Shooting Messengers of Disruption

In 2019 Harvard Business School ran a set of eleven experiments providing evidence that people tend to “shoot the messenger” by expressing dislike of people who, in some way, are seen to be bearers of bad news.

Businesses and business leaders receive a stream of messages from many directions all the time. Those messages inevitably span a spectrum from good to bad news. It is important for leaders to separate the content of messages from the bearers of the messages.

Mature leaders should be able to differentiate more important from less important messages, and absorb the content and significance of more important messages, irrespective of how the messages arrive or are delivered.

The Harvard experiments, though, indicate that most people, including business leaders, tend to shoot the messengers of bad news. The ability of leaders to hear the messages independently of the bearers of the messages can interfere with their ability to fully comprehend the significance and implications of the messages.

What has this got to do with disruption?

Personally, I have been surprised several times at some business’s reactions to disruptive factors they have faced. More than once I have seen business owners, and even multiple businesses within an industry react in ways that I think are ineffective, or even irrational, in the face of disruption.

Relating this to my personal experience

My background and business focus lead me to be sensitive and alert to disruptive factors and their significance for my clients. This is particularly significant in relation to a client who is building a momentum with potential for disruption in their industry.

In my view this initiative is driven by a powerful synthesis of a desire to make a positive impact on society within the context of a successful business. Doing good through doing good business. As far as I can discern there is no intent to disrupt for the sake of disrupting. All of this resonates strongly with me.

Disruption is not an accident

This initiative has the potential to be disruptive. You can only be disruptive if someone is being disrupted. I believe that an organisation that is being disrupted, in one way or another, has made themselves open to be disrupted.

There is so much talk and information about disruption. The rate of change in the world is accelerating faster than it ever has before. I strongly believe the leaders of every organisation have a deep responsibility to their organisations to be sensitive and alert to the dynamics of their environment. I believe that the leaders of organisations that are disrupted have probably not been alert or forward-looking or forward-thinking enough regarding their organisation.

Bringing this back to my personal experience again

As much as my client’s business is still very early stage, several businesses in a segment of their industry appear to have recognised early signs of at least some aspects of the impact this initiative could have. This implies that they are at least aware enough of developments in their industry to recognise and acknowledge, even if only to themselves, the potential impact of my client’s initiative. I sense that from their perspective they see this potential impact to be disruptive, possibly even threatening, to their businesses. These businesses now are engaging in “shooting the messenger” – my client. There is no engagement, for example on the logic of my client’s initiative, potential for collaboration, or refinement or evolution of their business model.

I believe this is entirely misguided. I believe that only organisations that are liable to disruption can be disrupted. Organisation that are liable to disruption are fundamentally at risk. If they were alive to the reality of their world and the emerging opportunities, they might well have been pursuing an initiative similar in at least some ways to my client’s initiative, as they have access to all the information that my client has.

The saddest thing for me is that, unless these organisations shift their perspective, these businesses are doomed to the same progressive demise of every organisation that has tried to stop disruptive progress.