Reliable vs. functional

Something you notice when switching tools is that some tools are incredibly reliable and others are immensely functional.

It’s rare to find a tool that does both.

Classic example: Wrike isn’t functional—it’s pretty outdated—but it is reliable. If I click on ‘time tracking,’ for example, it shows me what’s tracked every time.

Clickup is radically functional. There are dozens of features and helpful things you can do. But for all its hype, it’s hardly reliable—whether it shows me what it’s suppose to show me in a certain space or dashboard is often hit or miss.

Airtable is rare indeed. It’s both reliable—in that it does what I expect it to, every time—and functional—in that it offers specific features for specific tasks (and allows users’ to customize them to their liking).

Alas. If you can’t make a functional product, it helps to make it reliable, and vice-versa. If you want to be extraordinary (and possibly stand the test of time), it helps to do both.