Essay
December 15th, 2024
Thinking About Scale
SETH HOLLIS
SETH HOLLIS
825 words
5 min. read
The hardest part of building for scale is not technology. It’s understanding people you will never meet. How do you claim to know what thousands, or even millions, want when you’ve only spoken to a handful? What gives anyone confidence to make decisions that affect vast populations when the actual motivations of individuals remain invisible?
The hardest part of building for scale is not technology. It’s understanding people you will never meet. How do you claim to know what thousands, or even millions, want when you’ve only spoken to a handful? What gives anyone confidence to make decisions that affect vast populations when the actual motivations of individuals remain invisible?
Most organizations don’t wrestle with this question seriously. They focus on infrastructure, channels, and systems with remarkable sophistication while relying on blunt tools to interpret human behavior. Executives can explain their supply chain in detail but struggle to say with certainty why customers buy from them at all. The gap between operational precision and behavioral understanding is what explains so many failed launches, missed campaigns, and products that die despite flawless execution. It is rarely the technology that fails. It is our ideas about people.
Most organizations don’t wrestle with this question seriously. They focus on infrastructure, channels, and systems with remarkable sophistication while relying on blunt tools to interpret human behavior. Executives can explain their supply chain in detail but struggle to say with certainty why customers buy from them at all. The gap between operational precision and behavioral understanding is what explains so many failed launches, missed campaigns, and products that die despite flawless execution. It is rarely the technology that fails. It is our ideas about people.
The standard solution has been to simplify. Segment. Average. Create personas. Reduce millions into digestible groups that fit neatly on a slide. These techniques offer comfort, but they distort. They create an illusion of clarity when, in reality, they flatten the very complexity that makes human behavior interesting and unpredictable. We tell ourselves stories like “our customer wants convenience” or “our customer cares about sustainability,” as though tens of thousands of individuals can be distilled into one sentence.
The standard solution has been to simplify. Segment. Average. Create personas. Reduce millions into digestible groups that fit neatly on a slide. These techniques offer comfort, but they distort. They create an illusion of clarity when, in reality, they flatten the very complexity that makes human behavior interesting and unpredictable. We tell ourselves stories like “our customer wants convenience” or “our customer cares about sustainability,” as though tens of thousands of individuals can be distilled into one sentence.
The truth is less tidy. Large groups don’t think or feel anything as a whole. Only individuals do. What groups generate are patterns. They emerge not because people are identical, but because the messy variety of individual choices produces regularities. The patterns are real, but the explanations we attach to them are often made up—narratives that sound convincing but mask our ignorance.
The truth is less tidy. Large groups don’t think or feel anything as a whole. Only individuals do. What groups generate are patterns. They emerge not because people are identical, but because the messy variety of individual choices produces regularities. The patterns are real, but the explanations we attach to them are often made up—narratives that sound convincing but mask our ignorance.
Working at scale requires holding two difficult truths at once: people are too complex to model accurately, and yet their behavior in aggregate does show patterns that can be acted on. Companies that succeed at scale develop a kind of humility. They use patterns as guides while staying alert to how provisional their understanding really is. They know their models are tools, not mirrors of reality. They remind themselves that segmentation is something they create, not something they discover.
Working at scale requires holding two difficult truths at once: people are too complex to model accurately, and yet their behavior in aggregate does show patterns that can be acted on. Companies that succeed at scale develop a kind of humility. They use patterns as guides while staying alert to how provisional their understanding really is. They know their models are tools, not mirrors of reality. They remind themselves that segmentation is something they create, not something they discover.
This humility doesn’t slow action. It actually speeds discovery. It keeps organizations curious. It leads to feedback systems that test not only what people do, but whether the stories we tell ourselves about why they do it hold up. It encourages executives to admit what they don’t know, and to treat their explanations as working hypotheses rather than settled truths.
