Create New Practices
If we only follow best practices, how can one develop new practices? Today’s best practice was once a new practice. For whatever reason, someone had the courage or was just curious to challenge the status quo, experiment, iterate and replace an existing best practice. Or someone was naive and ignorant of the so-called rules and by sheer accident they created a new set of rules which eventually turned into a best practice that you’re following today.
Well, it's safe and common sense to follow best practices in most aspect of your life. You don't want to create new practices in areas where your life depends best practices and a set of predefined rules. For example swimming, flying an aircraft, or driving a car. Only domain experts can propose new practices in this context. For everyone else, you have to follow the rulebook. There's no question about it.
However this is not the case in every line of work. For example in filmmaking, you can choose to follow best practices, or go ahead and break all the rules and create new practices. Creative fields present you an opportunity to challenge conventional methods and create new solutions, even if you're a beginner. In fact beginners have more potential to create new practices, because they come with a fresh and curious mind. However this is not the case with all beginners. Most beginners tend to follow the industry protocols for various reasons.
On the work front, it's imperative for you to think and push the envelope in areas whether you’re an expert. You become an expert by following best practices and then you add your own style and experience to create new practices for yourself and for the benefit of other experts in the making.
What new practices are you creating at work?
Following someone or something is easy, however asking someone or something to follow your thinking and newer methods calls for a lot of thinking, effort, clarity, and credibility on your part. Start thinking about how you could bring in some new practices into your organization or industry and this process could be a new practice by itself.
It’s always a best practice to create a new practice.
First, learn all the rules of the trade. Get your fundamentals right and build a strong foundation in terms of understanding basic concepts, laws, rules, best practices, how your industry works and then break all the rules. Now that you know all the rules, break all the rules. Create your own rules. These rules are meant to be challenged and questioned by others who are in the industry. That’s how progress happens in any industry or organization. Dialogue is essential for progress. Break the rules, define the rules, and allow others to break them again. In this way, we keep fine tuning our methods and the beneficiary is the collective.
Create something new.
