The Simplicity Cycle: A Field Guide to Making Things Better Without Making Them Worse by Dan Ward

by Dan Ward

The award-winning engineer, Air Force lieutenant colonel, and author of F.I.R.E offers a road map for designing winning new products, services, and business models, and shows how to avoid complexity-related pitfalls in the process. With a foreword by design guru Don Norman. Humans make things every day, whether it’s composing an e-mail, cooking a meal, or constructing the Mars Rover. While complexity is often necessary in the development process, unnecessary complexity adds complications. The Simplicity Cycle provides the secret to striking the proper balance. Dan Ward shines a light on how complexity affects the things we make for good or ill, taking us on a journey through the process of making things, with a particular focus on identifying and avoiding complexity-related pitfalls. The standard development process involves increasing complexity to improve the outcome, Ward explains. The problem comes when the complexity starts getting in the way—but often we don’t know where that point is until we pass it. He suggests a number of techniques for identifying the problem and fixing it, including how to overcome several types of wrongheaded thinking—such as the idea that complexity and quality are the same. In clear, compelling language, and using his trademark mix of examples from research, personal experience, and pop culture, Ward offers a universal concept, visually described with a single, evolving diagram. Ideal for business leaders and technologists, The Simplicity Cycle is helpful for anyone looking to simplify and improve everything we do, whether we work in an office, at home, or at the Pentagon.

Genres: Business, Nonfiction, Design, Entrepreneurship, Reference, Management, Leadership

Unknown Binding

First published May 12, 2015

Reviews

[Peter Morville · Rating 5 out of 5]

If I could ask my clients to read one book before we work together, it would be The Simplicity Cycle by Dan Ward. At the heart of the book is an inflection point where the relationship between goodness and complexity flips. The problem is that people miss the point. Instead of clarity, they add clutter, always more, never less. I need my clients to see and understand this point. Everyone who designs products, services, and organizations should devour this book.

[Sally · Rating 5 out of 5]

If the government is listening: Please hire Dan Ward to design our national healthcare system. In the book, Ward follows his own advice and makes simplicity complex before finding the simplicity within it. However, I'm not convinced of the off-limits area he defines where complex things cannot be simple. If all the components in a complex system are as simple as possible and there are no unnecessary components, then it would seem that the complex system would fit that definition. I will probably need to experience it to fully comprehend why he feels it cannot exist.

[Karen · Rating 3 out of 5]

I felt this was a 20-page article expanded into a book of almost 200 pages. It is a fast read, though, due to the many diagrams. I felt I already knew most of what was presented, but if the material was new to you, perhaps you would need the repetition to have it fully sink in.

That said, the concepts are important and worth your while to consider.

[Catalina Butnaru · Rating 1 out of 5]

Promising that end up being boring

What if you want on a date with someone because to heard them make a really good joke, and throughout the evening you hear them making the same joke over and over again? The simplicity cycle could be simplified in a page long article. Once you see the first diagram you will see it every chapter, over and over again.

[Dan Vinson · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read this for work, after being exposed to it at a library conference in March, but it can really apply anywhere in your life! I will be using its concepts this summer in both arenas. Excellent stuff!

[Kelly · Rating 5 out of 5]

This small book is phenomenally good advice. I have long been a proponent for making systems simpler, and this book proposes a mental model and method for making it happen. A very good read.

[Khang Nguyen · Rating 2 out of 5]

The initial idea (a map to navigate between simple and complex, good and bad) is good, but it would probably fit in a blog post, a chapter max. This book has too much filler.

[Cliff Bartlett]

from: http://www.cio.com/article/2919487/it...
"4 must-read IT leadership books"

[Vuk Trifkovic · Rating 1 out of 5]

Pretty poor, and I am restraining from using another p-word.

Well intentioned but simplified to imbecility.

[Jack Ziegler]

I found a review of this book in the AIChE's July 2015 Chemical Engineering Progress magazine. I think that it will provide some insight into better control system design.

[Kate · Rating 3 out of 5]

Too many pages for its premise. Skim it at the library.