CFA - Cheap, Fast, Accurate

CFA is an acronym for Cheap, Fast and Accurate, and this seems to be what everybody wants. We are constantly tugging at the bit and demanding more efficiency, lower costs, and bigger profits. This is especially true when it comes to hiring consultants. Demanding that a consultant be cheap, fast and accurate is a recipe for insanity. Basic economics keep this kind of stuff from happening.

I learned about the CFA principle during an entrepreneurship class at Wichita State. We brought in a guest speaker to talk about hiring consultants. He was a CPA in his fifties and the second he started to talk you knew there was more to him than sneaky deductible advice. He was clearly a battle tested entrepreneur and consultant. The first thing he did after he introduced himself and did a little name dropping was write “CFA” on the board. After that he wrote, “cheap, fast and accurate” and said, “when hiring board members or consultants you can only have two out of three of these and the sooner you realize this the better.”

Here is how CFA works:

• If it’s cheap and fast, it’s not going to be accurate
• If it’s cheap and accurate, it’s guaranteed not to be fast
• If it’s fast and accurate, one can be damn sure it’s not going to be cheap

It’s a shame that most people are unwilling to accept these kinds of trade offs. I think they have a lot of strategic underpinnings and alternative applications, but the logic is most applicable to hiring people or consultants.