Standard creativity: creating flexible Web development standards

In the early days of the Web, we became "experts" at developing great looking sites using all of the layout and design codes available to us at the time. However, it quickly became apparent that sacrificing structure for style had created forward compatibility issues and would prevent us from moving forward as the Web grows and tools we use change. Looking at this future, we determined that the only feasible solution was to set Web development standards for our staff. Many organizations develop look-and-feel templates that are used throughout their organization, but with such a wide variety of audiences and customer needs, this approach was not feasible for our situation. We needed something that would allow our staff to maintain a level of consistency throughout all of the Web sites we produce, without losing the ability to be creative and flexible to our customers' wants and needs. We describes how we developed standards that allow staff to keep pace with changing trends, promote effective teaming, and ensure both backward and forward compatibility while maintaining a level of consistency and organizational identity.