They think success means speed—speed in decisions, speed in meetings, and speed in initiatives.

However, quality of thinking says something entirely different: Direction precedes speed. Speed does not create success; speed merely amplifies the outcome. If you are moving in the right direction, speed brings you closer to success. But if you are moving in the wrong direction, speed only accelerates your failure.

This is why you can predict a CEO's failure before his company's results even show—not through his profits, nor through his sales volume, but through the questions he asks.

If the first question he always asks is "How can we execute faster?", know that he may be heading in the wrong direction. A true leader, however, starts with a different question: "Did we choose the right direction in the first place?" Because solving the wrong problem efficiently... is not success; it is simply a faster failure.

Therefore, do not measure a CEO's quality by execution speed; measure it first by the correctness of the direction.

The most dangerous CEO is not the slow one, but rather the one who leads his company in the wrong direction... at the highest possible speed.

Always remember

Quality of thinking precedes quality of results.

Mohammed Bin Saleh

Interested in Management & Finance