"There are of course ongoing controversies about what exactly constitutes knowledge in contemporary organizations (e.g. Blackler, 1995; Scherer and Spender, 2007; Schultze and Stabell, 2004; Spender, 1998; Tsoukas and Vladimirou, 2001). Many of the references to ‘knowledge’ are vague and all-embracing (Schreyögg and Geiger, 2007). Nonetheless, the idea that valuable, rare and inimitable knowledge is significant to organizational performance has a strong rhetorical value. Instead of engaging in these debates about what knowledge ‘is’, we want to question the assumption in this field that sophisticated thinking and use of advanced knowledge is a core characteristic of many contemporary organizations. We think this ‘broader set of assumptions . . . shared by several different schools’ (Alvesson and Sandberg, 2011, p. 225) needs to be challenged. It creates a one-sided, widely-shared, and rather grandiose portrait of the smart, knowledge-based firm and its employees. This picture may be appealing, but it misses how effective organizational functioning calls also for qualities that do not easily fit with the idea of smartness. There is a huge body of work on non-rationality in organizations, which reminds us of the limitations to the intelligent mobilization of cognitive capacities. Some researchers document how cognitive limitations lead to practices that could be labelled ‘semi-rational’ (e.g. Brunsson, 1985; March and Simon, 1958). Others highlight more serious forms of irrationality, which are produced by unconscious elements, group-think, and rigid adherence to wishful thinking (e.g. Schwartz, 1990; Wagner, 2002). In our view, these studies miss a set of deviations from smartness, which are neither semi-rationalnor purely stupid. To capture these processes, we propose the concept of functional stupidity. Functional stupidity is organizationally-supported lack of reflexivity, substantive reasoning, and justification. It entails a refusal to use intellectual resources outside a narrow and ‘safe’ terrain. It can provide a sense of certainty that allows organizations to function smoothly. This can save the organization and its members from the frictions provoked by doubt and reflection. Functional stupidity contributes to maintaining and strengthening organizational order. It can also motivate people, help them to cultivate their careers, and subordinate them to socially acceptable forms of management and leadership. Such positive outcomes can further reinforce functional stupidity. However, functional stupidity can also have negative consequences such as trapping individuals and organizations into problematic patterns of thinking, which engender the conditions for individual and organizational dissonance. These negative outcomes may prompt individual and collective reflexivity in a way that can undermine functional stupidity. By advancing the concept of functional stupidity, we make three, overlapping contributions. First, we disturb a common field assumption that contemporary organizations operate mainly through the mobilization of cognitive capacities (e.g. Grant, 1996; Spender, 1996). We do this by pointing out how the denial of cognitive capabilities can actually facilitate organizational functioning. Second, we seek to extend existing accounts of the limits to rationality and thoughtfulness in organizations (e.g. Ashforth and Fried, 1988; Cohen et al., 1972; March, 1996; March and Simon, 1958), by providing a concept that allows us to account for how the use of cognitive capacities may be limited by relations of power and domination rather than a lack of time or resources, or cognitive fixations. Finally, we propose a concept and theoretical explanation for what we think is a pervasive, but largely unacknowledged aspect of organizational life. We think that the term ‘functional stupidity’ might be evocative and resonate with the experiences of researchers, practitioners, citizens, and consumers. Thus, our approach may help to illuminate key experiences of people in organizations, that are often masked by dominant modes of theorizing which emphasize ‘positive’ themes, such as leadership, identity, culture, learning, core competence, innovation, and networks. It should open up space for further in-depth empirical investigation of this topic. Through these three contributions we hope to offer an ‘interesting theory’ (Davis, 1971) that develops some counter-assumptions and encourages new lines of inquiry (Alvesson and Sandberg, 2011)." onlinelibrary.wiley/doi/10.1111/j.1467-6486.2012.01072.x/full
Posted on: Thu, 06 Jun 2013 17:51:19 +0000
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