Forum - August 2011

“What would happen if this decision went public?” — is another good double-check. Leaders must also balance between urgent problem-solving and the longer-term impacts of today’s choices.

2. Miscalculating Risk. Membership organizations need to tolerate a degree of ambiguity. However, the illusion of control creates its own ethical hazard. Taking the time to vet scenarios, even those that seem unlikely, can help.

Psychologists have identified one syndrome of unrealistic expectations as “hindsight bias.” This is the tendency to believe a surprising outcome was anticipated when it wasn’t. In this way, people protect themselves from confronting errors in judgment. For example, when recruiting a new board member, leaders may sense trouble long before anything actually occurs. Then, should an issue blow up, they may believe they cautioned their team during the vetting process, when, in fact, they kept their concern to themselves in a rush to get the job done.

Another psychological bias is at work when an issue is framed as an opportunity to either avoid a loss or gain an advantage. People are more likely to take risks when considering an opportunity to avoid losses, like reducing staff, and are more risk-averse with decisions about potential gains, like securing a new funder outside the normal bounds of the association’s field. Taking the time to objectively frame the issue can ensure clarity and candor when debating the team’s options.

3. Misjudging Causes.

When leaders debrief a disappointing situation, they first have to manage their inclination to assign blame. Personalizing complex issues cloud the bigger picture of cause and effect. Rather, embracing the systems view can boost a more realistic platform from which leaders can better understand their realities and their lessons learned. For example, boards may short change their strategic responsibilities, tending to overly rely on their executive directors for leadership in every function.

Examining all the players’ roles and their obstacles can help maintain a clear view of reality.

Faulty Reasoning About Others: Exaggerating Differences Ethnocentric thinking and stereotyping are well known adversaries to objective problem-solving. To allay the tendency to think “us” and “them,” address how “we” would respond given a particular decision point. Membership organizations must use extra caution not to create an “us/them” mentality, easy to do should member feedback be disheartening. Assuming that people are basically the same is a much safer place to start. Clear decision-making criteria and processes will help bolster leadership teams against unfair judgments based on group identity. One way to protect against personal bias is to put strong policies in place that are explicit commitments to fairness and individual assessment.

Faulty Reasoning About the External Environment

1. Limiting the Chain of Consequences.

Under pressure to decide, leaders may cut short consideration of all the potential consequences related to their options. Thinking broadly across the full set of an outcome’s effects takes patience and diligence, which pays off in reduced exposure to unwanted consequences.

Careful stakeholder analysis is one way to ensure a complete view. The “red face test” — asking,

Faulty Reasoning About Ourselves

1. Imagining superiority, control and advantage. Leaders with strong track records are confident for good reason. Believing that past successes naturally lead to positive advantage is trouble. Risk assessment requires a measured view of potential hazards as well as gains. Believing that a strong track record somehow alleviates uncertainty can derail good judgment. Leaders who are open to feedback and take responsibility for the good and bad outcomes have a much better chance at a realistic assessment of a current challenge.

2. Inflating a perception of fairness. Leaders tend to be goal-focused, with a good understanding of what achievement will bring to the association. Leaders work hard and can readily speak to all their efforts that forward the association’s success. A faulty sense of entitlement can ensue, biasing the leaders’ sense of fairness. A willingness to solicit feedback, particularly from third-party partners or advisers, can guard against this tendency.