by Warren Bennis; Daniel Goleman; James O’Toole; Patricia Ward Biederman
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
Pub Date: June 13, 2008
Print ISBN: 978-0-470-27876-5
Web ISBN: 0-470278-76-5
Pages: 144
Review :
I am pretty sure I have read other books by Jame O’Toole. Overall the technology aspects of this book (blogging..) were pretty repeat for anyone in the sector. Key messages were around culture of communication both externaly and internally. How mgrs handle themselves day-day as far as sharing information, what behaviors they encourage as far as truth, clarity Vs groupthink/butt-kissing is definitely worth consideration.
The book helped me reflect on several points for myself, but overall wouldn’t say it was major impact book for me.
What i took Away from Book :
At this point I am leading a router development group at cisco (team is in 100’s of folks) and there are often fun complications in getting best information flow possible :
– the amount of information coming at engineers in my team is massive, I hate to add to pollution. Choosing what will help folks Vs pollute their mailbox requires consideration, often there is so much going on that just spending time each day/week considering what I shouldn’t pass on, what folks already know, what to pass on that useful is just not possible
– at any one time there are dozens of indepdent projects in flight around various parts of my team, I sometimes worry over focus, accolades, on specific ones will at times illict more overt focus on the projects I find most interesting (obviously I shuld use in
I don’t deal too much at all (very middle mgmt) with external cisco publicity. So many of the examples regarding corporate communication gone wrong were not as applicable to me. Probably most application would be relative to handling of Software releases, release notes, field notices … I overall am pretty happy with how my group handles this, but will keep notes from this book in mind in future on those fronts.
Thinking about Groupthink, hard to say if I encourage this much within my team. I definitely know of Mgmt teams that seem to have this issue in cisco.
❑ TODO : read Antigone
On the need for a corproate fool to question groupthink, to shake things up I have had similar view for some time. I have seen a person that was not a fool, but was ‘outside’ the normal development team in position of influence both organiationally and personality wise, and could really shake things up. He put mgmt and ‘mainstream’ technical leaders off kilter and could interestinly really make some interesting things happen.
– there is a flip side, a # of times, the influence of this person could cause some folks to be particularly off center (not doing their best) and there were some distortions of reality that at times were unhealthy
– I view it is good to have some chaotic elements in any process/org that when needed can shake things up. BUt would guess that the organism of modern corporate entities will push such people away from influence.
I believe a major problem among execs I see today is the fear of taking action with a view there is more to lose from failed action then is lost by taking no action at all.
I think I do ok at this, but I need to continually to be on lookout for folks that compliment me or subtly manipulate with unwarranted flattery. I know it happens and I know of few times I enjoyed it some without really realizing it until later. I dont want to encourage that behavior around me.
– there is a flip side of this which is to avoid the kissing up with relgion. There are some folks it can be particularly easy/tempting. I have done it in small bits I am sure over the years but try to shy away from it. I think the rule here shoudl be if you find yourself in position were kissing up is expected or seems like only way to compete then you are in bad situation and time to evaluate options.
Book Notes :
Chapters in the book :
CREATING A CULTURE OF CANDOR
SPEAKING TRUTH TO POWER
THE NEW TRANSPARENCY
Chapter 1. CREATING A CULTURE OF CANDOR
– Culture of candor is free flow of information so that everyone in compnay has right info when they need it
– Good information flow is rare
– Book talks about flow of info both internal to an organization with public. Gives examples were lack of public candor left to harm to firms reputation
– In past 20 years notes that democrats have declassifed governt info, and republicans have classified
– Blogs are hard for companies to control (lot info that seems repeated in many forms these days about new media impacts on companies)
+ by mid-2007 70 million blogs
– Quite a bit about CEO’s (usual Jobs discussions) and how much they communicate to public
– On internal transparency the authors call out that staff’s will soften/spin message to their leaders.
– interesting some companies have ‘transparency software’, software that allows employees to anonymously communicate issues, risks, unethical behavior, ..
