Shooting the messenger

It is extraordinary how so many things in life seem to be either black or white.  Despite the complexity of modern society many seemingly want to view every social, environmental, moral, and economic issue as either being from one political standpoint or another. Parties of the centre, and those who proudly nail their colours firmly to the fence, are cursed with being neither one thing nor the other. Hideous events like the massacre in Connecticut result in both sides of the “argument” reaching a consensus amongst themselves, unable and unwilling to understand or accept the other side’s point of view. On the one hand, people are arguing that a society without guns is a safer society, and on the other people are saying that if only the teachers been armed then this horrible disaster could have been averted (Just watch how sales of guns in the US increase as people react to a very human desire that it shouldn’t happen to them.)

So how is it that normal, decent human beings can be so bitterly divided over an issue like this?  How can two people look at the same event and come to radically different positions?  Two recently published books have helped me understand this issue (The Righteous Mind by Jonathan Haidt and The Social Animal by David Brooks both cover this issue.) The point is that specialists are beginning to understand that we are products of our intuitive and emotional self to a far greater extent than we think.  Our rational self is often there to make post hoc rationalisations of decisions that we’ve already made.  It seeks out corroboration and dismisses any contrary ideas.  What we feel and think is almost entirely the product of our socialisation: the culture and the familial environment in which we were nurtured.  This includes a need to belong which in turn leads to seeking out tribes, us and them, be they political parties or football teams, a need that is buried deep within our subconscious.       

What all this means is that the one thing guaranteed to not affect the debate are facts. It is a fact that more Americans are killed by guns every six months than in the all terrorist attacks and Iraq/Afghanistan conflicts in the last 25 years.  It is a fact that the US has the highest per capita ownership of privately held firearms with an average of nine guns for every ten Americans (the next highest is Yemen). America also has the second highest incidence of gun-related murder (after Mexico).  Using standard techniques of correlation it would appear to most people that the fewer guns around the safer you are and the more guns available then the greater chance you have of getting harmed.  But they are only facts, and our tribal, emotional self has already subconsciously determined our position so that we seek out supporting facts and ignore those that don’t fit.

All of this has profound implications for communicators and for those seeking to influence social change.  Rational argument rarely impacts attitudes to smoking, drinking, eating, and exercise or even towards political leaders. Telling, preaching, and directing is not the way to create sustainable social change.  But if top-down rational communications can’t change attitudes what can?  The answer is that there is no one answer.  In the same way that money is rarely the long-term answer to solving poverty, behavioural and attitudinal change is the product of a complex web inter-connecting ideas and issues none of which, on their own, provide the solution.  The trick is probably to try and create the environment in which people feel comfortable; comfortable with themselves and their position and unthreatened by material or social pressures.  Self-supporting and self-sustaining communities are more likely to produce feelings of security and therefore more likely to support positive behaviours.  It’s not simple, and it’s certainly not a short-term fix.  But if we continue to try and change the world with facts then we will, like Dicken’s fact-obsessed character Mr Gadgrind, remain living in Hard Times.

Too big to fail

Size, as they say, isn’t everything.  Almost 50 years after the publication of Schumacher’s seminal work Small is Beautiful the debate about appropriate size is beginning to take root.  Actually, as with many debates about size, that statement is itself a bit of an exaggeration.   In reality, the current debate is more about whether capitalism has erred in allowing banks, and other institutions, to become too big to fail.  Whereas Darwinian economics allows for, say, Tesco to go to the wall, received wisdom was that the nature of our dependency on large banks was such that only by bailing them out with taxpayers’ (aka our grandchildrens’) money could a financial crisis be avoided. 

Similarly, the debate is also about the size of government.  The debt crisis in the UK and the problems in the Eurozone bring into sharp focus the merits of scale.  For some the solution to Europe’s problems is to increase the powers of the commission and the European Parliament over fiscal and social issues.  Only by becoming bigger, they say, can we become better. In the US the recent election could be characterised as a battle between the proponents of large and small government.  Here, behind the bluster of Autumn Statements and “events” there is a quiet ideological battle being whispered about whether the role of central government is to direct social change or to enable it.

Recently I went to hear the great Nassim Taleb (author of Black Swan) talk about his latest work Antifragile.  His central point is that the world is volatile and that if we are flexible then we can survive; but that if, as is mainly the case, we crave certainty then we will not survive the crisis that volatility will invariably present.  And to make matters worse, scale simply makes things worse: the bigger things are then the greater their exposure to risk.  That includes banks, businesses and buildings (perhaps economies of scale is yet another oxymoron, providing further reasons why so few M&As ever succeed).

