The world’s greatest scientists, philosophers, and artists agree: If an idea isn’t beautiful, it’s probably not innovative. They’re putting a special spin on the word “beautiful” by defining beauty as a quality of wholeness, or harmony, that generates pleasure, meaning, and satisfaction. A beautiful idea is often a great idea.

While beauty can’t be reduced to a pat formula, it can be best understood by viewing it as a system with three interactive elements: surprise, rightness, and elegance.

In everything we experience as beautiful, there’s a moment of surprise when we first encounter it. Surprise is the jarring pop of disrupted expectations—the jolt of rule #10. The pleasure, meaning, or satisfaction that follows this pop can be experienced as a warm glow, a slowly spreading smile, or the hair standing up on your arms. Physiologically, it’s a blast of serotonin to your central nervous system.

Rightness, the second element of beauty, is a kind of fitness for duty, a specific structure that allows the thing we’re encountering to align with its purpose.

Elegance, the third element, is a rejection of superfluous elements in favor of simplicity and efficiency. An elegant idea is one that has the fewest number of elements that allow the whole to achieve its purpose. The best ideas seem so perfect that they leave no room in the imagination for anything better.

When all three of these elements are working well together, an idea has enormous potential to improve the context in which it exists.

How can you create beauty in your own work? By shaping it according to the principles of design. Anyone can be a designer. All you need is the will and the skill to change an existing situation into a better one. The next section of the book lays out the basic rules.

* * *

To check out all of the “Rules” that have been featured thus far, please click here.

Marty Neumeier is a designer, writer, and business adviser whose mission is to bring the principles and processes of creativity to industry. His latest book, METASKILLS, explores the five essential talents that will drive innovation in the 21st century. His previous series of “whiteboard” books includes THE DESIGNFUL COMPANY, about the role of design in corporate innovation; ZAG, named one of the “top hundred business books of all time” for its insights into radical differentiation; and THE BRAND GAP, considered by many the foundational text for modern brand-building.

He has worked closely with innovators at Apple, Netscape, Sun Microsystems, HP, Adobe, Google, and Microsoft to advance their brands and cultures. Today he serves as Director of Transformation for Liquid Agency, and travels extensively as a workshop leader and speaker on the topics of innovation, brand, and design. Between trips, he and his wife spend their time in California and southwest France.