Customer Reviews

Leadership and Self-Deception: Getting Out of the Box

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Subtitled "getting out of the box", uses the parable of a fictional company, Zagrum, and a new employee, Tom Callum, to learn how to think and "outside of the box", AVOIDING THE PITFALLS OF SELF-DECEPTION.

Based on the work of Arbinger institute, it is a very readable tale that includes experiences with family, co-workers, strangers, etc. to help understand how our self-betrayal (knowing what to do and not doing it, or "honoring" it), places individuals "in the box" where it is necessary for others and situations to be problems in order to justify our false perceptions.

Bud Jefferson, the EVP at Zagrum, tells the true story of a doctor in mid 1800's Europe, Ignaz Semmelweis, who was trying to find out why the Vienna General Hospital had a mortality rate of 1 in 10. His studies included diet, laundry, most everthing he could think of with no real resolution of the problem! finally he determined that the physicians were carrying some unnamed organisms (germs, as we now know) from cadavers to living patients. In essence, they were the problem as they were trying to provide solutions. After instituting some rudimentary application of a lime and chlorine solution cleansing between patient contacts, the mortality rate plummeted to 1 in 100. This book makes the parallel between this experience and the self-deception inherent in most interpersonal relationships, notably at the leadership level.

Pretty powerful stuff, with some excellent diagrams to aid in understanding, applying the information. In the appendix, Arbinger tells of their passion in dealing with the three issues of self-deception (formerly called Resistance).
How can people simultaneously
1) create their own problems
2) be unable to see this, and yet
3) resist any attempts to help them stop.

I first read Leadership and Self-Deception years ago in fits and starts. I've read it again and it's fresh and relevant. The idea of treating others as having value only because they are people gets to the heart of many seemingly intractable issues in the world. Further, you don't really need a formal title or position to be a leader. You're a leader because of why you do what you do, and results will follow. In the scheme of this book, the results will be good if you're out of the self-deception box.

What kept me from absorbing the book the first time, I believe, is that so many other business books have used the same story type of format. I think it got popularized with Ken Blanchard's One Minute Manager. At least hundreds more followed this proven marketing success formula. The problem I personally have with these story formats is my inability to suspend belief. The story or dialogue seems implausible to me. I felt that way this time too but got past it. In fact, I felt the truth about self-deception.

The book shows how most conflicts are perpetuated by self-deception. On some psychological level the path of least resistance is to depreciate others when there is any type of conflict, and there are endless ways to do it. This reactive mode is being in the box, being dependent on outcomes that make us feel secure. Out of the box is when our motivations are not dependent on outcomes. Wanting to feel more secure does not have to lead the mind to self-deception. By catching this kind of thought process and stopping it immediately, we can live a better life. The first step is to become aware. For this reason, I recommend this book but also caution that the dialogue may seem implausible.

Leadership and Self-Deception catches us all in the act of being ourselves, which is sometimes not such a pretty sight. If you are willing to dredge up memories of conversations and relatiohships gone bad to figure out what went wrong and how you could possibly avoid the same thing happening again in the future, read this book. I'd go so far as to say that if you read this book and can't see yourself in the stories that are told then you truly are deceiving yourself - betraying yourself. Now, you may want to say that the substantial learning in this book could have been captured in three pages. Maybe so, but it's the very nature of the stories that are told that draws the reader into an examination of their own dark side. The narrative approach is extremely effective here. I rank this as one of the best books I've ever read, period. If you want to be a better leader, a better family member, a better human being, read this book.

This is one of those books that you wish you had read 10 years earlier. Though I doubt I would have been able to appreciate it as much back then. The basic premise of the book is how our own negative actions and thought influence those around us negatively which in turn affects us etc. Such a negative spiral of interaction is called 'being in the box'. The book gives some valuable insights about this process: none of which are radically new most of which seem blatantly obvious. The book illustrates these insights using various stories of a range of very recognisable professional and private situations. Most important: the book made me much more aware of how my thoughts and feelings affect those around me and vise versa and for that alone I am very grateful.

I got this book (the paperback version) two years ago from Jack Wood a professor at IMD - after attending a leadership course there. It's not a long read and I finished it before my plane touched down during the flight home. My wife read it within a week of me and I've been borrowing my copy to several of my friends and colleagues from time to time. They invariably love it.