The MOST important thing about standards is to have some, keep them and enforce them. Even if they are not the “best” standards in the world at least everything is consistent.

Look for

Naming conventions

• Tables
• stored Procedures
• triggers
• files – data, log and dump
• Stored Procedure Conventions
• Change audit and description
• Parameters
• Variables
• Use of rowcount and @@error

As a simple example
Which is easier to read

create procedure usp_SelClients @cl int -1
as
 select Client_name, HouseNo, Housename, Street, Town, Postcode from clients join addresses on clients.addressid = addresses.addressid where Clientid=@cl

or
Create Procedue usp_SelCleints @ClientId int -1
as
       select
              Client_name,
              House_No,
              House_name,
              Street,
              Town,
              Postcode
       from
              clients
       join
              addresses
       on
              clients.addressid = addresses.addressid
       where
              Client_id=@ClientId

And that’s a small stored procedure .. what happens when you get a complicated select statement with multiple joins and conditions!