READ TIME: 8 MINUTES | 21 JANUARY, 2026 | READ ON PHILHSC.COM​

We have a strange relationship with speed.

And it could be costing us more than we think.

I've led teams in healthcare where we moved with urgency to prove a product and validate a business model.

We needed speed. Investors wanted traction and the market was moving.

But healthcare innovation doesn't move at the pace of urgency.

It moves at the pace of evidence.

And here's the frustrating part: the evidence threshold is subjective.

What one regulatory body considers sufficient, another dismisses. What one clinical partner calls rigorous, another calls preliminary. You can do everything "right" and still be told you need more data, more time, more proof.

I watched teams burn out trying to force speed in a system that had its own inertia. We pushed harder. Worked longer hours. Applied more pressure.

And we didn't get faster. We became exhausted.

That's when I started to realise: We were thinking about speed wrong.

Most leaders do.

The paradox of speed

Here's what I've learned across military service, building companies, and coaching CEOs:

Speed doesn't come from increasing force. It comes from reducing drag.

Most leaders apply more pressure when they want speed.

Experienced leaders remove friction instead.

There is a well established mantra in the military: "Slow is smooth, and smooth is fast."

I remember being taught how to do room clearances as a young soldier.

This is the systematic, high-intensity tactical process used to gain control of a confined space, eliminate threats and secure non-combatants.

The instructors showed us what happens when you move too fast.

You miss a doorway. Corners don't get checked. You create blind spots. One mistake in a room clearance can be catastrophic.

But when you move slower, methodically and with precision, the success rate increases dramatically.

It's counterintuitive.

In life-or-death situations, the instinct is often to rush and rushing gets people killed.

Speed in that context wasn't about how fast you moved through the door. It was about how quickly you could gain control of the space without making a fatal error.

The teams that moved fastest weren't the ones sprinting. In fact, they were the ones walking.

They built the skills and situational awareness to move without hesitation when it mattered.

That's a very different kind of speed.

And it applies directly to how you lead your organisation.

Because every organisation has its own inertia, its own natural pace and its unique friction points.

And your customers and partners? They have different priorities, different definitions of "fast" and different tolerances for risk.

What feels urgent to you might feel reckless to them.

What feels measured to you might feel glacial to your board.

The mistake we make as leaders is trying to impose one definition of speed on a system with multiple stakeholders who don't share that definition.

And when it doesn't work, when people push back, when timelines slip, when execution stalls, leaders can settle into a dangerous acceptance:

"This is just how it is."

That's the moment ambition dies.

Because the problem isn't that your organisation is slow.

The problem is that we’ve stopped fighting the friction that's slowing us down.

Speed vs PACE

Over the past few years, I've developed a framework I use with CEOs to diagnose speed issues and fix them.

It's called PACE.

I'm sharing it here because this is the kind of model I use when coaching leaders—and I want you to have access to the same tools.

You'll also notice I include parenting examples alongside business ones throughout this framework.

That's intentional.

Many of you are in that phase of life where you're juggling leadership and parenting.

The principles that make you effective at work often translate directly to how you show up at home. And vice versa.

So when I talk about permission, alignment, capacity, and evidence, know that these aren't just business concepts. They're leadership concepts. And leadership happens everywhere.

Now, to the framework.

PACE breaks speed into four levers you can actively manage.

The core idea is this: Speed isn't about how hard you push. It's about what's in the way.

When you remove friction in these four areas, speed becomes natural. Not forced.

P — Permission: Can people move without fear?

Nothing slows a system more than hesitation.

Leaders unintentionally kill speed when their people are unsure:

• "Will I get in trouble if this goes wrong?"
• "Is this actually the priority?"
• "Am I allowed to decide, or do I need approval?"

Every moment spent wondering is a moment not spent moving.

Try this:

Give explicit permission before you need speed.

In business:

• "You don't need my sign-off under $X"
• "Progress beats perfection this quarter"
• "You’re covered if this fails because we learn"

In parenting:

• "You're trusted to try."
• "Mistakes are part of growing."

Permission removes cognitive load. And when people stop second-guessing whether they're allowed to act, speed follows naturally.

A — Alignment: Do people know what "fast" actually means?

Teams slow down when:

• Everyone is optimising for different goals
• Speed for one function creates rework for another
• "Urgent" isn't clearly defined

I've watched executive teams where engineering is optimising for stability, sales is optimising for features, and product is optimising for user experience. Everyone's moving fast. But the company isn't getting anywhere because they're pulling in different directions.

Try this:

Align on direction, not just deadlines.

Ask one clarifying question: "What does good look like and what are we NOT doing?"

In business:

• Define the non-goals as clearly as the goals
• Make trade-offs explicit
• When you say "we need to move fast," specify: fast toward what?

In families:

• Agree on values before rules

Aligned teams move faster than busy ones. Because when everyone knows where you're going and what you're willing to sacrifice to get there, decisions get easier.

C — Capacity: Do people actually have the energy to move?

Speed collapses when leaders confuse urgency with capacity.

