Hack:
Follow Best Practices... NOT!

By Matt Shlosberg - Managing Director at Hanna Concern

June 2, 2010 at 8:25pm

Innovation

Management

organization

Moonshots

Focus the work of management on a higher purpose

Reinvent the means of control

Amplify imagination

Summary

Companies like to follow industry best practices, but these practices are often far from the best. In fact, "best practices" is now a synonym for "I copy because I am unable to innovate".Following best practices blocks innovation and idea flow. Companies should reconsider the use of best practices and come up with ways to innovate their way to success. Why do we embrace democracy as the best form of government if elections are about choosing the lesser of the evils rather than the best candidate to run the country? What's worse, why do we hire lobbyists and pay them to protect us from the people we've elected in the first place?

Problem

Companies like to follow industry best practices, but these practices are often far from the best. In fact, "best practices" is now a synonym for "I copy because I am unable to innovate".Following best practices blocks innovation and idea flow. For example, why do we need to have toll free numbers for customer service in the world of virtually free long distance? Why are boards of directors in public companies chaired by the person they oversee? Why do we embrace democracy as the best form of government if elections are about choosing the lesser of the evils rather than the best candidate to run the country? What's worse, why do we hire lobbyists and pay them to protect us from the people we've elected in the first place?

Solution

Before following a "best practice", do some research and see if you can find alternative ways to perform a task. List all ideas and suggestions you find, no matter how absurd they look. Then take every idea you found and find a way to use it or consider situations in which they could work. Question whether or not you can modify these ideas to adopt them to your situation.

Another approach is to completely forget industry best practices and come up with your own solution to a problem. Try to think like a four year old. If you were four, how would you solve the problem? This approach may look silly, but the reason it works well is because four year olds are not overburdened by "best practices" in their heads. They have no bias towards doing it a certain way. As a result, every time they think, they innovate. Every time adults think, they pull an idea from their experience. So, asking a four year old to design a car can possible bring some interesting ideas.

Practical Impact

Companies can find better ways of doing things and come up with innovative solutions to problems that seem to have existing but ineffective solutions.

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October 15, 2010 at 5:53pm

Orlando Solis

Great Hack, simple and to the point.
Best practices don´t work. I think also beacuase every organization is different and even in the same industry, someting that work out well in another company might not be what is needed.

June 5, 2010 at 6:22am

Elad Sherf

Matt, Great hack. I love this hack as it strikes very closely to things I have been writing about for a long time now. I don’t know of this comment is actually a build. But I thought I point out a few resources (some mine) that might give you a look into a different perspective on the same issue.
1. First, I suggest you check out the book: Different: Escaping the Competitive Herd by Youngme Moon from Harvard. I would start by checking out this cool short video that describes the idea in the book: http://scription.typepad.com/blog/2010/04/different-escaping-the-competi.... I think some of your points correlate with the message of the book.
2. Second, a few months ago, I wrote a similar post called: “On ignoring best practices” (see here: http://comparativeadvantage.wordpress.com/2010/02/17/on-ignoring-best-pr...). I think it complements your hack with more examples and more sources.
3. A few months back, I submitted a proposal for a Changethis manifesto (that unfortunately) did not receive enough votes. That proposal was called “Breaking time – Going after the Conventional Wisdoms” (see more about here: http://comparativeadvantage.wordpress.com/2010/01/26/i-want-to-have-a-co...). The basic idea is that best practices are not only in strategy and marketing but also live in our everyday interaction with other people. From the way we handle our teams, to the way we try to coach people to how we think about our roles as managers. For some reason, there are concepts that have taken roots as the truth (or the Conventional Wisdom) although there is nothing connecting them to the actual truth (or maybe there was, but there is not more). If you are interested, check out my blog under the tag: Conventional Wisdom. BTW, if you read, Fierce Leadership by Susan Scott, I think she covers some of what I meant to be writing about…

Hope this helps. If you find it interesting and want to collaborate to add some of the ideas to the hack, let me know.