What’s Your Policy on Making a Policy?

Mike Donoghue is a member of a multinational information technology corporation where he collaborates on the communications guidelines and customer relationship strategies affecting the interactions with internal and external clients. He has analyzed, defined, designed and overseen processes for various engagements including product usability and customer satisfaction, best practice enterprise standardization, relationship/branding structures, and distribution effectiveness and direction. He has also established corporate library solutions to provide frameworks for sales, marketing, training, and support divisions.

  Governance   Knowledge Management   Lessons Learned   Organizational Project Management   Resource Management  

Why have a policy? For many organizations, it means you have reached a point where you have refined protocols and procedures so that you have developed an industrial or operational practice that is the de facto for all employees.

While it affords individuals the guidelines for how to act and function in certain situations, a policy also becomes a foundational document for a firm—establishing their maturity as a business. Sometimes a document of rules and regulations, a policy can also provide a company with a framework of appropriate behaviors and likewise a way in which to enforce adherence to the policy (for example, by repercussions such as staff sanctions or even termination).

While you may think it’s difficult to put these practices down on paper (or whatever your paradigm is), there are some basic steps you can follow to organize your thoughts, begin the writing process and edit the content to a final version.

Organizing Your Thoughts: An Exploration
To navigate to your final destination, you will need to get directions, ask for assistance and (if possible) draw upon examples that can help you get started. Just like with any trip, you will need to know how to get there. Some travelers may already have knowledge of the area or can get you close to the destination, but you will need more specifics than the basic “just go a few miles and turn left…

Please log in or sign up below to read the rest of the article.