世界簡單化之旅: 當簡單成爲解決之道大綱

At the beginning of 'Walden,' Henry David Thoreau makes a concise case against the complexity of modern life. 'Our life is frittered away by detail. An honest man has hardly need to count more than his ten fingers, or in extreme cases he may add his ten toes, and lump the rest. Simplicity, simplicity, simplicity!' he writes. '[L]et your affairs be as two or three, and not a hundred or a thousand; instead of a million count half a dozen, and keep your accounts on your thumb-nail. . . . Simplify, simplify.'

在《瓦爾登湖》(Walden)一書的開頭，梭羅(Henry David Thoreau)用簡短的篇幅抨擊了現代生活的複雜性。他寫道：“我們的生活在瑣碎之中消耗掉了。一個老實人除十指之外，便用不着更大的數字了，在特殊情況下也頂多加上十個足趾，其餘不妨籠而統之。簡單，簡單，簡單啊！我說，最好你的事只兩件或三件，不要一百件或一千件；不必計算一百萬，半打不是夠計算了嗎，總之，賬目可以記在大拇指甲上就好了……簡單化，簡單化！”

That was the 19th century, though, and we live in the 21st. In a typical day, we encounter dozens -- if not dozens upon dozens -- of moments when we are delayed, frustrated or confused by complexity. Our lives are filled with gadgets we can't use (automatic sprinklers, GPS devices, fancy blenders), instructions we can't follow (labels on medicine bottles, directions for assembling toys or furniture) and forms we can't decipher (tax returns, gym membership contracts, wireless phone bills).

然而梭羅所指的還是19世紀，我們現在生活在21世紀。在最平常的一天，都會有數十個甚至更多時刻，生活的複雜性不僅耽誤了我們的時間，還會讓我們感到失望或困惑。我們的生活中充滿了我們不需要的小東西（自動灑水器、全球衛星定位系統設備、花哨的攪拌器）、我們看不懂的說明書（藥瓶上的標籤，組裝玩具或傢俱的說明書），以及我們無法破譯的表格（納稅申報表、健身房會員合同、手機話費單）。

Every facet of our lives, even entertainment and recreation, is complicated by an ever-widening array of choices delivered at a frantic pace. Consider:

我們生活的各個方面，甚至連娛樂和休閒都因爲日益拓寬的選擇而複雜化。看看這些數字吧：

-- More than 800,000 apps in the Apple App Store

蘋果的App Store裏有超過80萬個應用程序

-- 240-plus selections on the Cheesecake Factory menu, not including lunch or brunch specials

除了爲午餐或早午餐臨時推出的特色菜之外，Cheesecake Factory的菜單上還有逾240種菜品

-- 135 mascaras, 437 lotions and 1,992 fragrances at

絲芙蘭的網站()上有135種睫毛膏，437種乳液以及1,992款香水

In 1980, the typical credit card contract was about 400 words long. Today, many are 20,000 words. 'Fine print' complexity costs us money in the form of hidden fees (about $900 per year for the average consumer, according to research conducted by the Ponemon Institute), denied claims and unanticipated charges ($2 billion in one year for landline phone customers, according to the Federal Communications Commission).

1980年，信用卡合同的長度一般爲400詞左右。如今，許多合同長達2萬詞。附屬細則中的隱形費用、拒絕索賠條款和意料之外的收費讓我們支付了更多的錢。根據波耐蒙研究所(Ponemon Institute)的研究，普通消費者每年支付的隱形費用大約爲900美元（約合5,580元人民幣）。根據美國聯邦通訊委員會(Federal Communications Commission)提供的數據，針對座機電話的用戶，其每年的意料之外的收費總計可達20億美元（約合124億人民幣）。

Who has 90 minutes to read 20,000 words or the time to select a Medicare Part D prescription plan (a Web search on will return 45 plans for you to consider)? Ponder the fact that a dermatologist must sign his name to forms almost 30,000 times a year, according to a 2008 article in the Southern Medical Journal. We are on autopilot -- blindly signing, agreeing, working and spending.

誰肯花90分鐘時間閱讀2萬個詞，或者，誰會有時間去選擇一個聯邦醫療保險處方藥計劃(Medicare Part D)（在上搜索會得到45個方案）呢？想想吧，根據《南部醫學雜誌》(Southern Medical Journal)顯示，一名皮膚科醫生一年需要在將近3萬個表格上簽字。我們現在好像坐上了自動駕駛儀，每天盲目地簽字、批准、工作和花錢。

How did we get into this mess? Lawyers and technologists are the taproots of complexity. Government regulators make things worse with misguided attempts to require 'disclosure.' Predatory companies with business practices that are onerous for consumers are only too happy to hide behind the cloak of complexity. And virtually all companies and organizations are averse to change and naturally inclined to take the path of least resistance. For them, it is far easier to keep tacking on amendments and exclusions than to take a blank-slate approach that would make things clearer to customers.

