Shiny Features vs. Stability: Why You Need Both

Software development isn’t a straight path of constant progress—it moves in cycles. A period of rapid development is often followed by a phase of maintenance and improvement. Understanding and embracing this cycle is crucial for long-term success.

The Rapid Development Phase

At the start of a project or major feature push, development moves fast. New features roll out, and visible progress is easy to measure. This phase is exciting but also introduces technical debt—shortcuts taken to move quickly that must be addressed later.

The Maintenance & Improvement Phase

After rapid development, teams need time to stabilize, refine, and optimize the system. This means fixing hidden issues, improving performance, and ensuring long-term scalability. While this phase may appear slow, skipping it leads to bloated, fragile systems that eventually slow development to a crawl.

Why Skipping a Phase Causes Problems

Neglecting either phase creates long-term issues:

• If you only focus on rapid development: The software becomes unstable, technical debt piles up, and eventually, progress slows to a halt. Teams end up spending more time fixing issues than delivering new features.
• If you only focus on maintenance: Progress stalls, innovation takes a backseat, and competitors move ahead. A product that never evolves will eventually become obsolete.

How Leaders Can Support This Cycle

• Set expectations – Both phases are essential for sustainable growth.
• Communicate clearly – Help stakeholders understand that maintenance is not wasted time.
• Plan ahead – Balance feature development with intentional periods of improvement.

The best teams don’t fight this cycle—they embrace it. By doing so, they build software that isn’t just fast to develop but also built to last.