Mindless Behavior in Organizations
Imagine you receive a conventionally formatted memo at work, the contents of which read “Please return this memo immediately” along with instructions on where to do so. Because you are right this moment reading a post about mindless behavior in organizations, you probably think that you would see the memo as some sort of joke.
But if you had been one of the subjects in a study done in 1978 by Langer, Blank, and Chanowitz, there is a 90% chance that you would have actually returned it. Even if the memo deviated from standard formats, there is a 60% chance that you would have returned it.
If you work in civil society, whether it’s social change, social service, or even social enterprise, you are almost by definition working in an environment that seeks change. You and your organization want the world to be different than it is, often in some very important ways. And yet, despite that ostensible focus on change, in the context of day to day work, how much of your time do you spend in a state of relative mindlessness?
Indeed, to what extent does organizational life serve, often by design, to create exactly such a state? There is a synthesis to be achieved somehow. The authentic organization has two goals that are very much in tension. On the one hand, there is the need to fully leverage the creative powers of its people, so as to face the challenges of making change in the world. On the other hand, there is the need to function predictably and perpetuate itself as an organization. Sadly, research and experience suggests that the balance may often be sharply skewed toward mindlessness.
In the global north and in many parts of the developing world, there is a fondness these days for the tropes of entrepreneurship. We talk about agility, innovation, initiative, and so on, but has anything really changed? Or are we like the mob in the movie Life of Brian who, in response to being told that they are all individuals, chant in unison, “we are all individuals”?
Tell me: What’s your organization’s equivalents for “return this memo immediately”?
Posted: April 18th, 2007 under The Ideas.
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Comments
Comment from Pete
Time: May 23, 2007, 5:12 pm
At the risk of being mindless myself here, what was the conclusion of the experiment? Was it to estimate how many people would read a memo and follow directions, or something else?
The cite to Life of Brian is spot on. I got a good chuckle when Brad DeLong posted a clip of that scene recently: http://delong.typepad.com/sdj/2007/04/the_easter_less.html
Comment from Kent Van Cleave
Time: May 26, 2008, 10:34 pm
The conundrum of which you speak here – leveraging creativity while ensuring predictability – requires that the organization abandon control by structure and adopt control by culture. When all understand fully the values of the organization and how they might contribute to upholding them, then they can be empowered to act creatively.
Comment from Dalene Bradford
Time: September 10, 2008, 8:02 pm
When I was teaching school a while back, our principal attended a workshop and learned that he was supposed to engage his staff in decision making. So, at our next teachers’ meeting, we spent nearly an hour (seriously) deciding what the special intercom code would be used to inform teachers, without alarming students, of an emergency situation in the building. After endless suggestions we landed on “Would the person who borrowed the yellow stapler please return it to the main office?” The future security of our school was ensured because of this secret code.
The next day, the kids came in talking about the new secret code and knew all the words. The teachers were talking about how stupid the teachers’ meeting was (and didn’t feel the least bit honored by being included in such high level decision-making).
Talk about “Please return this memo.” With this experience behind him, my principal probably became a Homeland Security consultant.
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