I’ve been thinking a lot about “business rules.” Every company has them, those rules we use to make decisions. But the more I think about it, I’m not sure rules alone were ever meant to be the basis for good decision-making. The constraints of technology and the linear nature of programming have made business decision-making models what they are today. We’ve ended up with a lot of rules-based stuff not because it works best but because that’s all we could handle. We are often told new tech systems will be customized to fit our way of doing business but it’s actually the other way around; our business models have been made to fit what tech could manage. These systems and the rules they brought have not prioritized innovation and creativity but rather standardization and compliance.
Things don’t have to be that way any more. The right way of doing things no longer means a single right way to the exclusion of other options. Data-driven decision-making is probabilistic by nature, with infinite options. Whether it’s pricing, marketing messages, stock holding or logistics, the opportunity to throw out the rule book has never been so exciting.