1. My First Smart
A little over 25 years ago, I bought my first Smart car. I was completing my legal traineeship at the time, money was tight, and yet I was determined to have that particular car. So I financed it over three years. Looking back, I’m not sure it was the wisest financial decision. But I still remember exactly what fascinated me about it.
It was the idea behind the Smart. “Reduce to the Max” was its advertising slogan. Rather than offering ever more power, features and space, it raised a different question: What does a car really need? What can you take away to allow what truly matters to stand out?
The French writer Antoine de Saint-Exupéry had expressed a similar thought decades earlier: “Perfection is achieved, not when there is nothing more to add, but when there is nothing left to take away.” What I find particularly interesting is that he was referring to the development of technical designs.
That idea has stayed with me, especially when I look at how companies operate. Because in organizations, we are remarkably good at adding things. Removing them is much harder.
2. Why Organizations Keep Getting More Complicated
A problem arises, so we introduce a new process. Information fails to reach everyone, so we create another distribution list. Decisions take too long, so we schedule an additional coordination meeting. Each measure can be justified. Often, it even makes perfect sense at the time.
The difficulty is that these structures rarely disappear when circumstances change. The next problem brings another process, the next project another meeting. Complexity does not necessarily emerge from some grand design. More often, it is the accumulated result of many small, perfectly understandable decisions.
When someone introduces something new, they can explain the problem it is intended to solve. But when someone wants to eliminate something, they have to explain why it is suddenly no longer needed. And that leads to a very different conversation.
3. When I Tried to Eliminate Meetings
I remember a situation in which I wanted to reduce the number of recurring meetings. Some were to be eliminated altogether, others held less frequently. My reasoning was straightforward: We were spending a great deal of time in meetings whose original purpose was no longer entirely clear. Surely that time could be put to better use.
The reactions surprised me. There were, of course, practical objections. Certain issues still needed to be discussed, and information still had to be shared. But I also sensed other, unspoken questions. Are our topics less important now? Are our concerns no longer being taken seriously? Does anyone still recognize the work we do?
That was when I realized that I saw these meetings differently from some of the participants. To me, they were organizational tools. To others, they also represented visibility, access and appreciation. I wanted to remove an appointment from the calendar. Some people interpreted that as a sign that I attached less importance to their concerns, their work and ultimately to them as individuals.
4. People Are Not Dead Weight
This gap between intention and perception reminds me of a statement by a board member of a DAX-listed company where I worked early in my career. In an interview, he said the company needed to “shed ballast.” He was referring to complicated structures, inefficient processes and the need to move faster.
Yet the public reaction focused primarily on the possibility of job cuts. An employee representative objected and was quoted the following day as saying: “People are not dead weight.” A simple statement that immediately illustrates how sensitive such language can be.
Someone talking about shedding ballast may be thinking of unnecessary processes. Someone worried about losing their job may hear that they themselves are considered unnecessary. Those are two very different things. But leaders cannot expect their words to be understood only in the way they intended.
5. What Simplification Really Requires
We encounter the same problem in debates about reducing bureaucracy. Almost everyone agrees that there should be fewer rules and reporting requirements. But once the discussion becomes specific, we discover that many regulations serve particular interests: protection, safety, participation or the need to make decisions transparent and accountable. Not every rule makes sense. But a rule is not necessarily unnecessary simply because complying with it takes time and effort.
That does not mean every existing structure must be preserved whenever someone objects to its removal. Leadership also means questioning established practices and making decisions despite resistance. But there is a difference between simply taking something away from people and working with them to understand what they actually need. The real challenge is not to avoid disappointing anyone. It is to reduce unnecessary complexity without disregarding legitimate concerns or making people feel that they themselves have become dispensable.
6. My Impuls
The idea behind my first Smart still appeals to me. But removing things from an organization is more complicated than designing a small car. What seems unnecessary to one person may serve an important purpose for someone else.
Which meetings, processes or rules would we choose not to introduce today if they did not already exist? What prevents us from eliminating them? And how can we distinguish between what people genuinely need and what they have simply grown accustomed to?
Perhaps good leadership is measured not only by what someone builds, but also by what they can make unnecessary without losing what truly matters.
