ation

Quintessential Thought

We’re in a series about unpacking composite attributes to increase clarity, alignment, and creativity. Last week, we explored how to find supporting attributes that can make up a composite attribute.

This week, we’re whittling the list down to find the most critical attributes to focus on.

If we want to increase agility, value, team effectiveness, or any other composite attribute, we need a short list of supporting attributes that are critical to the larger goal. If there are too many, we won’t be able to select actions that affect the goal, and we diffuse the focus of everyone working toward the goal. In other words, we need to minimize the list to maximize the focus.

The best way we know how to do this is to use a Liberating Structure called MinSpecs. With a group of people who will be involved in achieving the goal:

1. Come up with a list of all the possible attributes that could support the composite attribute (this was covered in last week’s article).

2. One at a time, consider each attribute and eliminate any that could be ignored while it’s possible to still achieve the composite attribute.

The conversations these simple steps produce are enlightening and clarifying. As the MinSpecs page says, “Often two to five Min Specs are sufficient to boost performance by adding more freedom AND more responsibility to the group’s understanding of what it must do to make progress.”

As a side note, you may discover it’s necessary to jettison the composite attribute when communicating. Perhaps it has become so strictly defined in unhelpful terms that redefinition is nearly impossible, and it’s clearer to use the supporting attributes or other terms to describe the high-level direction.

Now, with this clarity and focus, what do you do? Next week, we’ll look at how you can activate!

Quotes

“A designer knows perfection is achieved not when there is nothing more to add but when there is nothing more that can be taken away.” – Antoine de Saint-Exupery

“Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication.” – Leonardo da Vinci

“If your mind isn’t clouded by unnecessary things, then this is the best season of your life.” – Wu-Men

Quick Step

When have you experienced too many options being unhelpful for you or a team?

Question

Run MinSpecs for a composite attribute or goal in your team.

Professional Product Discovery and Validation, Jan 24

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