Lenny RachitskyHost of Lenny's Podcast | Author of Lenny's Newsletter

The hidden cost of "perfect" AI responses

10 Dec 2025 · 1 min

Watch on YouTube

0:34

A brief monologue (YouTube) by Lenny Rachitsky reflecting on how AI-assisted polishing can consume time without meaningful impact. The speaker recounts using Claude to perfect an email for 30 minutes, questions whether perfecting trivial outputs is worth the time, and asks what model behavior users should prefer: one that endlessly refines or one that optimizes for users' time and productivity.

Chapters

Over the past year, I've realized that the values that the companies have will shape the models. I was asking Claude to help me draft an email the other day, and after 30 minutes, yeah, I think it really crafted me the perfect email, and I sent it. But then I realized I spent 30 minutes doing something that didn't matter at all. Like, sure, now I got the perfect email. But this email probably didn't even move the needle or anything. If you could choose the perfect model behavior, which model would you want? Do you want a model that says, you're absolutely right, there are definitely 20 more ways to improve this email, and it continues for 50 more iterations? Or do you want a model that's optimizing for your time and productivity and just says, no, you need to stop? Your email's great, Just send it and move on with your day?