Just Because You've Always Done It Doesn't Mean You Should

Organizations have a remarkable ability to accumulate work.

A procedure gets introduced to prevent a mistake. Another approval is added because something went wrong. A department agrees to take on an additional responsibility because another team needs help.

Each decision probably made sense at the time. But years later, those same activities are still being performed, even when the circumstances that justified them have changed.

Nobody necessarily stops to ask whether they’re still needed. The work simply becomes part of what the organization does.

And when resources become stretched, the conversation usually turns to efficiency. How can we get more done? Where can we improve productivity? What can we automate?

Those are reasonable questions, but there’s another one I think leaders need to ask first.

Why are we still doing some of this work in the first place?

When Yesterday’s Commitments Become Today’s Burdens

When I took command of 25 Canadian Forces Supply Depot, my leadership team brought several concerns to my attention about activities we were performing outside our core mandate.

We were supporting Operation BOXTOP, providing support for Operation SANTA on behalf of Canadian Forces Morale and Welfare Services, and facilitating technical visits by equipment managers.

These weren’t necessarily bad activities. Each served a purpose, and the organizations receiving our support had come to expect it.

The problem was that every one of those activities consumed resources. People, time, coordination, and attention that could otherwise be directed toward the depot’s primary responsibilities.

Initially, I didn’t fully appreciate the impact.

It took me a couple of months to understand how much capacity these additional commitments were consuming. My team recognized the problem, but I needed to understand the implications before making decisions that would affect other organizations.

Once I did, the question became relatively straightforward.

Why were we continuing to perform activities that other organizations were better positioned to handle, particularly when doing so was affecting our ability to deliver our own mandate?

We started making changes.

Support for Operation BOXTOP was transitioned to another organization better suited to the task. Canadian Forces Morale and Welfare Services assumed responsibility for Operation SANTA. For equipment manager technical visits, we established criteria that I approved, limiting visits to those that were genuinely essential.

Not surprisingly, there was resistance.

Other organizations had become accustomed to receiving that support. From their perspective, the existing arrangements worked, so why should anything change?

But we weren’t making arbitrary decisions or simply looking for ways to reduce our workload. We had credible evidence demonstrating the impact these activities were having on our resources and our ability to deliver our mandate.

By explaining the situation, presenting that evidence, and engaging the organizations involved, we eventually gained their buy-in.

The experience reinforced something I’ve come to believe strongly about organizational leadership.

Just because work needs to be done doesn’t mean your organization should be the one doing it.

Sometimes improving performance isn’t about finding a faster way to complete a task. It’s about questioning whether the task belongs to your organization in the first place.

The Work Doesn’t Disappear Just Because You Stop Doing It

There’s an important distinction here, particularly for leaders responsible for large or complex organizations.

Protecting your team’s capacity doesn’t mean pushing responsibilities onto someone else and declaring victory.

The work may still need to be done. Customers still need support. Operational requirements still exist. Other departments still have legitimate needs.

The question is whether the work is being performed by the organization best positioned to deliver it.

At 25 CFSD, our objective wasn’t to abandon legitimate requirements. It was to establish more appropriate arrangements for meeting them.

That required working with other organizations, explaining the impact of the existing arrangements, and demonstrating why the changes made sense.

And it required recognizing that an arrangement that was convenient for one organization could create unnecessary pressure on another.

That’s where leaders need to think beyond their immediate teams.

A department can become more efficient while making the broader organization less effective. If all we’ve done is transfer the burden elsewhere without improving how the work gets done, we haven’t necessarily solved anything.

The goal is not to make your department look better. It’s to make the organization perform better.

Sometimes that means retaining a responsibility because your team genuinely is best positioned to deliver it. Other times, it means changing who owns the work, how it’s performed, or whether it’s still necessary.

Either way, the decision should be deliberate rather than based on historical expectations.

Organizations Accumulate More Than Processes

When leaders talk about bureaucracy, the conversation usually focuses on excessive paperwork, unnecessary approvals, and complicated procedures.

Those are legitimate concerns, but they represent only part of the problem.

Organizations accumulate two things over time.

The first is process. Additional steps, controls, reports, and approvals introduced to manage how work gets done.

The second is responsibility. Activities and commitments that gradually become part of what an organization does, even when they fall outside its primary purpose.

Both consume capacity, and both can become difficult to challenge.

A process might remain in place because nobody remembers why it was introduced. An additional responsibility might continue because another organization has become dependent on receiving that support.

In either case, something that once made sense has become a permanent expectation without anyone periodically reassessing whether it still serves the organization.

It’s relatively easy to tell people to work more efficiently. It’s much harder to challenge established practices, particularly when doing so affects people outside your immediate team.

But protecting your organization’s capacity sometimes requires exactly that.

Structure Is Necessary. Excessive Structure Is Not.

I spent much of my military career in environments where procedures, documentation, and accountability weren’t optional.

