CAD Manager's Q&A: Who Should Enforce Standards?

How can I communicate to my users how critical standards are?

Robert Green replies: I think it really is senior management’s job to set the tone for following standards! I’m not trying to pass the buck or upset anyone in senior management. I’m just trying to be realistic about where the expectation of following standards gets set.

It is the CAD manager’s job to educate senior management on the value of and need for standards, but once those concepts are explained, senior management must tell everyone, in no uncertain terms, that following standards makes everything work better, faster and with fewer errors.

My experience has shown that very few CAD managers actually have the power to enforce the usage of standards. And knowing that power is lacking, users can simply ignore the CAD manager. Many of you may recognize this conundrum as what I call the “all the responsibility but none of the authority” CAD management trap.

So if you want your users to understand how critical standards are, you should tackle the task by first educating your upper management on standards. I have given you some targeted advice for accomplishing this task in this edition of CAD Manager’s Newsletter.