We love policies. They make us feel organized, controlled, protected. A neat little rule for every possible scenario. A safety net for when things go wrong. Nothing says “we’re serious about this” like a brand-new procedure wrapped in a 12-step flowchart.
But every policy you create is a policy you must police. And policing policies is work —often far more work than the thing the policy was trying to prevent.
Organizations rarely think about this. We focus on risk reduction, compliance, and consistency, but we ignore the operational drag that comes with maintaining a universe of rules. Suddenly, managers are spending more time checking boxes than making progress. Employees navigate a maze of constraints instead of solving problems. And leaders mistake oversight for impact.
The Law of Unintended Management Consequences
Policies don’t live in binders. They live in behavior. When you write a rule, you create a new set of managerial responsibilities: monitoring, training, enforcing, documenting, escalating, and reporting.
Multiply this by dozens — or hundreds — of policies, and you’ve built an entire internal policing force without realizing it. Most people create policies to avoid managing. But in the end, those policies create more management than ever.
Why We Default to More Rules
Three reasons show up again and again:
- Fear of inconsistency – We think rules create fairness, but they often just create bureaucracy.
- Reaction to a single bad incident – One person makes a poor choice, and suddenly everyone gets a new procedure.
- The illusion of control – Rules feel like action, even when they don’t change outcomes.
But the biggest driver is a lack of trust. The more you distrust people’s judgment, the more rules you feel compelled to create.
Choose Your Policies Wisely
Before you add a new policy to the pile, ask yourself:
- Is this addressing a systemic issue or a one-off incident?
- Will this policy change behavior or just create checkpoints?
- What is the cost of enforcing it — time, attention, energy?
- Is there a simpler, more behavioral way to achieve the same result?
Because if the cost of policing the policy is higher than the cost of the problem itself, you’re not solving anything. You’re just shifting the burden.
If You Aren’t Careful, Management Becomes a Full-Time Security Detail
The more you police, the less you lead. The more you enforce, the less you empower. And the more you regulate, the less you innovate. It’s not that policies are bad. It’s that policies without intention become organizational clutter — and clutter always gets in the way of performance.
What To Do
Policies and procedures are tools. Use too many, and you start swinging them around like weapons. Make rules only for the things that truly matter. Because the moment you write it, you own it. And you’ll spend your time managing it instead of actually doing the work that moves the organization forward.
About the Author
Trained as an organizational behavioral scientist and customer-centricity expert, Andrea Belk Olson helps companies operationalize corporate strategy through understanding mindsets and behaviors. She is the author of three business books, including her most recent, What To Ask: How To Learn What Customers Need but Don’t Tell You.
She is a 4x ADDY award winner and contributing writer to Entrepreneur Magazine, Harvard Business Review, INC Magazine, World Economic Forum, and more. Andrea is also an applied entrepreneurship instructor at the University of Iowa and TEDx speaker coach.
More information is also available on www.pragmadik.com and www.andreabelkolson.com.
