Make Things Easy

“Truth is ever to be found in simplicity, and not in the multiplicity and confusion of things.” --Isaac Newton

I once heard a sales leader acknowledge to his team that many of their customers commonly refer to their product as very “technical”. Apparently embracing this label, the sales leader insisted his team become more “technical” to sell the product. I’m all for salespeople knowing the products they sell. In fact, the more you know and understand a product or service, the more you’re able to identify where it can add the most value for a customer. However, expecting your sales team to go beyond being just knowledgeable to being “technical” just to sell it is perhaps a reflection of its usability.

Apple’s ubiquitous and most popular product, the iPhone, revolutionized handheld technology with its introduction in 2007. With over 2 billion units sold worldwide since its inception, the success of the iPhone is due in part to its clean design – belying the complexity of the underlying technology. Google, the world’s most popular search engine, employs a minimalist design to mask its complex algorithms and extensive indexing that produce its massive search results.

What both transformative technologies have in common is simplicity. Two of the largest technology companies in the world have been wildly successful at hiding the technical intricacies of their products behind a user-friendly, intuitive interface. This is undoubtedly intentional as both companies understand one of the fundamental properties of a well-designed product – its ease of use, or usability.

Imagine having to dig through pages of documentation or hours of YouTube videos to figure out how to use an iPhone, Google, an Xbox -- or God-forbid, a TV remote. Heck, I’d never watch TV again (probably a good thing), people under 50 would still be playing Donkey Kong, pocket dictionaries would still be a thing, and the iPhone would share shelf space with New Coke and Zune in the Smithsonian. I’ve never seen a more effective human repellent than a How-To manual.

And yet, products requiring volumes of documentation just won’t go away. Why?  Because inordinately complex products (especially software) serves as an economic feedback loop – creating an ecosystem of hyper-specialized people, exorbitant certifications, and long-term job safety. The corporate world is littered with those who delight in creating or deploying overly-complex processes, tools, or software – basking in the misery of those forced to repeatedly CTRL-F through pages of PDFs to use it. The feeling of exclusivity in belonging to a club of uniquely-skilled, supremely-technical employees that can’t be fired lest the company fall apart can be enticing.

However, in an age where the size of technology is decreasing with our attention span, simplicity will increasingly determine a product’s viability.  No longer are we able to force consumers without consequence to become documentation bibliophiles, as they will eagerly gravitate toward competing products with an “easy button.” Since complexity is anathema to growth in business, our goal as business owners, inventors, executives, programmers, or content creators should be to create maximum simplicity – and not a club of exclusivity. Because when the “easy button” doesn’t exist, the only club consumers belong to is that of frustration. And in that club, no one’s having a good time.