In companies large enough that they need regulations, every regulation has an owner.  There is one person who is responsible for that regulation and who supposedly thinks it is a good idea and who could nope the regulation if it stopped making sense.  If there's somebody who says, 'Well, I couldn't do the obviously correct thing there, the regulation said otherwise', then, if that's actually true, you can identify the person who owned that regulation and they are responsible for the output.

Sane people writing rules like those write the ability for the person in question to throw an exception which gets caught by an exception handler if a regulation constraining them seems to obviously not make sense any more.  Any time somebody has to literally break the rules to do a saner thing represents an absolute failure of organizational design.  There should be explicit exceptions built in and procedures for them.

Exceptions, being explicit, get logged.  They get reviewed.  If all your bureaucrats are repeatedly marking that a particular rule seems to be producing nonsensical decisions, it gets noticed.  The one single identifiable person who has ownership for that rule gets notified, because they have eyes on that, and then they have the ability optimize over it, like by modifying that rule.  If they can't modify the rule, they don't have ownership of it and somebody else is the real owner and this person is one of their subordinates whose job it is to serve as the other person's eyes on the rule. 

'Nobody seems to have responsibility for this important thing I'm looking at' is another form of throwable exception, besides a regulation turning out to make no sense.  A Security watching Keltham wander around obviously not knowing things he's been cleared to know, but with nobody actually responsible for telling him, should throw a 'this bureaucratic situation about Keltham makes no sense' exception.  There should then be one identifiable person in the organization who is obviously responsible for that, which that exception is guaranteed to reach by previously designed aspects of the organization, and that person has the power to tell Keltham things or send a message to somebody who does.  If the organizational design fails at doing that, this incident should be logged and visible to the single one identifiable sole person who has ownership of the 'actually why is this part of the corporation structured like this anyways' question.

In companies large enough that they need regulations, every regulation has an owner.  There is one person who is responsible for that regulation and who supposedly thinks it is a good idea and who could nope the regulation if it stopped making sense.  If there's somebody who says, 'Well, I couldn't do the obviously correct thing there, the regulation said otherwise', then, if that's actually true, you can identify the person who owned that regulation and they are responsible for the output.

Sane people writing rules like those write the ability for the person in question to throw an exception which gets caught by an exception handler if a regulation constraining them seems to obviously not make sane sense over a particular event.  Any time somebody has to literally break the rules to do a saner thing represents an absolute failure of organizational design.  There should be explicit exceptions built in and procedures for them.

Exceptions, being explicit, get logged.  They get reviewed.  If all your bureaucrats are repeatedly marking that a particular rule seems to be producing nonsensical decisions, it gets noticed.  The one single identifiable person who has ownership for that rule gets notified, because they have eyes on that, and then they have the ability optimize over it, like by modifying that rule.  If they can't modify the rule, they don't have ownership of it and somebody else is the real owner and this person is one of their subordinates whose job it is to serve as the other person's eyes on the rule. 

'Nobody seems to have responsibility for this important thing I'm looking at' is another form of throwable exception, besides a regulation turning out to make no sense.  A Security watching Keltham wander around obviously not knowing things he's been cleared to know, but with nobody actually responsible for telling him, should throw a 'this bureaucratic situation about Keltham makes no sense' exception.  There should then be one identifiable person in the organization who is obviously responsible for that exception, who that exception is guaranteed to reach by previously designed aspects of the organization, and that person has the power to tell Keltham things or send a message to somebody who does.  If the organizational design fails at doing that, this incident should be logged and visible to the single one identifiable sole person who has ownership of the 'actually why is this part of the corporation structured like this anyways' question.

In companies large enough that they need regulations, every regulation has an owner.  There is one person who is responsible for that regulation and who supposedly thinks it is a good idea and who could nope the regulation if it stopped making sense.  If there's somebody who says, 'Well, I couldn't do the obviously correct thing there, the regulation said otherwise', then, if that's actually true, you can identify the one single person who owned that regulation and they are responsible for the output.

Sane people writing rules like those write the ability for the person in question to throw an exception which gets caught by an exception handler if a regulation constraining them seems to obviously not make sane sense over a particular event.  Any time somebody has to literally break the rules to do a saner thing represents an absolute failure of organizational design.  There should be explicit exceptions built in and procedures for them.

Exceptions, being explicit, get logged.  They get reviewed.  If all your bureaucrats are repeatedly marking that a particular rule seems to be producing nonsensical decisions, it gets noticed.  The one single identifiable person who has ownership for that rule gets notified, because they have eyes on that, and then they have the ability optimize over it, like by modifying that rule.  If they can't modify the rule, they don't have ownership of it and somebody else is the real owner and this person is one of their subordinates whose job it is to serve as the other person's eyes on the rule. 

'Nobody seems to have responsibility for this important thing I'm looking at' is another form of throwable exception, besides a regulation turning out to make no sense.  A Security watching Keltham wander around obviously not knowing things he's been cleared to know, but with nobody actually responsible for telling him, should throw a 'this bureaucratic situation about Keltham makes no sense' exception.  There should then be one identifiable person in the organization who is obviously responsible for that exception, who that exception is guaranteed to reach by previously designed aspects of the organization, and that person has the power to tell Keltham things or send a message to somebody who does.  If the organizational design fails at doing that, this incident should be logged and visible to the single one identifiable sole person who has ownership of the 'actually why is this part of the corporation structured like this anyways' question.

