Bureaucracy in the way of business. The need for “Break the rules, when necessary” culture.

Take this famous scenario: A country's parliament is under attack by terrorists. The national news television’s video crew is in the same premises. But no visuals of the incident were captured by this crew (while some of the private media players were airing live visuals). The reason? The crew had to wait for formal approval from their bosses to use the cameras outside the building. This is a classic example, that happened for real, of bureaucracy coming in the way of business.

All the systems, processes, procedures in any organisation should help the business move forward and achieve its objectives. But, how often have we encountered situations in everyday worklife, that bureaucracy, systems and processes are coming in way of the business, rather than helping the business move forward ?

It is not uncommon for businesses to encounter extra-ordinary situations (say the customer has an emergency request) that cannot be fulfilled if we are to follow the existing processes and procedures. Convincing the functions in the entire value chain to break their rules/ standard processes/procedures for these emergency situations, within a short span of time can be quite a task.

Just like leaders encourage organizations to be “innovative” : encouraging the culture of putting the business requirements ahead of bureaucracy is an absolute necessity, to stay in the business. The leaders should cultivate a culture that encourages employees to break the rules, when necessary , to put the business ahead.

Encouraging the "break the bureaucracy" mindset, should begin at the hiring stage. The candidates should be screened for their ability to break rules, within applicable limits, to get things done. This is equally important as the leadership quotient, the innovation quotient.

Individuals should be encouraged to go around the bureaucracy , in the larger interest of the organization. Annual performance reviews should have provisions to reward people for going around bureaucracy, in the larger interest of the company and client. At the same time, the annual performance reviews should have a section to penalize people for being bureaucratic - and standing in the way of business, without any other valid reason.

Would be very exciting to hear from readers, on how bureaucracy have been overcome in their own organizations !