Don’t Paint Over Rust
Summary: A Chief Petty Officer’s maxim — before you improve something, make sure you’re building from a solid base, not covering a weak one.
Sources: Handwritten.md; LinkedIn Posts.md (“Don’t Paint Over Rust,” posted 2025-10-08) (original content, authored by Paul)
Last updated: 2026-07-07
The phrase comes from Paul’s first assignment as a young naval officer, learned from his senior enlisted “Chief” — the practical counterpart to the theoretical leadership training officers received (source: Handwritten.md). Literally, painting over corroded metal hides the rust rather than fixing it; the corrosion keeps weakening the steel underneath, eventually causing failure. Sailors who slapped paint over weakened metal got “coached” by the Chief for it (source: Handwritten.md).
Applied to business: organizations under pressure to execute quickly often can’t tell the “good steel” from the rust that has accumulated through slow process drift. The discipline is to strip away the layers first, find the solid base process, and then protect it with policies, training, protocol, and documentation — the paint — so the team can trust the process will hold up when needed (source: Handwritten.md).
The published LinkedIn version makes the AI application concrete with a two-step checklist (source: LinkedIn Posts.md):
- Strip away the rust first: audit and clean the data (accurate, complete, relevant); validate the processes feeding that data (fix bottlenecks and gaps); identify ethical and compliance risks before they undermine trust.
- Then apply the paint: establish strong policies, governance frameworks, and documentation; train teams on proper AI usage and oversight; continuously monitor systems to prevent new corrosion from creeping in.
This is a direct precursor to safe-enablement and team-yes: governance and documentation (“paint”) only work if they’re protecting a genuinely sound underlying process (“steel”), not covering for one.