“The Laws of Subtraction: 6 Simple Rules for Winning in the Age of Excess Everything” by Matthew May (McGraw Hill, $24).
In an age of information overload, too many choices and make it happen now, May applies Occam’s razor (i.e. The simplest answer is often the best.) to innovation. His study of businesses large and small shows that less often yields more.
Here are May’s six simple rules as applied by business people:
1. “What isn’t there can often trump what is.” As CEO of Behance, Scott Belsky developed the LinkedIn of the creative world. Its mantra: “When you reduce the number of doors that someone can walk through, more people walk through the one you want them to walk through.” Useful triumphs over abundant.
2. “The simplest rules create the most effective experience.” Intuit’s development teams are never larger than the number of people who can be fed by two pizzas. Brad Smith, Intuit’s president and CEO says the Two-Pizza Rule “allows members to stay nimble and reach decisions quickly.” The rule also develops a team’s laser-like focus and collaborations that produce results.
3. “Limiting information engages the imagination.” Scott McCloud, who wrote the Zot! Comic strip, knows that you can pack lots of content into a few panels. That content engages the audience — and makes them think. The fewer the panels (slides in a presentation or words in a speech), the greater the audience focus on meaning. Various perspectives and ideas come to light when the audience discusses the content.
4. “Creativity thrives under intelligent constraints.” Framing the issue or problem properly reveals the creative thinkers in the room. It also energizes them. NASA’s Mars Pathfinder mission went from concept to touchdown in less than 44 months — and, at $200 million, it cost less than the Hollywood blockbuster Titanic. When May worked with Toyota on a number of projects, he pitched ideas on a single sheet of paper. It forced him to hone his ideas.
5. “Break is the most important part of breakthrough.” Think Skunk Works. Lockheed’s produced the designs U-2, the SR-71 Blackbird and the F117 Nighthawk. Steve Jobs and a small team developed the Mac far from the Apple campus. Not constrained by the corporate hierarchy and bureaucracy, the thinkers could tinker. Break also deals with thinking. Divergent thinking always creates more alternatives and solutions. Apple, a computer company, revolutionized the music and phone industries.
6. “Doing something isn’t always better than doing nothing.” May addresses the human side of less. People need work-life balance to maintain their energy. Boston Consulting Group found that teams that took “predictable time off” fared better than those that didn’t. May’s message: Wage war on more.
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“Admired: 21 Ways to Double Your Value” by Mark Thompson and Bonita Thompson (Evolve Publishing, $12.99).
In sports, the MVP award recognizes the player who did the most for the team. The authors take a slightly different view: The MVP (Most Valuable People) creates other MVPs by helping others reach their goals and realize their potential.
The Thompson’s study of people who enjoyed their work and found it meaningful showed they valued the following traits in their MVPs: supportive/helpful, straightforward/clear, hardworking/ambitious, cooperative, honest, loyal, fun-loving/friendly, family focused. Clearly, these traits speak to a shift from what’s in it for me to contributing to the success of others in ways that they notice.
Doing so requires that you treat others as customers, not just bosses, colleagues, family, friends, etc. Salespeople sell solutions and value, not products; so must MVPs. And like a salesperson, an MVP needs to know the customers. Each has various needs, wants and hot buttons. Sales (creating other MVPs) result from defining what a customer’s success looks like from the outset.
Of their 21 ways, I found #5 “Start where you are” particularly important. You have to be really good at what you do before others will have confidence in what you bring to them.
Jim Pawlak is a nationally syndicated book reviewer.