– culture of a group can influence upwards transparency a lot (e.g. dont volunteer
– There is notion that what we learn in our families impacts transparency, ignore major issues “vital lies”
– there is notion that companies/familes make up coded langugage to deal with problems
– GroupThink : “Whenever a tight-knit decision-making group fails to collect all relevant data and candidly analyze it, bad decisions are liable to be made.”
+ uses bay of pigs as examples
+ another example : Failure of the C.I.A. to provide reliable evaluations of Iraq’s weapons and armed forces in the run-up to the second Iraq War.
+ Groupthink-driven decisions are the downside of a dynamic every organization seeks to build: group cohesiveness and pride in belonging.
– best way for leaders to start information flowing freely in their organizations is to set a good example. They must accept, even welcome, unsettling information.
–
Chapter 2. SPEAKING TRUTH TO POWER - Jame O’Toole
– For chapter title use example of Enron and Sherron Watkins, meaning is that is hard to speak truth to people/groups in power.
– Talks about story of ‘Antigone’ and how it raised complex ethical dilemas
– “groupthink, a state of collective denial or self-deception that often has disastrous business and ethical consequences.”
– “People in organizations typically form shared ideas—”collective representations” in the language of social anthropology—and all the forces of the group conspire to protect those notions, no matter how inaccurate or outmoded they may be, or may become.”
+ example of US automakers self defeatuing notion that consumers didnt care about quality, and japanese eating their lunch
– When Verne Morland was an executive at NCR in the 1980s, he suggested that all companies could benefit from hiring a “corporate fool.”
+ would be obligated to “stir up controversy, respect no authority, and resist pressures to engage in detailed analyses.” (
– Fear of punishment by tyrannical leaders causes many managers to become risk averse. To free his people from such crippling fears, Percy Barnevik issued these “General Principles of Management Behavior” when he became CEO of ABB in the 1980s:
+To take action (and stick out one’s neck) and do the right things is obviously the best.
+ To take action and do the wrong things (within reason and a limited number of times) is second best.
+ Not to take action (and lose opportunities) is the only non-acceptable behavior.[]
– Whenever followers are asked to rank what they require of leaders, trust is always at the top of the list. But leaders can’t provide trust directly to followers. Instead, trust is an outcome of all a leader’s accumulated actions and behaviors.
+ leaders must do several practical things: provide equal access to information to all, refrain from punishing those who constructively demonstrate imperial nakedness, refrain from rewarding spurious loyalty, and empower and reward principled contrarians.
– Perhaps the main reason why so many leaders stubbornly refuse to listen to subordinates is that they fear the news they carry is of the boss’s own mistakes. Nobody likes to admit he is wrong but, as Lao Tsu wrote six hundred years before the birth of Christ, in the long run it is self-defeating for a leader not to do so:
A great nation is like a great man:
When he makes a mistake, he realizes it.
Having realized it, he admits it.
Having admitted it, he corrects it.
He considers those who point out his faults
As his most benevolent teachers.
He thinks of his enemy as the shadow that he himself casts.
– The book continues with a # of addiitonal depressing examples of George W Bush decision making issues. Amazing how common it is to use Bush as example of all things wrong.
– great unintentional harm can be done when speaking truthfully. That’s why managers find it so difficult to give candid performance appraisals to subordinates whose work is not up to par. Because giving negative feedback is nearly as unpleasant as firing people, most managers shy away from giving such appraisals even though they realize that an honest assessment of underperformance is in the interest of their organization and also of the subordinate receiving the bad news.
– The author James, gives personal example of ethical test were his mgmt were making bad decisions and he quit. He quit to avoid looking like he was disloyal and burning brdiges. He now wishes he had tried to work with them to fix things. And failing that tried to get company board to help fix.
–
Chapter 3. THE NEW TRANSPARENCY
– Opacity Index, launched in 2001
+ each country ranked
+ China is moving toward greater technology-driven openness. By 2008, China had 210 million Internet users and 47 million bloggers. And while the Chinese government diligently polices the Internet—limiting what people can access on Google, for instance—citizens are using the Internet to expose some of the most disturbing aspects of Chinese life.
+ More stuff on blogs that is pretty common knowledge
+ Talks about lack of privacy with new technology