They abound. And it is always easy to shield them with technical arguments or circumstantial prudence.
But it doesn’t take long for you to realize that you are facing or in a fearful organization.
As systems of roles and relationships with a certain purpose, organizations tend to reflect the personality of their founders. Over time they carve out their own culture, criteria, times, styles and ways of processing their affairs, but they never stop mirroring their owners or leaders to a certain degree.
You sell them. Whether you work in it or are simply exploring associating in some way, a fearful organization is a workspace that tends to reuse or flee from everything that they consider uncertain, risky or with a certain degree of danger to their structures or traditional forms.
While there are degrees and proportions, what distinguishes a cautious organization from a truly fearful one? Here are three elements for managerial reflection:
1) They doubt, then they analyze.- And it’s not a play on words. The order of the terms affects the product. Before any initiative, idea or approach. Indeterminacy emerges before the question, the evaluation and the rigorous analysis of the matter.
Consequently, first think about everything that can go wrong, that can deviate or fracture. And since they have exhausted everything that would make a harbinger of chaos happy, they then begin to ponder the positives they see or that their counterpart argues.
2) Continuous improvement comforts them.- Take a small step. We are making things progressively better. This avoids having to choose other radically different things or options that involve pain, insecurity or obvious conflict.
At its core, there is a self-perpetuating mentality that prolongs anything that can be prolonged until reality makes it impossible. They don’t see what Alejandro Salazar Yusti writes in The Emerging Strategy: “continuous improvement leads to competitive convergence.”
3) Predictability above all.- No deviations from the plan or what is offered.
Certainly not down, but not up either. Having to explain why exactly what was promised did not work out causes annoyance and, in its worst expression, anguish.
And of course unsatisfactory results are not liked, like any entity, but in line with the fearful style, what causes most discomfort is explaining unintended results or outcomes. Paradoxically, although they reveal interesting things to review.
There may be other elements or actions that define or profile fearful organizations, but the clearest trait to observe is the habit – accompanied by a set of skills as polished as they are notorious – to reason defensively about almost anything. This aptitude can even be so powerful that it nullifies the productive mentality of those who dare to verbalize thrown options or disruptive ideas.
It is no surprise that in fearful organizations, innovation or continuous change is conspicuous by its absence or is an absolute exception. What is incredible is that people with proactivity and a different disposition to business risk can blend in, consciously or unconsciously, in this type of environment that does not allow competitiveness to be brought to its maximum possible expression.
Entrepreneurs must always remember that like attracts like. So when we begin to see that our first circle shines more for its defensive mentality than for its proactive and productive capacity, there is no doubt that it is time to review our own set of fears and judge how we have enabled them in the organization.
