Peter, Rick, Richard and fellow humans,
Peter wrote:
> How can one ensure that group-think does not occur when a group
> participates in regular dialogue sessions? And is it essential to have a
> "devils advocate", or does the dialogue process itself have a built-in
> safeguard against group-think? I suspect the later but I'm not confident
> that I'm right.
Richard responded to Rick:
> Groupthink as used by Irving Janis in his book Groupthink (2d ed., 1982)
> refers to "a mode thinking that people engage in when they are deeply
> involved in a cohesive in-group, when the members' strivings for unanimity
> override their motivation to realistically appraise courses of action."
> Generally occurs because no one risks "upsetting the apple cart." Jerry
> Harvey refers to it as the Abilene Paradox.
Educational systems, as Stafford Beer puts it, seem to be an exercise in
reducing variety. In fact so are many boards, committees, discussion
groups, legislative assemblies, parliaments.
Unanimity is a reduction of variety. Quality considerations, if quality is
the reduction in variety, would emphasise doing just that?
If learning is the accumulation of new reactivities (ability to recognise
and react) then unanimity would lead to accumulation of identical
reactivities in different individuals. When different reactivities
accumulate in different individuals you have a variety of responses. The
identical response is likely to be efficient but have little survival
value for the group.
Our educational systems, as we observed through Beer, are promoting the
accumulation of identical reactivities.
Organisational learning, I guess, will be the accumulation of reactivities
within an organisation.
If learning itself is then of little virtue by itself, can organisational
learning ensure other than efficiency?
So how should we measure learning if it were to be of greater value? Do we
have mechanisms to ensure accumulation of diverse reactivities?
As Beer again puts it elegantly, it would be disturbing if our children
talked just the same language as us...
What if we all end up talking just the same language?
Regards,
Anupam Saraph
Anupam Saraph, Ph.D.
Change Reengineering, 79 Anand Park, Pune 411007
Tel: +91-212-383582 Email: saraph@giaspn01.vsnl.net.in
--Anupam Saraph <saraph@giaspn01.vsnl.net.in>
Learning-org -- Hosted by Rick Karash <rkarash@karash.com> Public Dialog on Learning Organizations -- <http://www.learning-org.com>