Design With Limitations

Designing something new from scratch may take longer and be less effective than making a simple structure based on less-specific parameters and then modifying it to meet the more specific goal. This is because we, as humans, have a hard time making decisions when we have too many choices. If we start with nothing, there are too many choices to think clearly and gain focus quickly. Just getting started can be a major hurdle; we can get bogged down when deciphering choices and deciding among too many things.

However, if given a partially constructed starting point it can act as a catalyst. We can then move on from there more quickly because many of the decisions have already been made by the existence and limitations of the given starting point. So, a design team might need to be two independent groups that do not communicate at all—one that has the task of coming up with catalyst for the second group, which continues from there to meet the 'real' goal.