Mitigating the Risks of Bias

Biases. We all have them. Sometimes we can innovate well and make good decisions despite our biases. And sometimes not so much. We will always have biases, but we can develop techniques that allow us to work more effectively with them.

The problem with biases is that they can:

• create blind spots (we overlook information, which compromises our ability to generate insights and take advantage of opportunities),
• limit our critical thinking (we miss critical insights during exploration and experimentation), and
• limit what we are able to do (they block our ability to change our behaviour, regardless of how hard we try).

Beliefs and biases are sub-conscious, they are difficult to recognize and difficult to change. However, with the good strategies, we can reduce our biases and make decisions that are much more effective for innovation and entrepreneurship.  

How many of us have looked for our keys unsuccessfully, only to find them in an obvious, but not expected place. We did not see them because we did not expect them to be where they were. This also happens with information, ideas and perspectives; we will not be able to "see" ideas that fall into our blind spots (eg go against our assumptions or beliefs). In contrast, we will accept without question ideas that are in line with our assumptions and beliefs.

WHAT ARE BIASES?

Beliefs are sub-conscious processes that help simplify our conscious decision-making and help us navigate our environments. Biases are flawed beliefs that we hang on to, even when they lead to bad outcomes. 

Our beliefs and biases help us reduce the tensions and undesirable emotions arising from conflicts between 'reality' and how we believe things "should" be. They help us move forward after upsets. They help us explain why things happened they way they did. Flawed beliefs or biases give us a false sense of security. They protect us from questioning ourselves, our 'tribes', and how we fit into the world.

A very, very short list of biases includes: 

• Confirmation bias: seeking information to prove we are right and ignoring information that shows what's wrong.
• Information-seeking or action bias: not balancing the development of information and insights with acting/doing in a way that is appropriate to the situation.
• Positivity or negativity bias: over emphasizing the positive or the negative.
• Authority bias: prioritizing a person with perceived authority or familiar characteristics, over a person with the qualifications and insights critical for the situation. (There also seems to be a trend of anti-authority bias: ignoring or shunning the people with relevant qualifications and insights.)
• Group-think: not challenging our community’s "best practices", beliefs and assumptions, and missing critical opportunities in favour of "group harmony".

SOURCES OF BIAS

Biases are cognitive processes. However, biases are also rooted deeply in our identities and our beliefs. Therefore, when someone or something challenges our biases, we may perceive the challenge as a personal threat.

Our identities (how we see ourselves, how we want others to see us, and who accepts us as peers) and beliefs (how we make sense of the world) are formed from birth and throughout our lives. We are shaped by our families, our socio-demographics, our education, our professions, our social circles, and our aspirations. To fit into the social groups we desire, we must demonstrate common values and behaviors. If we fit into the social, professional, economic and political groups we believe we "belong to", we feel psychologically safe. We know we're not perfect, but we feel that since we're 'winning', our identities and beliefs are "right".

When we start innovative or entrepreneurial projects, we do so because we feel uniquely qualified to do so, because we are "right" for the job. However, as we start running into challenges, our identities, beliefs and status might start feeling threatened. If we fail, we fear we might not just lose the opportunity, but also our status and our membership in formal and informal groups. When we feel psychologically threatened, we start shifting into aggressiveness (fight), defensiveness or distraction (flight), or acquiescence (freeze).

The fight/flight/freeze response increase the dominance of our limbic system (designed to keep us alive), while our cortex or executive brain function is sidelined. We are no longer open and reflective; our perception of 'reality' narrows and favours our biases. Our ability to collaborate, engage in creative-conflict and work with diverse thinkers shuts down. And our problem-solving and critical-thinking diminishes.

Fight/flight/freeze responses might include:

• challenging the challenger by questioning their credibility or motivation
• scapegoating, marginalizing, ostracizing or "othering" the challenger
• denigrating the challenger by labeling them "theoretical", "revolutionary" (Larman's 4th Law of Organizational Behaviour), "not a team player", interlopers, etc
• ignoring the challenge or challenger
• complaining how unfair the challenge is

Although it is very natural to challenge the challenger/challenge, it is more beneficial to understand and explore the challenge. A healthier response is extremely difficult, regardless of how well intended and valuable the challenge might be.

