Process Inflation

Processes accumulate complexity beyond their original purpose. Bureaucratic overhead expands independent of value delivered. What began as lightweight coordination becomes heavyweight procedure. Workflow becomes work.

Velocity. Judgment. Proportionality between effort and outcome.

Each process addition solves a local problem. No one owns the cumulative burden. Risk aversion favors adding steps over removing them.

• Compliance metrics show adherence
• Process owners defend their territory
• Removal requires consensus that addition did not
• The cost is distributed across many actors

• Rigor
• Governance maturity
• Risk management
• Professionalism

• Process steps multiply without corresponding value increase
• Approval chains lengthen over time
• "Why do we do this?" has no clear answer
• Workarounds emerge to bypass formal process
• Time-to-completion increases while output quality stays flat

"We need process to scale"

Process exists, but it has outgrown its purpose. More process is proposed as the solution to process problems.

"This is just how large organizations work"

Complexity is normalized as maturity. The cost of coordination is accepted as inevitable.

"We need better process documentation"

The process is documented. The problem is that the process itself has inflated beyond necessity.

"People aren't following the process"

People are routing around the process because it no longer serves its original function.

• Sunset clauses on new processes
• Total cost of coordination visibility
• Authority to remove without consensus
• Periodic process audits with deletion mandate

Process complexity trends downward while output quality holds.