The Stupidity Paradox
The Power and Pitfalls of Functional Stupidity at Work
Mats Alvesson and André Spicer
Having read it
★★★★☆
A relevant, clear and informative book that amongst its points and examples helped make clear to me a few of my own historical managerial – possibly even leadership – efforts that weren’t particularly great and were informed, at the time, by the existing means, methods and expectations somewhat of the internal setup; hopefully any misbegotten efforts by me didn’t scar anyone (too much!) but realistically, in amongst the near-endless talk and status of marketing et al some legacies of my efforts alongside my naturally curious and questioning nature complemented by some decent and worthwhile ideas and splashes of creativity helped support, even embolden, projects and others.
[...] If a firm really wants to learn, it should look at failures too.
As well as being misguided, attempts at imitation can be rather ham-fisted.
Aside from my own livelihood memories while reading this book, the text itself was decent, with a reasonable flow in its chapters (sorry, academic essay style) and informative and revealing of the fact that sometimes functional stupidity can be helpful but definitely not all the time and not necessarily a practice that natural thinkers, creatives and the curious and questioning ones, find easy to march to.
Talk and appearance – their behaviour in ‘high-visibility’ situations such as presentations to senior managers – may matter more for employees’ promotion than solid work and competence – what they have actually accomplished. In cultures that value action and decisiveness, senior people often rely on their perceptions. Lengthy investigation, deep analysis, careful reflection and rational decision-making are usually avoided.
Most organisations feed this culture of now. They place a huge premium on the present and the near future while forgetting the past and entirely ignoring the medium or distant future (except in sporadic jargon-filled mission statements).
Despite it being a little rough round the edges in its narrative, its pace is good, its case is great and its purpose helps shine a light on very typical (yet often unspoken?) traits of many an organisation . . . if only I had known of the book, and read it, back when it was published in 2016 . . . still, bullshit bingo was a bit of a thing back then and is referenced in it, so clearly some approaches were making an impact!
A good passage
Perhaps it should not be so surprising that some have started to point out that far from experiencing a boom in innovation, we are actually witnessing declines.29 Many fundamental innovations happened during the middle of the twentieth century, but since the 1970s we have actually seen a fall in the number of breakthroughs that fuel economic growth. The important innovations we have witnessed – such as the internet – were largely based on fundamental technologies developed earlier in the century. When innovation does happen today, it happens more slowly. The design and development of the first Boeing 747 (a radically new type of aircraft at the time) took five years. The design and development of the first Airbus A380 (a modest evolution) took fifteen years.
This should lead us to ask whether spending on the knowledge economy was more about public relations than producing innovation. Perhaps all this talk about knowledge is a way of creating an appealing image of an economy going places in order to avoid discussing the darker prospects that haunt deindustrialising countries around the world.
A second good passage
People at work are regularly pushed to conform with bureaucratic imperatives that free them from thought and decisions. At the very same time they are told that bureaucracy is bad. Now and then we may get angry with a particularly troublesome rule, but mostly we mindlessly comply. We stop asking questions and thinking for ourselves. We just go along with the rules and routines and hope that they make our lives easier.
Most of the time, structures, rules and routines do the thinking for us. We give them no thought, and mindlessly carry them out. This can be practical and efficient. Spared from the effort of assessing what needs to be done, and how and why, instead we can simply focus on the procedure. When you just have to tick boxes, then you don’t have to think outside the box.
A third good passage
[...] Careful feedback, learning, doing it better the next time? No. Bad news and honest feedback are usually avoided. Organisational amnesia usually wins the day. All that is sought for is positive news about change. Any other form of feedback is bad for your reputation, bad for your self-esteem and bad for your career. So when there is a chance, unwelcome feedback is swept under the carpet. Deliberate ignorance and mindlessness protect people from feeling obliged to think through issues and contribute to more rational organisational behaviour. The ideal of learning and rationality is preached. Functional stupidity is practised.