In companies large enough that they need regulations, every regulation has an owner.  There is one person who is responsible for that regulation and who supposedly thinks it is a good idea and who could nope the regulation if it stopped making sense.  If there's somebody who says, 'Well, I couldn't do the obviously correct thing there, the regulation said otherwise', then, if that's actually true, you can identify the one single person who owned that regulation and they are responsible for the output.

Sane people writing rules like those write the ability for the person in question to throw an exception which gets caught by an exception handler if a regulation constraining them seems to obviously not make sane sense over a particular event.  Any time somebody has to literally break the rules to do a saner thing represents an absolute failure of organizational design.  There should be explicit exceptions built in and procedures for them.

Exceptions, being explicit, get logged.  They get reviewed.  If all your bureaucrats are repeatedly marking that a particular rule seems to be producing nonsensical decisions, it gets noticed.  The one single identifiable person who has ownership for that rule gets notified, because they have eyes on that, and then they have the ability to optimize over it, like by modifying that rule.  If they can't modify the rule, they don't have ownership of it and somebody else is the real owner and this person is one of their subordinates whose job it is to serve as the other person's eyes on the rule. 

'Nobody seems to have responsibility for this important thing I'm looking at' is another form of throwable exception, besides a regulation turning out to make no sense.  A Security watching Keltham wander around obviously not knowing things he's been cleared to know, but with nobody actually responsible for telling him, should throw a 'this bureaucratic situation about Keltham makes no sense' exception.  There should then be one identifiable person in the organization who is obviously responsible for that exception, who that exception is guaranteed to reach by previously designed aspects of the organization, and that person has the power to tell Keltham things or send a message to somebody who does.  If the organizational design fails at doing that, this incident should be logged and visible to the single one identifiable sole person who has ownership of the 'actually why is this part of the corporation structured like this anyways' question.

In companies large enough that they need regulations, every regulation has an owner.  There is one person who is responsible for that regulation and who supposedly thinks it is a good idea and who could nope the regulation if it stopped making sense.  If there's somebody who says, 'Well, I couldn't do the obviously correct thing there, the regulation said otherwise', then, if that's actually true, you can identify the one single person who owned that regulation and they are responsible for the output.

Sane people writing rules like those write the ability for the person in question to throw an exception which gets caught by an exception handler if a regulation constraining them seems to obviously not make sane sense over a particular event.  Any time somebody has to literally break the rules to do a saner thing, that represents an absolute failure of organizational design.  There should be explicit exceptions built in and procedures for them.

Exceptions, being explicit, get logged.  They get reviewed.  If all your bureaucrats are repeatedly marking that a particular rule seems to be producing nonsensical decisions, it gets noticed.  The one single identifiable person who has ownership for that rule gets notified, because they have eyes on that, and then they have the ability to optimize over it, like by modifying that rule.  If they can't modify the rule, they don't have ownership of it and somebody else is the real owner and this person is one of their subordinates whose job it is to serve as the other person's eyes on the rule. 

'Nobody seems to have responsibility for this important thing I'm looking at' is another form of throwable exception, besides a regulation turning out to make no sense.  A Security watching Keltham wander around obviously not knowing things he's been cleared to know, but with nobody actually responsible for telling him, should throw a 'this bureaucratic situation about Keltham makes no sense' exception.  There should then be one identifiable person in the organization who is obviously responsible for that exception, who that exception is guaranteed to reach by previously designed aspects of the organization, and that person has the power to tell Keltham things or send a message to somebody who does.  If the organizational design fails at doing that, this incident should be logged and visible to the single one identifiable sole person who has ownership of the 'actually why is this part of the corporation structured like this anyways' question.

In companies large enough that they need regulations, every regulation has an owner.  There is one person who is responsible for that regulation and who supposedly thinks it is a good idea and who could nope the regulation if it stopped making sense.  If there's somebody who says, 'Well, I couldn't do the obviously correct thing there, the regulation said otherwise', then, if that's actually true, you can identify the one single person who owned that regulation and they are responsible for the output.

Sane people writing rules like those, for whose effects they can be held accountable, write the ability for the person being regulated to throw an exception which gets caught by an exception handler if a regulation's output seems to obviously not make sane sense over a particular event.  Any time somebody has to literally break the rules to do a saner thing, that represents an absolute failure of organizational design.  There should be explicit exceptions built in and procedures for them.

Exceptions, being explicit, get logged.  They get reviewed.  If all your bureaucrats are repeatedly marking that a particular rule seems to be producing nonsensical decisions, it gets noticed.  The one single identifiable person who has ownership for that rule gets notified, because they have eyes on that, and then they have the ability to optimize over it, like by modifying that rule.  If they can't modify the rule, they don't have ownership of it and somebody else is the real owner and this person is one of their subordinates whose job it is to serve as the other person's eyes on the rule. 

'Nobody seems to have responsibility for this important thing I'm looking at' is another form of throwable exception, besides a regulation turning out to make no sense.  A Security watching Keltham wander around obviously not knowing things he's been cleared to know, but with nobody actually responsible for telling him, should throw a 'this bureaucratic situation about Keltham makes no sense' exception.  There should then be one identifiable person in the organization who is obviously responsible for that exception, who that exception is guaranteed to reach by previously designed aspects of the organization, and that person has the power to tell Keltham things or send a message to somebody who does.  If the organizational design fails at doing that, this incident should be logged and visible to the single one identifiable sole person who has ownership of the 'actually why is this part of the corporation structured like this anyways' question.