Once something is moving, it’s hard to stop. And the heavier or faster it is, the harder it is to stop.
That’s called inertia.
If all you have is a very small force, and you want to radically change the direction of something with lots of inertia, you have essentially two options:
Push directly against the object you want to change. It will keep heading in the same direction but will immediately begin to slow down and eventually it will stop, before starting to (very slowly) move in the opposite direction. Keep pushing, and it’ll eventually be moving in the opposite direction at the same speed it started at.
Push at 90 degrees to the object you want to change. It won’t slow down, but it will immediately change direction. If you keep readjusting where you are pushing (so that you’re always pushing at 90 degrees), eventually it’ll be heading in the opposite direction.
Which option you choose, depends a lot on the object you’re pushing against (i.e. will it change in size as it moves/changes direction, making it easier or harder to move) and the environment around you (i.e. if it’s rolling down a hill there’s forces pushing it along, and you might not be able to slow it to a stop at all). Here’s some questions to ask:
How will this object respond to me pushing it?
Is it important to maintain speed?
What else is pushing this object?
Can I make it smaller?
Can I get stronger?
Will changing the direction of travel increase of decrease my ability to apply force?
In the context of property development, slowing down the construction industry to a halt before starting to move in a new direction is a horrendous future to contemplate. A far preferable process is to start moving, and work on increasing the force that you can apply as the direction changes.
*apologies for this post being extremely abstract, it makes sense in my head.