This humility doesn’t slow action. It actually speeds discovery. It keeps organizations curious. It leads to feedback systems that test not only what people do, but whether the stories we tell ourselves about why they do it hold up. It encourages executives to admit what they don’t know, and to treat their explanations as working hypotheses rather than settled truths.
This reframing changes what the real goal is. You cannot “understand millions of people.” That’s impossible. What you can do is create offerings flexible enough that individuals, each for their own reasons, find them meaningful. The most successful products at scale don’t demand that everyone relate to them in the same way. They create spaces for people to project their own needs and identities into. Think of platforms that allow personalization, or brands that establish a clear point of view and let audiences engage with it in varied ways. Attempts to appeal to everyone with a generic message usually appeal to no one. The paradox is that something specific and clear often travels further because it allows individuals to engage differently, each on their own terms.
This reframing changes what the real goal is. You cannot “understand millions of people.” That’s impossible. What you can do is create offerings flexible enough that individuals, each for their own reasons, find them meaningful. The most successful products at scale don’t demand that everyone relate to them in the same way. They create spaces for people to project their own needs and identities into. Think of platforms that allow personalization, or brands that establish a clear point of view and let audiences engage with it in varied ways. Attempts to appeal to everyone with a generic message usually appeal to no one. The paradox is that something specific and clear often travels further because it allows individuals to engage differently, each on their own terms.
Another useful shift is from thinking about “types of people” to thinking about situations. Similar choices across thousands of people rarely emerge because they share the same personality or disposition. More often, it’s because they are in similar contexts. They face the same constraints, see the same cues, encounter the same friction. When you stop asking “what kind of person does this?” and start asking “what situation produces this behavior?” the world gets clearer.
Another useful shift is from thinking about “types of people” to thinking about situations. Similar choices across thousands of people rarely emerge because they share the same personality or disposition. More often, it’s because they are in similar contexts. They face the same constraints, see the same cues, encounter the same friction. When you stop asking “what kind of person does this?” and start asking “what situation produces this behavior?” the world gets clearer.
This situational lens has practical consequences. It leads you to design less for imagined demographics and more for the realities of use. It shifts marketing from identity-based appeals toward contextual relevance. It emphasizes building products that fit naturally into the conditions where decisions get made. And it avoids the trap of assuming that if a pattern emerges, it must mean everyone in the group is motivated the same way.
This situational lens has practical consequences. It leads you to design less for imagined demographics and more for the realities of use. It shifts marketing from identity-based appeals toward contextual relevance. It emphasizes building products that fit naturally into the conditions where decisions get made. And it avoids the trap of assuming that if a pattern emerges, it must mean everyone in the group is motivated the same way.
What emerges is a more grounded way of thinking about large groups. Not as monoliths with unified desires, but as networks of individuals whose diversity nonetheless produces regularities. Not as markets waiting to be explained with a single narrative, but as environments where context shapes choice. The challenge is not to “know” millions of people—that’s impossible—but to respect the limits of what can be known, while still acting decisively on the patterns you can see.
What emerges is a more grounded way of thinking about large groups. Not as monoliths with unified desires, but as networks of individuals whose diversity nonetheless produces regularities. Not as markets waiting to be explained with a single narrative, but as environments where context shapes choice. The challenge is not to “know” millions of people—that’s impossible—but to respect the limits of what can be known, while still acting decisively on the patterns you can see.
The companies that thrive at scale are those that keep this balance. They reject the false clarity of simplified personas while refusing the paralysis of believing everyone is entirely unique. They stay curious. They keep testing. They treat every pattern as provisional. And by doing so, they create products that don’t presume to understand everyone but that somehow matter deeply to many.
The companies that thrive at scale are those that keep this balance. They reject the false clarity of simplified personas while refusing the paralysis of believing everyone is entirely unique. They stay curious. They keep testing. They treat every pattern as provisional. And by doing so, they create products that don’t presume to understand everyone but that somehow matter deeply to many.
-Hollis
-Hollis
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Thinking About Scale
Essay
December 15th, 2024