One of the few lessons from high school science classes that has actually stuck with me is the difference between velocity and acceleration. Simply put, the velocity is the speed at which an object is traveling, whereas acceleration is how much an object is increasing in speed.

To put it another way, one is an indication of a current status and one is an indication of rate of change.

People love ranking things. Best business school. Best company to work for. Best mustache. Rankings are designed to show how something compares to similar items in a particular category. It shows velocity. And people like that because it helps them make judgements based on what they see.

Velocity has played a part in a lot of the decisions I have made in my life, including what schools I have chosen and what companies I have worked for (not so much with mustache decisions :{ ). Despite this, my view on velocity as an important decision metric has begun to change. Lately, I've been learning to appreciate acceleration as a better measurement.