Say, "Whoopsadaisy, What Happened Here?"
Blues, who believe they never make mistakes, tend to ignore evidence of failure and continue with irrelevant tasks rather than admit a project has crashed.
THE IDEA
Say, "Whoopsadaisy, What Happened Here?"
Mistakes are made by blockheads and careless people. Blues don’t make mistakes, so when everyone else makes a mess of things and disrupts his plans a Blue might simply close the door and refuse to listen. He doesn’t want to hear that the project has crashed; he just wants to keep doing his part—even if that task no longer makes any sense.
When to use it
In a business meeting, a team leader ignores data showing declining sales and insists on following the original strategy.
In personal finance, someone continues to invest in a failing stock because they are embarrassed to sell at a loss.
In academia, a researcher refuses to abandon a hypothesis despite mounting contradictory evidence.
In everyday life, a person persists with a broken appliance rather than replacing it, because replacing it feels like admitting they made a poor purchase.
FROM THEORY TO EVERYDAY LIFE
In practice
Managerial Denial
A marketing manager continues to allocate budget to a failing campaign, ignoring reports of poor ROI, because admitting failure would contradict their self-image as a competent decision-maker.
Academic Misguided Persistence
A graduate student keeps pursuing a research hypothesis that data clearly refutes, refusing to attend seminars that might challenge their approach, because they believe a 'good' researcher never makes mistakes.
A MOMENT TO REFLECT
Put it to work.
Have you ever continued a task even after realizing it was futile? What drove that behavior?
How can you recognize when you are ignoring bad news about a project?
What strategies can help you admit mistakes and change course productively?
CONTINUE THE CONVERSATION
Source texts
- Surrounded By Idiots (Thomas Erikson)