P2P

10 a brutally clear lesson: Governance applies to people who don't matter enough to be exempt. High performers learn they're above the rules. Everyone else learns that governance isn't essential. The damage extends way beyond the individual violation. Junior people see stars getting away with non-compliance. They internalize that governance is performance theater. WORKAROUND CULTURE In organizations with healthy governance cultures, people who discover legitimate problems with policies propose solutions. They flag issues. They suggest improvements. In toxic governance cultures, people create workarounds and share them like life hacks. "Here's how to get around the document classification requirement." "Use this method to avoid the approval workflow." These workarounds get passed from person to person. They become part of the informal onboarding. The cultural message: Governance policies are obstacles to work around, not systems to work within. Clever non-compliance becomes a badge of competence. WHY TRADITIONAL APPROACHES FAIL Understanding why standard governance implementation approaches fail helps clarify what's needed instead. Most governance initiatives follow a predictable pattern: Assemble a team and research best practices. Develop comprehensive policies. Select appropriate technology. Announce the new program with great fanfare. Conduct training. Assume adoption will follow naturally. This fails because it treats governance as a technical problem requiring a technical solution. But culture isn't technical. You can't overcome cultural resistance by creating better SharePoint workflows or writing more straightforward retention guidelines. The technology might be perfect, and the policies might be flawless, but if they conflict with cultural values and norms, culture wins every single time. Organizations routinely overestimate what training can accomplish. The implicit theory: People don't follow governance because they don't understand it. So explaining it better will solve the problem. But lack of understanding is rarely the real issue. Most governance violations don't stem from confusion about what the policy requires. People know they should classify documents. They know they should follow retention schedules. They choose not to because competing priorities feel more urgent. You can't train people out of believing that attorney autonomy matters more than standardized processes. You can't train away the pressure to bill hours. Carrots and sticks don't work either. Rewards for compliance send a weird message. If you have to pay people to follow governance policies, you're implicitly admitting those policies don't serve their interests. Punishments create a culture of fear and minimal compliance. People do exactly enough to avoid consequences and no more. Real cultural change requires governance to become intrinsically valued. People need to follow governance policies because doing so aligns with their professional identity and helps them do their work. So if traditional approaches don't work, what does? Transforming culture requires fundamentally different strategies than implementing policies. CONNECT GOVERNANCE TO EXISTING VALUES The most powerful cultural strategy is demonstrating how governance serves values people already hold. Don't position governance as competing with client service, attorney autonomy, or professional excellence. Show how governance enables those things.

• Cover