{"id":69921,"date":"2022-06-22T23:29:00","date_gmt":"2022-06-23T03:29:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/?p=69921"},"modified":"2022-06-28T08:57:00","modified_gmt":"2022-06-28T12:57:00","slug":"workplace-rules","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/workplace-rules\/","title":{"rendered":"Workplace Rules: 3 Tips to Make Them Stick"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Have you set clear rules for your employees? How well do people understand and follow the rules?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

CEO and venture capitalist Ben Horowitz draws on historical examples to show how you can provide cultural leadership<\/a> in your organization. For lessons on workplace rules, Horowitz looks to Haitian revolutionary Toussaint Louverture and offers three tips for making rules that stick.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Keep reading to learn how to set effective workplace rules.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

Make Workplace<\/strong> Rules That Stick<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

To emphasize the need to be trustworthy, Louverture forbade officers from cheating on their wives or having concubines, although it had been common practice in times of war. The rule prompted questions, and Louverture explained that officers who cheated on their wives couldn\u2019t be trusted in other matters either. Horowitz emphasizes making workplace rules that surprise people and force them to think about the principle behind the behavior<\/strong>, like Louverture\u2019s rule for officers. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

(Shortform note: Horowitz\u2019s assessment of the rule\u2019s purpose might be incorrect. As CLR James explained in The Black Jacobins<\/em><\/a>, <\/em>this rule was part of Louverture\u2019s plan for building a respectable Catholic society. Forbidding concubines was a way for Haitians to simultaneously recall customs from their native cultures, such as the faithful keeping of wives, and emulate virtues of French society.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Horowitz says that, to make a workplace rule stick, make sure that:<\/p>\n\n\n\n