A-Z,
We live in a world of dwindling flying skills,nervous chief pilots and unforgiving insurance men..the result is this obsession with SOP and political correctness.
As 411a so rightly says:
Absolute strict regimentation sometimes leads to a few folks not seeing the forest for the trees
In a two-crew aircraft,one pilot flies the thing and the other guy(PM/PNF whatever the politically correct term is these days) keeps an eye on what hes doing and handles the radio.A lot of these new airlines dont really know all that much about flying so they make it up as they go along.I came across one that prohibited visual approaches,another that didnt like VS mode(the sweetest vertical mode there is),yet another that said you had to use intercom on a friggin jetliner.If the truth be told,the only SOP's you'll ever need can be written on a couple of lines and they'd include the two-communication rule,the V1 GO rule,the standard minima call-outs,the MCP altitude x-check,and good checklist discipline.