Human Debt

When Leaders Must Sacrifice Goodwill for the Greater Good

January 20, 2026 • 6 min read

Software engineers often have to make decisions around how to manage technical debt. They might consider large decisions such as bringing in a new and unproven component into their architecture down to the smallest consideration where every new line of code in the codebase is considered additional toil.

People leaders have to consider the currency of professional relationships as a key component of how effectively they are able to do their jobs. Similarly to the software engineer, who is optimizing for the highest quality within the tightest constraints such as time or cost, the people leader must optimize for tactical delivery or strategic victory potentially at the cost of favor or trust amongst their peers, subordinates, and superiors. In some cases, they must incur this human debt to effectively meet their goals or enable an objective for their teams and organization.

The Uncomfortable Reality

The consideration of deliberately damaging a professional relationship to further another objective isn't commonly discussed (as far as I've read). It is, however, something I've discussed many times with other leaders and peers. Just as shipping inefficient or buggy code for the sake of speed, for example, it is sometimes the difficult but correct decision a leader must make for the greater good of their priorities.

This creates tension between the prevailing leadership advice that is: build strong relationships, your people are your top priority, take care of your people and the rest will take care of itself. The nuance comes from when the "rubber meets the road", and you as the leader have to apply this advice in practice. You navigate a complex web of professional and interpersonal politics, biases, prejudices, grudges, favoritism, and selfishness. Prioritizing the people you work with sometimes means sacrificing the goodwill of some for the sake of others.

When Human Debt Becomes Necessary

There are some scenarios I will frame up based on my own personal experience as a leader that come to mind on this topic:

Moving a team member off a project they stood up and have a significant personal investment in to one of higher priority or one that requires their unique expertise. This leaves them feeling unsupported and unheard for not being able to see their project through till its conclusion and enjoying the victory lap.
Taking one side of a conflicting pair of proposals between two favored peers based on your own judgement of minimizing risk and maximizing the chance of success over innovation or experimentation with new technologies. The person behind the rejected proposal feels like they didn't get a fair shot or your decision was based on illogical bias towards the other individual.
Reallocating headcount off a leader's team that is just as saturated with work as the others but whose priorities are at lower risk of failing or causing significant harm to the business' bottom line. The impacted leader feels like they are being unjustifiably punished or put at a disadvantage compared to their peers when being held accountable for their delivery.
Overriding someone's architectural decision that provides significant improvements to key value metrics but significantly deviates from organizational standards and introduces risks to toil management and overall supportability. Those involved in the forward-looking design see their research and hard work into the new design thrown away and feel like their contributions are not valued.

These examples are general enough where you might find similarities with what you've experienced. They all represent decisions made with the best of intentions but deliberately required a sacrifice of goodwill or interpersonal currency.

Key Considerations

There are a few considerations I weigh when facing these scenarios:

What would a "good" leader do when presented with this as an option? Would they ever consider this an option at all? I say absolutely, yes. The ability to identify the right places to apply this tradeoff while never irreversibly damaging a relationship is what separates the good leaders from the great leaders. They build bonds that can withstand the strikes of single decisions. The great leaders construct visions that those around them are rallied around, above individual decisions that may or may not favor them.
When considering "people", it is not a singular construct in reality. Leaders spend considerable amounts of time and effort managing the fact that they typically work with people with potentially conflicting assignments, motivations, priorities, ideals, and personal values. It would be reductive to consider human debt from a singular perspective when in some cases the primary, "noble" objective is one directly at odds with one or more of these "people."
Is Human Debt inevitable? Is the decision to sacrifice a part of a professional relationship something every leader will have to face given enough time and experience? Again I say, absolutely, yes. With enough time and experience, great leaders hit these scenarios enough times, fail, and pick themselves up again the next time to understand the balanced formula for success. Eventually, they find the healthy equilibrium.
Can Human Debt be paid off? Humans are not deterministic, transactional things like codebases or software systems. Resolving the consequences of a decision that antagonized someone might be minor enough to do, or significant enough to be considered irrevocable. Some burned bridges are just impossible to rebuild. Great leaders apply these decisions deliberately with full understanding of the greater effect of their actions.

Conclusions

As leaders of people, our problems don't always have perfect solutions. People are not deterministic like code, and even with software you're always balancing tradeoffs in the moment and between the short and long term. If we spent all our time just nourishing our professional relationships, we'd come to be known as the friendly boss that gets nothing done. If we took every opportunity to push everyone away, well we'd probably just be known as the resident jerk...who got nothing done.

We all have to accumulate some amount of human debt, the spending of the goodwill we work hard to build and nurture in our professional relationships. It is the legal tender in the marketplace of solving hard problems. The greatest leaders are the ones that understand how to balance the savings and spending of this currency. Just remember to be frugal with your spending and know that a strong habit of building savings has always been sound advice.

The post was authored with editorial support (Claude Opus 4.5) and image generation (Nano Banana 3 Pro) from Generative AI. All words are my own.

