Someone could build a simple tool to do what I want. Someone could build a simple tool to do what you want. They would be different tools, though. Nobody wants to create different tools for me and you. So they create one tool, and it has to be more complex.
As the article says, the same thing happens with business units. Every VP wants something that does what they need (or think they do). And it might be simple to do any one of those. It's not simple to do all of them put together, though. (In fact, I wonder if it doesn't happen more because of different VPs than it does different customers.)
Exactly this. Much like the tale of people only using 10% of Microsoft Word, yet everyone uses a different 10%.
Strange the article doesn't address this tension between all the various stakeholders and tension among their priorities. I want the simplest thing that satisfies my need and want, yet no simpler. If others are using it then it'll already be more complex or one or both of us must compromise.
> Strange the article doesn't address this tension between all the various stakeholders and tension among their priorities.
I thought it did:
> Of course we all claim to hate complexity, but it’s actually just complexity added by other people that we hate — our own bugbears are always exempted, and for things we understand we quickly become unable to even see there is a potential problem for other people.
Fair, I was hoping it'd go deeper because even an individual has tension between different priorities that can require complexity.
This whole point kind of invalidates the conclusion that no one wants simplicity despite their claims. They really do want simplicity, despite struggling to understand both the depths of what's needed to satisfy their less visible constraints and the needs and priorities of everyone else using the thing.
Subconsciously or consciously folks may have a sense of the tradeoffs, which is why they keep choosing more complex solutions. Not because they're being dishonest or are hopelessly ignorant.
Someone could build a simple tool to do what I want. Someone could build a simple tool to do what you want. They would be different tools, though. Nobody wants to create different tools for me and you. So they create one tool, and it has to be more complex.
As the article says, the same thing happens with business units. Every VP wants something that does what they need (or think they do). And it might be simple to do any one of those. It's not simple to do all of them put together, though. (In fact, I wonder if it doesn't happen more because of different VPs than it does different customers.)