Are We Optimizing for Us or for Our Clients?
I found myself wondering, why do we overcomplicate things? I can’t recall a moment where someone explicitly said, “Yeah, let’s make this more complicated.” It just… happens, right?
In theory, we should always aim for the simplest possible way to deliver something, whether that’s a design, a website, or any other kind of deliverable. Yet no matter the discipline, things have a way of becoming complex. So why is that?
Is it intentional, lack of planning, or is it simply the result of repeating what we’ve done before without stepping back and applying a fresh perspective?
Take web development as an example. Agencies often rely on a familiar set of tools, frameworks, and templates to deliver projects efficiently, or at scale. Over time, those tools evolve. Something built for one specific use case gets reused, adapted, and layered onto another. Eventually, you end up with what we proudly call a “stack.”
But here’s the real question, are our internal stacks helping our clients, or hurting them?
Perhaps this stems from the fact that I’ve been hearing a familiar refrain from new leads:
“We don’t like WordPress, it’s too complicated,” or “The site just doesn’t work.”
And sure enough, when I take a closer look, the pattern is almost always the same. An over-engineered, plugin-heavy site, or a bloated solution built to solve a very simple problem.
To be fair, I get it. As service providers, we have to control costs. Building everything from scratch every time isn’t sustainable. Reusable systems are necessary. But the tools that worked well for one client don’t always serve the next, and when they don’t, complexity gets pushed downstream to the customer.
So what’s the answer?
I don’t think there’s a single, clean solution. But I do believe things get simpler when we return to fundamentals and actively work to remove unnecessary abstraction.
In my experience, there’s nothing inherently wrong with micro-frameworks, tooling, or abstraction layers. The problem isn’t the tools, it’s whether we’re using the right tools for the job. And that’s the sticking point. Are we optimizing for our own efficiency while quietly handing the complexity to the people who have to live with the result?
This question keeps coming back to me whenever I hear Drupal is complicated, or WordPress is complicated e.g. My reaction is always the same: if it’s complicated for the end user it was just a poorly built solution.
This is cross-posted from my Substack Behind the Thought. Which is a newsletter that ventures into the thought process that goes into my many ideas, ventures, and creative experiments.