Scope Creep, Hot Hands, and the Illusion of Control

The hot hand fallacy is the belief that we can better estimate the outcome of tests of skill if we weigh recent results more heavily than less recent results. It was first identified by Gilovich, Vallone, and Tversky in 1985 [Gilovich 1985]. They found that the belief that basketball players can have "hot hands," leading to streaks of successful shooting, is without statistical foundation. That is, players do have "hot streaks" and "cold streaks," but the streaks that do happen are consistent with random chance.

Nevertheless, people do believe in the "hot hand," in basketball, and at work.

When someone has succeeded at a string of assignments, managers and executives tend to attribute that success, without proof, to the performer's innate capabilities. And the longer the string of successes, the more faith they have in the belief, even though every string of successes has a beginning, before which outcomes were less stellar.

When we believe someone has a "hot hand," we tend to ensure that he or she is fully occupied. Then, when a difficult challenge with a troubled history comes along, we sometimes try to fit it into whatever the hot-handed people are already doing. We add it to their responsibilities, hoping for yet another success. If it doesn't fit well, we make it fit. Voila! Scope creep.

But there's a little more to it. The people whom we regard as having a "hot hand" often regard themselves that way, too. They overestimate their capabilities, partly because of the hot hand fallacy, and perhaps partly due to another cognitive bias called the illusion of control. The illusion of control is our tendency to overestimate our ability to control events that are beyond our control.

For example, a project manager who completes a project successfully might not notice that she was able to retain all of her staff for the life of the project — no key people were suddenly reassigned to other projects. Scope creep often takes place
outside our awareness, due to
misjudgments arising from
cognitive biasesIn many organizations, such a record is rare. But a project manager exulting in success might not notice this fortunate turn of events. Most project managers cannot control these "staff raids," but when they don't happen, the project runs more smoothly. Project managers then might tend to attribute the project's success to their own performance, neglecting to attribute any of it to good fortune. Project managers, or any managers, who attribute successes to their own performance, ignoring good fortune, might be in the grip of the illusion of control. And someone in that state is more likely to accept additional responsibilities when they're offered. Voila! Scope creep.

This example suggests that two people under the influence of different cognitive biases might produce collaborative misjudgments more erroneous than either of them acting independently, if their respective cognitive biases interoperate synergistically. Fascinating. First in this series | Next in this series  Top    Next Issue

Is every other day a tense, anxious, angry misery as you watch people around you, who couldn't even think their way through a game of Jacks, win at workplace politics and steal the credit and glory for just about everyone's best work including yours? Read 303 Secrets of Workplace Politics, filled with tips and techniques for succeeding in workplace politics. More info

Footnotes

Your comments are welcome

About Point Lookout

Thank you for reading this article. I hope you enjoyed it and found it useful, and that you'll consider recommending it to a friend.

Point Lookout is a free weekly email newsletter. Browse the archive of past issues. Subscribe for free.

Support Point Lookout by joining the Friends of Point Lookout, as an individual or as an organization.

Do you face a complex interpersonal situation? Send it in, anonymously if you like, and I'll give you my two cents.

Related articles

More articles on Project Management:

See No Evil

When teams share information among themselves, they have their best opportunity to reach peak performance. And when some information is withheld within an elite group, the team faces unique risks.

Remote Facilitation in Synchronous Contexts: I

Whoever facilitates your distributed meetings — whether a dedicated facilitator or the meeting chair — will discover quickly that remote facilitation presents special problems. Here's a little catalog of those problems, and some suggestions for addressing them.

Nonlinear Work: When Superposition Fails

Much of the work we do is confounding, because we consistently underestimate the effort involved, the resources required, and the time required to get it done. The failure of superposition can be one reason why we get it wrong.

Unnecessary Boring Work: I

Work can be boring. Some of us must endure the occasional boring task, but for many, everything about work is boring. It doesn't have to be this way.

Unresponsive Suppliers: III

When suppliers have a customer orientation, we can usually depend on them. But government suppliers are a special case.

See also Project Management, Emotions at Work and Cognitive Biases at Work for more related articles.

Forthcoming issues of Point Lookout

Coming July 8: Multi-Expert Consensus

Some working groups consist of experts from many fields. When they must reach a decision by consensus, members have several options. Defining those options in advance can help the group reach a decision with all its relationships intact. Available here and by RSS on July 8.

And on July 15: Disjoint Concept Vocabularies

In disputes or in problem solving sessions, when we can't seem to come to agreement, we often attribute the difficulty to miscommunication, histories of disagreements, hidden agendas, or "personality clashes." Sometimes the cause is much simpler. Sometimes the concept vocabularies of the parties don't overlap. Available here and by RSS on July 15.

Coaching services

I offer email and telephone coaching at both corporate and individual rates. Contact Rick for details at rbrenuQKLUMsVubCpqOpqner@ChacCCvpZbzKGsgliMGNoCanyon.com or (650) 787-6475, or toll-free in the continental US at (866) 378-5470.

Get the ebook!

Past issues of Point Lookout are available in six ebooks:

• Get 2001-2 in Geese Don't Land on Twigs (PDF, )
• Get 2003-4 in Why Dogs Wag (PDF, )
• Get 2005-6 in Loopy Things We Do (PDF, )
• Get 2007-8 in Things We Believe That Maybe Aren't So True (PDF, )
• Get 2009-10 in The Questions Not Asked (PDF, )
• Get all of the first twelve years (2001-2012) in The Collected Issues of Point Lookout (PDF, )

Are you a writer, editor or publisher on deadline? Are you looking for an article that will get people talking and get compliments flying your way? You can have 500 words in your inbox in one hour. License any article from this Web site. More info

Public seminars

The Power Affect: How We Express Our Personal Power

Many people who possess real organizational power have a characteristic demeanor. It's the way they project their presence. I call this the power affect. Some people — call them power pretenders — adopt the power affect well before they attain significant organizational power. Unfortunately for their colleagues, and for their organizations, power pretenders can attain organizational power out of proportion to their merit or abilities. Understanding the power affect is therefore important for anyone who aims to attain power, or anyone who works with power pretenders. Read more about this program.

• A recording of a program presented June 29, 2017, Monthly Webinar, sponsored by Technobility Webinar Series. PMI members can earn 1.0 Category 'A' PDU by viewing this program. View this program now.
   

Bullet Points: Mastery or Madness?

Decision-makers in modern organizations commonly demand briefings in the form of bullet points or a series of series of bullet points. But this form of presentation has limited value for complex decisions. We need something more. We actually need to think. Briefers who combine the bullet-point format with a variety of persuasion techniques can mislead decision-makers, guiding them into making poor decisions. Read more about this program.

• A recording of a program presented June 24, Monthly Webinar, sponsored by Technobility Webinar Series. PMI members can earn 1.0 Category 'A' PDU by viewing this program. View this program now.