The “sin, confession, priest” metaphor is a great anchor—that’s very similar to the feeling we try to project when we have these discussions with clients. And, related to Raemon’s question, that’s part of how I try to address the issue.
Specifically, we cast the instruction as much more of a simple commandment, leaving off the “But if you do” clause entirely from the particular guidance. So in this case, the instruction is: “Don’t reverse engineer competitor technology. Including, don’t buy copies of competitor tech or go searching for inside information. This information is risky for us to have (for various legal reasons I can bore you with, but aren’t important right now), and so you DON’T WANT IT.”
This guidance, along with any other ‘commandments’ goes into the general body of “Legal says ‘Don’t’” instructions. Which is more or less what most folks expect from a legal department. (We work hard not to be, but a lot of legal teams are considered the “Department of ‘No’ ”.)
And then, we overlay the number one rule over the top of all other guidance, and we finish with this every time: if you think you did something you shouldn’t have, tell us right away. If we don’t know, we can’t help you.
So to the original metaphor, we try to make ourselves part of the path to absolution (or at least mitigation), so that the rules can be simpler.
On the whole, it’s a little bit of the reverse of the original “Don’t … But …” construction. We try to flip it to: “We can help you if you screw up, but only if you tell us. Here’s what we hope we don’t have to help you with.” This way, if they remember a “Don’t”, it’s all good. If they forget a “Don’t”, but they remember “in case of doubt, ask legal”, we’re mostly OK. (If you sin, confess and get forgiven. If you don’t sin, good for you.)
In more semantic terms, we try to avoid the “But if you do …” construction, since that seems to stick with people in a way that ignores the “Don’t” part of it. By making the top rule, “let me help you if you break a rule”, it’s easier to keep from making the activity that breaks the rule sound like a premise for positive action.
I wouldn’t say we do great with this, but it’s part of an overall effort to cast legal as useful advisors (also a priestly role), rather than enforcers.
I found your example problem very interesting, and started thinking about social dynamics that match “tell me if you do it, but don’t do it”.
The closest cultural anchor I could find is that of sin, confession, priest. Modelling the situation as a confession might be an apt anchor
The “sin, confession, priest” metaphor is a great anchor—that’s very similar to the feeling we try to project when we have these discussions with clients. And, related to Raemon’s question, that’s part of how I try to address the issue.
Specifically, we cast the instruction as much more of a simple commandment, leaving off the “But if you do” clause entirely from the particular guidance. So in this case, the instruction is: “Don’t reverse engineer competitor technology. Including, don’t buy copies of competitor tech or go searching for inside information. This information is risky for us to have (for various legal reasons I can bore you with, but aren’t important right now), and so you DON’T WANT IT.”
This guidance, along with any other ‘commandments’ goes into the general body of “Legal says ‘Don’t’” instructions. Which is more or less what most folks expect from a legal department. (We work hard not to be, but a lot of legal teams are considered the “Department of ‘No’ ”.)
And then, we overlay the number one rule over the top of all other guidance, and we finish with this every time: if you think you did something you shouldn’t have, tell us right away. If we don’t know, we can’t help you.
So to the original metaphor, we try to make ourselves part of the path to absolution (or at least mitigation), so that the rules can be simpler.
On the whole, it’s a little bit of the reverse of the original “Don’t … But …” construction. We try to flip it to: “We can help you if you screw up, but only if you tell us. Here’s what we hope we don’t have to help you with.” This way, if they remember a “Don’t”, it’s all good. If they forget a “Don’t”, but they remember “in case of doubt, ask legal”, we’re mostly OK. (If you sin, confess and get forgiven. If you don’t sin, good for you.)
In more semantic terms, we try to avoid the “But if you do …” construction, since that seems to stick with people in a way that ignores the “Don’t” part of it. By making the top rule, “let me help you if you break a rule”, it’s easier to keep from making the activity that breaks the rule sound like a premise for positive action.
I wouldn’t say we do great with this, but it’s part of an overall effort to cast legal as useful advisors (also a priestly role), rather than enforcers.