It occurred to me that the problems of both craving certainty and too big to fail also apply to people.  I frequently encounter people who crave certainty in their lives.  The need for “security” of income, based on a complex formula incorporating the size of mortgage, school fees, fine wine, Arsenal season tickets, etc, mean that they have allowed themselves to become institutionalised and inflexible and, therefore, vulnerable to change.  Some have purposefully decided to postpone their real life until they have achieved a degree of financial security (remember the, probably apocryphal, merchant bank recruitment slogan: “you won’t know your children, but you’ll get to know your grandchildren really well”). Unfortunately these people often fail to be themselves; rather, they define themselves by what it says on their business cards. At the other end of the scale, many organisations find themselves with a too big to fail leader.  The celebrity CEO (Chief Entertainment Officer) whose self-created ego drives them to seemingly greater levels of super hero performance would be a good example.  However, their drive for growth often leads their organisation merely to become exposed to greater levels of risk.

Certainty and the desire for scale seem strange bedfellows but actually they are part of the same issue.  Many do seem to believe that there’s safety in numbers.  Our craving for certainty means that we often see being bigger and better as the way to achieve it.  But certainty is merely an illusion. To embrace risk and uncertainty is to embrace life.  And we should be aware of the lure of scale in our private lives, and watch out for the desire to become so big that we lose contact with both our true selves and with reality.  Hubris reminds us that no-one is too big to fail and ignore the words of the eminent psychiatrist, Dr Frasier Crane, who said: “Faust was a moron.  I’m going to become a star.”

Travails of my Aunt

Of all the words written and spoken about the BBC in recent days, two phrases struck a chord. The first was the PM saying that he didn’t think that the corporation was facing an existential crisis; and the second was the call for someone to get a grip.  Both points were, I felt, wrong.  Firstly, I do believe that the BBC is facing an existential crisis although not a new one.  The question is what is the BBC for? The original Reithian principles of educate, entertain and inform, whilst still relevant, have been seemingly stretched to embrace anything and everything.  In fact, in the firestorm surrounding journalistic standards on one programme it is easy to forget just what the BBC is.

The BBC is the world class institution behind creative drama masterpieces such as Parade’s End, and entertainment such as Doctor Who.  The UK’s radio output is the envy of the world (I, for one, couldn’t imagine life without Radios 3 & 4).  The BBC is also one of the biggest employers of full-time musicians in the world, running six symphony orchestras and a professional choir. And then there’s the natural history unit, and sport, and supporting social policy initiatives (eg BBC Click).  And what about its digital work, its web sites and the outstanding iPlayer?  And, of course, there’s the World Service (funded by the Foreign Office – something that I’m sure always raises a chuckle in the Kremlin).

The point is that many people are seeing this particular journalistic issue as being the only problem, and one that requires a hands-on journalist to sort out.  For sure, the bloated (in parts) management structure may have contributed to the problem, although probably less likely than that of institutional capture (too many BBC people are “lifers” and perhaps can only see issues through BBC eyes). The BBC’s reputation is more than its journalism, and the next DG must be someone who can understand more than just the day-to-day rough and tumble of the news agenda

The second point was the call for someone who can get a grip.  I’m sure that this phrase was used in the context of bringing some order to the current crisis, but what is not needed in the long run is a gripper.  The next DG cannot be editor-in-chief any more than be principal flautist-in-chief, chief camera technician, final arbiter of all Radio and TV schedules, costume designer-in-chief, comedy chief.  The next DG needs to be someone who can provide a vision for this marvellous but sprawling institution, and make sense of what it means to be a national broadcaster in a modern digital world.  The media world is fragmenting in the face of disruptive technology and cost pressures and it would be wrong to deny the BBC the opportunity to have its own existentialist crisis when every other media organisation is having theirs.

Organisations are complex entities, and few are more complex than the BBC.  The next DG needs to be able to create a narrative for the BBC which allows it to be true to its original purpose but relevant in the modern world.  Rather than getting a grip the next DG needs to be able to create a culture that is comfortable with ambiguity, that is collaborative and sharing, and with less hierarchy.  Modern leaders recognise that leadership is about setting a vision and building teams that are empowered to act.  It is not about doing everyone’s job for them.  Leadership is not about decision making: it is about creating the environment in which people are able to take their own decisions.  Being editor-in-chief merely encourages all issues to be upwardly delegated leading to paralysis in the organisation.  Perhaps the next DG should take a lead from the BBC Symphony Orchestra and think of themselves as chief conductor. Motivate and lead, but don’t try and blow their trumpet for them.

