Petrov feels honoured

The chief executive of a mining company wanted to implement a new pattern of work shifts for the organisation and formed a work committee to investigate the idea. Membership on the committee was by invitation only, and receiving an invitation directly from the chief executive was seen as prestigious. Therefore when Petrov received his invitation he felt valued and honoured to be part of the select group.

A pre-determined outcome?

When the committee met for the first time, the chief executive set out his plan for the new shift patterns. The job of the committee was to investigate possible options but the chief executive made it very clear that he had a preference for a particular shift pattern.

Several members of the committee were sceptical about changing shift patterns, and were uneasy about the effect that the preference highlighted by the chief executive would have on productivity in the mine.

Different options were explored, with the committee analysing advantages and disadvantages of different shift patterns, but despite different viewpoints and opinions being expressed, the committee remained aware that the chief executive’s desire meant that independent thinking was discouraged. Petrov found that although the committee was supposed to be empowered to make a decision, the focus tended to be on the group’s recommendation aligning to the chief executive’s preferred pattern.

The supposed unanimous decision of the committee was in fact a symptom of group think since many members of the committee apologetically expressed reservations privately about the new shift patterns but willingly self-censored themselves in public.