我們是怎麼惹上這些麻煩的呢？律師和技術人員是複雜生活產生的根源。此外，政府監管機構要求“公開信息”的誤導性措施讓事情變得更糟。一些公司的商業操作對消費者來說過於繁重，它們非常願意躲在複雜的外衣掩蓋下。事實上，所有公司和機構都不願意做出改變，它們自然地傾向於最小程度地抵制政府對信息公開的要求。對於他們來說，與其採用讓客戶更清楚的方式，不如繼續使用拐彎抹角的附錄和免責條款，因爲後者要容易得多。

Do you know anyone who stops to read 'click-through' agreements on websites in the middle of performing a task? One company, PC Pitstop, deliberately buried a clause in its end-user license agreement in 2004, offering $1,000 to the first person who emailed the company at a certain address. It took five months and 3,000 sales until someone claimed the money. The situation hadn't improved by 2010 when Gamestation played an April Fools' Day joke by embedding a clause in their agreement saying that users were selling them their souls.

你認識在網站上註冊時讀完網站協議再點擊“繼續”的人嗎？2004年，PC Pitstop公司故意在終端用戶許可協議中加了一條，稱將獎勵給第一個按要求向某地址發送郵件的人1,000美元。過了五個月，在公司賣出了3,000臺電腦之後，終於有人獲得了這1,000美元。2010年的情況也是如此，那年的愚人節，Gamestation公司開玩笑地在協議中加入一句話，說用戶正在出賣自己的靈魂。

Complexity is the coward's way out. But there is nothing simple about simplicity, and achieving it requires following three major principles: empathizing (by perceiving others' needs and expectations), distilling (by reducing to its essence the substance of one's offer) and clarifying (by making the offering easier to understand or use).

使事情複雜化是懦夫解決問題的辦法。不過要做到簡單絕非易事。實現簡單需要遵循三大原則：爲對方着想（這需要你理解他人的需要和預期），化繁爲簡（去粗存精，只保留產品或服務的實質），以及清晰的表達（讓你的服務更容易理解或使用）。

Why is it so rare for a product or service to be launched with simplicity baked in? The missing ingredient is empathy. Companies tackle simplification as a science rather than as an art. They measure the length of customer service calls down to hundredths of a second, run readability formulas counting syllables and monitor mouse-clicks by the millions. Afraid to let common sense prevail, companies rely on numbers to judge clarity and usefulness -- two attributes that defy quantification. As a result, they send out documents that they tout as being written at a sixth-grade reading level when in fact no college-educated person understands them.

爲什麼很少出現具有簡單之美的產品或服務呢？就是因爲人們不會設身處地爲對方着想。企業把簡化的過程看做是一門科學，而不是藝術。他們以百分之一秒爲單位計算客服電話的長度，使用可讀性公式來計算音節的多少，以百萬爲單位監控點擊鼠標的次數；但企業卻不願以常識爲原則，而是依賴數字來判斷清晰度和實用性，而這兩個特點是不能被量化的。因此，儘管他們稱自己的文件是針對六年級閱讀水平寫成的，而事實上擁有大學文憑的人都無法理解他們的意思。

Empathy is the only way to truly shorten the distance between an organization providing services and the individual receiving them. Cleveland Clinic (a client, in the mid-90s, of the brand-strategy firm where we work) understands that empathizing with patients is critical, so it doesn't just focus on simplifying medical care but looks at everything the patient experiences: smells, sounds, greetings, hospital gowns, security and appointment scheduling. It wasn't until staff members were wheeled through hallways lying in hospital beds that they realized how disconcerting and dizzying that experience can be. Preparing patients for the 'thrill' ride is a simple gesture that allays fears.

