A recent conversation with a friend who works for a global manufacturing company focused on his horror at colleagues who had shipped product offshore before obtaining regulatory clearance to sell the product in the destination country. He was incredulous that this could happen at such a large corporation. The potential for a disastrous outcome (fines, inventory sitting in customs unable to be retrieved, rejection of the shipment resulting in additional shipping expense, loss of revenue due to delivery delays, possible lawsuits, etc.) was significant.

I was reminded of two rules that I learned early in my career while working for an industry-leading manufacturer whose products were known far and wide.

1. Don’t do anything that will result in shutting down production.

2. Don’t do anything that interferes with a product getting to market on time.

Large companies have a complex web of employees contributing to the product lifecycle. Although there should be oversight at every phase of the process, it’s easier than most executives would admit for some steps to fall through the cracks. Even so, we each bear a personal responsibility to do our jobs to the best of our ability. That includes mitigating risk and evaluating daily decisions against both long and short term objectives.

If you work for a product manufacturer, don’t flirt with disaster in the name of expedience. Keeping these two rules in mind may help you make better decisions on the company’s behalf.