The Science of Fear and Failure

At Adani Institute of Digital Technology Management,?we are starting our maiden PGDM (Big Data Analytics) with noted Industry veterans. One of the topic being talked about is?“Why some organisations don't grow but others do”.

Famous journalist Vir Sanghvi narrated this story in a conference. In 1970, N R Naranyan Murthy worked for Patni Computer Systems. Having good work relation with one of the Patni brothers, Mr. Murthy had great freedom to work. He hired a fresh engineer those days who became close work associate to him soon.

In 1981, the other brother treated Mr. Murthy and his close associate roughly. The engineer, now famous as “Nandan Nilekani”, and the entire division resigned with Mr. Murthy.?

That estranged division created Infosys. Mr. Murthy and Mr. Nilekani then wanted to create an organisation which was run professionally and beyond a family-owned enterprise. They believe that Patnis needed to change the way they worked then. It did not happen, but Infosys did.

The business world is full of stories of organisational failures. Be it a Nokia, Blackberry or General Motors.

Is it so difficult to imbibe any new development? The psychology of change works with an interesting theory.

That’s called readiness to fail. The same is also known as negativity bias. It says that our minds are wired with possibilities of failures. We always are better geared towards failing and are kind of relieved when it happens.

The road map works in a different way here.

It is crucial to understand ‘how’ we are going ahead, which is different from ‘where’. Fear of letting go of a dear thing or habit kicks in much faster in a person than the ability.

Tell them the milestones and a clear path ahead. Prepare them for journey with excitement.