The End of Best Practices and the Rise of Situational Judgment

TL;DR: Best practices are losing relevance because work no longer happens in stable, repeatable conditions. What’s replacing them is situational judgment: the ability to assess context, tradeoffs, and risk in real time. In 2025 and beyond, value will belong less to those who know the “right” answer and more to those who know how to decide when no clear answer exists.

The Era of Best Practices Is Ending

For decades, best practices were the currency of professional credibility.

They made work repeatable.
They scaled expertise.
They gave leaders confidence that proven methods would deliver predictable outcomes.

And for a long time, that worked.

But the environment that made best practices useful no longer exists.

Today’s organizations operate inside:

• Constant technology change
• Overlapping transformations
• AI-accelerated decision cycles
• Fluid org structures
• Perpetual capacity constraints

Best practices assume stability.
Modern work is defined by volatility.

What used to be a strength is now a limitation.

Why Best Practices Are Breaking Down

Best practices rely on three assumptions that no longer hold:

1. The problem is well-defined

In reality, most work today begins with ambiguity, not clarity.

Teams are asked to solve:

• Problems that are still evolving
• Issues with incomplete data
• Situations shaped by politics, timing, and tradeoffs

There is no clean starting point. There is only motion.

2. The environment is repeatable

Best practices assume that what worked before will work again.

But AI, platform shifts, regulatory pressure, and organizational churn mean:

• Last year’s solution may be actively harmful this year
• Success conditions expire quickly
• Context matters more than process fidelity

Copying success has become riskier than adapting imperfectly.

3. Execution is the hard part

This may have been true once.

Today, decision quality is the constraint.

Most organizations are not short on plans.
They are short on:

• Prioritization
• Tradeoff clarity
• Authority to say no
• Confidence to act without consensus

Best practices don’t solve those problems.

What’s Replacing Best Practices: Situational Judgment

Situational judgment is not instinct or improvisation.
It is disciplined contextual thinking.

It looks like:

• Knowing when to apply a framework and when to ignore it
• Understanding second- and third-order consequences
• Adjusting approach based on organizational maturity
• Balancing speed, risk, and credibility in real time
• Reading the system, not just the task

This is why experienced practitioners feel more valuable than ever — and more exhausted.

They are no longer executing playbooks.
They are deciding which playbook even applies.

Why This Shift Is Uncomfortable for Organizations

Situational judgment is hard to standardize, measure, or scale.

It does not fit neatly into:

• Maturity models
• Certification paths
• Operating procedures
• AI prompts
• Quarterly KPIs

It also exposes a hard truth:

The most valuable work in modern organizations cannot be fully automated, templated, or outsourced.

That makes leadership nervous.

So organizations cling to best practices longer than they should — not because they work, but because they feel controllable.

What This Means for Change Management

This is where the conversation gets uncomfortable.

Change management didn’t fail.
But the expectation that it could be standardized did.

What’s emerging instead:

• Fewer playbooks
• More judgment calls
• More embedded work
• More ambiguity
• Less ceremony

The practitioners who will thrive are not the ones with the most certifications.

They are the ones who can:

• Read organizational signals
• Navigate tradeoffs
• Adapt in real time
• Make decisions without perfect information
• Explain why a path was chosen, not just what was done

The Real Shift: From Knowledge to Wisdom

Knowledge scales.
Wisdom contextualizes.

Knowledge answers questions.
Wisdom chooses which questions matter.

That’s the shift happening now — quietly, unevenly, and without a clean headline.

And it’s why many practitioners feel like the ground is moving beneath them.

Because it is.

Final Thought

Best practices gave us scale.
Situational judgment gives us resilience.

As the year closes, that may be the most important shift to recognize.

The future of change work does not belong to those who follow the playbook best.

It belongs to those who know when to put it down.

ChangeGuild: Power to the Practitioner™

Now What?

1. Stop collecting frameworks. Start developing judgment.
   Ask yourself not “What’s the model?” but “What’s different about this situation?”
2. Treat context as a first-class input.
   Industry, leadership maturity, risk tolerance, and timing matter more than process purity.
3. Document decisions, not just deliverables.
   Your reasoning is becoming more valuable than your artifacts.
4. Practice saying “it depends” — clearly and confidently.
   Ambiguity handled well builds trust. Avoiding it erodes credibility.
5. Invest in your thinking, not just your tools.
   AI can accelerate execution. It cannot replace judgment.

Frequently Asked Questions

Is change management really “dead”?
No. What’s fading is the traditional, playbook-driven version of change management. The work itself is evolving toward embedded decision support, situational judgment, and continuous adaptation rather than formal programs and phased rollouts.

What do you mean by “situational judgment”?
Situational judgment is the ability to assess context, constraints, risk, and timing in real time and choose an appropriate course of action. It’s less about following a method and more about understanding when and how to adapt one.

Why are best practices becoming less useful?
Best practices assume stable conditions and repeatable scenarios. Most organizations today operate in constant flux—driven by AI, shifting priorities, and resource constraints—making rigid approaches less effective.

Does this mean frameworks and models no longer matter?
No. Frameworks still have value as reference points. The problem arises when they’re treated as prescriptions rather than tools. The skill now lies in knowing when to apply them and when to deviate.

How does AI factor into this shift?
AI accelerates execution and exposes weak decision-making. It highlights gaps in clarity, prioritization, and judgment. Organizations that rely solely on process struggle more, not less, when AI enters the picture.