Innovation Elegance

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Elegance Manifesto

We are uncovering better ways of innovation teamwork

by doing it and helping others do it.

Through this work we have come to value:

Expectation setting over flexibility

Low marginal cost over frequency

Muscle memory over creativity

Clarity over ambiguity

Sense of accomplishment and rest over continuous delivery

Fixing institutional errors over fixing human errors

Succeed fast, succeed small over fail fast, fail small

Career security over job security

Ambition over competition

Generosity over “just enough”

 

That is, while there is value in the items on

the right, we value the items on the left more.


Principles behind the Elegance Manifesto

We follow these principles:

Our highest priority is to satisfy the customer

through synchronized and paced approvals

of valuable assets.

 

Welcoming changing expectations,

even within days of setting or meeting them.

Elegant processes harness change for

innovators’ collaborative advantage.

 

Approving expectations rhythmically, from a

couple of hours to a couple of days or weeks,

optimizing the size of each batch of expectations.

 

Junior and senior employees must work together

with schedule visibility and decision transparency

throughout the project.

 

Build projects around empathetic individuals.

Give them psychological safety,

a sense of belonging, and time away from the job

and trust them to get the job done.

 

The most durable and scalable method

of setting and meeting expectations

among stakeholders

is executing Five Verbs

wherever their desks are located.

 

Go-live events are the primary measure of progress.

 

Elegant processes promote ambitious innovation.

Junior and senior employees should be able

to maintain a sustainable pace indefinitely.

 

Continuous attention to rhythmic excellence

and good balance enhances elegance.

 

Simplicity–the art of minimizing

Verb Sprawl in formal planning—

is essential.

 

The best stories, experiences, and moments that matter

emerge from disciplined and empathetic teams.

 

At regular intervals, the team reflects on how

to become more effective, then tunes and adjusts

its behavior accordingly.