EVOLVING OUR BIASES

If we believe biases are cognitive, then it is easy to believe we have biases because we haven’t thought things through properly. However, if biases were truly cognitive, the average person would be able to change them once they understood the flaws in their logic. We all know stories of very smart, very disciplined people with a lot to lose who are not able to adapt themselves or their companies due to their biases.

Since beliefs and biases are deeply connected to our identities, our biases won't be changed by logic and cognitive processes. And they won't be changed by addressing them directly. We can only evolve the conditions that allowed those biases to form and to stick.

Research is increasingly showing that if we learn the techniques to work with the processes that create biases, we can create a competitive advantage for ourselves.

Recognizing and acknowledging our own biases can be painful, embarrassing and ... not fun. It takes real courage to face those uncomfortable insights and recognize what we need to do. To challenge our biases, we need to develop:

1. Awareness of our motivations: Maslow's hierarchy outlines that we are motivated by the need for

• safety (physical and psychological),
• belonging (loving relationships with family and community, and respect relationships in our professional and social realms), and
• meaning (creating value for the people around us, and for the future).
• Money and status are implied by Maslow's levels of motivation, however, they are not ends in themselves. There is nothing wrong with wanting to have lots of money and/or lots of power, but the question that needs to be asked is why? Is it to fill a psychological need? Is it to challenge ourselves and see what is possible? Is it to feel safer, increase connection and/or to leave a greater legacy? There is no "right" answer, but motivations influence the identities, beliefs and biases we develop.

2. Body-wisdom: is the ability to work with our physiological responses and to leverage the power of their information. It includes: interoception (sensing our physiological responses), reflection (cognitive evaluations of our actions), and reflexion (seeking to understand the drivers of our behaviours).

3. Curiosity, collaboration and creative-conflict: the ability to question, to challenge and be challenged, and to explore and experiment. It is not for the faint of heart when innovating. It requires immense courage when challenging our own beliefs and identities.

4. Growth mindset and entrepreneurial mindsets: is the ability and willingness to continually evolve ourselves and grow as individuals. Evolving our mindsets can be challenging, but is is also really interesting and fun. When we have a growth mindset, we can use our abilities to figure out how to solve problems – by learning and by collaborating with people who know different things than we do. And a growth mindset means we can develop new insights, beliefs and identities, which will allow us to truly innovate and create the change we want.

5. Grieving: Any personal change process mirrors the grief cycle (which is not a linear process). We may get stuck in denial, where we retrench our relationships with like-minded people. We may get stuck in anger where we blame everyone and everything else for things not working as desired. We may get stuck in desperation or depression which doesn’t help anyone (but is a part of healthy grieving). Giving up or reshaping key identities, beliefs and biases is giving up a part of ourselves. But it is necessary for new identities and beliefs to emerge. We need to honour the legitimate grief we feel letting go a part of ourselves.

6. Humour and joy: Personal evolution is hard, and there are days it really sucks. But the pay off usually is much higher functioning and much greater clarity on what it takes be achieve and maintain success. There is definitely joy in achieving our goals, however, there often is humour and joy along the way. Sometimes we have to work hard to find it, so we need to look for it and savour it when we find it. Humour and joy feed us so we can keep moving towards our goals.

We all know we have biases, but we don't always know when they hurt us. They are embedded in the identities and beliefs we formed over our lives, based on a broad range of experiences. To diminish our biases, we need to update our identities and beliefs.

Rather than trying to hunt down specific biases we have, it is much more effective to develop skills that support our continuous personal evolution: awareness, body-wisdom, curiosity, skills of creative-conflict, a growth- and entrepreneurial-mindset, grieving/letting go, and savouring humour and joy. These skills won't prevent us from having biases, but they will allow us to evolve them before they cause significant damage.

Extensive research shows that the more effectively and continuously we can develop our leadership and innovation competencies (which include personal competencies), the more effective we will be in all aspects of our life. To paraphrase Jerzy Gregorek, we can make easy choices and have a hard life, or we can make hard choices and have an easy life. Hard choices and the hard work of learning to acknowledge our biases and evolving the skills that address the conditions that allow biases to thrive, does in fact create an easier, and higher quality of life (personal and professional).

I’d be curious to hear about your experiences recognizing and changing biases? What works for you? Are there other things you would add?  

If you have any questions on how to create the changes you'd like to make - personally or with your teams - feel free to message me. I'd be pleased to speak with you.  

#bias #belief #identity #decisions #innovation #change