This was one of my favourite piece in my first book, "Understanding Organisations: Organisational Theory and Practice in India" (Chapter 11, Section D), where I could slink in my existential concerns...
The fact, nevertheless, is that organisations do provide legitimacy to defensive behaviours, and so help people to avoid coming in touch with their deep‑seated emotional or existential anxieties and dilemmas (Jaques, 1970; Chattopadhyay, 1986). Kets de Vries (1980) noted how people create structures and roles to avoid coming in touch with their deeply experienced feelings of alienation and emptiness. Behind the conscious concerns with tasks, responsibilities, obedience, etc., may lie the unconscious interpersonal anxieties aroused by close contact with people. In fact, Morgan (1986) showed through his analysis of the life of Frederick Taylor, the father of scientific management, how the unconscious concerns for controlling one’s impulses can get translated into socially legitimate aims of controlling organisations (see also Chowdhry and Kakar, 1971). He points out howTaylor
The implication of this defensive nature of organisations, is again for the accuracy of the perception of reality. If the involvement of the decision‑makers and organisational members is based on the unconscious motives of warding off deep‑seated anxieties, then they are less likely to accept psychologically threatening realities. Janis (1982) pointed out how decision‑making groups develop filters and shields (illusions of invulnerability, stance of self‑righteousness, stereotyped perception of the problem and the “enemy out there”, etc.), which do not allow the members to come in contact with an unacceptable reality, and reinforce a process of groupthink. Similarly, Argyris (1970) noted how in the organisational change process, managers tend to neglect, deny, and distort dissonant information:
According to Pauchant and Mitroff (1992), these distortions result from the bounded emotionality of the managers, i.e., from the defects in their capacity to feel and experience certain emotions. They found that these inadequacies in the emotional capacity of the decision‑makers (i.e., their faulty and unhealthy mechanisms of dealing with their own feeling and impulses) were significant contributors in making organisations crisis‑prone. One only has to look at some of the major industrial disasters and organisational failures (e.g.,Bhopal
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The most popular view of organisations is that they are socio‑economic
entities, which are meant for producing goods or providing services in the most
efficient and effective manner. Moreover, so pervasive is their influence in
our lives that one tends to unquestioningly accept their existence as almost
natural and given. In accepting this view, however, we neglect the basic truth
that, organisations are man‑made, simulated, controlled and ‘artificial’
environments, which also serve some deep psychological purposes in the lives of
their members (managers, staff members and workers).
At the most obvious level (as we noticed in Jefferson’s
observation about the Shell executives), organisations, with their emphasis on
rationality, reliability, control, etc., provide excellent mechanisms for warding
off uncertainties and ambiguities of human condition. They help people to
regulate their lives, to experience a feeling of predictability, and to derive
a sense of mastery over themselves. In this sense, they serve as useful
psychological defenses, which are often quite functional (in a task‑related
sense) as well. Menzies (1960), for instance, described how the depersonalised
work systems, procedures and practices related to a nurses’ job (e.g., strict
“professionalism”, structuring work in precise routines, referring to patients
as “bed number”, etc.) are aimed at increasing
their interpersonal distance from the patients. Such psychological
distancing may also be necessary for the nurses to do their jobs effectively.
The fact, nevertheless, is that organisations do provide legitimacy to defensive behaviours, and so help people to avoid coming in touch with their deep‑seated emotional or existential anxieties and dilemmas (Jaques, 1970; Chattopadhyay, 1986). Kets de Vries (1980) noted how people create structures and roles to avoid coming in touch with their deeply experienced feelings of alienation and emptiness. Behind the conscious concerns with tasks, responsibilities, obedience, etc., may lie the unconscious interpersonal anxieties aroused by close contact with people. In fact, Morgan (1986) showed through his analysis of the life of Frederick Taylor, the father of scientific management, how the unconscious concerns for controlling one’s impulses can get translated into socially legitimate aims of controlling organisations (see also Chowdhry and Kakar, 1971). He points out how
...a
splendid illustration of how unconscious concerns and preoccupations can have
an effect on organisation. For it is clear that his whole theory of scientific
management was the product of a disturbed and neurotic personality. His attempt
to organise and control the world, whether in childhood games or in systems of
scientific management, was really an attempt to organise and control himself.
At a much deeper level, the very construction of
organisations can be seen as a social defense against the anxiety of death. In
his book, The Denial of Death, Becker (1973) argued
that all the efforts of mankind (religions, ideologies, institutions, culture,
etc.) are aimed at denying the finite and transient fact of human existence.
The fact that we will all die is a fact which makes our existence devoid of any
permanent meaning, and creates anxiety. In building organisations and
institutions, and in identifying with them, we create something which is more
durable and larger than life. Our roles and work activities, give us a sense of
continuity, and make our existence real to us. In the introduction of their
book, In Search of Excellence, Peters and Waterman
(1982) quoted Becker: “What man really fears is not so much extinction, but
extinction with insignificance... Ritual is a technique for giving life.” They
go on to say: “In other words, men willingly shackle themselves to the nine‑to‑five,
if only, the cause is perceived to be in some sense great.”
The implication of this defensive nature of organisations, is again for the accuracy of the perception of reality. If the involvement of the decision‑makers and organisational members is based on the unconscious motives of warding off deep‑seated anxieties, then they are less likely to accept psychologically threatening realities. Janis (1982) pointed out how decision‑making groups develop filters and shields (illusions of invulnerability, stance of self‑righteousness, stereotyped perception of the problem and the “enemy out there”, etc.), which do not allow the members to come in contact with an unacceptable reality, and reinforce a process of groupthink. Similarly, Argyris (1970) noted how in the organisational change process, managers tend to neglect, deny, and distort dissonant information:
...the
clients may tend to forget controversial information suggested by the
interventionist and recall in its place the information from the past
substitutes for the controversial 0information. It means clients will expose
themselves to learning the information that maintains their present degree of
self‑acceptance... (and) will tend to interpret relatively threatening
information in line with their values...
According to Pauchant and Mitroff (1992), these distortions result from the bounded emotionality of the managers, i.e., from the defects in their capacity to feel and experience certain emotions. They found that these inadequacies in the emotional capacity of the decision‑makers (i.e., their faulty and unhealthy mechanisms of dealing with their own feeling and impulses) were significant contributors in making organisations crisis‑prone. One only has to look at some of the major industrial disasters and organisational failures (e.g.,
Denials that
crises are developing and that strategic reorientation is needed arise, to no
small degree, from sincere conviction... (managers) really do believe that they
should act only on the basis of reliable information and that communi-cations
should flow through channels... it is a normal human characteristic to adhere
to one’s prior beliefs, inspite of evidence that they are incorrect.