Who CARES wins?

Who cares wins?

It might be whimsical to draw conclusions from the US elections for the role of modern leadership in business – but then again it might not be!

In the election of what is still, arguably, the most powerful person in the world, there are some attributes which must surely trump all others.

 Vision? Surely……Strong Leadership? A sine qua non surely?

Looking at the Edison Research exit poll from across the USA on 2012 Election Day, there are some surprising findings.

The defeated Romney significantly outscored the victorious Obama on these two seemingly key attributes – indeed his superiority over Obama on Strength of Leadership and Vision was marked.

Where Obama reversed the tables, however, was on the attribute of ‘’ Cares about people like me’’ – here HE was the pre-eminent force with a staggering 82 to 18 lead. A decisive lead it would seem.

So, what to make of such an apparent non sequitur? The USA returned a leader who came second on Leadership, second on Vision, second on ‘’Shared Values’’ but who won by a country mile on Empathy. Bizarre or explainable?

Much has been made of the better use by the Democrats of social media during the Election – both communicating and listening. Obama himself in his acceptance speech highlighted the benefit of ‘’listening’’ to the electorate. Whether he did or whether he didn’t, it seems the USA thinks he did.

Business in 2012 and beyond would do well to study this.

Vision, Leadership and Conviction are all very well but not game clinchers without empathy. The leader may not be a naturally empathetic human being – indeed few naturally are - but with all the technology at a leader’s disposal today, there is no excuse for not being in touch.

Out of touch business leaders – in the silo, inside the bunker at the top of the ivory tower – will not only find themselves misunderstood and rejected but increasingly astride underperforming businesses without quite knowing what is going wrong.

It is all too easy not to have time – wrong balance sheet with wrong investors with wrong sales mix with wrong diary. The store visits, the team dinner, the employee survey, the ad hoc stroll around the factory or warehouse – so easy not to do it. So easy to be tied up. Too busy being fabulous for the few who actually don’t matter. Neglectful of the many who do matter.

I found a disproportionate return on time spent walking the floor – it was noticed, scrutinised by colleagues to see if it was genuine but always noticed nonetheless.

It was always easier not to do it – of course. Like the dentist, however, you would rather not but you knew it was the right thing to do and you never failed to be the better for it. People saw the person behind the name on the email. The returns were huge.

So Mr Obama. Consciously or not, you got this key attribute right. Mr Romney, with no apparent empathy, missed a very open goal despite seeming to have the traditional Leadership attributes in abundance.

In the end, the result seems to have stemmed from a swing attribute more than from a few swing states.

Colleagues will take care to forgive Leaders having to make tough decisions. What this election result would seem to show is that they don’t forgive Leaders not caring.

Left, right, left, right

I often think it comical

How nature often does contrive

That every boy and every gal

That’s born into this world alive

Is either a little Liberal or else a little Conservative. 

I thought it best to leave out the fal-lal-la’s from WSGilbert’s lyrics, but it’s just that party conference season always has me singing Private Willis’s words from Iolanthe.  And for Liberal and Conservative, please feel free to read Left and Right, Democrat and Republican, Pro and Con, or even City and United.  The fact is that we seem to often find ourselves on one side or other of a real or imaginary Berlin Wall.  But what has been fascinating me recently is less how came to find ourselves in these positions and more about what it means for communication.  You see, it is now becoming increasingly clear that groups of people are simply talking to themselves.

In a recent book, US behavioural psychologist Jonathan Haidt wrote about how it is that good people are often divided by politics and religion.  In The Righteous Mind he demonstrates firstly that humans are hard-wired to merge into groups.  The tribal instinct, which is prevalent in many species, seems to lead humans to be part of large, selective groups. Secondly, his moral foundations thinking says that all cultures and societies create values built on a series of six foundations, with people from the traditional left and right spectrum placing different values on each of the six.  Finally, he underlines the findings of many experimental psychologist who demonstrate that humans intuit first and rationalise second.  All of this has profound implications for communicators and politicians.

