What's Wrong With "Best Practices"
What's Wrong With "Best Practices"
Raise the Bar...
“Best Practice” is a harmful cliche. People use the phrase carelessly. Will it always work? Will it be “Best” in different circumstances?
For me, the “Best Practice” approach turned out wrong at least once. Working on an international banking IT project, I shut down an endless Zoom call about a reporting dashboard for the executives by citing "industry best practices" as my preferred approach. That got me labeled a "thought leader." The result wasn’t really a great fit. We finally arrived at the right solution through experimentation and testing.
“Best practices” can refer to processes, materials, organizing, or other ways of dealing with things. Using the label “best practice” can result in doing “it” in a way that works, which makes some sense. After all, who would want to do something that was proven not to work? But don’t let best practices be the end-all.
“Best practices” should be a starting point. They are a valuable way to look at a tried-and-true method. They are a necessary place to start, not the best place to end up.
To get better than “Best Practices”, try this approach.
Start with a clear picture of your current actual process or practice. You must overcome the inertia of “the way we do things”. People will revert to the default mode unless you make the changed process the only acceptable approach or (much better) make it much easier/faster/more convenient/hassle-free.
Once upon a time, my team was stuck using Excel spreadsheets to track projects. Switching from Excel to project management software saved hours every week for everyone, but getting the team to change was still difficult. The learning curve was daunting. An hour’s tutoring was all it took to get us over the hump.
Ensure you are getting over the “Current Best Practice” bar.
Imagine a restaurant that prides itself on using the freshest ingredients. Reviewing industry standards could tell them they could get better quality by sourcing from local certified organic farms.
Make a list of your three most pressing problems. What still isn’t great from the user’s view?
For example, A. Employee turnover, B. Profit margin, C. Speed to market
Focus on the most pressing one and think of ways to close the gap between today’s situation and the desired result. Let’s assume employee turnover is the biggest problem for this exercise. To close the gap you could pay more, train people, offer incentives, etc.
Reassess the first problem, considering the approaches for your second and third most pressing problems. Make sure your solutions don’t conflict with each other. For example, paying people more affects profit margin—keep these interactions in mind. Find a balance.
Do the same for your other issues. Make sure that you end up with a list of actions to try that don’t contradict each other.
Pilot some variations of the most promising actions, especially those that reinforce each other. Offering better training can reduce turnover and help increase the profit margin. Used in conjunction with your marketing plan, it could make your company stand out.
Roll out the successful practices as your new “Current Best”.
Rinse and repeat for the next business problems you find.
Pilot this approach to fit your needs, making sure the changes don’t have unintended consequences. Test the approaches in reality and move toward a more coherent overall strategy.
Continuous improvement, tested in the real world, is the true "Best Practice."
That’s My Perspective…