Critical thinking fosters innovation: how to contradict your boss

Sometimes a kind of collective syndrome occurs within companies that prevent managers from challenging what they might see as wrong decisions and how they will also avoid contradicting their bosses, perhaps for fear of being sidelined in future promotions or being excluded from the inner circles of power. A lack of critical thinking, the failure to speak out or to contradict the established order can and have contributed to collective disaster. 

For example, many of the mistakes that sank some financial institutions in 2007 were due to incompetent management, a failure to think critically and to objectively analyze key decisions, rather than a simple absence of ethics. What was missing during the boom years was any kind of professional deontology, which requires managers to apply extreme caution when carrying out risk assessment and decision-making. 

A saying that has become the golden rule for many employees is “the boss is always right.” Wrong. 

I believe that business schools have a duty to teach our students that professional ethics, best practice and fiduciary duty, on behalf of the shareholders, are for managers to use their better judgment to explore the best decision in the face of any business dilemma, even if it means contradicting the boss. 

Whenever friends or students ask me about the best way to act in such cases, I always make the same recommendation: Express the highest respect for your boss, but say what you really think, stating the reasons that justify your opinion: that’s what they pay you for. That said, I should add that I understand the unquestioning attitude of many managers, even when they know the boss is wrong.

However, anybody who aspires to leadership must rise to the occasion and say what they think in a difficult situation, regardless of the risk. Good bosses will always appreciate critical, respectful and constructive judgment from their subordinates. If they don’t, then perhaps they are not somebody worth working for. The first beneficiaries of critical thinking in companies are the bosses. Complacence and resistance to rethinking ideas, processes and activities is the beginning of a slippery slope that can ruin a company. All bosses want their ideas to be supported, particularly by their subordinates, and criticism or opposition is unlikely to be well received. But good bosses are prepared to develop the capacity to listen and value criticism: It provides a good opportunity to innovate and improve the company’s performance. 

Fostering a critical spirit among senior managers, encouraging constructive debate, drives innovation and better practice, which in turn improve the bottom line, argues Helen Lee Bouygues, President of the Reboot Foundation. She recommends three courses of action to boost this capacity in organizations.

and fundamental decisions while at the same time avoiding throwing the baby out with the bathwater. Some assumptions are part of the company’s knowledge pool and have been acquired through experience, making them valuable rules worth following. In any event, even if these assumptions are respected, there is no harm in reviewing them periodically. Times change and some sectors experience the entry of disruptive competitors that can dramatically transform the rules of the game. –

There are two fundamental factors to take into account here. The first is an excess of information. Paradoxically, big data has not made it any easier to make important decisions in business. In many cases, too much information can lead to errors in decision-making. The second factor is overestimating the opinions of experts, external consultants or senior management, whose views tend to carry more weight. This is not necessarily a bad thing: Experience is the mother of science. At the same time, fresh input often provides an opportunity for improvement. 

Most studies confirm our intuition: Diversity, well managed, generates greater opportunities for innovation. As I said before, the spiral of unethical behavior in a company, on a collective scale, is usually a process rather than the result of a single action or decision. 

As Andrew Hill, Management Editor at the Financial Times, explains: “Bad outcomes often result from many small steps, not single reckless leaps. The Enron board’s notorious decision to waive its code of conduct and allow its chief financial officer to serve as general partner for an off-balance-sheet vehicle was the culmination of a series of smaller decisions. Directors were led step by step into the mire.” Hill adds that “bad culture starts at the top.”

There are only two reasons for widespread unethical behavior in a company: Senior management is either leading it, or if it isn’t, then it’s incompetent and should be replaced.