How Managing Natural Complexity Results in Manufactured Complexity

Now that we know why complexity exists, let’s turn our attention to how to manage natural complexity.

Natural complexity is inevitable and can be due to reasons like:

• Regulatory constraints of your industry
• Operating in multiple countries
• Having many different revenue lines

As stated yesterday, most organizations can only influence manufactured complexity, not natural complexity.

Thus, we need the ability to manage the natural complexity of the industry and network that an organization operates within.

Fortunately, regulated industries often have solutions that are purpose-built to assist with compliance. They also have people that are familiar with the constraints that serve as the subject matter experts to assist with the implementation of business processes.

As for operating in multiple countries or having many different revenue lines (i.e. one-off products, subscription licenses, professional services projects, ongoing managed services), most enterprise-grade CRMs and ERPs are able to manage this complexity without requiring significant customization.

Let’s consider how we can manage natural complexity associated with multiple countries or many revenue lines as it relates to CRM:

• Single system strategy involves implementing one CRM system for all countries or revenue lines
• Multiple system strategy involves implementing multiple CRM systems, which are often split by region, country, or revenue line

Now, we are faced with a choice of between which strategy to use, and that choice results in manufactured complexity, as the:

• Single system strategy adds manufactured complexity to any of the business processes that involve CRM, along with configuration and customization of the CRM system itself
• Multiple system strategy adds manufactured complexity to only those business processes and systems that involve sharing data across borders or revenue lines, which could be needed for use cases like multinational customers or higher level reporting

Neither option is better or worse than the other, and to risk sounding like a consultant, it depends on the requirements and constraints of each organization.

Regardless, we have a paradigm where:

1. Managing natural complexity results in choices
2. Those choices produce consequences in the form of manufactured complexity
3. Our goal is to have as little unnecessary, manufactured complexity as possible
4. That is lens through which we need to evaluate the choices we make to manage natural complexity

TLDR: The choices we make on how to manage natural complexity results in manufactured complexity.