I had the chance to be in a casual meeting with one of those big guys in one of Saudi companies. There came a discussion about companies’ strategic plans and work procedures. This gentleman said something that really startled me! Unfortunately, I did not have the chance to discuss that idea with him more throughly but to simply put his concept, it is something like : ‘let there be rules, respect them, but do not follow them!!’
Now in my humble understanding, whether it is Google, Apple, or Amazon, they all have some kind of business processes. There is no way a business would be able to conduct its daily activities or long term objectives without setting its work on a clear path … and that clear path is nothing but a group of processes.
[picapp align=”right” wrap=”true” link=”term=manager&iid=7281429″ src=”0/5/a/4/Closeup_of_a_9c00.jpg?adImageId=9909151&imageId=7281429″ width=”234″ height=”156″ /]However, processes should not be confused with bureaucratic-old-school kind of paper work and hundreds and hundreds of signatures. While such bureaucratic rules are always treated as if they are coming out of holy books, there is a room in modern processes to be flexible and they are always subject to modifications and enhancements.
In todays world, businesses are faced with tough challenges and frequently changing market rules. For that, it is necessary for organizations to have the ability to adapt, change course, and interact with their environment. This cannot be done by letting everybody working on his/her own without any kind of direction and guidance and, of course, it cannot happen by imposing rules that have been around for the past 50 years.
Even innovation and ‘thinking out of the box’ have their own rules that turn them into useful and practical models instead of wasted time, efforts, and resources.
I really hope that I misunderstood this big shot executive and hope that he really has some logical explanation to his strange idea, don’t you think?
I do agree that putting strategic plan for future is important for any organization in the world so things would be clear for all level of management.
I think if he claims such an idea as you’ve mentioned in the opening of your post . : ‘let there be rules, respect them, but do not follow them!!’
I don’t understand it completely but I think if such mentality as far as I can predict is dependable on others work or hiring people to work for his own advantage…
Thanks for this post .
Hey Abdul Malik,
I cannot even claim that understand that ‘respect rules but do not follow them’ thing … because if you want the truth, it does not make a lot of sense; what is the point of having rules at the first place if we are going to break them!
[…] not care much about processes nor scope of work. Let there be processes, but they should know that you have the power to overrule them whenever you […]
[…] not care much about processes nor scope of work. Let there be processes, but they should know that you have the power to overrule them whenever you […]
Wow that was strange. I just wrote an really long comment but after I clicked submit my comment didn’t appear. Grrrr… well I’m not writing all that over again. Anyhow, just wanted to say superb blog!