The CSO: The Chief Simple Officer

Businesses, in theory, should be simple. Sell something for more than you spent on making it and you should have a profit. 

Everything after that complicates it. In one isolated task, a bit of complexity isn't a big deal, but over months, years, decades, it can become a cancer that grows and murders the business from the inside. It's the CSO's job to prevent that from happening.

What causes it?

Systems, processes, people.

Systems and processes make sense. That's the idea of standardising something you do a lot, so you end up with a repeatable, simple process. People can learn and remember how to do it and it doesn't rely on individual brilliance to achieve basic tasks. 

Perfect, providing it's kept in check!

Then there's people.

No-one worth anything shows up to work and isn't trying to do their best. The trouble is, it's often the 'trying' that leads to a complex solution instead of a simple one.

It could be adding an extra feature, a word in a bit of copy, an extra section on a website or an extra step in a previously-simple process.

People is where the CSO is needed. The CSO's job is to question and simplify as much as possible. 

Why does that need to be there? 
Why does it need to be that long? 
What if we just removed that section?
Can we half it? 
What if we did it in a week instead of a month? 
What if we skipped that bit completely? 
What would happen if we just cancelled this project?

Your staff can't really do this very easily. It's their job to make their work good, and in most work environments, more is better, complicated justifies the expense and your existence. How else can you prove your worth if you don't come up with elaborate solutions to things?

But it's the elaborate part that kills businesses and the difficult part is, that is the human default - to add complexity. It's not human instinct (at least at work) to simplify things. 

The CSO in our business is me, simplifying is in my nature because I actively don't want a complicated business. But it should also exist in everyone as much as possible. 

Everyone needs to be the CSO of their own work.