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Speed sounds great until rushing starts creating more problems than it solves.

The choice was simple: meet the boss’s strict time limits or keep producing careful, accurate work.

Instead of arguing, this employee followed the rushed policy exactly and let the results speak for themselves.

Read on to see how quickly “efficiency” fell apart.

My Boss Wanted ‘Efficiency’—So I Gave Him Just That!

I’ve been working in my field for a while, and I’ve always taken pride in doing a thorough, reliable job.

I’m a high performer and had a solid track record with my previous bosses, who valued quality and consistency.

But then, Eric became our new boss, and things took a hard turn.

Eric was all about efficiency.

He came from a startup environment where things didn’t need to be perfect, just right AND fast! He wanted things done fast—even if it meant cutting corners.

In meetings, he’d throw around phrases like, “Time is money!” and “Every second counts!” Sure, efficiency is important, but Eric took it to an extreme.

He didn’t care about the quality of our work; he just wanted it done now. Nuances, quality checks, and double-checking went right out the window.

This employee’s new boss, Eric, implemented a time tracking policy.

Then, he decided to implement a “Time Tracking and Output” policy. This meant logging every task we worked on with specific time limits.

Anything taking longer than his arbitrary limits was flagged, and we’d have to explain ourselves in weekly “efficiency reviews.”

Essentially, the new rule was: you don’t need to do it completely right—just do it fast.

I tried explaining to him that rushing through things would lead to mistakes, but Eric insisted this would “maximize productivity.”

Frustrated but willing to play by his rules, I decided I’d give him exactly what he asked for. If Eric wanted speed, I’d deliver speed.

I stopped double-checking everything. Tasks that normally took an hour to review and refine? I was now completing in 15 minutes, barely glancing at them.

Documents that required analysis? I’d throw some data together and call it a day. Anything that usually got a thorough review now only got a quick, single pass—tops.

Clients started noticing the decline in work quality.

Naturally, errors began cropping up. Typos, incorrect numbers, misplaced data, bad presentations—mistakes were popping up everywhere. But technically, I was working exactly within Eric’s time limits.

Eric was thrilled with how much faster I was working and started bragging in meetings about how “efficient” our team had become.

Then the clients started to notice. One of our biggest accounts found a major error in a document I’d whipped together at record speed. That led to an awkward phone call with Eric.

More issues came up, and after about two weeks of “optimized efficiency,” I got called into his office with his boss.

Eric got what he deserved in the end.

Eric, visibly irritated, asked me why the quality of my work had taken such a nosedive.

I calmly explained that I was meeting all of his time limits, exactly as instructed.

I told him that quality work requires time, which I simply didn’t have under his new policy.

Eric sat there in silence, realizing his policy had backfired. His boss stared at him, completely stunned and red in the face.

After an awkward pause, Eric muttered about “re-evaluating” the time limits on tasks. The “efficiency” policy quietly disappeared soon after.

Now, I’m back to doing my job properly. Eric’s under performance review, and his boss is closely involved with all our operations, especially with big clients.

Why reinvent the wheel when things are working fine? And why try to rein in the high performers to stamp your authority?

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Sad reality.

This employee met every deadline, but the rushed work quickly caused mistakes that major clients noticed.

Once senior management learned why quality had dropped, the policy disappeared and the boss landed under review.

He saved minutes on every task, then spent them all explaining mistakes to angry clients.

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Author

Chris Allen