The biggest problem with policy development, as I see it, is that they are often created in a counter-productive environment.

In the corporate example, policies are created to enforce certain principles of interest to, say, Human Resources, but the time involved in following those practices are not accounted against that department.

Thus, there is no incentive for that department to institute EFFICIENT processes, creating a net negative for the company.

The same thing applies in any environment where policies are developed without taking responsibility for the costs of those policies.

Situations like the US, where laws are often created that are "unfunded mandates" are the best example.

Mandating that some task be undertaken without actually paying for it is just insane.

There's ways around some of these problems, for example by making sure those processes dictate implementation thresholds. If a task/process/project is below the threshold, or the risks associated with failure are below that threshold, then they don't need to be done.