Flowers and Innovation

I ordered $50 worth of flowers once for a business partner. We can debate whether the purchase was appropriate. From my perspective, instead of spending hundreds (thousands?) of dollars to send staff (no-one wanted to go) to attend a celebration in another city, it felt like it was a prudent way to express our support and goodwill.

 

I didn’t ask for permission or approval for the purchase. I had a suspicion there were policies against it, but I didn’t check. Once the claim for reimbursement hit the system, three different people in the process told me my purchase was against policy and I couldn’t claim it. Each time, I thanked them for telling me. I acknowledged I had made a mistake and I asked them to process the claim anyway.

 

Ultimately, it got back to my boss. He told me I couldn’t claim the expense.

 

“OK,” I said, “I made a mistake. I’d like to be reprimanded for my error in judgment and officially declined for reimbursement.”

 

I wanted to push the policy. My well-paid, professional brain had made a decision, but there was a policy in place to restrict me from using my own judgement. Choices to spend $50 were beyond my discretion. I led a team of eight.

 

Weren’t we discouraging creativity and innovation? In the course of trying to do my best for the organization, what if I make a $50,000 mistake? Am I still on the hook? That’s a quick way to stifle any ambition or initiatitive.

 

That didn’t matter to the system. The bureaucracy demands adherence, not creativity. My job was to adhere, not be creative.
I willfully refused to retract my claim. I really did want someone to explictly say that discretion and personal agency were not allowed.

 

It didn’t get to that. Even as I protested and tried to refuse, my boss personally reimbursed me.

 

I was young and itching to be a martyr. I suspect my boss saved me (and them) from some short-term discomfort. The stifling discomfort of bureaucracy won again. How much does that cost?