When you’re responsible for national logistics capabilities, billions of dollars in assets, and operations affecting people across an entire organization, you cannot rely on everyone simply figuring things out as they go.

You need repeatability.

People must understand what is expected, who has decision-making authority, what standards must be met, and how work moves between different parts of the organization.

Without that structure, execution becomes inconsistent. Knowledge gets concentrated in a few experienced employees. Mistakes are repeated because lessons aren’t captured. Leaders become personally involved in decisions that should be handled several levels below them.

But the opposite extreme creates its own problems.

Organizations can become so focused on controlling how work gets done that they lose sight of whether the work is being done effectively.

Every decision requires another approval. Every mistake produces another procedure. Every concern generates another report.

Individually, those decisions might be reasonable. Collectively, they can create an organization that appears highly controlled but struggles to execute.

The challenge isn’t choosing between structure and flexibility. It’s creating enough structure to deliver consistent results without making that structure an obstacle to performance.

That means understanding why each process exists and whether it still serves its intended purpose.

Every Process Should Have to Justify Its Existence

Think about how procedures accumulate.

Something goes wrong, so another approval is introduced. A report doesn’t contain the information someone needs, so an additional report gets created. A decision produces an unexpected outcome, so another review is added.

Organizations are usually much better at adding processes than removing them.

Years later, the original circumstances may have changed. New technology has replaced old systems. Different people occupy the positions. Responsibilities have shifted.

Yet the process remains.

And when someone asks why a particular step is necessary, the answer is often some variation of, “That’s how we’ve always done it.”

That’s not a sufficient reason to continue consuming organizational resources.

I believe leaders should be able to answer two questions about any significant process or control.

What specific problem or risk is this designed to address?

How does this particular step actually address that problem or risk?

If the answers aren’t clear, it’s time to investigate.

That doesn’t mean immediately eliminating the process. Some controls exist for very good reasons, including safety, financial accountability, legal obligations, and regulatory compliance.

But understanding why something exists is the first step toward determining whether it remains appropriate. And if the original problem has changed, perhaps the process needs to change with it.

Match the Control to the Actual Risk

One of the mistakes organizations make is treating every situation as though it requires the same level of oversight.

Consider a routine purchase of a $200 item compared with a contractual commitment worth $2 million.

Both require appropriate financial accountability. But applying identical approval requirements to both decisions probably doesn’t make much sense.

When work is predictable, repeatable, and relatively low-risk, employees should have a clear process that allows them to complete it without unnecessary intervention.

However, when a decision involves significant financial exposure, safety implications, regulatory requirements, or consequences that are difficult to reverse, stronger controls may be necessary.

The key is understanding the actual risk.

A relatively inexpensive item could have serious safety implications. A much larger purchase might be straightforward if it falls within an established agreement and approved budget.

Leaders need to consider the consequences of failure, the complexity of the decision, the capabilities of the people involved, and whether mistakes can be corrected.

The goal isn’t to eliminate controls. It’s to make the level of control appropriate to the decision being made.

This is also where judgment becomes essential.

No procedure can anticipate every possible situation. Employees need to know what is mandatory, where they have discretion, and when something needs to be escalated.

If we expect people to exercise judgment, we need to give them the authority and boundaries to do so. Otherwise, we’ve simply created another process that eventually leads every decision back to the leader.

Your People May See the Problem Before You Do

One of the most important aspects of my experience at 25 CFSD was that my team identified the problem before I fully understood it.

They were the ones dealing with the competing demands. They could see how additional responsibilities were affecting their ability to deliver.

My responsibility as the commander was to listen, understand the broader implications, and make decisions that protected the organization’s ability to execute its mandate.

Senior leaders have visibility across the organization, but they don’t necessarily see the day-to-day friction experienced by the people doing the work.

A process might look perfectly reasonable when presented in a briefing. The workflow has clearly defined steps, approval authorities are identified, and reporting requirements are documented.

But the people using it may experience something very different.

They may be entering the same information into multiple systems, waiting days for decisions that take minutes, or working around procedures because the documented approach no longer reflects reality.

If you want to understand whether your processes are effective, talk to the people who use them.

Ask where work slows down. Ask which approvals genuinely add value. Ask which activities they perform simply because someone has always expected them to.

And perhaps most importantly, ask what prevents them from delivering their core responsibilities more effectively.

There’s another question worth considering.

How many times have your people raised concerns about unnecessary work, only to be told that it’s simply part of the job?

It’s easy for leaders to become accustomed to arrangements that other people have to manage every day.

Listening doesn’t mean automatically accepting every recommendation. Leaders remain responsible for understanding risk, managing competing priorities, and making decisions that serve the broader organization.

But when your people consistently raise concerns about activities that consume capacity without contributing meaningfully to the mission, those concerns deserve investigation.

You might discover that the biggest obstacle isn’t a lack of effort, training, or accountability.

It might be something the organization itself has created.

Four Questions Worth Asking About Your Organization

When I look at whether an organization has the right processes and responsibilities in place, I come back to four questions.