設身處地爲對方着想，這是唯一的方式，能真正縮短提供服務的機構和獲得服務的個人之間距離。克里夫蘭醫療中心(Cleveland Clinic)（是我們工作的品牌戰略公司上世紀90年代中期的一個客戶）知道，站在病人的角度思考至關重要，因此該中心不僅僅專注於簡化醫療保健服務，而且關注病人一切體驗：氣味、聲音、問候、醫院制服、安全保障和預約安排。員工們只有親自躺在病牀上被用輪椅推到走廊時，他們纔會意識到這個過程是多麼令人窘迫和頭暈。讓病患爲這場“驚悚”做好準備，是一個簡單但卻能夠緩解恐懼的措施。

The clinic's guiding principle -- patients first -- is used as a mantra by chief executive Toby Cosgrove, who weaves patient experience stories into all of his presentations. Everyone at the hospital, regardless of his or her job, is called a 'caregiver.' Through this simple change in vocabulary, Cleveland Clinic is able to send an important signal to everyone in the organization about what's expected.

這家醫療中心“病人至上”的指導原則，被首席執行長託比•科斯格羅夫(Toby Cosgrove)奉爲真言，他把有關病人經歷的故事融入自己所有的演講中。醫院的每個人，無論具體職能，都被稱作“關愛給與者”。通過用詞的簡單變化，克里夫蘭醫療中心向機構所有員工發送了一個重要信號，告訴他們病患對他們的期待是什麼。

What makes the biggest impression on people during their stay in a hospital? As Cleveland Clinic learned, it's the small details: how long it takes a nurse to answer the call bell, the availability of food on request, whether staff members follow the '10-4' rule ('when 10 feet away from a patient, smile and make eye contact; when 4 feet away, address the patient').

人們待在醫院時，哪些事情留給他們最深的印象？克里夫蘭醫療中心認爲是一些細節：護士多長時間會迴應呼叫鈴；食物是否能隨叫隨到；員工是否遵守了10-4規定（在距離病人10英尺遠的時候微笑和眼神交流，距4英尺遠的時候開始迴應病人的訴求）。

Borrowing from the hospitality industry, Cleveland Clinic has even paid attention to the scent in the air. No antiseptic aroma; the air smells like a signature fragrance favored by four-star hotel chains. Everything from the way doctors talk to patients (in plain English, and with a willingness to answer questions until there are none left), to the hospital gowns (designed by Diane von Furstenberg to combine ease of access with a touch of dignity), to the clear, concise bills you receive after checking out reflects a commitment to simplifying the interaction between a human being and a large, complex medical establishment. The hospital has achieved simplicity through the elimination of 'hassles' and the addition of clearer, more human communication.

克里夫蘭醫療中心甚至向酒店業學習，關注空氣中的氣味。這裏沒有消毒劑的味道，空氣聞起來就像四星級連鎖酒店裏常有的香味。從醫生對病人的講話（願意用簡單易懂的英語回答病人的所有問題，直到病人滿意爲止）到醫院的着裝（由黛安•馮芙絲汀寶(Diane von Furstenberg)設計，結合了親和力和高貴之感），以及出院時清晰簡潔的單據，這些都反映出，克里夫蘭醫療中心致力於簡化人類和大型複雜醫療機構之間的互動。通過減少麻煩和增加更清晰更人性化的交流，這家醫院實現了簡單化。

One of the keys to achieving empathy is feedback. The hospital gathers lots of it from patients and displays the data in patient experience 'dashboards.' For staff members eager to do well in comparison with their peers, 'Bedside Manner' has become a measurable attribute, not an intangible quality.

爲病人着想的關鍵在於獲得病人的反饋。這家醫院收集了大量病人反饋，並將數據展示在一個有關病人體驗的“控制面板”上。對於積極上進的員工來說，“臨牀禮儀”已成爲一個可量化的品質。

If Cleveland Clinic appeals to the emotional side of our brains to provide a simple, soothing experience, the supermarket chain Trader Joe's tries to simplify rational choice. The company's long-standing goal is to reduce the grocery-shopping experience to a few manageable decisions. Trader Joe's figured out that trying to give people everything is a lousy business model: It overwhelms customers, clutters stores and undermines the shopping experience, causing some customers to default to 'no' since they can't make up their minds. On top of that, it is inefficient for handling inventory.

如果說克里夫蘭醫療中心提供的簡單、令人放鬆的體驗滿足了我們的感性需求，超市連鎖Trader Joe's的嘗試則簡化了我們的理性選擇。這家公司的長期目標是將雜貨店的購物體驗簡化爲幾個可以管理的決定。Trader Joe's發現，努力向人們提供所有的商品是一種糟糕的商業模式，這會讓客戶難以抉擇，導致商店擁堵，破壞購物體驗，一些客戶會自動拒絕購買任何東西，因爲他們無法作出決定。最重要的是，無法有效地控制庫存。

Trader Joe's offers many fewer products than other supermarkets (about 4,000 items instead of 40,000, according to Peter Sealey of the Sausalito Group). Limiting variety doesn't mean bland selections, however; the company does extensive research on its customer base to make smart choices on behalf of the people who shop there, mixing in some exotic food choices and using playful, quirky packaging. Shoppers are thus spared the aggravation of having to sort through dozens of options for jam or mustard or frozen foods.