You can't sprint a marathon. You can't sustain high velocity when people are running on empty.

Signs capacity is broken:

• Everything feels rushed
• Small decisions feel heavy
• People look busy but momentum is gone

I see this constantly with CEOs. They want their teams to "move faster" but haven't paused to ask: what would we need to stop doing to free up the capacity to move fast on what matters?

Try this:

Reduce load before you increase pace.

In business:

• Pause lower-value work before launching something new
• Ask: "What can we stop for the next 30 days?"
• Protect energy in roles critical to momentum

In life:

• Rest isn't the opposite of speed, one helps the other

Sustainable speed is an energy strategy. When you treat capacity as a strategic constraint rather than a wellness add-on, you make better decisions about what to accelerate and what to cut.

E — Evidence: Can people see that moving faster actually works?

Nothing builds speed like proof.

Leaders slow teams down when:

• Change feels endless
• Wins aren't visible
• Progress feels abstract

If people can't see that moving faster is producing results, they'll revert to the old pace. Because the old pace feels safer.

Try this:

Create visible proof points.

In business:

• Ship something small that’s materially important
• Celebrate traction (not just completion)
• Make progress visible to the team, not just the board

In parenting:

• Reflect growth back to kids: "Did you notice how that went better this time?"

Evidence converts skeptics into believers. When people see that speed produces results instead of chaos, they start moving faster without needing to be pushed.

How to use PACE as a diagnostic

You can diagnose speed issues in minutes by asking these four questions:

1. Where is permission unclear?​
   Where are people hesitating because they're not sure they're allowed to act?
2. Where is alignment off?​
   Where are teams optimising for different outcomes or pulling in different directions?
3. Where is capacity stretched?​
   Where are people too overloaded to move, even if they wanted to?
4. Where is evidence missing?​
   Where do people not believe that moving faster will actually work?

Fix one of these and pace improves.

Fix all four, and you've built a system that moves fast without burning out.

There is an alternative (and it’s when leaders settle)

I've watched organisations where leaders shrug and say, "This is just how it is."

"Our industry moves slow"
"Our customers aren't ready"
"Our team doesn't have the skills"

And maybe all of those things are true.

But here's what I need you to understand: settling for "this is how it is" is resignation.

And resignation has consequences.

Lost market position. Talent leaving for faster-moving companies. A culture that stops believing change is possible.

But there's something deeper at stake here.

As a leader, one of your most important jobs is providing meaning.

Helping people understand what your organisation stands for. Why the work matters. What you're building together.

When you settle for "this is just how it is," you're not just accepting friction. You're telling your team that the friction is bigger than the mission.

You're saying: "We're not capable of moving faster. We're not capable of changing. This is who we are."

And people don't follow leaders who've given up on what's possible.

The cost isn't just speed. It's ambition. It's belief. It's the very thing that makes people want to be part of what you're building.

So when you catch yourself thinking "this is just how it is", pause.

Ask: Is this actually a constraint? Or is this friction I've stopped questioning?

Because the moment you stop questioning the friction, you stop leading. You start managing the status quo instead of building what's next.

What changes when you get this right

When you move from forcing speed to removing friction, three things happen:

First, people start moving without being pushed. Because they have permission, they know the direction, they have the energy and they've seen it work.

Second, speed becomes sustainable. You're not burning people out. You're building a system that can maintain velocity over time.

Third, the organisation starts to believe it can move fast. And belief is what separates organisations that adapt from those that get left behind.

The bottom line

Speed isn't about working harder or demanding more.

It's about diagnosing where friction exists and removing it.

Permission. Alignment. Capacity. Evidence.

Four levers. One framework. And a completely different way to think about how fast your organisation can move.

So here's my question for you: Where have you been applying pressure when you should be removing friction?

Reply to let me know, I'd love to learn more.

And thank you for your attention, I appreciate it.

THE PARTNERSHIP PLAYBOOK PODCAST

Here are this week’s podcast episodes for your walk, commute or workout.

PARTNERSHIPS MOMENT

EP 152 - 9 min: Why the best GTM partnerships in 2026 start with 6 questions. Most GTM leaders are pushing harder on partners in a market that’s already tight on trust, attention, and momentum. In this episode, learn how to open deeper, more transparent partner conversations that drive growth instead of friction. Listen on Apple Podcasts | Spotify​

LEADERSHIP MOMENT

EP 154 - 12 min:How to create time to think as a CEO. When was the last time you had real time to think as a CEO? In this episode I break down how CEOs can reclaim time to think and, more importantly, how to use that time to create clarity, momentum, and calm across the business. Listen on Apple Podcasts | Spotify​

CEO INTERVIEW

EP 153 - 61 min:Colonel Kim ‘KC’ Campbell. Meet former US Air Force fighter pilot, Colonel Kim 'KC' Campbell and learn how partnerships, trust, and debriefing play a critical leadership role in high-stakes environments. Listen on Apple Podcasts | Spotify​

See you next Wednesday,

Phil Hayes-St Clair
Executive Coach

​Find me on LinkedIn​

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