1. Are we doing the right work?

Before improving a process, determine whether the activity actually belongs within your organization’s responsibilities.

What outcome are we trying to achieve? Does this activity support our mandate? Are we the right organization to perform it?

At 25 CFSD, that was the most important question we needed to answer.

2. What controls are genuinely necessary?

Identify the actual risks and determine which controls are required to manage them.

That might mean an approval threshold, a verification requirement, a checklist, or a clearly defined escalation point.

Every control should have a purpose that can be explained. And where a control remains necessary, leaders should consider whether it’s still the most effective way to manage the risk it was designed to address.

3. Do people have the authority to act?

Establish who owns the work, what decisions they can make, and when they need to involve someone else.

For the equipment manager technical visits at 25 CFSD, we didn’t eliminate the activity altogether. We established criteria that allowed us to distinguish essential visits from those that didn’t justify committing depot resources.

The principle is simple: define the boundaries so decisions can be made appropriately without requiring unnecessary intervention.

4. Is the system delivering the intended result?

A process isn’t effective simply because people follow it.

Measure whether it produces the outcome the organization needs.

How long does the work take? Where are decisions delayed? Are mistakes being prevented? Can employees complete routine tasks without constant leadership intervention?

When the process isn’t working, adjust it.

The goal isn’t to create a perfect procedure that remains unchanged for the next decade. It’s to build a reliable system that can evolve as the organization changes.

Compliance Isn’t the Same as Performance

An organization can be fully compliant with its internal procedures and still be performing poorly.

Every form gets completed. Every approval is obtained. Every report is submitted on time.

Yet customers are waiting, employees are frustrated, and decisions are moving far too slowly.

From an administrative perspective, everything appears to be functioning correctly. From an operational perspective, the system may be failing.

This is why leaders need to measure more than whether people follow the process. They need to understand what the process is actually producing.

Are we getting the results we need? Are we using resources appropriately? Are we preventing meaningful risks? Are we creating unnecessary delays?

And perhaps the most revealing question:

If we removed one step from this process, what would genuinely become riskier?

If nobody can provide a credible answer, that step deserves closer examination.

Some processes are designed to protect against rare but severe consequences. Their value may not be obvious from everyday performance measures. Those controls require careful assessment, not casual elimination.

Effective leadership requires understanding the difference between necessary governance and unnecessary administrative burden.

They aren’t the same thing.

Before You Launch Another Efficiency Initiative

When leaders recognize that their organizations have become overly bureaucratic, there’s a temptation to launch a major efficiency initiative.

Suddenly, every department is reviewing procedures, redesigning workflows, and attending meetings about reducing meetings.

I’ve always found some irony in organizations creating more administration to address excessive administration.

There may be situations where a comprehensive redesign is necessary. But most leaders don’t need to start there.

Start with one process or activity that creates unnecessary friction.

Choose something your people regularly complain about, something that consumes significant time, or something that repeatedly requires senior leadership intervention.

Then examine it with the people involved.

What outcome is it supposed to achieve? Why does each step exist? Which requirements are genuinely necessary? Where is work duplicated? Who actually needs to make the decision?

And don’t limit the conversation to how the activity is performed.

Ask whether your organization should be doing it at all.

You may discover that the process needs to remain rigorous because the risks justify it. You may find that a single approval can be eliminated, a handoff clarified, or a decision delegated.

Or, as I discovered at 25 CFSD, you may realize that another organization is better positioned to carry out the work.

Whatever the outcome, you’ll be making a decision based on purpose, evidence, and organizational priorities rather than habit.

That is a much stronger foundation for change than simply telling people to become more efficient.

Sometimes Your People Need a Decision, Not Another Process

The next time your leadership team tells you they’re stretched too thin, don’t immediately ask how they can become more efficient.

Ask what they’re doing that no longer needs to be done, what they’re doing that someone else should own, and what processes you’ve allowed to remain in place without questioning their value.

That doesn’t mean abandoning legitimate responsibilities or removing necessary safeguards. It means having the discipline to examine whether the way your organization operates still makes sense.

My experience at 25 CFSD reminded me that protecting organizational capacity is a leadership responsibility. It requires listening to your people, understanding the evidence, and sometimes challenging expectations that others have become comfortable with.

Those conversations aren’t always easy. But avoiding them doesn’t make the resource problem disappear.

Your people might not need another productivity initiative. They might need you to make a leadership decision.

So here’s my challenge.

Think about one process, responsibility, or commitment in your organization that everyone accepts because it’s always been done that way.

If you were building your organization from scratch today, knowing what you know now, would you include it?

If the answer is no, what is stopping you from challenging it?

I’d be interested to hear what you’ve encountered in your own organization. Where have established processes or inherited responsibilities become obstacles to getting the right work done?

And if you’re navigating a more complex challenge around organizational priorities, accountability, or execution, those are the kinds of issues I work through with leaders in a Leadership Clarity Call.