In a bustling airport snack shop, travelers dart in and out, snatching quick bites off the shelves and quickly settling up on their way. But there’s no cashier to enforce payment, only the honor system and a kiosk. It’s an invitation to steal, so the obvious fix should be more cameras and more control, now automated in the age of AI, right?
Linus Arauz, who runs nearly 100 airport retail spots, ran the numbers and found the opposite: policing every shelf cost more than the theft it prevented.
Guido Friebel’s piece in HBR pushes the idea further with a real experiment. A German bakery chain lost experienced workers, and the suspected cause was over 20 daily checklists that made skilled bakers feel distrusted. Researchers pulled just the two checklists that caused the most grief at half the stores. The result? Sales rose 2.7% and attrition among veterans fell 20%. Quality never slipped.
But there’s a twist: attrition rose among newer staff at those same stores. The checklists that insulted the pros were a lifeline for the rookies.
Controls should match the intended employees, and they should be appropriate for specific goals. As AI makes surveillance cheap and constant, it is tempting to turn all automated controls on. If a little is good, a lot must be amazing! But it sends the wrong signals to our team if not calibrated properly, and worse, may distract from addressing more fundamental business strategies. By focusing on the right control for the right person, we can support the team members who need it, and empower those who don’t.