Comments on: Why “Best Practice” Is a Fallacy (At Best)

By: Dave Newman

Dave Newman — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 01:34:10 +0000

A harder problem is defining ‘best’. Best according to whose values?

E.g. in public consultations should we promote practices that are better for the consultees, or for the consulters? Is neatly formulated organised knowledge the goal, or higher levels of democratic participation?

By: CV Harquail

CV Harquail — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 14:11:32 +0000

Hi Stephen,
I’m sorry to be late-ish in commenting, but I was really struck by the usefulness of your action recommendation at the end of this post. It reminds me of an analysis of an alternative approach to ‘uncertainty’, where instead of invoking abstract principles and models, managers are pushed/encouraged/forced to focus on the specifics of each situation and their role in gathering the set of resources from their network to address that specific situation. Really intriguing: “Bullsih on Uncertainty” by Michel and Wortham.

By: Gurteen Knowledge-Letter: Issue 112 – October 2009 « Oxfordprospect.co.uk – Oxford News

Sat, 24 Oct 2009 17:53:12 +0000

[...] Billing in his blog recently added weight to what David has to say. He comments that best practice” ignores the [...]

By: John Maloney

John Maloney — Sun, 18 Oct 2009 22:33:54 +0000

Bravo!

Been railing against BP for 15 years. We embrace, apply ‘Next Practices.’ They inform emergence. See:

http://www.pmcluster.com/web/Next_Practices.htm

We like Theory U and the TALC too.

-j

By: Mike

Mike — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 11:48:46 +0000

There are several factors that prevent a practice to transfer from one unit/organization to another. In short let me refer you to the work by Prof. Szulansky on Sticky Knowledge

By: James Collie

James Collie — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 13:20:06 +0000

Same thing in comic form!

http://www.dilbert.com/2009-10-11/

Its like the ancient Beauty vs Truth question. Both are important. Ignoring either will cause unacceptable results.

By: Mark Levitt

Mark Levitt — Fri, 09 Oct 2009 15:46:53 +0000

Good topic. In my experience as an advisor to vendors and customers about business technology solutions, I have seen best practices be of great value. The trick is to treat them as a starting point, rather than as a final destination. Best practices can provide helpful examples of what has worked for others in the past and could potentially work for now or in the future in a similar situation. Blindly following what has worked in the past is not a good idea but ignoring what has worked in the past is also not a good strategy. This is true even through different people and organizations are involved. A smart team or organization seeks out best practices not to copy them verbatim but rather to see what others have done that could help guide development of its own practices.
Thoughts?
Mark Levitt
Technology Analyst and Business Strategist

By: informal coalitions

informal coalitions — Fri, 09 Oct 2009 10:00:31 +0000

Where is the magic in “best practice”?…

Last week, as I was facilitating a workshop with a great group of people in Germany, the topic of “best practice” arose. I challenged the idea that the transfer of so-called best practice between organizations was a credible way of……