Rule Breakers

Have you ever broken the rules? I have - frequently. I'm not talking about significant societal norms, but petty, contrived, and arbitrary rules that make no sense whatsoever.

Is your name tag displayed correctly at work?
Does your attire meet the business casual dress code requirement?
Did you park in the correctly assigned spot?

Why are we so obsessed with rules? Why do we spend so much time obsessing over the meaningless and mundane?

We contrive arbitrary rules like these, and then obsess about them, because we want a certain level of performance from individuals, but don't want to have to deal with the confrontation of holding them accountable. Instead of defining expectations and holding people accountable, we build a fortress of rules and try to enforce conformity. We like this method because it's much less confrontational, and as human beings we tend to avoid confrontation.

What have we given up in the meantime though? We've given up our transparency. We're no longer being straight with people and telling them what our expectations are. We're not providing opportunities for meaningful successes or failures, much less personal or professional growth and development. In the process, we're spending an excessive amount of time, effort, and energy in constructing and maintaining this house of rules facade. It's wasteful, and doesn't generate much value. This approach simply creates conformity for conformity's sake.

People who are comfortable living inside a house of rules typically exude low expectation. It's the equivalent of saying, "I don't expect much from you. You're not going to generate a lot of value, so the best I can hope for is conformity. Don't rock the boat and I'll be content to get the one thing out of you that I can hope for - just follow the rules." For some, this is perfectly appropriate. Why not clearly define the expectation - just follow the rules - and allow people to be stellar rule keepers? Praise and reward them for their proficiency at rule keeping, but recognize that we aren't all rule keepers. We can't all live by the same standard of expectations. There are those who need the freedom to run, which means breaking the rules - often. You'll get the most value out of these people because rewards only come at the cost of taking risks.

Some of you are rule keepers. You need to admit it and be content. If you're a rule keeper, be a rock star at keeping the rules, but if you're not, break them. Break them early and often, and break them especially if they are arbitrary conventions that diminish the value you could be producing. Next week, park in the CEO's spot. Just be sure you've done something stellar to justify it. I doubt he or she will care where you park if you're consistently outperforming expectations, and if they do you might want to look for a new job anyway.