We run into and up against rules every day. Now, let me clarify, I’m not talking about laws, laws are in place to protect society right? I’m talking more about rules or policies that restrict our work and personal life. I’ve had a couple of interesting experiences with rules lately and I’d like to share them.

First, on the personal side of things. I had the privilege of spending a week on vacation in Florida recently and after what seemed like several years of the “polar vortex” in Minnesota, I can only describe warm sun, sandy beaches and cold (alcoholic) beverages as heavenly. However, I did find some rather strange rules on vacation and I found myself wanting to break them. First, we stayed with relatives in a “seniors only” condo, which again was wonderful. But, it seems that when baby boomers have free time, they like to create rules. The craziest rules involve the beautiful pool at the building. It’s incredibly expensive to maintain a swimming pool with heat, chemicals, cleaning, etc. – but apparently the only time they want the pool to be used is one hour a day, in the morning, for water aerobics. There is to be no jumping, no toys, no splashing, basically no fun. In past year’s I’ve received warnings because my kids were playing with dive toys, throwing balls and because I was playing “marco polo” with them. Really? The other rule that I found myself breaking several times was walking into a “private” area of the beach and purchasing drinks from a “members only” snack bar. Don’t signs like this actually make you want to see if you can get in? Why would you refuse money from people who are thirsty on the beach? So, that retired people never have to stand in line at the snack bar? We’ve already established that all they’ve got is free time so what’s the big deal?

The other rules that I’d like to highlight today are those that I’ve encountered during a recent job search. I’m pretty sure that they were also created by the baby boomers that run most HR departments at large companies but that would be me just guessing. I find it very interesting that the human part of hiring has been replaced by elaborate rules that are enforced by technology called “applicant tracking systems.” I’m sure it’s at least 2% more efficient to use these systems to collect and manage resumes and they offer ample opportunity to create rules to limit the candidates who actually get reviewed by a person. Are we better off this way? In talking with other job seekers, they often feel like even though they are qualified and jump through the hoops involved with the application process, they don’t ever get an interview. I’ve also seen this from the other side of the desk when trying to hire people and working with HR – no one I’ve ever talked to seems to like the technology that manages the hiring process. What’s the point? Why can’t we just get back to letting people hire people? I love the model adopted by Internet sales experts at Zappos (now part of Amazon.com). I saw their founder Tony Hsieh talk about their culture and their values book one time. They hire for personality and culture fit, that’s what’s behind their legendary customer service. They have great questions like “what’s your theme song?” and “on a scale of 1 to 10, how weird are you?” I would probably not get hired there because my theme song is probably by John Mellencamp or Blake Shelton and I’m boring but they know what they want and how to get at it in an interview process. They have an amazing philosophy, read more about it here: http://onboardingnewhires.com/620965-Corporate-Culture-Best-Practices-Zappos.html

Florida is one of those places that’s so much fun to visit that you look past strange rules. Zappos is a pretty next generation company, not many boomers behind the scenes – after all Hsieh is just barely an Xer. Is there something to that? Will corporate culture and senior-only condos change considerably once Gen Xers and (god help us) Millennials start making the rules? Will there even be rules? What do you think about rules? What’s your favorite rule to break?