Everything Should Be Made as Simple as Possible, but No Simpler

In a recent newsletter, Matthew Yglesias suggested three steps for creating effective policies:

1. It’s easy for everyone, whether they agree with you or disagree with you, to understand what it is you say you are doing.
2. It’s easy for everyone to see whether or not you are, in fact, doing what you said you would do.
3. It’s easy for you and your team to meet the goal of doing the thing that you said you would do.

These are great, but I think they could be applied far more broadly, which is exactly what I do in this episode.