Simple Systems Have Less Downtime

Greg Kogan, writes in a blog post: The Maersk Triple-E Class container ship is 1,300 feet long, carries over 18,000 containers across 11,000 miles between Europe and Asia, and... Its entire crew can fit inside a passenger van. As a former naval architect and a current marketing consultant to startups, I found that the same principle that lets a 13-person crew navigate the world's largest container ship to a port halfway around the world without breaking down also applies to startups working towards aggressive growth goals: Simple systems have less downtime. Ships contain simple systems that are easy to operate and easy to understand, which makes them easy to fix, which means they have less downtime. An important quality, considering that "downtime" for a ship could mean being stranded thousands of miles from help. Take the ship's steering system, for instance. The rudder is pushed left or right by metal rods. Those rods are moved by hydraulic pressure. That pressure is controlled by a hydraulic pump. That pump is controlled by an electronic signal from the wheelhouse. That signal is controlled by the autopilot. It doesn't require a rocket scientist or a naval architect to find the cause of and solution to any problem.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.



from Slashdot https://ift.tt/2ImPS0N

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