Wer schreibt, der bleibt — who writes, remains. A German saying about the authority of the written record, used in meetings about who is taking the minutes.
Papier ist geduldig — paper is patient, the counter-saying, warning that writing something down does not make it true.
Das steht so im Prozess — that is how it stands in the process. Offered in German discussion as a reason, and usually accepted as one.
The German Basic Law gives the Chancellor Richtlinienkompetenz — authority to determine the general guidelines of policy. The constitution allocates the power to set the framework as a named competence, distinct from the power to decide within it.
Federführung — the quill-leading. The German term for which department holds the pen on a document, a project or a negotiation. It is contested openly, because whoever drafts determines what is discussed.
Zuständigkeit — competence, jurisdiction, the area for which one is responsible. German organisations and public bodies define it precisely, and disputes about it are real disputes. Dafür bin ich nicht zuständig is not an evasion. It is a statement about where the authority sits.
A Betriebsvereinbarung between employer and works council binds both and governs how work is organised. Negotiating one is a genuine contest, and its terms determine daily working life more directly than most management decisions.
German bodies from the Bundestag to a works council operate under a written Verfahrensordnung governing who may put items on the agenda, in what order, and how a decision is taken. Control of the rules of procedure is understood as control of what can be decided.
German industry associations draft technical guidelines, model contracts and codes of practice for their sectors — VDI, VDE, VDA, VDMA. Influence over an industry runs through the documents it works to.
German organisations give the technically competent function authority over how its work is done, and the phrase das ist Sache der Fachabteilung — that is the specialist department’s affair — settles a question by naming who owns it.
German standards are written by committees within DIN, drawn from industry, research, government and consumer bodies. Firms send their engineers and pay for the seat. A place on the committee that writes the standard is worth having.
The German Qualitätsbeauftragter has authority independent of production management and, in regulated industries, may halt release. The person who defines the process is deliberately placed outside the line that would benefit from bending it.