Trader Joe's提供的產品比其他超市要少（Sausalito Group的彼得•希利(Peter Sealey)稱，它只提供大約4,000種商品，而不是4萬種）。不過，限制產品種類並不意味着店內的產品是枯燥乏味的。這家公司對客戶進行了廣泛研究，從而代表消費者作出了聰明瞭選擇。這家商店購進了一些外國食品，店內商品採用好玩、奇特的包裝。購物者因此不必辛苦地從幾十種果醬、芥末或速凍食品中作出選擇。

Does it work? The chain, which has about 350 stores in the U.S., sells an estimated $1,750 in merchandise per square foot, according to Fortune magazine in 2010, more than double the sales generated per square foot by Whole Foods Market.

這麼做行得通嗎？據2010年的《財富》(Fortune)雜誌稱，這家連鎖店在美國大約有350家門店，平均每平方英尺（約0.09平方米）的店面帶來的銷售額大約爲1,750美元（約合1萬人民幣），比全食有機食品連鎖店(Whole Foods Market)每平方英尺的銷售額的兩倍還多。

Sometimes simplicity can be a matter of life and death. A decade ago, worried that confusing prescription labels threatened the health of her grandparents, Deborah Adler decided to do something about it. A graphic designer, she took on this challenge for her master's thesis. Rearranging the small type on the typical prescription label, Ms. Adler put the information in a logical order, giving prominence to the things that people most need to know at the moment they are reaching for their medicine. She divided the label into two parts, separated by a thick black line, and placed the critical information, such as the name and dosage of the medication, at the top, with everything else relegated to the bottom.

有時候，簡單化有着生死攸關的重要性。10年前，由於擔心令人困惑的藥品標籤可能會耽誤祖父的治療，德博拉•阿德勒(Deborah Adler)決定做些什麼。作爲圖像設計師，她在碩士論文中討論了這個難題。阿德勒重新排列了藥品標籤上的小字，以一種有邏輯的順序安排標籤上的信息，突出顯示人們在拿到藥品時最想知道的信息。她把標籤分成由一條粗黑線分隔的兩部分，並把藥物名稱和用量等重要信息放在黑線上端，其他的信息則放在下面。

Ms. Adler next considered the shape of the bottles. The wraparound labels on conventional round bottles were difficult to read, so she designed a flat tube-shaped container that stood upright on its cap, with plenty of room for a large, flat label that could be read easily at a glance. Also, by color-coding the bottles, she made it possible for family members to distinguish among their individual medications. Her simpler, clearer drug packaging has been adopted by Target pharmacies nationwide.

阿德勒接下來考慮了藥瓶的形狀。傳統圓形瓶子上的標籤難以閱讀，因此她設計了一個扁平管狀容器，有足夠的空間可以平貼一張標籤，這樣一來標籤的內容就一目瞭然了。此外，她還在瓶身上加了彩色代碼，家庭成員可區分他們各自的藥物。她的更簡單、清晰的藥品包裝已被全國的Target藥房採用。

Smart companies test product information by finding out how customers perceive it and how much of it the customers actually comprehend. Measuring perception alone can be misleading because people are often reluctant to confess their confusion. They view it as a personal failing rather than as a flaw in the information. Measuring their ability to perform tasks based on the information is a more reliable indicator of its clarity and precision.

聰明的企業往往通過調查客戶對產品信息的理解，以及能理解到什麼程度來測試產品信息是否足夠簡單。單獨評估客戶的理解程度可能產生誤差，因爲人們通常不願意承認自己的疑惑。他們認爲這是自己的失敗，而不是信息表達的缺陷。客戶根據信息執行任務的能力纔是更可靠的指標，以此可衡量產品信息表達的清晰度和準確度。

This type of testing can be conducted quickly and cheaply with online panels of consumers. For example, testing a notice from the Internal Revenue Service (a current client of ours), a taxpayer might be asked how much they would pay in penalties and interest if they missed a deadline, revealing their actual understanding of the consequences of their actions, not just their impression of the tone and clarity of the notice. Similarly, patients can be asked what dosage of medication to take and when so that we don't have to guess whether they truly understand the package directions.