To start with we tend to associate with a tribe or team that shares our values and any new communication from whatever source will merely strength our existing position. Our intuitive self has already decided our position and rational facts are post-rationalised to affirm the conclusions that we’ve already come to.  This means that political parties are merely talking to themselves and people who belong to other “teams” are merely sticking their fingers in their ears and singing fa-lal-la. For instance, when was the last time you heard a politician say of a rival position, “what a jolly good idea.  I think we should adopt that policy forthwith.”

Decades ago, when I was a young student studying politics I remember writing a critique of Tony Benn’s Arguments for Socialism.  I seem to remember it being well-throughout and critical.  What I remember most, however, was my Mother saying that she didn’t like Tony Benn because he had funny eyes.  Two very different ways of coming to the same conclusion, but I recall thinking that that’s what most people do: they have an emotional response first and rarely let the facts get in the way.  Facts tend to be for reinforcing positions and less for changing minds.

The US Presidential campaign is a good example of these issues.  There is some evidence that the binary divide between Republicans and Democrats runs extremely deep, so deeply, in fact, that people in these two camps actually seem to inhabit different versions of America, living in different parts of town, eating in different places, shopping in different shops, and watching and reading different media. It seems that in many areas political discourse has ceased to fashion.  It is merely tribes talking to each other and dismissing their rivals on emotional grounds. There is less of an engagement in debate and more of an exchange in vitriol.

So how can the level of engagement increase?  Haidt says that what needs to happen is first to recognise the validity of the other persons position.  Rather than merely trying to persuade them that they are wrong, first try to understand their values and attitudes.  Real dialogue comes from holding multiple perspectives and creating a shared bond.  This is as true for business leaders as it is for politicians.

Then again, perhaps the reason that so many people take comfort from an emotional identification with a particular party or team is that is negates the need to set out what they truly believe.  Here’s WSGilbert again, this time from HMS Pinafore: “I always voted at my party’s call, and I never thought of thinking for myself at all.” After all, it’s much simpler that way.

Sorry is the easiest word to say

Apologies if you’re fed up with apologies, but it seems that we’ve now entered a permanently sorry state of affairs.  People seem to be either making apologies or clamouring for others to make them.  Hastily arranged press conferences, video apologies, and Parliamentary statements seem to be becoming the norm. We’ve even had coaches apologising to fans for their team’s “sorry” performance, although, to be fair, we haven’t had the spectacle of an MP lining up his “happy family” for a photocall in front of the duck pond for a while.  Meanwhile, in the US Romney, whose campaign book is called “No apologies” has in fact apologised for schoolboy pranks (aka bullying) but not for his “inelegantly chosen” words on tax payers.

Being sorry, it seems, is an essential part of today’s discourse.  But why is it that someone saying sorry often leaves us feeling no better.  Perhaps it’s because there is more than one type of sorry.  The first type is “I’m sorry [that it happened]”.  In this case it was either a mistake or an error of judgement.  This sort of thing happens all the time and to everyone.  The trick in saying sorry for this sort of thing is to convey the feeling that one genuinely wants to learn from the episode.  After all, without mistakes there can be no progress.

The second form of sorry is the “I’m sorry [that I got caught]”.  In this scenario, the person saying sorry is often not remotely regretful that something happened, only that it got out.  Think of Harry in Vegas or Clinton with Lewinski.  Sorry, perhaps, for the situation that one’s put oneself and others in; less for what actually occurred.

The third type is more akin to what the Psalmist described as a broken and a contrite heart.  Genuine remorse is what we really mean by sorry.  It’s the difference between a heartfelt apology and a pre-scripted press statement.  The difference is authenticity, and authenticity is often the one attribute that seems to be missing from so many figures in public life.  Many people have joked along the lines that the key to success is sincerity, and that if you can fake that you’re made.  But today’s society is far more transparent than ever before; perhaps that’s why there’s been such a significant decline in levels of trust.  Polished performers spouting perfect soundbites tend to reek of insincerity and as a result we think that they’re sorry that it happened, or sorry that they got caught, but rarely that they’re really sorry. Authenticity is one of the key ingredients of true leadership.  It is also something that is difficult to fake.  Without it, the word sorry can never be truly sorry.

Finally, if you’re ever tempted to wheel your bike past the police and through the wrong exit whilst under the influence of a red mist, remember Ambrose Bierce’s wise words: “Speak when you are angry and you will make the best speech you will ever regret.”

