A promise made by an institution can outlive everyone who understood why it mattered.

Institutions make commitments in a particular moment, for reasons that everyone present understands. Decades later the commitment is still in the rules, and the reasons have left with the people who held them. The promise is then kept mechanically or dropped carelessly, because nobody remaining knows what it was protecting. A rule without its purpose is just a habit with authority.

Where you have influence, write down why alongside what, especially for commitments meant to last. When you inherit a rule you do not understand, try to find the reason before deciding it is obsolete. The reason is usually recoverable for a while, and then it is not.