Communicating complexity with simplicity

Humans relate with stories and stories should be simple. However, we might be dealing with quite a lot of complexity to make things work and if it is not communicated timely and appropriately, it can cause wrong decisions. However, it is not a cakewalk to communicate complexity in easy terms either, however we can try to build a framework to help out.

Surface complexity is visible to everyone and hence easier to communicate on collection, data can be represented in graphs easily.

• APIs and their usage
• Direct Outputs
• User interactions

Documentation is the key for under the hood complexity, document the "Iceberg Effect", what users see is tip of iceberg so make it clear.

• Multiple layers underneath providing the handling routines
• Infrastructure
• Security
• Performance

Collect Metrics for measuring impact

• Volume of value flowing through your functional part.
• Error recovery mechanisms helping to provide seamless business value
• How much time you are saving through complex technologies you are dealing with
• How is it helping in managing product risk

I mentioned human connection through stories above. So build these stories through data e.g.

"When user clicks that button, how it fans out an army of threads handled by your system securely, providing fallbacks on errors, predictably fetching the desired response, saving 3 hours of work"

If you have a particular use case you can apply such a template and build a compelling story to communicate your complexity.

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