I followed dragonchild's earlier link to Extreme Perl--Preface and came across the quoted text below. It (with the addition of a little context) does so much a better job of saying what I was trying to say above, I just wanted to point it out.

Start out by

...do[ing] the simplest thing that could possibly work...

I sort of arrived at this basic philosophy for coding (which I attempted to describe in My number 1 tip for developers.), over many years almost by accident. It is basically the result of an adverse reaction to having been forced to attempt to follow one new "programming paradigm", "structured programming methodology" after another as each new fad came (and for the most part went).

From the classical Waterfall Model, through SSADM/LBMS, OOA/OOD, DataFlow Modelling and Use Cases to the current trends for Data Driven and Test Driven development, AOP and XP. Each of these brought something slightly new and valuable to the subject.

The problem is that all too often, that one new thing is seen (by some, temporarially) as the be-all and end-all of chique and they try to design a whole "methodology" around it. The problem for the programmer is pursuading management that whilst that one new pin is a useful technique, that it can be incorporated into the existing working practices without throwing everything else away.