The Myth of Doing More with Less

Let's build a tricycle with one wheel! Sounds absurd, doesn't it? Yet, the corporate world is rife with the mantra "do more with less." Expecting someone to create a miracle with reduced resources is not just unrealistic, it's counterproductive! So what is the alternative?

The real key to effectiveness with fewer resources isn't about squeezing more out of a reduced workforce. It's about fostering an engineering culture of tiny incremental improvements.

Start small and improve

Small, manageable units of work allow teams to pivot quickly and release with minimal work-in-progress that has a potential to become waste. Imagine building a house room by room, and already living in the house while it is still being built! Even if we need to stop working on the house to do something else, we already have something to live in.

Be Curious & Empathetic

Constantly asking "why?" might seem annoying, but it's crucial. It ensures engineers understand their tasks and, more importantly, the customer problems they're solving. Sometimes, the simplest solutions are right under our noses, making the customer happy sooner and revealing unnecessary features - the real waste! Maybe a mono cycle is perfectly good, but to decide if that is a viable solution we need to understand the problem that the tricycle was meant to solve, and consult with the user if they are willing to learn how to use a monocycle instead.

Do Less, Deliver More

Building a culture like that is not easy, and just telling your employees to do more with less, or even telling them to reduce waste isn't going to cut it. For that engineering culture to become reality your team needs the understanding and deliberate practice.

Lean Poker is a dynamic collaborative environment where these behaviours aren't just encouraged, they're essential. Lean Poker turns theory into action, showing teams the immense value of agility and effective resource utilisation. It helps teams understand what reducing waste means, and shows them the way to their success as a team.

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