In the last few weeks, I have observed how humans tend to be reductionists. We reduce our thoughts to an X post. We take a 500-page book and summarize it by its title. We take a whole CRM of customers and reduce them to a handful of personas. We make a detailed strategic plan and reduce it to a few goals and guiding metrics.

In a complex world with accelerating change, simplicity is seductive. Our brains cannot process the world in its full fidelity, while a clear and compelling idea can galvanize thousands of people across an organization and the world to take action. Hence, we create mental models, heuristics, frameworks, and rules of thumb to help us make directionally accurate decisions. These simple tools align teams, set priorities, and maintain cohesion because simplicity scales.

While simplicity scales and is empowering, it carries hidden risks. A book’s value cannot be measured by its cover or title. Any customer is more than its assigned persona. A person’s social media posts cannot explain the person’s intention or soul.

Reductionist thinking is a cornerstone of science, business, communications, and reasoning. We enjoy breaking down a complex idea, concept, or system into more straightforward and manageable parts. Yet, we know that the outputs of these simpler parts often get us into trouble. We’ve all chased a singular metric and found it didn’t fully capture what we were after. We made our revenue numbers, but we had a mixed bag of good and bad revenue. We hit our DAU numbers, but the usage was fleeting. Our social post received lots of engagement but little conversion.

There is no merit in making something more complex than it has to be, but simplicity for simplicity’s sake will also fail us. The challenge is not to reject simplicity but to use it humbly. We should not confuse simplicity and, by extension, our reductionist thinking with reality. Here are some methods to complement simplicity:

1. Face the Limits. Simplifying frameworks has a domain of validity. Knowing where a simplification breaks down is as important as knowing when and where it applies.
2. Zoom In and Out. Each problem looks different from different angles and altitudes. By zooming in and out, we’ll likely apply different frameworks and mental models to simplify our problem. Diversity of vantage points and mental models can lead to different understandings and be illuminating.
3. Convergence. When we apply various simplifying frameworks, do our answers converge? If not, we need a deeper understanding of our problem.
4. Probabilistic Thinking. As a simplifying method, we view the world as static and stationary, yet we know the world is not static and non-stationary. It is often helpful to apply a probabilistic approach.
5. Humility. Simplifying conclusions and beliefs should be loosely held. Be careful of narratives that feel too elegant. While we struggle for clarity, the truth is often messy.

Next time you hear, “Simplicity scales, and complexity doesn’t,” instead of nodding in agreement, perhaps give a more nuanced response that the former is seductively true but not always right, and there are plenty of counterexamples to the latter. Our universe and world are complex and continue to increase in entropy and expand just fine. The uncomfortable truth is that complexity does scale, but it is hard to understand and control.
 
Albert Einstein’s saying, “Everything should be made as simple as possible, but not any simpler,” encourages us to hold two opposites in tension and to seek clarity without sacrificing the integrity of reality. It inspires us to seek simplicity and completeness.