Principle Stacks

We’ve all been part of efforts to articulate principles that we should try to honor through our personal behavior, interactions with one another, and the way we design our products and services. But there is an awkward reality that comes with adopting and working with any set of principles on a moment-by-moment basis.

The awkward reality of working with principles is that you’re never going to have just one principle, and your principles will sometimes conflict with one another.

To abide by one principle often means that you cannot abide by another. And when your stated principles conflict, how should behave? You have to make decisions about which principle wins over the other. When you sacrifice certain principles over and over again they start to mean less over time. This is where the principle stack comes in.

A principle stack is not just a list of principles. It’s a ranked list of principles. In a situation where you are trying to follow two or more principles that are in conflict, you can refer to the principle stack to remind yourself which principle outranks the others, and go with that one.

In some ways the principle stack seems like a simplistic concept that would fall apart the second you try to implement it. So I have a problem I’m trying to solve where Principle #2 and Principle #3 are in conflict, and all I have to do is follow the list and let Principle #2 win? What if Principle #3 is somehow truer or more relevant to this situation than #2? Do I have to follow #2 anyway? Context matters!

Yes, context matters. Which is why a principle stack should not be adopted as a law, but instead viewed as a tool for making decisions. The true value of a principle stack is that it makes it easier to see your principles for what they are—a system of linked beliefs.

A principle stack reveals the relationships between your principles and prompts meaningful discussions when they come into conflict. If there’s a conflict and you are thinking about aligning to Principle #3 instead of Principle #2, the rankings force you to grapple with some interesting questions.

First, are your principles ranked correctly? Sometimes there is a difference between how you think your principles rank, and how you behave. If you find yourself choosing Principle #3 over Principle #2 again and again, it might be a sign that there is a disjoint between what you say you value and what you value in practice. The stack allows you to spot this pattern, talk about it, and adjust if necessary.

And then, what do you sacrifice by choosing to follow Principle #3 instead of Principle #2? Are those sacrifices acceptable? Through the process of comparing ranked principles the trade-offs become clearer. Trade-offs are at the heart of every tough decision. The principle stack makes it easier to articulate what they are and come to an informed decision.

So, at the very least forming a principle stack is an interesting exercise. It forces you to think critically about what you value, and helps you understand how your principles relate when they come into conflict with one another. It helps your principles become more than words on a page.