Written openly to constrain a rival unit's practice, a new policy raises the cost of that practice for everyone it covers, so its author has to be ready to live under it too.
Borderline: whether this move is justified depends on the situation, and only the person in it can judge.
An example
Before she proposed it, the head of operations at a hotel group with forty properties listed every contract her own team had signed without competitive bids in the past year. There were nine, mostly emergency repairs. Her target was the marketing head's agency retainers, renewed each year without a tender, and she said so at the leadership meeting: three bids and a sign-off for any vendor contract over $50,000, starting with the agency renewals in March. The draft included an emergency clause, open to every unit, that required a written justification within five days. When a burst pipe flooded the downtown ballroom six weeks later, operations used the clause and filed its justification on day two. The marketing head ran the agency tender in April and kept two of the three agencies, at lower fees.
Why it works
Working on the rival's practice, the policy makes a sole-source retainer look worse, a habit in need of a check, and makes continuing it costlier through bids, approvals, and paperwork. Because the cost is written as a general rule, it lands on anyone whose work looks the same, including the author. The move holds when the author has checked their own exposure first, accepts the constraint publicly, and drafts around the behavior, so the rule survives the first test case the rival brings.
The thinking behind it
Thomas C. Schelling In The Strategy of Conflict (1960), Schelling argues that binding oneself can be a source of strength, and that simple, conspicuous lines, which he called focal points, are easier to hold than arbitrary ones. A general policy is such a line, credible because it binds its author too. That is the source of both its force against the rival's practice and the boomerang: a rule drawn to exempt its author would lose the credibility that makes it hold.
When it fits
Fits a manager with the authority to propose company-wide policy, a real concern about how a rival unit operates, and a practice of their own that can stand the same rule. You need a sponsor who will approve the policy on its merits, and enough knowledge of your own operations to know where the rule will catch you.
How to use it well
List your own exposure before you draft. Every activity of yours that the rule would cover is a test case the rival will raise.
- Write the rule around the behavior you want to change, in plain terms, and say openly which practice prompted it.
- Turn the exceptions your own unit needs into general provisions anyone can use, with the same paperwork.
- Comply first and visibly, so the first test case is yours and it passes.
- Set a review date and report how the rule is working across all units.
When the rival asks whether the rule applies to you, the answer should be yes, with the record to show it.
What it costs and where it backfires
A general rule binds you as well, and the rival will look for the first case where it does. Universal language drafted by compliance staff can catch work you never meant to slow, and carving out an exemption for yourself afterward reads as proof the rule was personal. The move stays clean while the rule is applied evenly. Enforcing it on the rival while waiving it for allies turns it into selective enforcement, which is retaliation, and the record of who complied will show it.
When it is used on you
Turned on you, the move shows as a general rule whose story everyone knows is about your unit. Read its operative words, list what the author's own unit does that they cover, and ask in writing whether those activities fall under it. Comply visibly yourself, so the only open question is whether the rule applies evenly.