Policy wonks love policy, and with good reason. First sighted around 1387, when it meant civil administration or government, its "chief living sense", as the Oxford English Dictionary puts it, is "a course of action adopted and pursued as advantageous or expedient". It is also, according to the American Heritage Dictionary, a "guiding principle", as in "Honesty is (generally speaking) the best policy", or "The customer is (almost) always right."
Policy honks also love policy, but their reasons are not so good. They quack "policy! policy!" because it's the easiest thing to do. It's an excuse not to think and act. It saves them from exercising judgment. It's a power tool with which to screw customers, show them who's boss. Or it’s because they’re “just following orders”. Some businesses really do design their policies to make things easy for themselves, not their customers. These same companies distrust their employees, and thus give them no freedom to think.
If you work for such a company, here's a good policy: keep your resume current.
Companies that want to stay in business understand that policies are there to protect them from bad customers. And their people are there to protect good customers from the policies. They give their people the power to do what’s right for both the customer and the business, train them on how to use it, and give them guidelines within which they can safely bend the rules.
With the advent of robotics and radio frequency identification (RFID), it won't be long before stores get rid of people altogether. Until then they may do well to abide by this policy: good companies have good people to exercise good judgment.
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