97 Things Every Project Manager Should Know

Chapter 5. Favor the Simple Over the Complex

Scott Davis

AS FAR AS I'M CONCERNED, my microwave oven only has one button: "add a minute." To boil a cup of water for my coffee, I press the button three times. To melt cheese on my crackers, one click. To warm up a flour tortilla, I press "add a minute" and then open the door after 15 seconds.

Would a one-button microwave oven ever make it out of the planning committee? Probably not. I can tell by the (never used) features on my microwave that the committee favored complexity over simplicity. Of course, they probably cloaked "complexity" in the euphemism "feature-rich." No one ever starts out with the goal of making a product that is unnecessarily complex. The complexity comes along accidentally.

Suppose that I have a slice of cold pizza that I want to warm up. According to the manufacturer's directions, I should press the "menu" button. I am now faced with the options "speedcook" or "reheat." (Um, "reheat," I guess, although I'm kind of hungry. I wonder if speedcook will be any faster than reheat?)

"Beverage," "pasta," "pizza," "plate of food," "sauce," or "soup"? (I choose "pizza," although it does have sauce on it, and it is on a plate.) "Deli/Fresh" or "Frozen"? (Neither, actually—it's leftover delivery pizza. I'll choose "Deli/Fresh," I guess.) "1 slice," "2 slices," "3 slices," or "4 slices"? I have no idea how much longer this interrogation ...