Controls can create complexity.

A recent blog post to the Harvard Business Review Web site points out that companies often establish controls in response to incidents that have already occurred, even when the original problem remains exactly the same. According to the blog post's author, Ron Ashkenas, managing partner of Robert H. Schaeffer & Associates, managers should periodically evaluate the effectiveness of the newly established controls by checking for the following three common problems:

1. Static controls for dynamic problems. (Solutions can't be implemented quickly.)

2. High costs in proportion to the problem.

3. Controls misapplied to address different problems.

In his blog...