All Hands on Tech in Practice: Kill a Stupid Role Contest

Whilst the ‘Kill a Stupid Rule Contest’ is not an invention by myself - it was indeed a program launched in our engineering division. It encouraged around 1000 engineers (or even more) to think about processes, tasks or policies that do not make sense anymore. Well knowing, that most processes, tasks etc. have been setup with good intent.

In an attempt to become faster and to encourage an environment of innovation the contest has been launched with the support of the top executive team of that divison.

The idea was simple:
If a process, policy, or rule annoys you and doesn't add value anymore – nominate it.

In a nutshell:

There were hundreds of submissions.
Some hilarious. Some bold. Some painfully honest.

🏆 The top ideas were shortlisted through peer voting.
🚀 The winning one? Actually implemented – with top management fully backing the change.
Several more ideas were adopted as well into day to day office life.

What stood out to me most were two things:

First, the courage and clarity of the approach – truly empowering teams to challenge the status quo.
But even more impactful was what it revealed: how much time and energy were being lost to waterfall-style communication, excessive bureaucracy, or legacy processes no one could really justify anymore.
Even personal development talks made it onto the chopping block.

It was a catalyst moment – encouraging people to question not just what they were doing, but why they were doing it.

Have you ever run something like this?
I’d love to hear how your team has tackled outdated processes or “just because” tasks. Let’s share ideas – maybe it’s time to kill another stupid rule.

Wishing a lot of fun while implementing this idea

Sophie