The Importance of Principles
Editorial note: This article is part of an ongoing series of essays on my experience building products. It contains thoughts on design, innovation, and technology; lessons on culture, principles and community; and ideas to improve strategies, processes, and wellbeing. It’s written with an entrepreneurial spirit, an ethos of openness, and a willingness and desire to drive and make social impact. Hard lessons make easy stories, and these are some of my personal accounts.
Over the years, I’ve come to develop a flavorsome appreciation for the importance of principles: their construction, personification and expression.
Principles, at their fullest, are essentially a set of foundational rules that can be readily utilized to help solve problems and make decisions. I think, when used thoughtfully, they can be rigorous, exacting tools, and teach us many things.
Here are a few things I have learned:
From a product perspective— and this can also be applied to a company or organization— it’s become increasingly clear that principles are important, not only for the powers of their a) abstract systematization of ideals, but also, for their full-bodied, b) concrete ability to put thought into action.
Apple is a wonderful use case, perhaps the single clearest instance where a principle, in this case, “simplicity”, became so deeply ingrained in the culture and design of the organization, that it changed the ethos and expectations of the entire world par excellence.
As Steve Jobs reflected,
“Simple can be harder than complex: You have to work hard to get your thinking clean to make it simple. But it’s worth it in the end because once you get there, you can move mountains.”
Consumers have become so accustomed to the design principle of “simplicity” that it categorically seeps into life.
At their best, then, these two movements, one theoretical and the other more practical, are, in nature, one and the same— coupling ambitious, far-reaching ideas that strive to innovate, with the more salty, immediately within reach, action-oriented necessities that drive impact.
When products get out of sorts, so to speak, or become disconnected, it’s often because they lose focus. They lose touch with their principles and obsessions or rely too heavily on this influence or that— with principles fading out of view. They teeter-totter to pure abstraction or practicality, slowly losing the art and craft of what differentiated their product in the first place.
In the dance to make beautiful products, balance remains crucial.
Principles can personify, and even embody principles, practices, and operational philosophies. It’s a powerful movement of thought: principles encapsulated in the ethos-making of the product and in the ethos of the product itself. An entire lifecycle is realized in a single motion.
Principles look princely as pixels.
Alongside the product, principles can inspire communities, which can become vociferous advocates. When the power of every voice is harnessed within the product, these communities can take on and assume special forms and functions. Perhaps more than anything, however, principles can rally teams. I mean, really bring teams together in rich and unexpected ways.
When the community, product and team align around a shared set of principles, everything starts to hum.
I think it’s important to note, straight from the outset, that not every organization has a set of principles. It’s also clear, more circuitously, that even if an organization has a set of principles, not everyone thinks about them in the same way. Every organization is unique, with a different set of challenges. And, to be sure, regardless of size or industry, this is part of the conviviality of principles: they can take on a life of their own.
Organizations are social configurations and principles are but one component of a much broader ecosystem. Which is to say, principles can shoulder multiple functions at varying stages of a company or even within individual teams. In many respects, principles are the backbone.
First things, first, as they say.
Principles can be yardsticks, excellent instruments by which to measure success and evaluate progress. They can be essential in helping to weather the unexpected or in finding indiscriminate ways to come to terms with the present. Principles can help navigate the new and, perhaps invariably, the best principles are as fixed as they are adaptable.
If ever there were a paradox of principles it would be here: an-exact yet rigorous.
Whether constructed right away, in the midst of building a company, or even in retrospect, principles can have an important role to play:
data-driven teams can formulate objectives and key results with these considerations in mind;
product marketing teams can fashion stories and focus their efforts on expressions of principles;
founders, from inception, can point to principles as landmarks to navigate against an ocean of opportunities.
Amidst an impassioned team, or a passionate problem, principles can serve as a dispassionate bellwether. They can act as guideposts to make decisions, providing a consistent framework by which to include everyone in the process. In short, principles can help to ensure sound decision-making, and faster, more reliable and democratic product-making.
Principles can be a lovely tonic to the messiness of creation.
The hard work of principles is at least two-fold. First, the development of principles, taking the time to slow down, think about them carefully, and craft how they relate to the mission of the company. And, secondly, the continual constitution of how they inform culture, roadmap, and, the experience of the product. Essentially, where they manifest and persist, and, equally, where cracks form around their sturdiness.
How principles are constructed, the hardscrabble efforts of getting together, organizing ideas, and putting everything down on paper, depends on the organization. How these principles are carried on becomes a task in itself. Both are inextricably tied to a steadfast, sinewy culture. These two operations are absolutely quintessential to the successful implementation and execution of principles.
As a general rule, I believe there’s undeniable value in the exercise of codifying principles. It serves as a mechanism by which to have meaningful conversations. Perhaps this goes without saying. Principles themselves may not be seen as product differentiators, at least on the face of it, but how they are lived and incorporated can be, creating expectations, and serving to embody the values of a company, as in the case of simplicity with Apple.
When used appropriately, principles can be co-conspirators in making products. Not only in making the product, but also in inspiring the team, and, ultimately, growing the company. How principles are utilized, and where they are expressed, is where the discrepancy often manifests, as the personification or embodiment can take on many different forms.
My favorite example comes from Herman Miller, one of the first “design-driven organizations” and a leader in thinking about how principles can inform their products.
Their four guiding principles are clear and concise. They are literally designed in a way that allows creativity to take shape, customers to be heard, and teams to be supported and inspired in their journey to innovate with customers.
Trust
Stewardship
Equity
Innovation
The ability to create a framework that lets things happen, that allows growth within constraints, that serves the users by providing products and services which improve the quality of life and culture, all the while fostering a spirit of innovation an art.
Having a clear and aspirational purpose, something emblazoned in the stars and actively realized in the daily tasks is essential. With mission-alignment anything is possible and everyone can rally around and be relayed by these North Stars.
Principles should guide and inform the path, yet never hinder, serving as strongly held opinions, guideposts that can be updated. The establishment of principles, of collective participation, is often as important as the principles themselves, and these types of expressions can be articulated in a number of different ways, all of which should be exemplified.
As a personal exercise, I created a set of operational principles for myself. These are my work-in-progress principles.
