Should you still build monoliths if you have to decompose it in 10 years to scale?
Tech debt isn’t always bad. You just need to know why you’re taking on debt and how you’ll pay it back.
Here are some key takeaways:
Not all tech debt’s worth tackling immediately.
<ul>
<li>If tech debt’s killing your team’s productivity, fix it now.</li>
<li>Tech debt, like financial debt, gives you leverage to move faster if you use it right.</li>
<li>Prematurely optimizing for scale isn’t as important as finding market-fit and having customers.</li>
<li>Customers don’t care or know how you’ve built your product. You can grow your customer base on less-than-optimal tech and fix it later.</li>
</ul>
Are you taking on tech debt wisely?

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Tech debt isn't inherently bad. It can provide leverage to move faster if managed correctly. Not all tech debt needs immediate attention; it should be fixed if it hampers team productivity. Prematurely optimizing for scale is less important than achieving market fit and gaining customers, who typically don't care about the internal technology. Ensure you take on tech debt wisely and have a plan for addressing it later.

Why you should embrace tech debt

Differently from financial debt, technical debt is hardly perceived and rarely tracked. Taking debt isn’t a challenge, but tracking and prioritizing tackling it (or at least it’s interest) down is.

in my opinion, a debt, technical or not, is ALWAYS bad.
It’s time or money you owe to someone or something.
You wanted to do some stuff, but didn’t have the ressources so you borrowed extra money.time and bought it. but now, a fraction, more realistically a growing fraction, of everything you win is due to pay the debt.
For me the goodtechnical “debt” is technical investment, and i do agrre with your article if i use this terminology.
Investment means, I had the money to buy cash, but i decided to borrow half of the price at a certain rate, and to invest/save the corresponding share at a higher rate.
In that case, yes, that’s good, cause in the end my ROI will be higher than the cost of my debt, meaning taking a debt actually rewarded me with time/money.
So tho i completely agree with the philosophy of the article, i think we should just rename the notion to create a real difference between “goog” and “bad” debt.

Thank you for sharing! I attempt to approach technical debt in the same form I do financial debt. Only if it is a necessity. Will I get a 80K loan for a brand new SUV even if that would mean limiting my wife and daughter on essential needs? Surely not. Will I go in debt for a 250k house so that I can provide a roof for them? Absolutely. Because, unless a miracle occurs, I know I won’t be able to pay that amount out of pocket.
Yes, technical debt, as financial debt, is always bad, in my opinion. But sometimes it is just a necessary evil. I doubt anyone loves the idea of owing a hospital 100k, but sometimes that’s the only exit if you want to survive and don’t have the resources to pay the surgeon immediately. The same applies to a business. Sometimes the only way to stay alive/ be profitable, at a given moment, is to accrue debt, that, hopefully, is paid later. 😅

This will happens when some new Intern Direct work on Production cluster. ;D