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Forking Work Simplification – Let's Bring Back Eisenhower's Process Improvement
- curtisszmania 1y ago[dead]
- scrappyjoe 1y agoFrustratingly little actual content in the article, but it links to a new-looking website that is WIP and mentions an original source document that is, frustratingly, only available for download in the US. Archive.org has a copy, here - https://archive.org/details/worksimplificati00coxj https://archive.org/details/worksimplificati00coxj
- scrappyjoe 1y agoActually, scratch that, the link I posted is to a master thesis.
- RetiredRichard 1y agoHave you tried reaching out to the guy for a copy?
- scrappyjoe 1y agoYup, that’s what I did next.
- RetiredRichard 1y agoDid he reply back with the book?
- scrappyjoe 1y agoI actually asked the author of the original article, which was linked in the article you posted, and got no reply. But I managed to track it down elsewhere. I've thrown it onto my static site, so that it's easy to get to. My understanding is that it's in the public domain, so this is fine. If I get told otherwise I'll take it down. https://riazarbi.github.io/files/Work%20simplification%20as%20exemplified%20by%20the%20work%20simplification%20program%20of%20the%20US%20Bureau%20of%20Budget.pdf https://riazarbi.github.io/files/Work%20simplification%20as%...
- scrappyjoe 1y agoWell, after all that, it turns out the netlify app linked in the post is a copy of the original PDF! So, if you care about the actual content, just go read that. The PDF does have some cool graphic design though.
- scrappyjoe 1y agoI know I'm just talking to myself at this point, but I _finally_ get the meaning of the linked article title. The netlify app is a fork, like a code fork, of the original document. Which is to say, they have taken the original work, transcribed it to a digital format, and will now evolve it. I don't know if that just went way over my head or if it was not clearly communicated, but there you have it.
- RetiredRichard 1y agoI think the bulk of the people gotten it
- condorsail 1y ago[dead]
- Animats 1y agoIt's reasonable, but it belongs to the era when the world ran on tracks of printed paper. A useful line for process improvement today - "You should never have to tell the computer something it already knows." That was a Steve Jobs line that got lost somewhere.
- jon_richards 1y agoAnd yet we still enter zip code after the rest of the address.
- pjc50 1y agoHuh. In the UK we usually enter postcode plus house number and have the computer look up the rest of the address (even though that's a paid API).
- dambi0 1y agoA UK post code is much more specific than a five digit zip code which might be one reason why.
- graemep 1y agoGood point, but because the postcode database was privatised it will always have to be a paid service which is why not everyone uses it.
- robertlagrant 1y agoIt's still paid even if it's public. The difference is now the people who use it pay for it.
- abridgett 1y agoThis sounds reasonable. However there was a study showing major economic benefits if was free. These benefits came from more people implementing it, time saved by all those additional users, removal of licensing hassle.
- bawolff 1y agoI don't know how they intend to implement these ideas if the article can't even give a high level summary of what they are.
- cgio 1y agoIdea1: Selling simplification is more profitable than implementing it.