Time to hit pause

When the concept of reputation management first became fashionable it was always the banks that topped the list.  Dour bank managers (with a dose of Scottish Presbyterianism thrown in) were held up as the pinnacles of trustworthiness.  After all, you trusted them with your money.  And now look what’s happened.  One minute we’re asking them if they could possibly see their way to extending us a small overdraft facility and next they’re selling us products we don’t need and mortgages that we’ve got no hope of paying back.  Their collective behaviour nearly brought the Western world to its knees.  And the solution to this is likely to be an inquiry that could lead to tighter regulation. In the words of that great banker, Sergeant Wilson: “Do you think that’s wise, Sir?”

Increased regulations are unlikely to change behaviour.  Faced with a choice between what we read and what we observe, we will invariably choose the latter.  Just look at the long-running inquiry into media standards.  Sometimes it was exisiting laws that were being broken; and other times it was serial unpleasant behaviour.  But in all cases, like the banks, the behaviour patterns were set at the top not in the words of the code of conduct.  The solution, therefore, is less about rules and regulations and more about values and behaviours.

The question, however, is broader.  How is it that we have reached a point in society where so many institutions seem to be in the wrong place. The truth is that you get what you deserve.  As a society we have come to value the wrong things; for instance, we “teach” our children to pass exams rather than to learn and “success” is all about material wealth and status.  I once heard a senior executive in a consumer goods company say that he could sleep well sure in the knowledge that he produced real goods and played no part in creating the financial crisis.  But the truth, of course, is that he did play a part.  Advertising and marketing create an insatiable desire for things that we often don’t need. The desire to have products that make your hair shinier than before is the same one that leads to taking on a mortgage that you can’t afford.  Of course progress is important but it has to be sustainable not only in resource terms but also in understanding genuine human need.  And yet, across the world the cry is going out that we have to get our economies growing.  What growth means in reality is driving more people into the shopping malls to buy an even bigger HD TV, even though the current one works well enough.

So perhaps it is time to hit the pause button.  Society today is dominated by a left-brain culture that values hierachy, status, and material possesions.  We need less logic and rational thought and more contemplation of what is really important.  Bankers won’t suddenly stop being so motivated by money that they act less badly simply because someone writes a new set of rules.  Bankers are us in a different context.  We all need to take time to reflect on what really matters rather than chasing after bigger and better.  As Tolstoy said of Count Vronsky when he finally got Anna Karenina: “It showed him the eternal error people make in imagining that happiness is the realisation of desires.”

Time to rethink communications

Not long ago I went to a talk on the Future of PR.  It was so poor that when I left I was quite surprised not to see gas lamps lighting streets full of horse-drawn Hackney carriages. The discussion was all about the importance of getting PR recognised at board level (yawn), reputation management (that wonderful oxymoron), and whether social media really changed anything.  It was as if PR existed in a bubble of its own creation.

And recently there’s been much breast-beating about how few prizes PR wins for creativity, which is a bit like castigating Switzerland for its lack of award-winning aircraft carriers.  The fact is that PR, and its cousin corporate communications, is still largely transactional.  It decides what’s important and then takes its messages and seeks to communicate them to specfic audiences whether those audiences want it or not.  It reminds me of Ambrose Bierce’s definition (in the Devil’s Dictionary) of a bore as being someone who talks when you want them to listen.  And this blinkered one-dimensional approach is exacerbated by an obsession with measuring output (believe it or not, column inches is still regarded as important) rather than outcome (that is, did the campaign actually change anything).

Many forward thinkers have been wrestling with what the future of communications actually is.  For sure, in a Loose (hat tip to Martin Thomas), horizontal, peer-to-peer world there can be no room for a command and control approach to PR.  And yet the myth of PR as a persuasion and advocacy industry still pervades.

One area where PR has a long way to go is in understanding the psychology of communications.  In a recent book called The Righteous Mind, Jonathan Haidt has done just that.  As an eminent academic he sought to understand why, in his words, good people are often divided by politics and religion.  His motivation, other than merely pure experimental psychology, was to work out why the US Democratic party failed to get its message over to Republicans.  This is a familiar issue for all those of us tired of the binary, he-said-she-said, adversarial nature of modern politics.  What he found was that we humans make an instinctive gut reaction to an issue or an event and then post rationalise our position. This may sound obvious, but when you add in confirmation bias (where one tends to seek out things that support your position and ignore things which don’t) then it becomes clear that one-dimensional messaging is largely ineffective.  Which is why you either like or dislike certain politicians regardless of the “facts” of their argument.

