Skepticism and probability of success
Skepticism is not new to a coach or consultant.
Isn’t lean just a fad? Isn’t Just in Time just a theory? Isn’t Single Piece Flow just a matter of common sense? Isn't Change Management just a new wave?
Directly or indirectly, as a coach, I frequently face these questions, which are often just rhetorical for the people posing them since the pre-meditated intuitively generated answer is already there in their minds and they are fully convinced of that. Needless to mention, for them the correct and acceptable answer in their minds is only “True. Yes – it is.” I have sometimes reached the rare dead end too at which the financial and cultural gains are apparent like never before, yet the skeptic maintains the stance that such a progress would happen without any special effort such as these methodologies! At this stage, the debate cannot progress because the stand is clearly intuitive and emotional and not rational. I am sure many other coaches face these questions too.
Skepticism like this is not new and I do feel, it is not completely misplaced either. This type of skepticism, despite the very merit and genuineness of all these tools, techniques, and philosophies, is rife, perhaps because all these tools and techniques are also overshadowed at times, in the memories of people posing this skepticism, by several failed projects that once commenced in their presence with tall promises and yielded almost nothing or worse, consumed resources and left unwanted scars.
The skepticism is also justified when we see conflicting situations such as advocacy of a long-term philosophy when the enterprise is struggling with Covid or GFC! Workforce is obviously almost always wise enough to read through such ironies.
Yet the lustre of these tools, though diminishes marginally over time, does not disappear. Why? Simply because there are numerous success stories too everywhere. This raises the question – is there one or are there a few underlying common factors of the effort that make or break the initiatives based on these tools? As I see, the answer is a resounding “yes.”
“Collective wisdom” – that is it.
Coaching is less of a "coach knowing and putting that knowledge to use" and more of "a coach knowing the experience, knowledge and a sound judgment that the team has, can develop and translating those qualities into a meaningful improvement."
The more I coached and facilitated various teams over years, the more I realised that it is all about "collective wisdom".
It is true that the wisdom of - or lack of it in - a group of people as a whole can vary anywhere between two extremes, one being the most destructive and unruly state of utter chaos caused by an uncontrolled crowd (or mob) and the other the most efficient and effective form of group work such as the most complicated aerobatics maneuvers. For the former, the term wisdom would be of course a misnomer. Various philosophers and authors have argued with their own views both the sides of the arguments. However once we consider the spectrum of possible collective wisdom as varying from the most destructive end to the most effective end, the strength of the basic ethos would be indisputable.
Collective Wisdom – the vital ingredient
In the initial years of my coaching career, I too not only faced but perhaps also caused a few failures and lacklustre projects. As the experience increased, the appreciation for factors such as stakeholder engagement and customization of the otherwise standard approaches to suit the unique needs of each organization also increased.
Yet – I started thinking about “Collective Wisdom” as the common denominator – the one and universal – underlying factor that makes or breaks these tools only sometime in the last few years.
In any change or improvement project we invariably use terms such as engagement, participation, contribution, teamwork, alignment, initiative, morale etc. I prefer the phrase "collective wisdom". An all-encompassing summary term.
I find it particularly pertinent when the world is increasingly using “artificial intelligence” to improve, and the perfect ingredient that must complement artificial intelligence in any project from the outset till the end of it is “collective wisdom.” (It is rather obvious that it is unlikely that we will have “artificial wisdom” anytime soon in the near future that could render collective wisdom redundant!)
Just an abstract concept?
That would raise the question however if it is just an abstract concept that has no practical usability in management. As I see, far from such abstraction, it is actually a concept that can be miniaturised and structured reasonably well. Its aspects can be subdivided into precise skills and behaviours that can be potentially observed and guided.
The subject is not new but is being researched well currently and there is some recent literature too. Some good books – to name a few - which have initiated some in-depth thought processes are from the last couple of decades.
1) Collective Wisdom: Principles and Mechanisms – Edited by Helene Landemore and Jon Elster (Cambridge University Press, 2012)
2) The Wisdom of Crowds by James Surowiecki (Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group, 2005)
3) The Power of Wisdom and the trap of collective folly by Alan Briskin, Tom Callanan, Sheryl Erickson (Berrett-Koehler Publishers, 2009)
The recent thinking on collective wisdom has been on multiple forms of its manifestation and multiple factors that influence it. Stock markets, the digital world, effectiveness of democracy etc. are the key domains.
Having said that, the implication I prefer the most for the purpose of business management is simply by the dictionary meaning at this stage.
Collective*
(Adj.) Done by or belonging to all the members of a group of people
Wisdom*
(Noun) The quality of having experience, knowledge, and good judgment
Collective Wisdom, therefore, as I interpret would be:
The quality of a group of people having experience, knowledge and good judgment while acting as a group.
(*Source: Oxford Learners Dictionary)
So, what is the real-life use?
This can be perhaps best understood by the manifestation of lack of collective wisdom as well as the manifestation of the presence of collective wisdom.
Whenever a wrong machine is acquired but not utilized or a wrong product is developed or a person acutely skilled at some process is indispensable for an organization – all this without adequate consultation and group-work in spite of it being easily feasible, a risk precipitates into an expensive problem or an adverse after effect of a definite feeling – “This could have been avoided.” This feeling itself is a reflection of inadequate use of collective wisdom upstream i.e., at the initial stages of a project. Needless to mention that these are just a few of the many routine examples we see regularly.
Quite on the contrary, when the entire team harnesses the specialist knowledge each member has and arrives at a well-evaluated decision by rejecting the less effective options, collective wisdom prevails. A slightly unfortunate part, I guess, is that when the initiatives work well because of the collective wisdom properly utilised, the risks never surface, never become problematic situations, and the effective groundwork is seldom realised because “people did not see the problems that never occurred!”
It would be tempting to quickly trivialise this to suggest, “Well – that’s how the world works!” but in reality, Collective Wisdom can be achieved by ensuring that
1) The decision making is based on the evaluation of potential risks as well as rewards.
2) By understanding the implications of all the people, process, product, and technology related aspects of the system – not just a few that naturally occur to the team.
3) Known effective practices are followed.
4) Suitable behaviours are encouraged and developed well in time.
Etc.
Who can ensure that collective wisdom is systematically organised and put to maximum use? That – I feel is the role of a leader, a manager and of course – a coach or any associated facilitator. Or even better – all of them together!
For the purposes of sustained in-depth application, of course, one needs to miniaturise the entire process of harnessing wisdom of the team further by suitably categorising the groups of elements of collective wisdom into multiple interlinked aspects such as sense of moderation and sense of proportion that a coach should be mindful of. That would be, for the purpose of brevity, beyond the scope of this post. Certainly, something to follow sometime soon.
In a nutshell – if collective wisdom prevails – collective wisdom prevails!
Nilesh Pandit
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