由於網絡上有大量消費者資源，這種測試可以非常便捷，又無需花很多錢。例如，如果要測試美國國稅局(Internal Revenue Service)（目前是我們的客戶）的一則通知，納稅人可能需要回答，如果錯過最後期限他們需要支付多少罰金和利息，從中就可以看出他們對行動的後果的真實理解，而不光是瞭解到他們對信息的大致印象。同樣，病人可能會被問到用藥的計量以及用藥時間，這樣我們就不需要猜測他們是否真正理解了包裝上的說明。

Simplicity is slowly catching on as a standard. The Pew Charitable Trust, for instance, is trying to develop simplified model documents on financial topics such as banking fees, about which there is widespread and costly confusion. The model form that Pew put forward last year has been voluntarily adopted by several of the nation's largest banks─a very encouraging sign.

簡單正在慢慢成爲一種標準。例如，皮尤慈善信託基金會(Pew Charitable Trust)正在努力開發簡化版本的金融文件，比如銀行費用，人們對銀行費用存在廣泛的困惑，而這種困惑的代價相當高昂。美國的幾家大型銀行主動採用了皮尤慈善信託基金會去年推出的模板，這是一個令人振奮的信號。

Similarly, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is working its way through the disclosures related to major consumer financial transactions (student loans, home mortgages, payday lending) with an eye to making it easier for borrowers to do comparison shopping. Local governments such as New York City are simplifying residents' interactions with the bureaucracy through systems such as a 311 hotline for complaints and urgent matters. And social media is allowing all of us to get closer to companies and institutions and to make known our concerns and compliments.

同樣，消費者金融保護局(Consumer Financial Protection Bureau)正在研究與主要的消費者金融交易有關的信息公開（學生貸款、住房抵押貸款、發薪日借貸），目標是使借款者更容易比較消費。通過311投訴和緊急事務熱線等系統，紐約等地的地方政府正在簡化消費者與金融保護局之間的互動。社交媒體也正在使人們與企業機構間建立更密切的關係，使人們的擔憂和好評能被更好地瞭解。

What do we still need to simplify? For ordinary personal and commercial transactions, we need brief online contracts with interactive features explaining key words, concepts and computations. We need personal health records that can be easily used and updated by all health-care providers. We need summaries of our home and auto insurance that clearly explain how we will be reimbursed when the next storm hits; clear, one-page hospital bills that will allow us to recognize each element in the care that we receive; and a simplified tax code that will eliminate the need for costly tax return preparation by professionals.

我們還需要簡化什麼？對於普通的人事和商業交易來說，我們需要簡潔的網絡合同，通過互動手段解釋一些關鍵詞、概念和計算方法；我們需要個人健康記錄，任何醫療保健服務提供者都能輕鬆使用和更新；我們需要家庭和汽車保險概要，它能清楚解釋下一次風暴來襲時我們將如何獲得補償；我們需要醫院僅一頁紙長的單據，清晰告知我們享受到了哪些醫療服務；另外還需要一個簡化的免稅代碼，從而使專業人員無需準備高成本的納稅申報單。

For any modification or addition to its pristine home page, Google GOOG -1.06% has a famous zero-based approach, which is meant to avoid creeping complexity. The company requires extensive justification for any new visual element, assigning 'points' for each change in type style, size or color. The goal is the fewest number of points because, as the company says, 'More points = less simplicity.' Other institutions would do well to adopt a similar approach for evaluating new services, communications and products.

谷歌(Google)採用了一種著名的零基礎法來決定是否對其原始主頁進行修改或補充，這種方法旨在避免使頁面複雜化。公司要求對任何新的可視元素進行廣泛論證，爲版式風格、尺寸和顏色上的每一個變化打分。谷歌的目標是讓變化的總分最少，該公司說，這是因爲分數越高，頁面越不簡潔。其他機構也可採取類似的方法來評估新的服務、溝通和產品。

Simplicity may sound like a narrow standard, but it can help companies, governments and every other sort of organization winnow down unnecessary choices and clarify their messages to consumers, clients and citizens. We may not quite be able to re-create Thoreau's calm life on Walden Pond, but it is always possible to drive improvement by simplifying.

簡單化可能聽起來是一個不易達到的標準，但它能幫助公司政府和各種機構剔除不必要的產品和服務，使消費者、客戶和市民獲得更清楚的信息。我們也許不能夠複製梭羅在瓦爾登湖的寧靜生活，但是我們永遠可以通過化繁爲簡來改善自己的生活。