Poor Performance

We are responsible for our own behaviour

This belief underpins our approach to management.

We are all capable of deciding how we should behave.  So if an individuals performance isn’t up to scratch then that is a problem of our their own making.

To improve performance manage the people.

Is it that simple?

Professor Philip Zimbardo is a man who challenges this assumption.  He is a social scientist who specialises in an extreme type of performance.  He investigates what makes people evil.

His credentials are strong.  He has spent 30 years defining the causes of evil and wrote The Lucifer Effect.  Recently he acted as an expert witness in the Abu Ghraib trial.  He represented Chip Frederick, one of the prison guards accused of war crimes.

Evil behaviour

During the war in Iraq, United States Army personnel  were accused of human rights violations in the Abu Ghraib prison. These violations included physical and sexual abuse, torture, rape, sodomy, and murder. Ultimately seven US military police were charged with war crimes.

President Bush’s administration was quick to point out that there were only a few bad apples responsible.   but Professor Zimbardo sees the case differently.  As he puts it:

Don’t ask “who is responsible?” but “what is responsible?”

Zimbardo argues that there is a hierarchy that causes evil:

1. Behaviour – the actions of the individual guards
2. Situation – the other people, the expected norms, peer pressure and blind eyes
3. System – the political, economic, cultural and technological environment that allowed that situation

To change an individual’s behaviour, change the situation.  To change the situation change the system.

Isn’t this just theory?

Not according to Zimbardo.  He cites two studies:

• The Milgram Experiment on obedience to authority figures.  Stanley Milgram’s showed how ordinary people would follow the orders of a scientist and inflict lethal electric shocks upon strangers.
• The Stanford Prison Experiment into brutality.  Zimbardo demonstrated how students conformed to stereo types.  Either brutal guard or submissive prisoner.

Both show how little evil behaviour has to do with the individual.  It is the situation that causes it.

Few of us work for evil organisations

But there are a whole host of shades of grey between what is acceptable and what is not.

• Was it OK for Volkswagen to flaunt pollution legislation?
• Were the guys at Enron right to lie about their accounting practices?
• How many deaths could have been avoided at Stafford hospital?
• Should Thomas Cook have denied responsibility for the deaths of two children in one of their hotels?

Organisational behaviour and performance aren’t driven by the individuals within a corporation.  Nor are they caused by those who turn a blind eye. The systems we build drive behaviour:

• The performance management system
• Our pricing strategies
• The bonus structure
• The planning horizon
• The incentive programme
• The I.T. constraints
• The recognition programme

To change an individual’s behaviour, change the situation.  To change the situation change the system.

Not convinced?

Watch the video.  Then ask yourself “how would I have behaved?”

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Photo by Peter Forster on Unsplash