Constructive Laziness

What is "constructive laziness"? Is it a good thing?

At FourThought Partners, we consider constructive laziness to be one of the best attributes a thinker can have. In mathematics, it is called the search for elegance. It means not being satisfied with a complicated solution, but rather seeking out a simple and straightforward one.

Too often, business processes, especially old ones, are anything but simple. They represent a long ago solution (which may once have been elegant) with lots of fixes changes and enhancements on over the years to solve the problems of the day. By today, the process has no single owner, it is incredibly complicated, and it has legacy features that no one can quite explain (but, which no one dare eliminate for fear that the house of cards may come crashing down).

In such a case, it would be highly desirable to simplify the process, and make the work easier - hence the term "laziness", which in this context means looking for less work and a process that is easier to understand and execute.

Another example of a context in which constructive laziness is a good thing is when looking for a way to display data. The non-constructive lazy solution is to just dump it out and let the reader try to figure out what it says. (How often have you been in a meeting where that is what the presenter did?)

The constructive lazy solution is to think about how the presentation could be short and simple, with conclusions readily apparent to the reader. It's actually more work to do it this way, but the result is much easier to explain and to modify at a future time. In other words, it's much less work for everyone over the long haul.

We at FourThought Partners strive to be constructively lazy in all our projects. It may have been difficult to perform our assignment, but we do not want it to be difficult to get benefit from our work. We strive to find the easiest way to get each problem solved.