In the first post of this series for World Standards Day 2025, my argument was simple: standards are the infrastructure of trust for the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), they are the common language that allows to turn ambition into execution, and execution in results. Let’s continue in the same path going one level deeper with the statement: if standards are the language, collaboration is the conversation.
The magic of standards development
Standards development is the method that convenes people from different horizons, with different background and different incentives to produce a one agreed way of doing things. This agreed way is never the lowest common denominator. It is a best practice, always developed to maximize the benefits for the greater good. A voluntary and a bottom-up process, it takes the energy of the markets and turns it into working guidance that profits everyone. The magic here is not speed or design. It is that it goes beyond the individual interests of the participants.
How standards are developed
Let’s demystify the process. A standard begins with a need that is felt by someone. For example, a need for interoperability between systems, for the safety of a family of products, for a method to measure activities in a comparable way, or the need to improve the performance of a system. This need is translated into a new work item proposal by a standards body. A technical committee, consisting in experts from all stakeholders concerned by the proposed standards (companies, governments, academia, civil society, etc.), will be set up with the task to agree on the scope, structure and content of the document. Drafts are written, debated, and revised until a consensus is reached. Then national standards bodies, or the members of the standards body developing the document, will review and vote, ensuring that the text can be adopted in different legal and market contexts without losing coherence. The formal publication of the document as standard is not the end of the process. Implementation will reveal issues, technology will evolve, new market needs will emerge, which is when a maintenance cycle will keep the document current. What looks like a static text is, in reality, a dynamic consensus that moves with the state of the art.
Collaboration is everywhere
Collaboration is not just within technical committees. Every actor in the chain plays a distinct and critical role. Standards organizations offer to stakeholders the platform with the neutrality, the governance and the due process that make consensus possible. National bodies onboard their stakeholders and ensure that the adoption of international or regional standards aligns with language, law and local needs. At the core, industry brings the hard truths of engineering, manufacturing, feasibility and cost, and the knowledge, data and experience from the field. Governments express public interest expectations and align references made in regulations so that voluntary standards can support their implementation. On their side, consumers and civil society make sure that health, safety, accessibility, and environmental integrity are not afterthoughts. These groups, with others, meet with reciprocity and respect, resulting in a legitimacy that adds to the technical value of a standard.
The compounding effect of standards
It is easy to understand the multiplier effect of collaboration at all levels of standardization. The benefits to society are substantial and visible wherever standards are well used: interoperability allows systems to connect seamlessly, waste are reduced, and scale is unlocked in areas such as health, safety, energy, mobility, or digital infrastructure. Claims are verifiable, which levels competition and protects consumers. Risk is reduced because design and operational best practice are formalized and shared instead of rediscovered at each firm and site. Not least, innovation accelerates. In short, standards compress the time between a good idea and a good outcome.
Standards taker or a standard maker?
Questions I am often asked these days by industry leaders: how can we participate effectively and, does it really matter whether we are standards takers or standards makers? The answer is obvious: it matters. When companies invest their expertise in technical committees and contribute, standards become more implementable, less theoretical. The better fit between requirements and reality limits costs. Anticipating changes through participation shortens time to market and reduces risks of non-conformities. Shaping interfaces and measurement methods can open entire markets. But participation is not lobbying. It is accepting the responsibility for the commons that everyone relies on, including competitors and suppliers. In the turbulent times we are going through today, this is a powerful statement of civic responsibility by business.
The trap of the lonely path
Of course, collaboration is not easy. Tensions exist between the desire for global harmonization and the one to serve local specificities, between speed and due process, between protecting intellectual property and business models and enabling broad access. The temptation in polarized contexts is to withdraw into silos or to push for unilateral solutions. Unfortunately, as I can observe, some have already succumbed to this. This path fragments markets, increases cost, and undermines safety and trust. If it may bring immediate benefits, it is likely to create irreparable damages in the medium and long terms. A certainty, it certainly doesn’t make lives easier, safer and better. To me, the better path is continued conversation and patience in a world where only a few still know how to pause, and to define what must be common, specify what can be different, documenting clearly the boundaries. Good standards carry this wisdom in their architecture, they preserve a shared core that allows trade, safety, and innovation to scale together.
The materialization of consensus
Today’s reality is that the volume of relevant, applicable, documents for a single product has grown dramatically, and revision cycles are faster. As we saw in the previous post, leaders and teams need to know what matters and what applies, what changed, and what dependencies exist across families of documents. They need provenance and authenticity they can demonstrate. They need to integrate requirements into engineering, quality, and procurement workflows without breaking how work gets done. None of this replaces the human work of consensus. It makes that work usable at the point of decision, which is where all collaboration presented either materializes or dissolves into good intentions.
Accuris, the connector
This is where one understands the critical role of Accuris, positioned precisely at the junction between consensus and application. As such, it is a key ally to standards bodies, extending the reach and usability of their content, operating as a trusted distributor and technology partner, protecting authenticity, and helping to explore digital formats and services that preserve value as the ecosystem evolves. On the other hand, it is a practical enabler for industry, providing a single authoritative entry point to discover, understand, and implement standards across roles and geographies, with version control, provenance, and workflow integration built in. The aim is not to sit above the ecosystem, but to connect its parts so collaboration travels the last mile, from technical committee rooms into product requirements, operating procedures, supplier contracts as well as into strategy development and execution.
Working all as partners
At a time where divisions prevail, partnership for a better world is not a slogan; it is a discipline. It requires organizations that can convene fairly, companies that engage constructively, and tools that translate agreements into daily practice. Standards development demonstrates this discipline at work every day, quietly enabling quality, health, safety, sustainability, and market access in ways many take for granted.
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