Why We Overcomplicate Work
A Short Summary on Why We Overcomplicate Work and How Decision Science Can Help.
I’ve spend a lot of my career wondering why corporate processes, user flows and projects were overcomplicated. It didn’t make sense. Smart people seemed to make things complex, for no reason.
As a Decision Scientist with a view into most areas of the business, I couldn’t understand it.
Why not keep things simple? Customers would benefit from simplified user experiences. Projects would benefit from simplified focus areas. Planning would benefit from simplified documents and templates.
So I spent some time researching the topic of overcomplication. If you also find this frustrating, read on friends.
Overcomplication Is Caused By Complexity Bias
The first thing to know is that our minds are hardwired to make situations more complicated. It’s called Complexity Bias.
Complexity Bias is one way our species distinguishes itself from other animals. We can make things complex and smarter, so we’re different.
We also overcomplicate things as a mental shortcut to conserve mental energy. Overly complex things are seen as out-of-reach or impenetrable and therefore we surrender the need to ‘understand’. Why bother trying to understand something that’s beyond us?
The interesting side-effect of this mental shortcut is that we are naturally suspicious of simple things. Our brains crave complexity, and we see complex things as superior. Thus, by opposition, simple things are less desirable to our brains and we bias away from them.
Human beings also naturally crave patterns. Our brains are continually looking for patterns in nature and in cause-and-effect. We have a hard time accepting random chaos — aka simple chance. Instead we believe there must always be a pattern or reason for an event.
Why This Leads To Overcomplication In Business
There are three broad reasons why we overcomplicate processes, teams and products in the business world.
First, corporations are simply collections of people. And, as noted, people bias towards the complex because our brains crave that mental shortcut.
People naturally bias toward overcomplicating their roles, their tasks and their responsibilities at work.
This ultimately leads to broader complication in the projects that these same people drive, the products they build and the user flows they design.
Second, business practices, product lists and user flows morph over time. What made sense at inception may not make sense any more.
Complication builds as processes evolve over time without audits, product lists grow without hygiene, corporate structures expand without checks and taxing managerial habits add to overcomplication.
Complexity grows unchecked.
There’s also little incentive to improve when business leaders do not explicitly prioritize simplification. Eliminating overcomplication requires ongoing vigilance and a commitment to ongoing efforts.
Given humans don’t naturally simplify — rather, we actively bias against simplification — business leaders don’t naturally gravitate to reducing overcomplication.
Simplification is a skill business leaders need to actively learn and develop. It’s doesn’t exist in our default state.
Third, overcomplication offers a form of exclusiveness and job protection.
Science has long been criticized for using complicated language (aka jargon) that excludes or makes it hard for others to engage in scientific discussion.
People in the corporate world do the same in protection of their roles. They fill meetings with jargon and overcomplicated terms that deter others from debate and conversation.
Jargon not only exclusionary, it also does harm by excluding people from important discussions.
For example, everyone should understand how politicians are spending budget and public money. But too often we hear jargon and overcomplication from politicians that obscures what and how they are spending public funding.
In business, everyone should have the opportunity to contribute to broad business priorities. Overcomplicating language and communication excludes others from participating, limiting the opportunity for new ideas and broad input.
Simplifying process, product and experiences is not only good hygiene and a more inclusive approach. Various studies have shown that simplification drives up profits, reduces costs and is a key competitive advantage.
How Decision Science Can Help A Business Simplify
Decision Science sits in a unique role within most companies. We span both business and technical spheres. Often our analysis and insights dictate plans, influence product development and connect impact across two or more teams.
Here are a few ways Decision Science can help a business simplify:
- Using KPIs and Scorecards to Force Focus — Metrics are a key way to improve focus. Forcing a team to look at a limited set of key metrics helps reduce unnecessary complication and removes metric cacophony. For example, I enforce a limit of two KPIs. All other metrics can go in a ‘learning agenda’.
- Routinely Ask ‘Why’ — Just because something has ‘always been done’ a certain way or performed best in the past doesn’t mean it’s the right way to do it going forward. Decision Scientists are typically very curious, so it’s important we lean into that skill and ask whether something is the simplest it can be. Asking ‘why’ on a regular basis is a great way to re-evaluate and simplify when possible.
- Use Analysis and Experimentation to Look for Ways to Simplify — Tracking user flows, measuring differences, running experiments and evaluating product launches are all examples of opportunities to understand the end-to-end experience and look for ways to simplify. Sometimes it takes someone outside the product or marketing teams to look at a process and suggest ways to simplify.
- ‘Simple First’ Mentality — Decision Science methods can get complicated quickly. That said, always opting for the simplest methodology first, making analysis documents simple-to-understand and visualizing insights in their simplest form. I consider this the Decision Science version of Occam’s Razor which argues the simplest explanation is preferable to a more complex reason.
- Using First Principles Thinking — It’s hard to over-estimate the benefits of the first principles approach in reducing overcomplication. First principles thinking is essentially stripping something back its principle element(s). For example, legal guidelines and enforced industry requirements are some of the basic elements in business. Everything built on top of these is building from First Principles. A business updating or tweaking an existing business process is not working from first principles. An idea or process that is brand new is likely working from first principles. As Decision Scientists, we often need to understand the principle elements to ensure we’re understand the data and deliver accurate insights. That puts us in a natural position to encourage First Principles thinking throughout the business.
It’s somewhat comforting to think that overcomplication is a bias that’s hardwired into our brains. But we needn’t be held hostage to unnecessary complexity in business or as individuals.
Tools like ‘KPI scorecards’ and frameworks like First Principles thinking can reduce unnecessary complication in business. Training managers to be aware of Complexity Bias and to look at their own actions that may contribute to complexity can also reduce overcomplication. Management prioritizing simplification as a priority for the business will also combat unnecessary complexity.
All of which is worth the effort. Reducing overcomplication in business has been proven to reduce costs, increase profits and generally improve the health of an organization. This should encourage businesses to consider simplification as a key business strategy and competitive advantage.
Decision Scientists can play a pivotal role promoting simplicity-minded management. Decision Science roles have a cross-functional approach and a need to deeply understand end-to-end experiences in order to deliver the best analyses. This unique position means Decisions Scientists are in a great position to identify overcomplication throughout a business.0