What all this means is that we need to change what we understand by communications.  We need to find ways of talking to the heart and not the head.  We need to recognise that often words can be the least effective way to communicate and that images and actual oberserved behaviours are a far more powerful way to affect change.  But then, PR and communications first needs to decide whether it wants to focus on ouput or outcome.  If it’s the former, then stick to measuring press cuts.  But if it’s the latter, then it needs a new breed of practitioners with a very different mindset.

Working from home

With the Olympics just around the corner, many London-based organisations are encouraging their staff to work from home rather than increasing the pressure on the already over-stretched transport infrastructure.  For many people this will be their first chance to work from home and will give them the opportunity to define their existence as something other than the binary alternatives of “I’m going to work” and “I’m on the way home.”

The first thing you notice when working from home is how quiet it is.  So many offices today are open plan and noise levels can be extremely distracting.  In addition to the sound of printers and computers, there are loud phone calls and “informal” drop-by pull-up-a-chair meetings .  The second thing you tend to notice is how much time is usually spent being unproductive.  Offices tend to encourage politics, people issues, and mind-numbing processes to such an extent that as much of the working day can be spent managing the environment as actually doing any work.  When you remove the extraneous day-to-day stuff of the office, it is a revelation how productive it is possible to be.  Without distraction one can focus on output (and outcome) rather than input.

On a slight tangent, there are those who rather cynically say that expecting offices to be productive is as naïve as equating schools with education.  In the absence of major wars or pestilence, both institutions are designed to keep large numbers off the streets and “occupied”.  And in the case of office workers, they’re given just enough money to keep the economy turning over and to stop them from rioting.  Money for workers playing the same role that alcohol does for airline passengers, where a little bit of booze provides just enough anaesthetic to divert attention from the fact that you’re 35,000ft above the ground sitting on giant fuel tanks.

But back to the point. Obviously advances in communications technology mean that it is possible to be seamlessly in touch wherever you are, making the need to actually be in the office less of a necessity.  So why don’t more people do it?  The reasons vary: sometimes it is old-fashioned management who believe that they need to see and supervise their workers (as much for the manager’s own status as for perceived reasons of productivity). Other times it could be that the personal circumstances of the employee rule it out.  Nevertheless, the few weeks of the Olympics provide an ideal opportunity to try it out.  And rather than feeling guilty about sitting in the garden with a Wi-Fi’d laptop and a mobile, you can console yourself with the knowledge that you’re being far more productive than those stuck in the office.

Oh, and if it’s social interaction that you miss most, then why not invite the neighbours around for tea.

The entrepreneurial employee

Gore Vidal once famously said that each time one of his friends succeeds a little part of him dies. Recently I saw an article in the Times about a business run by an old friend of mine which gave me the opposite feeling. In ten years he has built a hugely successful business that not only employs a couple of handfuls of bright and brilliant people but also that wins awards for being amongst the best places to work in the UK. Not bad for someone who was forced into starting out on his own and without, as he said at the time, a single entrepreneurial gene in his body. But he’s done it by dint of hard work, luck (both good and bad) and many ups and downs. The whole thing made me think: why do some people become entrepreneurs when others don’t?

I once heard a very senior board director telling a journalist that it was “impossible to be entrepreneurial in a regulated company.” I remember thinking at the time what a load of tosh that statement was (something borne out by legions of subsequent leaders of that same company proving him to be spectacularly wrong.) However, even in unregulated companies it can often prove difficult to engender a free-spirited environment. I think that there are two reasons why that is the case:

The first is the way that organisations tend to be run. Hierarchy, not-invented-here syndrome, silo mentalities and a process-driven way of working can all lead to a repetitious and, potentially, stultifying environment. Innovation, a key part of entrepreneurial behaviour, is often strangled at birth by endless procurement processes or death by committee. Those people who do exhibit entrepreneurial attributes tend to be iconoclastic mould-breakers who spend their time fighting against the system. Often they don’t last long, either upping sticks to greener pastures or ending up tired and broken-spirited.

