Many of my management clients tell me, “time is money.” That is only partially correct.
Once you decide to invest a dollar, that dollar has the same value as any other dollar.
Instead of focusing on the expense of a dollar, look for the value that dollar can return. (Because no one ever knows how long anything will take.)
Are you investing that dollar into collaborative work to generate outcomes your customers can use? (That's flow efficiency thinking.)
Or, do you choose to invest that dollar into individual work, outputs? (That's resource efficiency thinking.)
Flow efficiency thinking reduces wait time and offers the possibility of faster product development. At a minimum, a faster learning cycle.
Managers: Watch for the sunk cost fallacy. Focus on how little you can invest to get to the next decision point. That's how you can look for the value the effort returns. Not the cost of the effort.