It’s a sweltering, dusty July day in Coleman, Texas. Four people wait for the heat to pass, drinking lemonade in the shade of the porch of a country house. At one point, someone suggests they drive to Abilene, 53 miles away, for a bite to eat at a diner there. The others think it’s a crazy idea, but say nothing and move on. They drive all the way to Abilene in a car without air conditioning through a dust storm, have a mediocre meal, and return to Coleman hours later, tired, hot, and unhappy.
When they return home, they reveal that they didn’t want to go in the first place, but did so because thought the others were eager to drive. Of course, this communication gap was someone else’s fault.
Here we have the Abilene Paradox, a group dynamics phenomenon first identified by Jerry Harvey of George Washington University in 1974. The paradox is that people accept a bad decision, knowing full well that it was a bad decision in the first place. . The result is the complete opposite of what was originally intended: half-hearted support, uninspired ideas, and wasted time and money on results that don’t live up to expectations.
On the way to Abilene
We have all experienced the Abilene Paradox, especially in decision-making meetings. We struggle to make a decision, to come to an agreement only to find, in our hearts, that we did so only because of what we assumed about the wishes and opinions of others.
If you’ve told yourself in those situations, “Who cares; it’ll be okay no matter what we decide” or “I guess I’ll just go with the flow,” you’re on your way to Abilene. We assume that the others really want to go to Abilene, even though we don’t, but we agree to go anyway. And, if every individual has the same wrong assumptions, then action is something that nobody wants. We agree as a group, but as individuals, we regret it. It can be said that this is an absurd situation.
Why do people actually support things that go against what they want? What happened to the outspoken individual with ideas to contribute and concepts to roll? A rare bird in groups.
According to Harvey, in group settings, expressing your real beliefs creates a degree of anxiety. Should you maintain your own integrity and self-esteem by speaking your mind, or compromise your values and go with what you want? think is the consensus?
Anxiety stems from the magical belief that something disastrous will happen to you if you reveal your true thoughts. “Oh, I’ll get fired if I do that. I’ll be labeled a hipster. I’ll look like a fool. I won’t be nice.” Because you think those things will happen if you say what you really think, you end up not being honest about what you really think. These magical consequences provide an excuse to be quiet.
And what do these magical and negative consequences represent? Alienation, separation, ostracism; these are powerful underlying fears, so powerful that we will act against our self-interest to avoid the risk of not being “a part” of something. Of course, doing so takes you to Abilene.
When Commitment Gets Unhealthy, You’re Heading Down the Road
But isn’t commitment part of working life? Are we not going against our own interests when we agree to continue? In his new book, The commitment trap, Elizabeth Doty draws a line between the healthy commitment that is necessary to achieve goals and the unhealthy commitments that betray beliefs and values. When unhealthy commitments pile up, the conflict inside your head can cause stress and lots of trips to Abilene (as well as the alienation, separation, or ostracism you feared in the first place!).
His approach is to recognize when you are being pressured to play by rules that undermine your beliefs and/or common sense, and to play a different game by being true to yourself, no matter how difficult the circumstances. The key to playing this different game is to question your assumptions. Is this decision really in the interest of the group? Are there others committed to this or do they just feel pressured to keep going? What are the costs to me if I go ahead, including the costs to my self-esteem and the ability of others to trust me? And finally, will I really get fired, ostracized, or marginalized if I focus on helping the group achieve its goals?
In her book, Elizabeth shows numerous examples of professionals who questioned their assumptions and found that the consequences of speaking out weren’t as bad as they first seemed, at least not compared to the dust and heat of Abilene.
So how do you know your team is on its way to Abilene? Here are some indicators:
Soft and ambiguous language. Vagueness and opacity in the agenda versus clear, descriptive words? Vagueness leads to low understanding which leads to uncertainty about how to react. Collateralized debt obligations, anyone?
Missed opportunities. Do people leave meetings saying something like, “What I really wanted to say was…?” We individually and privately have a completely different opinion than what we express in the team.
It’s not fun. Are the meetings formal, serious, procedural and somewhat intimidating? Is there a place for spontaneity of expression?
Authority games. Beware of the authority figure who subtly deflects ideas, inserts his own preferences, and uses forceful language to press the main points without reply from the group.
Looking for a scapegoat. We were all involved in the bad decision; we are all to blame Under those circumstances, it is not a good sign to blame. That’s a sign you’ve been to and may still be in Abilene.
Low involvement. Are there people in the meeting who don’t contribute? Because?
Under questioning and probing. What is the proportion of questions that ask for ideas?
Process awareness. Do people realize that they are producing deals that nobody really wants?
The point is that you need to chime in with your true point of view, whatever it is. To get people to listen, be diplomatic, choose your words carefully, and back up your thoughts with logic and data. People will not listen to the ideas that are forced on them.
We visit Abilene too often
Unfortunately, the Abilene paradox plays out in real-life situations where ersatz decision-making has dire consequences. One highly publicized example was the Bay of Pigs invasion in 1961. This is what a CIA officer wrote about the final stages of the decision-making process.
“It is hard to believe in retrospect that the president and his advisers felt that plans for a complicated, large-scale military operation that had been in the works for more than a year could be reworked in four days and still offer a high probability of success. It is equally surprising that we at the agency agreed so easily.”
For more on the Abilene paradox, see TThe Abilene paradox and other musings on management by Jerry Harvey. For more information on unhealthy commitments, see The commitment trap by Elizabeth Doty.