- daveland 1y agoHere is another article about Work Simplification (which was linked but apparently someone can't be bothered to click): https://www.statecapacitance.pub/p/eisenhowers-bureaucrats https://www.statecapacitance.pub/p/eisenhowers-bureaucrats
- jillesvangurp 1y agoGermany’s bureaucracy is a beast—especially for non-Germans like me (originally Dutch). Everything’s wrapped in legalese, paper forms, snail mail, and it’s all in German. Locals don’t question it, and arguing won’t get you anywhere. But the upside? It’s predictable. If you figure out the system and plan well, things do work. Setting up an UG (the “lightweight” GmbH, though not really light) was a trip. It’s less about simplicity and more about skipping the 25K capital requirement. The process involved notaries, banks, accountants, and multiple agencies. Classic chicken-and-egg problem: you need a bank account to register the company, and need the registration to open the account. The workaround? A weird notary ritual where you literally show them cash. Costs add up quickly—expect a few thousand euros upfront and ~1500/year in running costs, even for a dormant UG. Mine’s three years old, has zero revenue, and owes me 6K. You don't quite need 25K upfront. But you do need some access to capital. If you want to be frugal, you basically cut out the accountant and deal with the tax office directly. I chickened out and pay my accountant to do that for me. I value my time too much. I've went through the process twice over the past fifteen years. An absolute PITA but it's doable. If I did it again now, I’d use an LLM. Bureaucracies are basically just predictable API calls made through forms. Perfect for agentic AIs. There are a lot of steps and each step is tedious (lots of form fields, lots of waiting for people to process these and get back to you) but fundamentally quite simple. Maybe don't let the LLM hallucinate your form input but do use them to pick apart any mail that comes in, translations of key stuff, summarizing the process, double checking things people tell you, composing emails, etc. LLMs speak legalese pretty well and are endlessly patient. The way to fix this process would be to standardize and automate all the manual steps. Why is a notary involved? Because people use non standard contracts with special clauses. The whole point of standardization is to get rid of all the special clauses, the little exceptions to the norm, and all the other silliness. The chamber of commerce is essentially a database. The whole ritual of getting your company registered in Germany boils down to a months long ceremony to execute an FFing INSERT statement and receiving back a database id. Congratulations! Your company now exists. All the rest is ritualistic bullshit that needs to die. There are some discussions about an EU Inc. That would be great. Doing business in Germany really sucks currently. This was a big theme during the last election round. So, it's not just my opinion. I'm not sure what Eisenhower did but as a battle hardened military person he'd be well familiar with bureaucracies getting in the way of winning a war. In the famous words of despair.com, "Tradition: Just because you've always done it that way doesn't mean it's not incredibly stupid.": https://despair.com/products/tradition?variant=2457305795 https://despair.com/products/tradition?variant=2457305795
- CGamesPlay 1y agoI think the actual link is supposed to be this one, which appears in this submission directly adjacent to a newsletter signup, so it's very easy to miss: https://worksimplification.netlify.app/ https://worksimplification.netlify.app/
- hansmayer 1y agoNo, please. Eisenhower Matrix, Scrum, Extreme Ownership and the like - all from the minds of military types, whose supposed valuable lessons from a completely different area of human activity (wars and the like) are supposed to be something we should admire and apply in the workplace, under the joint tagline of "Leadership". In fact, I´d argue that precisely the application of those principles in the last 20 years have contributed to worsening and making the today´s office work environment unnecessarily intense. Everyone has "leadership qualities" these days and is trying to exert "influence" - instead of actually doing some real work.
- rqtwteye 1y ago“ instead of actually doing some real work.” Doing real work is for suckers. Talking about it is where the real money is.
- hansmayer 1y agoSadly, you are absolutely spot on.
- appleorchard46 1y agoThe original implementation is different from what it's turned into. There was a heavy emphasis on listening to workers and understanding why each step of a process was important (or not) and making appropriate improvements. The top-down one-size-fits-all manager hellscape framework approach (scrum etc) is more a product of the Clinton era.
- hansmayer 1y agoWell, scrum was invented by a Vietnam-war combat pilot (what the hell did he know about producing value as opposed to wasting value, for example by dropping ordinances).
- andrewl 1y agoOr it may be the application of principles that are described or marketed as being these old principles, but are often just junk with a fake veneer. These giant systems really are fascinating, although I'm glad I don't work in them. And I believe they were massively advanced during World War II. Because besides the obvious task of fighting a war, a lot of military work is logistics. No large scale operation can be accomplished without putting a lot of thought and work into it. A lot of what is required is sophisticated supply chain. You will not find it difficult to prove that battles, campaigns, and even wars have been won or lost primarily because of logistics. General Dwight D. Eisenhower Amateurs talk about tactics, but professionals study logistics. Gen. Robert H. Barrow, USMC (Commandant of the Marine Corps)
- appleorchard46 1y agoFor a brief overview of work simplification and its history I would highly recommend this post - https://www.governance.fyi/p/process-and-performance-how-america https://www.governance.fyi/p/process-and-performance-how-ame...
- thebeardisred 1y agoHere's an online view of the original work being cited: https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=iau.31858047196617&seq=1 https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=iau.31858047196617&se... and the catalog record for it: https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/102942676 https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/102942676
- condorsail 1y ago[dead]
- mrgoldenbrown 1y agoI had to dismiss multiple useless popups (like subscription asks) to read this article. Surely those are useless steps that could be simplified if the writer cared about the citizens/user experience like they say the govt should.