Human irrationality
subsequent questions of ‘How?’ and ‘What?’ This
echoes the earlier work of Friedrich Nietzsche and of
Viktor Frankl, who, in Man’s Search for Meaning, asserts
that one can achieve any ‘what’ if the ‘why’ is large
enough.
All make a compelling case for the importance of
developing and buying into a clear and inspiring
‘Why?’ This has certainly been a significant part of our
leadership strategy during our combined 50 years in
the commercial world and it is abundantly apparent
in other people whose leadership we most admire.
However, as anyone who has ever been on a diet can
attest, ‘why’ is often temporary. Initially the ‘why’ —
be it a high-school reunion three months hence, or
a wedding, or a hot date — will inspire enormous
amounts of action and even results. But, inevitably,
time goes by and the ‘why’ fades. All of a sudden,
we find ourselves back on the sofa in our sweatpants,
watching Oprah and eating chicken out of a bucket!
In the 1600s, French mathematician, inventor and
philosopher Blaise Pascal famously suggested in his
dissertation on ‘decision theory’ that human behaviour
was the result of an individual looking at all of their
available options, weighing up the pros and cons and
then making the most logical decision possible. Of
course, this was in the 1600s and there was very little
reality television around to dissuade him from his
idealism.
More recently, scholars of the behavioural sciences,
such as Daniel Goleman in his ‘Emotional Intelligence’
series, have suggested that we are far more driven by
emotions than simple logic and that by developing our
Emotional Quotient (EQ), we may better understand
what drives human behaviour and belief systems. This
certainly seems to be the case. Everything we do is to
some extent filtered through how our actions will make
us feel.
Of course, we still post-rationalise our emotional
decisions. There are plenty of men in their fifties
driving around in sports cars who can tell you all about
aerodynamics, German engineering and their marque’s
racing heritage … but all they are really interested
in is attracting women half their age. Alarmingly,
behavioural studies carried out in Las Vegas indicate
that this may often be a successful strategy (good news
for the ageing gent in a Porsche or Ferrari then).
Hot on the heels of Goleman’s research is the work by
Simon Sinek, who tries to narrow down our emotional
focus to dealing with a single question — ‘Why?’ —
a question that he rather neatly dovetails into the
Why? Good question. It turns out that, like discipline,
an inspiring ‘why’ can be difficult to maintain over the
long haul. A lot of this is driven by our sense of Identity
Congruence, our innate need to behave in a way that
aligns with our sense of self. If the ‘why’ or the program
of discipline conflicts with who we think we are at our
core, it is highly unlikely to be sustainable.
However, it is also a function of the environment
and systems we create around ourselves. Discipline
is a lot easier to maintain in an environment that
supports it. Abstinence is relatively easy when you’re
an overweight, bombastic senator with nothing on
offer (versus being a charismatic President such as Bill
Clinton). Eating fresh food is simple in the absence
of fast-food options in your local area and workers
without families in remote locations are more likely
to be willing to put in a little overtime than those
surrounded by other priorities. (Why wouldn’t they be?)
People working in business-to-business sales often
pride themselves on the rationality of both themselves
and the customers they serve. In fact, many scoff
at anything other than an order-taking approach to
engaging their customers: ‘They’re not interested in
soft sell, they want what they want. It’s a necessity’.
While we hold an almost fetish-like fondness for office
equipment, it does seem a bit of an overclaim to call it
a necessity.