Managing the Unexpected

Until I read Managing the Unexpected – Assuring High Performance in an Age of Complexity mindfulness conjured up for me visions of Buddhist meditation and non-attachment. However, I now know it’s one of today’s business hot topics.

This fascinating and readable book about the mindset of mindfulness by Karl E Weick & Kathleen M. Sutcliffe (Jossey-Bass, 2001) is based on research into organizations such as nuclear aircraft carriers and fire fighting crews that consistently perform with far fewer disruptions and accidents than might be expected. It is part of the University of Michigan Business School Management series.

One of its aims is to assist organizations to develop the attitude of mindfulness so as to ensure higher reliability and fewer costly mistakes. Mindfulness is equally applicable to small and large organizations.

So what is mindfulness? It ‘is about staying attuned to what is happening and about a deepening grasp of what these events mean’ (p. 172). One aspect involves being preoccupied with failures rather than successes.

When I first read this, I admit to reacting with some scepticism. Personally, I prefer to emphasize the importance of attending to strengths and celebrating success as I think we often don’t do nearly enough of this. Examining failures, in my book, tends to be counter productive as it is frequently only done with a view to assigning blame. Fear of being blamed can lead to people being so afraid of making a mistake that they prefer to do nothing rather than take some initiative that might be useful and prevent impending disaster. And doing nothing in such circumstances is definitely not in the best interests of an organization.

However, on closer inspection, it has to be admitted that examining failures can be very instructive if we ‘separate the people from the problem’ and ask ourselves what we can learn from failures and mistakes about our organization, its environment and the relationships and communication amongst its members, clients, suppliers and other stakeholders.

A friend recently told me that her daughter was working in a small mixed grocery store and reported that a customer trod on a grape. A small incident, yet, the result was that the customer was transported from the store in an ambulance – fur and feathers were flying – and the final outcome is yet to be determined.

How might it help this store to be more ‘preoccupied with failure’ and to learn from that potentially costly incident?

According to Weick (p.85-86), when Winston Churchill during World War II made the horrifying discovery that Singapore was far less impregnable than he thought and was in fact highly vulnerable to land invasion, he made four comments:

• I ought to have known

• My advisors ought to have known

• I ought to have been told

• I ought to have asked

The last comment seems to me to be the most useful – I ought to have asked. No use blaming others: as my father would have said, ‘If you want a thing done, do it yourself’. Churchill ought to have asked. But he didn’t think to do so. And the consequences for Singapore were dire.

When we look at our own businesses, or our own lives for that matter, are there questions ‘we ought to have asked’ and what might they be?

And what about after the event?

Here are some questions that may be helpful in starting to think about post-disaster analysis with a view to preventing or containing future disasters of the same kind.

• what factors led to this happening?
• what stopped relevant people who could have prevented the disaster from hearing about it and taking action?
• why was this possibility not taken into account in the decision making process?
• what action(s) can be taken to avoid similar unpleasant surprises in the future?
• how can the organization encourage its people to develop greater foresight and be prepared to take effective action in the face of future unexpected developments?
• What expectations did I have that allowed this to take me by surprise? What expectations would be more useful to me in the future?

One of the aims of Managing the Unexpected is to provide guidelines for managers to encourage mindfulness in organizations of any size and also ‘in our other lives as well’. Amongst other useful suggestions, Weick and Sutcliffe provide sets of items that managers can use to audit the level of mindfulness in their organizations.

If you would like to pursue a collaborative enquiry into the relevance of the mindfulness mindset to your business or organization, please contact me.

Email or telephone 61 0421 654 972.

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