Why essence of simplicity hard to achieve ?

In Leonardo Da Vinci ‘s words “The greatest complexity is simplicity.”. Shakespeare believed that brevity was the essence of wit, not to mention the KISS concept coined by American system engineer Kelly Johnson, a backronym for “keeping it easy, dumb.” Simplicity is a key to success whether it’s science or literature, engineering or architecture. But it is extremely difficult to do.

As a designer everyone is trying to make a project he/she is working on a award-winning project. But, as we stare at a blank screen, looking for the best of our ideas in a hope for better times to come. It is difficult to start something when you are out of your creative ideas. Every Designer falls in these sort of traps once in a while when they try to outsmart others. The main difficulty is achieving simplicity. Simple is what sells but achieving simplicity is more tough than imagined.

The main reason in achieving simplicity is also time. Each project is time-bound, and it’s another reason why simplicity in design is so hard to achieve. Modern life ‘s rapid speed encourages you to be actively involved in several tasks: making, preparing, negotiating and learning. You have to better manage your time, be stress-resistant and work under pressure to think clearly.

Steve Jobs had a simple view of what makes elegant architecture. He produced products, powered by his innovative ideas, that took the world by storm — with their elegant simplicity that had no effect on the complexity of their features. This approach to modern narrative design has taught marketers how to turn their representations of technology into stories — stories that can strike, attract and convert. That way, the central concept of successful design is focused on clarifying items, not just making them work. Instead of having the product creation process overcomplicated, you should take a scalpel and start simplifying it.

Here are a few things to bear in mind when you aim to make your strategic marketing and product planning simplicity:

Core set of product needs: Above all, understanding the key deliverables is important. What needs have to be met, and what features are necessary to meet those needs most directly? Articulate your product or service with an initial view of the bare necessities.

Look to eliminate features in your design: Spend as much time evaluating what you should remove from your product as you are evaluating what your product should contain. Adding functionality requires very little thought but the end result is usually a complicated mess. By adding elements to your product continuously you risk making the user experience more complicated and less enjoyable.

Customer always doesn’t know the best: I know that sounds like blasphemy, but hear me out. Interaction with the customers is important for the most popular goods, but the questions you ask are critical. The trick is to ask the customers what they need, and what problems they try to solve. Don’t waste much time making feature requests. When validating your product, concentrate on whether it suits the criteria and not what they want to see. Unrestrained demands for enhancements contribute to bloat — which can cripple the development team.

Have vision: Being able to look at the product as a whole and understand how it will actually be used is important. Vision focused on a deep understanding of consumer desires — not demands for functionality — is revolutionizing industries. For example, feature guided development would have given rise to an iPhone with a keyboard.

In his book “The Laws of Simplicity” the American designer and technologist John Maeda gives 10 guidelines for designers who want simplicity:

1. Decrease. The best way to achieve simplicity is by considerate reduction. To put it another way, only delete when in doubt.
2. Plan. Plan. It makes you think less of a structure.
3. Time.Time. Saving time has the feeling of ease, though waiting feels complicated.
4. Learn more. Awareness makes all of this easier.
5. Disagreements. Everyone requires simplicity and complexity. The other one stands out, when one prevails.
6. History. It is certainly not peripheral what lies in the periphery of simplicity.
7. Being sentimental. More feelings are better than less; don’t be afraid to add more layers of sense or ornament.
8. Esteem. We believe in simplicity, despite the repercussions it brings.
9. Failure. You can never make some things easy, and you have to learn from your mistakes.
10. The one. Simplicity in design is about the obvious being subtracted and the important being substituted.

While ‘simplicity’ comes from ‘simple,’ you can see that analysis, thinking, preparation and effort are needed. In addition, to understand the basic psychology, you must accept lifelong learning, cultivate empathy and remain open-minded. Simplicity takes time, and the laws of John Maeda are proof of that.

While it’s hard to achieve simplicity, it’s absolutely worth it. Only think about the iconic Apple and Nike logos. They ‘re really easy and, thus, evergreen. But you get closer to the dream of making your product recognizable and cultic when you set aside time and develop a simple design. Simplicity is not only a matter of submission to the visual but also of perception. It’s an art of simplifying the complex. It is very complicated but it’s worth it.

Originally published at https://medium.com on September 11, 2020.