Webmentions

--- title: "Human Debt" subtitle: "When Leaders Must Sacrifice Goodwill for the Greater Good" date: 2026-01-20 tags: ["leadership", "career", "technology"] --- Software engineers understand technical debt. It is the accumulated cost of trading off quality for speed or the short term for the long term that must eventually be repaid. Leaders have their own version of this ledger. I call it **human debt**: the relational cost incurred when you must sacrifice goodwill or trust to serve a higher priority. Software engineers often have to make decisions around how to manage technical debt. They might consider large decisions such as bringing in a new and unproven component into their architecture down to the smallest consideration where every new line of code in the codebase is considered additional toil. People leaders have to consider the currency of professional relationships as a key component of how effectively they are able to do their jobs. Similarly to the software engineer, who is optimizing for the highest quality within the tightest constraints such as time or cost, the people leader must optimize for tactical delivery or strategic victory potentially at the cost of favor or trust amongst their peers, subordinates, and superiors. In some cases, they must incur this **human debt** to effectively meet their goals or enable an objective for their teams and organization. ## The Uncomfortable Reality The consideration of deliberately damaging a professional relationship to further another objective isn't commonly discussed (as far as I've read). It is, however, something I've discussed many times with other leaders and peers. Just as shipping inefficient or buggy code for the sake of speed, for example, it is sometimes the difficult but correct decision a leader must make for the greater good of their priorities. This creates tension between the prevailing leadership advice that is: build strong relationships, your people are your top priority, take care of your people and the rest will take care of itself. The nuance comes from when the "rubber meets the road", and you as the leader have to apply this advice in practice. You navigate a complex web of professional and interpersonal politics, biases, prejudices, grudges, favoritism, and selfishness. Prioritizing the people you work with sometimes means sacrificing the goodwill of some for the sake of others. ## When Human Debt Becomes Necessary There are some scenarios I will frame up based on my own personal experience as a leader that come to mind on this topic: - Moving a team member off a project they stood up and have a significant personal investment in to one of higher priority or one that requires their unique expertise. This leaves them feeling unsupported and unheard for not being able to see their project through till its conclusion and enjoying the victory lap. - Taking one side of a conflicting pair of proposals between two favored peers based on your own judgement of minimizing risk and maximizing the chance of success over innovation or experimentation with new technologies. The person behind the rejected proposal feels like they didn't get a fair shot or your decision was based on illogical bias towards the other individual. - Reallocating headcount off a leader's team that is just as saturated with work as the others but whose priorities are at lower risk of failing or causing significant harm to the business' bottom line. The impacted leader feels like they are being unjustifiably punished or put at a disadvantage compared to their peers when being held accountable for their delivery. - Overriding someone's architectural decision that provides significant improvements to key value metrics but significantly deviates from organizational standards and introduces risks to toil management and overall supportability. Those involved in the forward-looking design see their research and hard work into the new design thrown away and feel like their contributions are not valued. These examples are general enough where you might find similarities with what you've experienced. They all represent decisions made with the best of intentions but deliberately required a sacrifice of goodwill or interpersonal currency. ## Key Considerations There are a few considerations I weigh when facing these scenarios: - What would a "good" leader do when presented with this as an option? Would they ever consider this an option at all? I say absolutely, yes. The ability to identify the right places to apply this tradeoff while never irreversibly damaging a relationship is what separates the good leaders from the great leaders. They build bonds that can withstand the strikes of single decisions. The great leaders construct visions that those around them are rallied around, above individual decisions that may or may not favor them. - When considering "people", it is not a singular construct in reality. Leaders spend considerable amounts of time and effort managing the fact that they typically work with people with potentially conflicting assignments, motivations, priorities, ideals, and personal values. It would be reductive to consider human debt from a singular perspective when in some cases the primary, "noble" objective is one directly at odds with one or more of these "people." - Is Human Debt inevitable? Is the decision to sacrifice a part of a professional relationship something every leader will have to face given enough time and experience? Again I say, absolutely, yes. With enough time and experience, great leaders hit these scenarios enough times, fail, and pick themselves up again the next time to understand the balanced formula for success. Eventually, they find the healthy equilibrium. - Can Human Debt be paid off? Humans are not deterministic, transactional things like codebases or software systems. Resolving the consequences of a decision that antagonized someone might be minor enough to do, or significant enough to be considered irrevocable. Some burned bridges are just impossible to rebuild. Great leaders apply these decisions deliberately with full understanding of the greater effect of their actions. ## Conclusions As leaders of people, our problems don't always have perfect solutions. People are not deterministic like code, and even with software you're always balancing tradeoffs in the moment and between the short and long term. If we spent all our time just nourishing our professional relationships, we'd come to be known as the friendly boss that gets nothing done. If we took every opportunity to push everyone away, well we'd probably just be known as the resident jerk...who got nothing done. We all have to accumulate some amount of human debt, the spending of the goodwill we work hard to build and nurture in our professional relationships. It is the legal tender in the marketplace of solving hard problems. The greatest leaders are the ones that understand how to balance the savings and spending of this currency. Just remember to be frugal with your spending and know that a strong habit of building savings has always been sound advice. > The post was authored with editorial support (Claude Opus 4.5) and image generation (Nano Banana 3 Pro) from Generative AI. All words are my own.

