Decades' worth of studies show that a diverse workforce measurably improves decision making, problem solving, creativity, innovation, and flexibility. But most of us also believe that hiring, development, and compensation decisions should come down to merit. Although the two ideas don't seem contradictory, they're tough to reconcile in practice. Cognitive roadblocks keep getting in the way. The author looks at recent books and research studies on the subject, including Success and Luck: Good Fortune and the Myth of Meritocracy, by Robert H. Frank, and Pedigree: How Elite Students Get Elite Jobs, by Lauren A. Rivera. Frank points out, for example, that hindsight bias causes us to believe that random events are predictable and to manufacture explanations for the inevitability of our achievements. And winner-take-all markets intensify the consequences of our cognitive shortcuts. Rivera studied hiring committees at professional services firms that believed they were ensuring rigor and counteracting bias through group discussions of job candidates from the school-recruitment pipeline. But those conversations actually dampened diversity by giving negative racial, ethnic, and gender stereotypes greater sway over decisions.
The information that top managers receive is rarely unfiltered. Unpopular opinions are censored. Partisan views are veiled as objective arguments. Honest mistakes are made. The manager is then left to sort it all out and come to a wise conclusion. Few people know how to get an accurate read on a situation like documentarian Errol Morris. He is the award-winning director of such films as The Thin Blue Line and this year's Standard Operating Procedure, an exploration of the elusive truth behind the infamous photographs taken at Abu Ghraib prison. The Guardian has ranked him among the world's top 10 directors, crediting him with "a forensic mind" and "a painter's eye." In this article, Morris talks with HBR's Lisa Burrell about how he sorts through ambiguous evidence and contradictory views to arrive at the real story. "I don't believe in the postmodern notion that there are different kinds of truth," he says. "There is one objective reality, period." Getting to it requires keeping your mind open to all kinds of evidence- not just the parts that fit with your first impressions or developing opinions-and, often, far more investigation than one would think. If finding the truth is a matter of perseverance, convincing people of it is something of an art, one with which Morris has had much experience not only as a documentarian but also as a highly sought-after director of TV ads for companies like Apple, Citibank, Adidas, and Toyota. He holds up John Kerry's 2004 bid for the U.S. presidency as a cautionary tale: Kerry struck voters as inauthentic when he emphasized only his military service and failed to account for his subsequent war protest. Morris would have liked to interview him speaking in his own words-natural, unscripted material-so that his humanity, which seemed to get lost in the campaign, could emerge.
In the four years since Rob Miranda became CEO of Growing Places, a provider of on-site child care for companies in the Midwestern United States, he has been a font of ideas. For instance, he set up rooms where moms can breastfeed their babies during breaks in the workday and put Webcams in classrooms so that parents can "visit" their children from their desks. As a result of Rob's entrepreneurial vision and operational savvy, the company has achieved profitable growth. The problem is that Rob tends to stick his foot in his mouth. Evan Breyer, the company's founder and chairman, hopes that Rob will learn to avoid making verbal gaffes; he even gets Rob to see a coach. But while Evan is wrapping up a facility tour for a potential corporate sponsor of a scholarship program, Rob makes an insensitive remark about breastfeeding in front of the visitors--among them, a reporter. Not surprisingly, the local paper runs a scathing editorial the next day. Several days later, during a conference presentation on preschool curricula, he does it again with a comment implying that teachers are lazy and unprepared. The result is more bad press and a meaningful dip in stock price. It's beginning to look as though Rob is not going to change, and many board members are talking ouster. Should Evan try to persuade the board to hang on to Rob? Commenting on this fictional case study in R0612A and R0612Z are Ronald A. Heifetz, a professor at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government; John H. Biggs, the former CEO of TIAA-CREF; Torie Clarke, a CNN analyst; and Roger Brown, a cofounder of Bright Horizons.
In the four years since Rob Miranda became CEO of Growing Places, a provider of on-site child care for companies in the Midwestern United States, he has been a font of ideas. For instance, he set up rooms where moms can breastfeed their babies during breaks in the workday and put Webcams in classrooms so that parents can "visit" their children from their desks. As a result of Rob's entrepreneurial vision and operational savvy, the company has achieved profitable growth. The problem is that Rob tends to stick his foot in his mouth. Evan Breyer, the company's founder and chairman, hopes that Rob will learn to avoid making verbal gaffes; he even gets Rob to see a coach. But while Evan is wrapping up a facility tour for a potential corporate sponsor of a scholarship program, Rob makes an insensitive remark about breastfeeding in front of the visitors--among them, a reporter. Not surprisingly, the local paper runs a scathing editorial the next day. Several days later, during a conference presentation on preschool curricula, he does it again with a comment implying that teachers are lazy and unprepared. The result is more bad press and a meaningful dip in stock price. It's beginning to look as though Rob is not going to change, and many board members are talking ouster. Should Evan try to persuade the board to hang on to Rob? Commenting on this fictional case study in R0612A and R0612Z are Ronald A. Heifetz, a professor at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government; John H. Biggs, the former CEO of TIAA-CREF; Torie Clarke, a CNN analyst; and Roger Brown, a cofounder of Bright Horizons.
In the four years since Rob Miranda became CEO of Growing Places, a provider of on-site child care for companies in the Midwestern United States, he has been a font of ideas. For instance, he set up rooms where moms can breastfeed their babies during breaks in the workday and put Webcams in classrooms so that parents can "visit" their children from their desks. As a result of Rob's entrepreneurial vision and operational savvy, the company has achieved profitable growth. The problem is that Rob tends to stick his foot in his mouth. Evan Breyer, the company's founder and chairman, hopes that Rob will learn to avoid making verbal gaffes; he even gets Rob to see a coach. But while Evan is wrapping up a facility tour for a potential corporate sponsor of a scholarship program, Rob makes an insensitive remark about breastfeeding in front of the visitors--among them, a reporter. Not surprisingly, the local paper runs a scathing editorial the next day. Several days later, during a conference presentation on preschool curricula, he does it again with a comment implying that teachers are lazy and unprepared. The result is more bad press and a meaningful dip in stock price. It's beginning to look as though Rob is not going to change, and many board members are talking ouster. Should Evan try to persuade the board to hang on to Rob? Commenting on this fictional case study in R0612A and R0612Z are Ronald A. Heifetz, a professor at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government; John H. Biggs, the former CEO of TIAA-CREF; Torie Clarke, a CNN analyst; and Roger Brown, a cofounder of Bright Horizons.