The Goldilocks Approach to Process: Not Too Heavy, Not Too Light
When it comes to process and quality management, finding the right balance is critical — especially for growing engineering businesses. Too much process, and you risk slowing everything down with unnecessary complexity. Too little, and important steps get missed, quality slips, and chaos creeps in.
The best approach is what we call the “Goldilocks” method: processes that are not too heavy, not too light — but just right for your size, pace, and complexity.
Early in a company’s life, lightweight, flexible ways of working are often the key to success. But as you grow, the same informal habits can start to cause friction: missed handovers, inconsistent outputs, quality escapes. The answer isn’t to bolt on layers of bureaucracy. It’s to deliberately design simple, fit-for-purpose processes that support efficiency and consistency without strangling initiative.
Good processes are ones people actually want to use. They make life easier, not harder. They clarify responsibilities, streamline communication, and reduce errors — without turning every action into a checklist exercise.
When optimising, it’s important to ask:
Is this process adding value or just adding work?
Can we simplify or automate parts of it?
Does it scale easily as our business grows?
A few smart adjustments now can save huge amounts of time, cost, and frustration later.
At its best, a "just right" approach to process helps you deliver faster, maintain quality, and free up your teams to focus on solving problems and serving customers — not battling internal systems.
