Deciding to Change: Choosing

When organizations decide to do something different from what they've been doing, the changes they undertake might involve changing more than what they do. Sometimes they must also restructure the way they make decisions. For example, the relative importance of software engineers and actuaries in insurance companies has changed significantly in the past 50 years. Although software engineering is more important today in such organizations than it once was, one can debate whether the political power of the people engaged in software engineering today parallels the importance of their profession in executing the mission of the organization.

Elective change in organizations sometimes exposes conflicts of interest between the interests of the organization and the interests of the people who must make the decision to change. In some cases, this conflict of interest is resolved not in the favor of the organization, but in favor of the personal interests of the decision makers. When that happens, the organization remains stuck on paths that lead to stagnation, contraction, and — possibly — bankruptcy.

What can we do about this? Here are four suggestions for enhancing decision quality.

Recusal

A pattern of participation in decisions that affect the personal interests of the decision makers is a performance issue. In politics and jurisprudence, excusing oneself from such participation is called recusal. The practice is rare even there, but with the exception of certain professional standards, it's almost totally absent from organizational life. Would not organizations that succeed in incorporating recusal into their decision processes gain significant advantages in decision quality?

Inclusion

The dual of recusal is inclusion. In most organizations, the same group of decision makers makes all the big decisions. From time to time, they do seek advice from specialists, but the specialists' role is advisory only — they rarely have decision authority. Are there not classes of decisions that would be improved by including some people who are customarily excluded from decision making?

Decision process risk management

Even among A pattern of participation in
decisions that affect the
personal interests of the
decision makers is
a performance issueorganizations that recognize the importance of risk management, risk management practice tends to emphasize what the organizations does, rather than how the organization makes decisions. Certainly all organizations make bad decisions once in a while. Can we not use risk management principles to protect ourselves from these mistakes?

Retrospectives

Most important, perhaps, is a practice often called "lessons learned," or retrospectives. Retrospectives help us avoid repeating our own mistakes — or the mistakes of others. Although widely used in the lower reaches of the org chart, they are much less common at high levels. Why do you suppose that is? Could it be that requiring self-examination of others is easier than asking it of oneself?

Which of these practices do you recognize in the decision-making process of your own organization? Which are absent from it?   First issue in this series   Top    Next Issue

Is your organization embroiled in Change? Are you managing a change effort that faces rampant cynicism, passive non-cooperation, or maybe even outright revolt? Read 101 Tips for Managing Change to learn how to survive, how to plan and how to execute change efforts to inspire real, passionate support. Order Now!

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.

This article in its entirety was written by a human being. No machine intelligence was involved in any way.

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 Organizational Change:

Comfortable Ignorance

When we suddenly realize that what we've believed is wrong, or that what we've been doing won't work, our fear and discomfort can cause us to persevere in our illusions. If we can get better at accepting reality and dealing with it, we can make faster progress toward real achievement.

Definitions of Insanity

When leaders try to motivate organizational change, they often resort to clever sloganeering. One of the most commonly used slogans is a definition of insanity. Unfortunately, that definition doesn't pass the sanity test.

The True Costs of Cost-Cutting

The metaphor "trimming the fat" rests on the belief that some parts of the organization are expendable, and we can remove them with little impact on the remainder. Ah, if only things actually worked that way...

Cyber Rumors in Organizations

Rumor management practices in organizations haven't kept up with rumor propagation technology. Rumors that propagate by digital means — cyber rumors — have longer lifetimes, spread faster, are more credible, and are better able to reinforce each other.

Contrary Indicators of Psychological Safety: II

When we begin using new tools or processes, we make mistakes. Practice is the cure, but practice can be scary if the grace period for early mistakes is too short. For teams adopting new methods, psychological safety is a fundamental component of success.

See also Organizational Change and Organizational Change for more related articles.

Forthcoming issues of Point Lookout

Coming September 4: Beating the Layoffs: I

If you work in an organization likely to conduct layoffs soon, keep in mind that exiting voluntarily before the layoffs can carry significant advantages. Here are some that relate to self-esteem, financial anxiety, and future employment. Available here and by RSS on September 4.

And on September 11: Beating the Layoffs: II

If you work in an organization likely to conduct layoffs soon, keep in mind that exiting voluntarily can carry advantages. Here are some advantages that relate to collegial relationships, future interviews, health, and severance packages. Available here and by RSS on September 11.

Coaching services

I offer email and telephone coaching at both corporate and individual rates. Contact Rick for details at rbrenyrWpTxHuyCrjZbUpner@ChacnoFNuSyWlVzCaGfooCanyon.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 500-1000 words in your inbox in one hour. License any article from this Web site. More info