Pity poor Lehman Brothers (and Merrill Lynch, Bear Stearns, Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, AIG, and more to be named shortly). It is easy to get lost in the world of information where nothing is real. Men and women in the thrall of their dreams were betting borrowed money on loans they had never examined to profit in a market they thought would rise forever, but which had actually been falling steadily for two years. With faith in out-of-date reports on the economy, hope that the next bounce of the index would make them billionaires and the charitable belief that they were smarter than anyone else in the game, dozens of executives ignored the evidence, silenced dissenters and forgot history. And in all of these cases, executives had invested their employees' pension money in the company's own stock.
The problem is that this is happening over and over again. Weapons of mass destruction turned out to be an illusion. Warnings about Three Mile Island were ignored. Those who opposed the launch of the shuttle Challenger were silenced. A growing history of information management failure in engineering, medicine, foreign affairs, finance and government is conveniently forgotten as we rush forward into the Information Age. Why do these decisions go wrong?
Cognitive science has given us a good look at how the mind rejects dissonant information. We all find it difficult to accept facts that are contrary to established concepts and long held values. Some things must be believed to be seen. Management studies show how teams regularly whitewash uncertainty and converge on a simple, action-oriented program that makes everyone look good, even when the data disagree. Sociologists remind us that companies, communities and even nations cling to false knowledge long after everyone in the group has started to suspect the truth. Even as its balance sheet turned to dust, the executives at Lehman were raising capital and denying their death.
There are antidotes. (1) Be skeptical of your own judgment. The mind has a preference for pleasant information and has great difficulty with unflattering, contradictory and ambiguous detail. This is not personal, it's just biology. (2) Urge your teammates to speak the truth, even to power. The most innovative and successful teams are those that respect the facts, make decisions together, and honor dissent. (3) Make sure you are choosing among considered alternatives, not just accepting the first solution that seems to fit the situation. The most common mistake made in information disasters is that no one read beyond the executive summary and, frankly, life is not that simple. (4) Expect the truth. From your colleagues, from the media, from your doctor, your broker or your soccer coach. Truth is more interesting, and it may save your pension-or your life.
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