Time-based competition, one of the defining business ideas of the late 1980s and early 1990s, paid real dividends by convincing executives to cut the slack from their operations. Speeding up crucial business processes helped improve performance on all fronts. Companies that figured out how to manufacture products faster than their competitors cut costs and even improved quality. Those that brought technological innovations to market first gained market share. And those companies that outsourced noncore activities became much more efficient. I would argue, in fact, that the economic boom the United States has enjoyed since 1990 was built in large measure on the accelerated operations of that period.