You will have rules, or you will have rulers. G.K. Chesterton said that in 1910 and it’s still true today. Every team runs on expectations—written or unwritten, visible or hidden. When they’re explicit and coherent, they empower everyone.When they’re implicit or inconsistent, they create confusion, friction, and hierarchy by default.

Making Rules Matter draws from over a decade of practice inside the Holacracy® and self-management movement—a living experiment in distributed authority and conscious structure. Holacracy showed that structure doesn’t have to mean control. Rules can liberate.

But it also showed that full systems like Holacracy require deep commitment and readiness. Many organizations admire it, but few adopt it fully—not because they lack courage, but because every group must evolve from where they are.

The Making Rules Matter framework distills the principles of effective and humane collaboration—without requiring a specific system. You can use it inside Holacracy. You can use it inside a management hierarchy. You can even use it in a single team within a larger, more conventional organization.

It’s not a governance model. Or constitution. It’s a set of principles and practices that help groups make their expectations explicit, fair, and functional—at whatever level they’re ready for.

The goal isn’t to replace your system. It’s to make it work better—to surface hidden assumptions and rules, clarify agreements, and strengthen trust.

Whether your group runs on hierarchy, Holacracy, Scrum, a hybrid, or something homegrown, the same principles apply.

If your team or organization wants to work with greater clarity and integrity—without tearing down what’s already working—this approach meets you where you are. Explore workshops, talks, and resources designed to help your group make its rules matter.