© 2005-2007 Degraffenreid
Internal Policy Audits
One of the most toxic and enervating words in the English language is the word "policy". In North American English it usually rears its ugly head in the phrase "Our policy is ..." and it seldom precedes good news. Most people have formed an unpleasant association with the word policy based on previous experience so when they hear it, their perspective becomes very narrow or negative. In most cases, we advocate completely eliminating the word from all internal and external customer conversations. In its place, we recommend "our guidelines", "our options", or "how we usually handle this is ...".
The main problem, however, is that whatever you call them, most businesses have too many policies. Even more critically, the unspoken message those policies convey can be extremely disempowering. Unfortunately, many policies are created as a knee-jerk response to an unusual circumstance or sometimes out of simple paranoid concern for something that hasn't even happened. Eliminating these types of policies can send a clear and refreshing message to employees and customers.
In repeated engagements, we have been told by employees that this is one of our most invaluable services. By freeing them up to use their better judgement and trusting them to act in the company's best interest, they are able to operate more appropriately and efficiently than any policy would allow.
In conjunction with this process, we also deliver a design strategy for new policies going forward, as well as an evaluation process to continually determine when policies become unnecessary or ineffective.
