I remember WordPerfect when it was still a DOS program. The simplicity of “this format code affects all text after it” was elegant.
And then we got Word foisted on us, with “this format code (which you have no way of viewing) affects the block of text before it” so if you accidentally delete or move that format code then you screw up a seemingly random bunch of text. And here we are.
And of course if you fix things proactively (before they happen) then that’s likely to be expenditure which will be seen as unnecessary if/when it doesn’t happen. So:
a) the best way to do it
AND
b) management will hate you for it.