Trust, or Rust

He who does not trust enough, will not be trusted. —Lao Tzu

High process almost always = low trust.

So eventually, high process companies become filled with cautious, compliant, and careful workers—who are rewarded for quietly following process without questioning it.

And when an external force–revenue, customer loss, pandemic, you name it–cause that company to realize they need to fundamentally change how they operate, they’re at a loss. Why?

Because there’s nobody left who will ask questions, put forth meaningful ideas, or challenge the status quo.

Then ‘change’ becomes little more than bike shedding, and what feels like change is really just rearrangement.