Beautiful design is a multiplier of productivity

One thing that I've already realized in the first couple weeks of 2025 - beautiful design is not just about making things pretty.

It is a multiplier of productivity itself.

No exaggeration.

I realized this when I ditched all of the bad software we were using at our business. Particularly, Super and Mailerlite.  I used them both for the content side of our business. Now, I've replaced them with Ghost and Kit respectively.

In fact, I knew that this change was a good thing because the migration process itself, which is usually a headache, went so seamlessly with both the tools. I would even go as far as to say that the migration was delightful.

2 weeks in, now I can confidently say that these were a multiplier of productivity. I've already created more content using these new tools than I have in any 2-week period of my life.

Lost time in procrastination

One of the under-talked aspects of using a beautiful product is just how inspiring it is. I had known about both Ghost and Kit for the longest time. And yet, I didn't use them because I wanted to go with the cheapest tool for the job as I was starting the new business.

In hindsight, I realise that was a mistake.

My old tools caused so many paper cuts (sorry Super and Mailerlite) that every time I used them to publish a new piece of writing, I developed an irritation to the process itself. Over time, this led to me procrastinating. While doing my 2024 reflection, I realized that I had so many things I wanted to share with my readers but I didn't simply because I hated using those tools.

As I've said already, I have now published more writing in the 2-week period of 2025 than I have in any other period of my life. So I know that I'm not just making an excuse for my low productivity. These tools just make me want to write more - a process that I thoroughly enjoy.

You know what they say about good work being its own reward, right? When you have good, beautiful tools, its easier to focus on doing this good work.

When I think about it this way, I realize that it'll be a worthwhile investment to make my own tool - Curated Connections - beautiful too. Because this tool is somebody's work and beautiful tools inspire beautiful work. So we have to give this benefit to our customers as well.

Good design is not just an afterthought, it's a feature

This runs counter to the advice of just shipping the minimum viable thing. In this school of thought, focusing on making things beautiful is a waste of time because it doesn't bring you any new customers directly. That time should be spent create a new feature to help solve the customer problem.

I now believe that creating beautiful design is a feature in itself. It's not a feature that allows you to do some new thing rather it is a feature that allows you to do all the old things better. A multiplier of productivity.

Not to mention the direct growth good design brings you. Because beautifully designed products are a delight to use, people talk about it - resulting in word of mouth growth.

And in this age of AI, there is no good reason to not have good design for software because the cost of  implementing those designs has reduced so much.

Basically, if you ever discover any point of friction in your product, it has to be your top priority to fix that. Because you amass enough of these points of friction, and it results in death by a thousand cuts. You do not want your product to feel that way.