Unpopular Opinion (that I stand by):

If your training programs only teach people to follow SOPs, you're not preparing them for the job.

 You're preparing them to freeze the moment something goes off-script.

I’ve led Learning & Development at scale. I’ve seen what happens when high-performers stall—not because they lack intelligence, but because they lack something we don’t talk about enough:

👉 Judgment.

We’ve trained employees to follow.

 But the future belongs to those who know how to adapt, assess, and act—even when the playbook doesn't apply.

Let me say this louder for the back row:

 🛑 SOPs don’t build leaders. SOPs build robots.

Yes, SOPs matter. They’re the bedrock of consistency, quality, and safety.

But if that’s all we’re teaching, we’re raising teams that can execute flawlessly in controlled environments—and panic in unpredictable ones.

And unpredictable is now the norm.

So here’s what we’ve done differently:

🔥 We stopped measuring training success by test scores and started measuring it by decision-making quality.

 🔥 We designed learning to include moral gray zones, conflicting priorities, real trade-offs.

 🔥 We trained teams to recognize when a procedure is outdated in real time—and how to escalate, adapt, or act with confidence.

Because here’s the real cost of training people only to follow:

– 🚫 Opportunities missed

 – 🚫 Innovation stalled

 – 🚫 Crisis responses that require 7 approvals

 – 🚫 Culture of fear over ownership

But when you train people to think—not just follow—everything changes.

✅ Decisions get faster.

 ✅ Teams get bolder.

 ✅ Leaders emerge from everywhere.

So now when we build learning programs, we ask:

⚠️ Not “Can they follow steps?”

 ✅ But “Can they step up when there’s no script?”

If your people can’t make a smart call when things get messy, you don’t have a readiness problem. You have a design problem.

It’s time to build judgment into the DNA of how we train.

Your best SOP is still only a guess at yesterday’s reality.

 Your people? They’re the ones facing today’s.

Let’s give them the tools to lead, not just comply.

💬 I want to hear from you:

 How are you helping your teams build judgment, not just muscle memory?

#LearningAndDevelopment #JudgmentOverProcedure #LxD #CapabilityNotCompliance #LeadershipDevelopment #CriticalThinking #FutureOfWork #WorkforceReadiness #CultureShift #L7DLens