Many of us in the IT industry know the term ‘Design Debt’ James Shore defines it as “Design debt explains the problem. When a team is working under pressure, they take shortcuts that compromise design quality. It’s like taking out a high-interest loan. The team gets a short-term boost in speed, but from that point forward, changes are more expensive: they’re paying interest on the loan. The only way to stop paying interest is to pay back the loan’s principle and fix the design shortcuts.”

I would like to coin a new team ‘Learning Debt‘ (if not already defined by someone), every week (if not every day) that you let go without learning something you have just increased that debt. 

Conferences and books are excellent way to cut down on that learning debt. I find another really good way to keep it down is by joining or creating a groups of like minded individuals and having interesting conversations (after all what is life without interesting converstaions ? don’t know but it would suck), think about it as a gym buddy just as having a gym buddy helps you stay on track. 

Don’t want to talk about the dangers of letting this debt get out of hand you probably already know it loss of freash ideas, mind rot, loss of job……