Rationality as a faulty survival gene?

Humans, by nature, are inclined to rely on what has or is believed to have worked in the past. The tendency to reuse past successes, while rational, can either ignore or misinterpret the changing context and perpetuate the wrong things. 

For example, businesses continue to use fossil fuels because they have historically driven economic growth and abandoning them might mean losing their competitive advantage. But this rational choice has for the past 125 years ignored the long-term impact to the atmosphere and associated climate change.

Similarly, individuals make decisions based on short-term benefits while sacrificing long-term well-being. This is evident in our daily choices based on convenience, like opting for fast food over a healthy meal or choosing a car over public transport, while disregarding the future health and environmental costs.

Examples of rational speak...

• "This is the easiest solution."
• "It's always been done this way, so it must be right."
• "It's too complicated to change course now."
• "The numbers don't lie."
• "This is the cheapest option, so it's the best."
• "It's the logical next step."
• "We met our immediate goals, so it's a success."
• "X is good, so more of X will be better."
• "The downstream impacts aren't our problem."

Systemic Problems with Rational Thinking (Like it or not)

A colleague frequently reminds us, "Today's problems are yesterday's solutions". Rational thinking, with a narrow focus can contribute to unknown or unintended consequences, as seen in the board of executive’s story. 

Yes, they may have made a different 'rational' decision with more complete information, but the truth for any complex condition is that we will never have 'all the information'. More often than not we only have a small part of the picture and yet continue to pretend we can be rational.

In our modern and complex society, our everyday rational choices are probably always going to contribute to ecological overshoot when they are related to:

• money and returns on money, 
• maintaining status quo, 
• risk management or butt covering,
• personal gain or satisfaction,
• competitive advantage,
• ongoing extraction,

Playing along the party-line of rationality virtually guarantees we won't change and will continue to neglect the collective good.

The omnipresence of money and the emphasis on financial success have skewed our perception of value, leading us to prioritize monetary strength over other aspects of life. 

When money is our prevailing paradigm, everything is reduced to a metric, commodity, advantage, leverage, equation, substitution, sensation or means to a financial result. 

This is the Rationality Illusion - It is a trap that prevents us doing what is best for the long term for the whole system. 

The effects are mounting.

An important insight in the context of the Rationality Illusion is the accelerating pace of change in today's world. With the accelerating change comes increasing organisational vulnerability. 

This rapid evolution presents a unique challenge for all organizations and especially those solely focussed on money. Traditional rational decision-making models, reliant on historical data and patterns, become obsolete in the face of unprecedented technological, social, and environmental shifts.

Large organizations and their people are particularly vulnerable. Their size, complexity, and previous successes, while once sources of stability, eventually must become liabilities. Without a serious effort to change they are toast. 

The rationality illusion is at play when there are signs like:

• Organisational silos prevent change – "We are doing fine in our patch."
• Pushing harder and harder for efficiency is wrecking people.
• HR or finance dream up counterproductive incentive schemes. 
• People become arrogant or exceptional. We are too good or big to fail. 
• Familiarity and laziness creeps in.
• The organisation swings like a pendulum, trying to cherry pick winners or tap into the latest fad.
• There is more spending on administration and public relations around an important activity, than on the activity itself.
• The culture shuts down the dissenters and heretics.

Rationality as a System default

It seems obvious that organisations and institutions that fail to adapt to changing contexts risk not only irrelevance but also potential collapse.

 And we might think that the growing awareness and real impacts of issues like climate change demand a shift towards increasing resilience and adaptability, and they do.

But the system also demands we exist 'within budget' and that despite the need for transition, the majority of us hate change anyway. So, the rational and defendable answer, "maintain status-quo"... can be very hard to argue with, let alone shift. 

Beyond Rationality

Face it, the world we live in is not a simple, join-the-dots game, even though we want it to be. There is no data for the future, what happens then, doesn't necessarily come from a perception of a 'rational now' or from what worked previously.

The fact is that the world is changing from a system that has reached its limits - to something else, we are in the midst of a transition, and this has implications for all of us. 

Regimes, professions and cultures that reduce everything to 'paint by numbers' are likely to struggle over time when coming up against those with new ideals, cultures, processes and practices.

How we observe, inquire, learn and be with each other ought to be increasingly less rational in this transition space. Love, empathy, trust, passion, courage and dialogue will become increasingly important as we move forward.

We need to develop beyond rationality. This involves embracing wisdom, better relationships, sharing of power, long-term thinking, and adaptability. 

Conclusion

The board of directors' story reflects a larger issue we face today. The Rationality Illusion is real and has significant consequences. 

And imagine for a moment you were there, witnessing the Wright Brothers first attempts at flying. 

Would they have ever happened at all if everything they did had to be agreed to by a steering group, approved by the risk committee and signed off by the PR and communications group? Or that they were afraid of failure?

There is a new playbook evolving, one in which the non-rational and perhaps irrational are embodied as sources of creative energy, new behaviours and culture. Why not join us and create your part in it.

Check out our Real Transition Leadership programme. Testimonials at Real Transition Leaders | Transition-HQ (thq.nz).

This weeks quote

"“If we open a quarrel between past and present, we shall find we have lost the future” 

                                                   - Winstone Churchill