Software engineers understand technical debt. It is the accumulated cost of trading off quality for speed or the short term for the long term that must eventually be repaid. Leaders have their own version of this ledger. I call it human debt: the relational cost incurred when you must sacrifice goodwill or trust to serve a higher priority. Software engineers often have to make decisions around how to manage technical debt. They might consider large decisions such as bringing in a new and unproven component into their architecture down to the smallest consideration where every new line of code in the codebase is considered additional toil. People leaders have to consider the currency of professional relationships as a key component of how effectively they are able to do their jobs. Similarly to the software engineer, who is optimizing for the highest quality within the tightest constraints such as time or cost, the people leader must optimize for tactical delivery or strategic victory potentially at the cost of favor or trust amongst their peers, subordinates, and superiors. In some cases, they must incur this human debt to effectively meet their goals or enable an objective for their teams and organization. The Uncomfortable Reality The consideration of deliberately damaging a professional relationship to further another objective isn't commonly discussed (as far as I've read). It is, however, something I've discussed many times with other leaders and peers. Just as shipping inefficient or buggy code for the sake of speed, for example, it is sometimes the difficult but correct decision a leader must make for the greater good of their priorities. This creates tension between the prevailing leadership advice that is: build strong relationships, your people are your top priority, take care of your people and the rest will take care of itself. The nuance comes from when the "rubber meets the road", and you as the leader have to apply this advice in practice. You navigate a complex web of professional and interpersonal politics, biases, prejudices, grudges, favoritism, and selfishness. Prioritizing the people you work with sometimes means sacrificing the goodwill of some for the sake of others. When Human Debt Becomes Necessary There are some scenarios I will frame up based on my own personal experience as a leader that come to mind on this topic: Moving a team member off a project they stood up and have a significant personal investment in to one of higher priority or one that requires their unique expertise. This leaves them feeling unsupported and unheard for not being able to see their project through till its conclusion and enjoying the victory lap. Taking one side of a conflicting pair of proposals between two favored peers based on your own judgement of minimizing risk and maximizing the chance of success over innovation or experimentation with new technologies. The person behind the rejected proposal feels like they didn't get a fair shot or your decision was based on illogical bias towards the other individual. Reallocating headcount off a leader's team that is just as saturated with work as the others but whose priorities are at lower risk of failing or causing significant harm to the business' bottom line. The impacted leader feels like they are being unjustifiably punished or put at a disadvantage compared to their peers when being held accountable for their delivery. Overriding someone's architectural decision that provides significant improvements to key value metrics but significantly deviates from organizational standards and introduces risks to toil management and overall supportability. Those involved in the forward-looking design see their research and hard work into the new design thrown away and feel like their contributions are not valued. These examples are general enough where you might find similarities with what you've experienced. They all represent decisions made with the best of intentions but deliberately required a sacrifice of goodwill or interpersonal currency. Key Considerations There are a few considerations I weigh when facing these scenarios: What would a "good" leader do when presented with this as an option? Would they ever consider this an option at all? I say absolutely, yes. The ability to identify the right places to apply this tradeoff while never irreversibly damaging a relationship is what separates the good leaders from the great leaders. They build bonds that can withstand the strikes of single decisions. The great leaders construct visions that those around them are rallied around, above individual decisions that may or may not favor them. When considering "people", it is not a singular construct in reality. Leaders spend considerable amounts of time and effort managing the fact that they typically work with people with potentially conflicting assignments, motivations, priorities, ideals, and personal values. It would be reductive to consider human debt from a singular perspective when in some cases the primary, "noble" objective is one directly at odds with one or more of these "people." Is Human Debt inevitable? Is the decision to sacrifice a part of a professional relationship something every leader will have to face given enough time and experience? Again I say, absolutely, yes. With enough time and experience, great leaders hit these scenarios enough times, fail, and pick themselves up again the next time to understand the balanced formula for success. Eventually, they find the healthy equilibrium. Can Human Debt be paid off? Humans are not deterministic, transactional things like codebases or software systems. Resolving the consequences of a decision that antagonized someone might be minor enough to do, or significant enough to be considered irrevocable. Some burned bridges are just impossible to rebuild. Great leaders apply these decisions deliberately with full understanding of the greater effect of their actions. Conclusions As leaders of people, our problems don't always have perfect solutions. People are not deterministic like code, and even with software you're always balancing tradeoffs in the moment and between the short and long term. If we spent all our time just nourishing our professional relationships, we'd come to be known as the friendly boss that gets nothing done. If we took every opportunity to push everyone away, well we'd probably just be known as the resident jerk...who got nothing done. We all have to accumulate some amount of human debt, the spending of the goodwill we work hard to build and nurture in our professional relationships. It is the legal tender in the marketplace of solving hard problems. The greatest leaders are the ones that understand how to balance the savings and spending of this currency. Just remember to be frugal with your spending and know that a strong habit of building savings has always been sound advice. The post was authored with editorial support (Claude Opus 4.5) and image generation (Nano Banana 3 Pro) from Generative AI. All words are my own.