Four Ways To Kill Best Practise Analysis

Four ways to kill best practise.
As a consultant all too often I hear the phrase “best practise” thrown around. This comes from the clients that hire us and even worse from my fellow consultants. Clients, especially those in large enterprises full of hierarchy, rules and rigid structure, feel the need to follow this dangerously linear way of thinking as a means to justify change. Consultants use this as a way to dress up old rope and sell it for new prices.
Not all best practise methods are useless. If I were to have open heart surgery, I would prefer my doctor to follow best practise. An engineer planning a high-rise building in the middle of Tokyo, would do well to use what’s considered best practise.
However, when trying to drive change,
Organisations that adapt and thrive question current methods not just accept them. These internal confrontations are positive as it allows them to test their assumptions and identify their weaknesses. What becomes difficult is that since we can see our competitor’s business models it can become quite easy to just copy and paste without thinking why it has worked for them.
Take for example the newspaper printing industry in the UK. For years they kept printing their newspapers on the more expensive broadsheet style paper. The reason they did this was because they felt their customers did not want the cheaper tabloid style papers and that all the quality newspapers were printed on broadsheet. However, when a few papers started switching to tabloid, their sales soared and eventually most other companies followed.
Interestingly, the reason companies started printing on broadsheet was because in 1712 the British government taxed newspaper companies based on the number of pages they printed, so it was cheaper to print on large paper as that required less pages. Even though this tax was removed in 1855, everyone continued printing on the larger sheets. This method was accepted as standard and never
This is a perspective that shows up methodology like "Just Enough Design", and is a cure for assuming that what worked in the past will work today.
Embrace Risk. Innovation is hard. It most definitely doesn’t come without risk. However taking risks does not feel safe, someone’s job might depend on a certain decision, competitors might outwit you if you fail. Many companies I work with often talk about the benefits versus risk ratio, if the risks outweigh the benefits then we look for a less-risky alternative. Rather than looking at risk as a downside, turn it around and look at it as a measure of opportunity. If the risk isn’t great enough you might need to ask yourself: “is it worth it?” This is one of the reasons companies are so entrenched in following best practises, as by definition they are proven as effective methods. The problem is what works for one does not necessarily work for the other. You will land up wasting precious resources and wondering why things didn’t work out. Take a chance, learn from it and start