The second reason is the prevailing view that entrepreneurs, like leaders, are born. Plenty of books have been written by and about the Bransons and Sugars of the world. Common mythology seems to indicate that true entrepreneurs started early, usually involving some dubious playground activity, and shunned university in favour of an early start in the market. But it is plainly not the whole story. Thousands of shopkeepers and small businesses up and down the country are testiment to the fact that it is a mixture of opportunity and necessity that creates entrepreneurs. For sure, some people are temporarily less suited to the rigidity of working in structured organisations but there are plenty of career options for them that don’t require them to start their own business.

Many organisations suffer from having employees who, despite elements of variable pay, churn out the same sort of work year in year out. Institutional capture and a financially secure environment combine to create workforces where risk-taking is rare. So the real question is how can more people be encouraged to take more control of their working lives and demonstrate a more entrepreneurial attitude within organisations. The answer for me lies in fundamentally changing the way that businesses are run, ditching the outdated command and control attitudes and introducing flatter, looser, and non-hierarchical approaches. Encouraging three-way communications and engaging people in changing the way they work will lead to the creation of an entrepreneurial mindset that will challenge legacy systems and attitudes. And all this needs to be supported with a pay and benefits package that rewards risk-taking and has a more equitable approach to sharing in success.

It is curious how so many organisations that were founded by spirited entrepreneurs have found themselves stuck in the rut of big company syndrome. So perhaps the solution is to recognise that whilst entrepreneurs aren’t born, they do require a less staid environment in order to flourish. After all, it’s neither nature nor nurture. It’s a combination of both.

Dedicated followers of fashion

The other day I was talking to someone going through the process of moving into an open plan office. He worked for a very traditional organisation (he is a lawyer) and the transition for him and his team was clearly proving difficult. It made me wonder whether open-plan offices, like outsourcing, was a business idea that will soon start to become unfashionable.

Outsourcing is a classic case of the law of unintended consequences. The idea is that moving transactional and commoditised services to people who specialise in those things will reduce costs and increase productivity. Nice idea, but in practice it often takes far more effort to manage the interface than it saves. There are also other issues: the more you dilute the business operations the more you dilute the corporate culture. And, of course, if everyone is trying to be strategic then who is left minding the shop.

The “fad” of open-plan is another example of starting in the right place for the right reasons but coming to the wrong answer. Offices were seen as a symbol of the old way of working. They represented a sense of status and hierarchy (I can remember the days when offices were carefully measured to ensure they reflected the relevant grade). They were also seen as encouraging a silo mentality and of perpetuating inefficiencies. After all, how much work actually went on behind closed doors, especially in those post prandial hours?

Open-plan offices are seen as being inclusive and meritocratic, and of providing a more creative and transparent environment that allows the whole team to be together. But do they actually work? Open-plan offices can also be a pretty difficult place to work. Often they are incredibly noisy and distracting. Noise control legislation was originally introduced to protect factory workers. Current regulations set the bar at 85 decibels and it would be interesting to know how many open-plan offices get close to that. There is the constant whirring of photocopiers and printers, and “bing-bong, lift going up” every few minutes. The constant ringing of phones (and the unanswered mobile left on a desk). There are noisy co-workers: the ones with piercing voices that can be heard across a whole room. And what about the “informal meeting” when someone starts chatting to the person next to you. All very noisy, very distracting and, probably, not particularly efficient.

Recently some people have started to focus on the importance of introverts in business. It probably comes as no surprise that whereas extroverts love brainstorming, introverts hate them. Whatever technique is applied, the end result merely forces introverts further into their shell. Which is a shame, for introverts tend to make up a majority of the gifted population. They tend to have the best thought-through and most practical ideas. And where do they have their best ideas? Not in a public brainstorm but on their own at their desk. In fact, at their desk with a bit of peace and quiet. Making a bunch of detail-focused introverts leave their offices and placing them in a bear-pit, extrovert-friendly, open-plan office tends to make them feel uncomfortable, increasing stress and decreasing productivity.

So why are these lawyers only now getting around to the idea of open plan? This is where the diffusion model comes in. New things start with innovators, the people who have the original idea. They are quickly followed by the early adopters. After them come the mass market early majority. At this stage it’s less important whether the new idea works but more that everyone else is doing it. This “safety in numbers” approach drives the next group, the late adopters, followed finally by the skeptics. However, what this bell curve model also tells us is that once the critical mass has moved in the early adopters move out and on to the next big thing.

I wonder how long it will be before once again someone starts to extoll the virtues of the office. In fact, I might just close my door, forward my phone calls, put my feet on the desk and take a few moments to ponder that very issue.