Impact Trust • Working glossary
Simple rules (complexity)
A small number of guiding principles general enough to apply in any situation but specific enough to shape action – enabling good decisions without top-down instruction, especially in chaos.
Details
Our Take
Immediately practical: what 3-5 rules would guide a volunteer's decisions in any crisis? Central to distributed decision-making. 'Care for the carers' was identified as simple rule for humanitarian first responders. Simple rules are the cultural DNA that enables coherence -- if principles are clear and internalised, people can improvise effectively without waiting for instruction. Simple rules are what make improvisation intelligent rather than random.
Examples of Use
Complex systems, Multisolving Institute, Cynefin
Synonyms/Variants
Heuristics, Rules of Thumb, Decision Rules, Guiding principles
Typical everyday wording
A few clear rules that help anyone make good decisions, even in chaos
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