Is The Abilene Paradox the Reason why we fail to do Business Transformation right?
The Abilene paradox is a rationale why we fail to manage agreement appropriately — very different to what management usually involves which is to management of disagreement.
The term was introduced by management expert Jerry B. Harvey in his 1974 article “The Abilene Paradox: The Management of Agreement”. The name of the phenomenon comes from an anecdote that Harvey uses in the article to elucidate the paradox:
On a hot afternoon visiting in Coleman, Texas, the family is comfortably playing dominoes on a porch, until the father-in-law suggests that they take a [50-mile] trip to Abilene for dinner. The wife says, “Sounds like a great idea.” The husband, despite having reservations because the drive is long and hot, thinks that his preferences must be out-of-step with the group and says, “Sounds good to me. I just hope your mother wants to go.” The mother-in-law then says, “Of course I want to go. I haven’t been to Abilene in a long time.”
The drive is hot, dusty, and long. When they arrive at the cafeteria, the food is as bad as the drive. They arrive back home four hours later, exhausted.
One of them dishonestly says, “It was a great trip, wasn’t it?” The mother-in-law says that, actually, she would rather have stayed home, but went along since the other three were so enthusiastic. The husband says, “I wasn’t delighted to be doing what we were doing. I only went to satisfy the rest of you.” The wife says, “I just went along to keep you happy. I would have had to be crazy to want to go out in the heat like that.” The father-in-law then says that he only suggested it because he thought the others might be bored.
The group sits back, perplexed that they together decided to take a trip which none of them wanted. They each would have preferred to sit comfortably, but did not admit to it when they still had time to enjoy the afternoon.
The Abilene paradox is similar to groupthink, but differs in significant ways, including that in groupthink individuals are not acting contrary to their conscious wishes and generally feel good about the decisions the group has reached. In the Abilene paradox, the individuals acting contrary to their own wishes are more likely to have negative feelings about the outcome. Groupthink is a psychological phenomenon affecting clarity of thought, where in the Abilene paradox thought is unaffected.
Like groupthink theories, the Abilene paradox theory is used to illustrate that groups not only have problems managing disagreements, but that agreements may also be a problem in a poorly functioning group.
On occasions I have made what I believed to be Godfather like “offer they can’t refuse” offer to a client for business transformation , only to have offer rejected for a variety of reasons. I was of course making an offer in terms of my interests rather than the client — a guarantee of failure.
Other times I have started by taking the time to fully understand the client interests and developed a proposal that meets their needs fully — and still failed.
I believe this is because of the aforementioned Abilene paradox — everyone in the client organisation believes they need to transform their business, but the last time they tried it, rather like going to Abilene on a hot dusty afternoon, they had a miserable time.
I have found a solution is a clear explanation of the transformation journey, and the mutual commitments required from me and client, with benefits and impacts clearly outlined — the territory.
Then rather than have a miserable transformation journey, we collaborate effectively towards a common goal, and that, rather like the last line in the movie Casablanca “is the beginning of a beautiful friendship”.
If the apocryphal family going to Abilene had a cool air-conditioned car and the restaurant was one of their favourite family chains, they would have been happy and “The Abilene Paradox” would never have been written.
