Example of complex integrative solution – Drive profitability while pursuing both innovation and operational excellence.
80-20 rule states that for 20 percent of the maximum effort, we can get 80 percent of the ideal result. Applied to the cognitive domain, the rule says that 20 percent of the maximum mental effort will yield 80 percent of the perfect answer. Further the rule suggests that only an obsessive or pathological perfectionist would invest 80 percent more effort in the hope of reaching an answer that would at best only be 20 percent better.
The 80-20 rule implicitly acknowledges that simplification is not the perfect solution to the problems of ambiguity and causal inconsistency, but rather a coping mechanism. We settle for 80 percent to avoid being overwhelmed by complexity and losing the ability to function at all. It is also a way to keep the complexity at a tolerable level.
As comforting as simplification can be, however, it impairs every step of the integrative thinking process. It encourages us to edit out salient features rather than consider the question of salience broadly. Editing, in turn, leads to unsatisfactory resolutions of the dilemmas that business throws at us. Simplification makes us favor linear, unidirectional causal relationships, even if reality is more complex and multidirectional.
Simplification also encourages us to construct a limited model of the problem before us whatever it might be. The alternatives we perceive are meager and unattractive, closing any remaining avenue to an integrative resolution. The simplifying mind has no choice but to settle for trade-offs, also known as best bad choice available.
The following graphics are from the book – The Opposable Mind –
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