Last week I visited a client who uses a software system for workshop planning, purchasing and sales.
It is the kind of system many small businesses depend on every day. Not very glamorous, but essential. If it works, the business keeps moving. If it does not, people immediately lose time.
This particular system works best in Google Chrome. That is not just a random user preference. It is what the software supplier recommends, because some parts of the application behave better in Chrome.
So the choice is simple: the business uses Chrome for that system.
Or at least, that is what they try to do.
When the default changes back
The client uses Windows 11. But every now and then, the default browser appears to change back to Microsoft Edge.
The user wants Chrome. The business application works best with Chrome. The software supplier recommends Chrome. The IT choice has already been made.
But the operating system keeps pushing Edge back into the workflow.
At first sight, this looks like a small annoyance.
A browser opens in the wrong application. A link does not behave as expected. A workflow breaks in a subtle way. Someone has to change a setting…again.
The result: an annoyed user calls us because something “suddenly works differently again”.
But underneath that small issue is a much bigger question:
Who decides how a workplace behaves?
The user?
The business?
The IT partner?
The software supplier?
Or the supplier of the operating system?
Small business, real-world IT
This client is a small business with about 5 users.
They are not large enough for a complex Active Directory or Intune environment with central policies, enterprise tooling and dedicated IT staff.
And that matters.
Because a lot of IT advice assumes that every company has the same kind of infrastructure as a larger organisation: use Group Policy, use Intune, use enterprise management, deploy configuration profiles, lock it down centrally.
That may be good advice in some environments.
But many small businesses do not work like that, at least not in Europe. They have a handful of PCs, a few important software packages, and people who simply need their tools to work consistently.
For them, this kind of behaviour is not an interesting technical discussion.
It is friction.
A setting is not always your setting
In the past, there were ways to influence default application settings with Group Policies, scripts or other tooling. For example, you could set file associations or browser preferences more directly.
But Microsoft has increasingly protected these settings. The associations between file types, protocols and applications are no longer something you can simply change in the background. They are hidden, protected, hashed and guarded against manipulation.
There is a reason for that.
Malware and unwanted software have abused default app settings for years. A browser hijacker changing your defaults without permission is obviously a problem.
So protection is not automatically bad.
But this is where it becomes interesting. Because the same protection that prevents unwanted software from changing the browser can also make it harder for a legitimate user, business or IT partner to keep a conscious preference in place.
The system protects the setting.
But from whom?
From malware?
From the user?
From the business?
From the IT administrator?
That distinction matters.
This is not about Chrome being perfect
To be clear: this is not an argument that Chrome is the perfect browser.
It is not my personal favourite either.
Like Edge, Chrome is part of a large commercial ecosystem, with its own incentives around accounts, data, advertising, tracking and now AI integration.
So this is not about replacing one large technology ecosystem with another.
If I were choosing purely from the perspective of independence and privacy, I would usually look at alternatives such as Brave first.
But that is not the point in this example.
The point is that this business application is designed and supported to work best in Chrome. The software supplier recommends it.
The business has made that choice because it fits their daily workflow.
And that choice should be respected.
A business should be able to decide which browser works best for its own process. Especially when that choice is based on the requirements of the software they use every day.
Convenience has a direction
Microsoft Edge is not a bad browser. That is also not the point.
The point is that the operating system has a preferred direction.
The browser, search engine, cloud storage, identity platform, office suite and AI features are increasingly part of one integrated ecosystem.
That can be convenient. But convenience often has a direction.
It quietly guides users toward the defaults of the platform.
And every time a user accepts one of those defaults, the organisation and the user becomes a little more dependent on that ecosystem.
Not because someone made one big strategic decision.
But because small choices were made for them over time.
A browser opens here, a PDF opens there, a file gets saved in this cloud, an account gets connected to that service, a button appears, a setting changes, a default returns.
None of these things feel dramatic on their own.
Together, they shape the workplace.
This is what control looks like in practice
Digital sovereignty sounds big.
It sounds like governments, laws, cloud regions and data centres.
But in daily IT practice, it often starts much smaller, like a browser that will not stay in its lane.
That does not mean Microsoft should disappear from the workplace.
It does not mean Chrome is always better.
It does not mean open source solves everything.
But it does mean that choices should remain choices.
If a company consciously chooses a tool, the operating system should not keep nudging, resetting or steering that decision back toward its own ecosystem.
Especially not when that choice affects a business process.
The bigger question
For me, this is exactly the kind of small example that shows a bigger pattern.
The issue is not really Edge versus Chrome.
It is not even really about browsers. The issue is control.
Can a small business still shape its own digital workplace?
Can it choose what works best for its process?
Can its IT partner support that choice without constantly fighting the defaults of a large platform?
Or is the workplace slowly becoming something that behaves according to the commercial preferences of the vendor who controls the operating system?
That is the question I keep coming back to.
Who is actually in control?
Because IT should not only be easy to use.
It should also remain predictable, understandable and yours.