People think growing and improving is always a case of adding. Adding new skills, new systems, new strategies... But this is so wrong. The brilliant book ‘AntiFragile’ by Nicholas Nassim Taleb argues that often it’s the removal of a bad habit, a false assumption, or a wasteful procedure that unlocks our potential. Subtractions often benefit us more than addition.

But modern society, it turns out, has a huge bias towards additive solutions. Why? Consumerist capitalism, which has given us so many advantages, also has some strong biases.

Let me explain…

A lucrative business can be easily built around a diet pill or shake (additive solutions). Building such a business around the idea of just reducing your caloric intake… that’s far less marketable. Though we all know eating less is the one solution that definitely works, the weight loss industry doesn’t benefit from people doing that. It needs a product to sell that people can consume.

Hence the current bias in all media, in all discourse, and in all our collective psyche towards additive solutions.

(As a side-note, this is why I think there are so many HOW TO books, but no HOW TO NOT books, even though some of the most valuable wisdom in life is about avoiding negative outcomes.)

Now that bias has saturated our thinking. When problem solving, we automatically look to things we can purchase to solve our problem. The market is certainly set up this way, with an endless supply of products and services for us to buy, rent, or upgrade to.

As a HubSpot Gold Partner, vBase Digital is even incentivized to upgrade your HubSpot subscription. Are we just part of the problem then? Well, only if we neglect subtractive solutions, which we don’t.

We know our clients are often better off looking for things to remove, let go, or cease. This is known as the Via Negativa approach, so named by Nicholas Nassim Taleb in his recent book. But its origins are ancient.

“Michelangelo was asked by the pope about the secret of his genius, particularly how he carved the statue of David, largely considered the masterpiece of all masterpieces. His answer was: It’s simple. I just remove everything that is not David.” - a quote from AntiFragile

(It even turns out that we all used the Via Negativa approach when we first learned to walk, which you can read more about here.)

Taleb argues, convincingly, that subtractive solutions are often superior to additive ones: “Actions that remove are more robust than those that add because addition may have unseen, complicated feedback loops.”

Ever added a new widget to find it has knock-on effects? Implemented new training that caused unexpected friction? Invested in a new platform that only made your life more complicated? That's what Taleb is talking about.

Additive solutions are error-prone. 

Overcoming our modern bias towards additive solutions is just one part of the Via Negativa wisdom, though. The other key part is an awareness of how negative knowledge (what doesn’t work) is more robust than positive knowledge (what does work). 

“We know a lot more about what is wrong, what is bad, what is harmful, or what won’t work, than we know about what is right, what is good,  what is beneficial, and what would work.”

Bringing this back into the context of your CRM, we understand that what you’re doing worst is a better place to start than what you’re doing best. Because we can more confidently say when our client’s actions are absolutely wrong (manually inputting records, siloed databases, ambiguously labeled properties) than when they’re absolutely right.

Many HubSpot partners will only talk about what you can do best if you add a certain feature to your subscription, because that sounds more positive to you and earns a commission for them. They’re leveraging your bias towards additive solutions.

At vBase Digital, however, our loyalty lies with our client before HubSpot. So we utilize the Via Negativa approach. That’s why we are more than happy to tell you what you’re doing wrong, secure in the knowledge that your performance will improve more via subtraction of the negatives than from chasing the positives. If that means downgrading your subscription, that’s what we’ll recommend (but don’t tell HubSpot we said that).

To conclude, if you’re in a rut with HubSpot, or with anything in life, perhaps you’d benefit more from identifying what you shouldn’t be doing, than trying to find something new you should be doing.

Here are some common errors vBase Digital solves for its clients with subtractive thinking:

• Using external apps for things that already exist within HubSpot
• Manually uploading/downloading data instead of integrating the dataflows
• Having a surplus of contact information crowding the interface
• Possessing false assumptions or self-limiting beliefs about HubSpot’s capabilities
• Too many people sharing responsibility of a process, causing confusion
• Paying for features that you're just not using

By first removing what’s deconstructive, we can then fully focus on building what is constructive.

Otherwise, you’re your own worst enemy, and getting in your own way.

That’s not such an easily marketable solution as selling you another app, feature, or service.

But it works.

And that’s why we do it.

Because humanity’s happier when tools work better.

Not sure where to start with subtractive solutions? The checklist below walks you through all the questions you should ask yourself when trying to prune, cut, and reduce the negative factors in your systems and tools.

Once your systems have been pared back to only what contributes towards your performance, then you’ll be in a position of greater certainty about the very nature of your systems. In the words of Taleb:

"Since one small observation can disprove a statement, while millions can hardly confirm it, disconfirmation is more rigorous than confirmation."

And like the Statue of David, we hope your CRM will stand in it's full beauty once you've chipped away everything else.

Thanks!

Obsessive about optimization, vBase Digital believes that humanity's happier when tools work better. If you want to work smarter and not harder with HubSpot, contact us.

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