VUCA stands for Volatility, Uncertainty, Complexity and Ambiguity and is, in short, about how you navigate in a changing and complex world. Here, bias is your friend – but also your worst enemy. So learn how to use bias to your advantage so it doesn't stifle innovation and development. The article was first published in Ugebrevet Mandag Morgen February 8th, 2023 https://www.mm.dk/ledelse/artikel/saadan-bruger-du-bias-til-din-fordel-i-en-vuca-verden
Bias is a term that has crept into everyday language in recent years, also in leadership lingo. However, the phenomenon of bias is by no means new, it is an ancient and completely natural and essential part of being human.
Biologically speaking, bias covers the function in our brains where we make assessments and assumptions based on previous experiences and information. This helps us navigate the world and make decisions quickly.
Bias is the enemy of innovation, and innovation is the key to survival in the VUCA environment that currently defines the organisational world in which most leaders find themselves.
However, bias can also limit our thinking to a great extent, both as an organisation and as an individual, and prevent us from seeing and considering alternative perspectives and solutions. As a result, we cannot create the innovative solutions that make it possible to navigate in a VUCA environment, which is characterised by high unpredictability and complexity, hence the letter combination, which covers: Volatility, Uncertainty, Complexity and Ambiguity.
Yet bias is not without benefits for an organisation either. Imagine an organisation that is completely without bias. What would it look like? We can tell you what it would look like: it would be a complete and utter disaster, a total train wreck. No alarm systems would be in place, none of our survival mechanisms would work and the decision process would move with the speed of a glacier.
Bias is the enemy of innovation
So bias is not evil and it is here to stay. But in modern life, in order to get the most out of it, we have to drag it out of the dark corners and into the light. Because bias is the enemy of innovation, and innovation is the key to survival in the VUCA environment that currently defines the organisational world most leaders face.
There are many models for navigating a VUCA environment, but if you apply them without addressing bias, you're likely missing out. So how do we work with our bias on an organisational level?
Knowing that something is a problem is the prerequisite to solving it. Therefore, it is first and foremost necessary to become aware of our own and the organisation's biases, so that we can intercept the automatic behaviour that can be an obstacle to achieving our goals.
Our brains are designed to associate. Finding patterns, connections and coincidences is what we do best, and that ability is the very foundation of our neural function. We have a strong urge to classify people, experiences, objects and so on into our little mental boxes; boxes that are made up of stereotypical combinations of notions from our biased brain.
Broadly speaking, this means that bias affects organisations' relationships, worldviews, strategies and systems and entails an attempt to make everything fit into the 'boxes'. In other words, our bias gives us a wildly skewed view of the world, and therefore our strategies will be too if we don't make an effort to avoid it.
We also tend to gravitate towards someone who looks like us and thinks like us, and devise solutions that immediately make the most sense. But when we do that, "we usually do" too often wins, and we cut ourselves off from being innovative as an organisation. The risk of that is that we become irrelevant in a world that looks very different from what our bias tells us.
All in all, unmanaged bias is of very little use in an environment where we need to be able to do and think something new.
Slow down to reveal bias
In order for us to consciously work with our biases, whether at the organisational, team or individual level, we need to slow things down. After all, our bias allows our brains to make decisions super quickly to save energy and – ultimately – save our lives.
We must train ourselves to slow down, so that our bias does not jump straight to the conclusion and thus potentially choose the easy solution.
Therefore, we must train ourselves to slow down, so that our bias does not jump straight to the conclusion and thus potentially choose the easy solution. We do this, for example, by allocating time to ask questions about the processes we decide on or already have in the organisation. Here are two things you can do:
1: Value chain analysis or workflow analysis can be an excellent way to build organisational bias awareness. By analysing our processes step by step, it becomes easier to spot bias. We often see that steps in processes are redundant and only exist because of a biased assumption about their necessity.
An example is that "it is necessary for the manager to lay out the route for the drivers, because the drivers cheat us if they can get away with it". The value chain analysis is a way to slow down the decision-making process and bring bias to light.
2: In addition, you can work purposefully to promote a culture that is psychologically safe. By doing so, there is a greater chance that people will share alternative perspectives without fear of consequences. Consciously create time, process and space for all members of the organisation to contribute their perspectives and thus create better and less biased ideas and solutions.
Force new processes
If we don't have a systematic approach to inspire and challenge beliefs throughout the organisation, then we are missing out. So use different problem-solving models (and change them often) to simply force the organisation to slow down and question what it is doing.
As mentioned, we are fighting against our energy-saving brains, which just love to do what we usually do, so to ensure that we change track it is a good idea to force the brains out of habitual thinking every now and then.
Another suggestion is to get help in 'VUCA Prime', which is a behavioural management model by Robert Johansen. Here, VUCA stands for Vision, Understanding, Clarity and Agility, and the model functions as an action regulator by presenting proposals for how the organisation can respond to uncertainty, ambiguity, etc.
Because we can force ourselves to think differently if we want to, and exciting innovations can come out of that. A good example is The Rules of Dogma, which four Danish film directors publicly promised to observe in 1995. It led to a new era in both Danish and international film production and was considered wildly innovative. And they were actually very, very simple rules, but by applying them, filmmakers were forced to think differently and challenge their own bias for "how to make a good film".
Be more curious
Being genuinely curious about other beliefs, perspectives, worldviews, perceptions and so on will automatically broaden our horizons and improve our ability to navigate a VUCA environment with agility and innovation power. Curiosity, like everything else, can be trained. You do this, among other things, by being aware of getting input from sources you don't normally get input from.
A good method is to ask questions about the people, things and situations you come across and don't fully understand, instead of just jumping straight to judgement. A really excellent question to ask when you want to train your curiosity is: "What good intention could the person behind this statement/product/etc. have had?" That question will automatically challenge our bias, as even the most alien attitudes or measures are illuminated from a completely different angle when we ask like this.
And if we really want to practice curiosity and the ability to innovate, we should not only use models from our own cultural hemisphere or industry. Then novels, management models, art, films, thinkers, philosophers and more from other parts of the world should be brought in as catalysts for our innovation processes.
So where bias is the enemy of innovation, curiosity is the enemy of bias. And every time someone says, “But we always have…”, you know it's time to start asking questions and bring in the wild and wildly different perspectives.
Learn more about bias, download our free eBook here: https://hexes.dk/ebook-on-bias/
Janus & Nanna HEXES