Adam Howe is a Partner at Heidrick & Struggles based in their New York office and specialises in helping organisations to proactively kill complexity and promote simplicity. This episode is essential for leaders of any sized business.
Adam realised during the delivery of large scale transformation programmes that people were overwhelmed and overloaded and that the idea of taking things away and subtracting tasks would improve productivity.
Complexity is a huge issue and has never been higher. Research has found that on average, large publicly traded companies waste 10.2% of their EBITDA and high tend to suffer from low employee engagement ad lack of innovation. The solution for many companies is rooted in good leadership and culture.
Heidrick & Struggles research has shown that companies who have high quality cultures drive 90% more revenue growth and 30% more profit growth over 5 years.
The vast majority of organisational complexity is actually self generated by peoples decisions and behaviours. Leaders must become complexity conscious and be able to distinguish between good ad bad complexity.
Good complexity is where the value of the complexity outweighs the cost and the inverse is true for bad complexity. As the context of an organisation changes, good complexity can become bad complexity so leaders must remain curious and vigilant.
The role of complexity being used to undermine is well known as Adam explains how the CIA taught its operatives to use complexity in the 1940;s in its fight against governments it was at war with.
Adam outlines the major root causes of complexity and the need for leaders to look holistically across the business. He also shares some examples of organisations who have benefited from killing complexity and promoting simplicity.
As humans we are wired to create complexity and we need to avoid 'zombie complexity' which Adam explains as complexity that is simplified but the root causes were never dealt with so the complexity comes back.
To sustainably drive simplicity within your business you must have a culture where everyone can call out complexity, they can speak up with our fear and know they will be listened to.
Adam's advice is for leaders to be bold, clear trusting, pragmatic and obsessed in becoming complexity conscious.
Check out the episode to hear about Home Depot, the Balance Bike and JEEP (Just Enough Essential Parts)
Adam's top tips for any leader are to do the following:
1. Write down on one page your top 3 priorities and your team are aligned on them
2. Empower your team and your teams teams to really identify where bad complexity is getting in the way. Thereby getting clear on your complexity shadow.
Start today by asking yourself and your teams, 'what have you said no to today?'
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