MGCR 222 Lecture Notes - Lecture 12: No. 12 Group Raf, Misgivings, Groupthink
Lecture 12 – Group Decision Making Diversity and Conflict
Case: Columbia’s Final Mission
• On Feb. 1, 2003, the shuttle began its descent to earth after a 16 day mission
• The crew of 7 (5 men and 2 women) never made it back
• Their fate had been sealed 16 days before when the shuttle took off
• A piece of foam insulation the size of a briefcase fell off, cracking some of the
heat-resistant tiles on the shuttle’s left wing
• Super-heated atmospheric gases forced their way into the shuttle’s airframe
through the hole in the wing, causing it to disintegrate
• Report of the Columbia Accident Investigation Board
o The foam did it, the institution allowed it
o Echoes of the Challenger
o Three conclusions – NASA
▪ Downplayed the risk of the foam strike
▪ Adopted a “wait and see” orientation to action (reactive or passive
response)
▪ Embarked on a fragmented, largely discipline-based analysis of the
foam strike
Symptoms of Groupthink
• Illusion of invulnerability
o Members fail to prepare for and respond to clear warnings of danger
o They become overoptimistic (overconfident) and willing to take
extraordinary risks
o Columbia disaster
▪ Records of foam strikes over the years as “anomalies”
▪ Senior NASA managers classified it as a maintenance concern and
concluded that it was an acceptable risk
• Collective rationalization
o Members rationalize away any resistance to the assumptions they have
made
o Columbia disaster
▪ Framed the space shuttle program as an operational endeavor
rather than as an experimental project
▪ A shift from trial-and-error learning (hypothesis generation) to
hypothesis testing with aggressive and unrealistic schedule and
deadlines
▪ A reversal of the burden of proof: prove that the shuttle is unsafe
• Belief in inherent morality
o Members ignore the ethical or moral consequences of their decisions
o Columbia disaster:
▪ Jon Harpold, the director of mission operations, said that there was
“nothing they could do about” the foam strike
▪ “Don’t you think it would be better for the crew to have a happy
successful flight and die unexpectedly during entry than to stay on
orbit knowing that nothing to be done until the air ran out?”
• Direct pressure on dissenters
o Members ridicule those who express doubts about or question any of the
group’s shared views
o Columbia disaster:
▪ Debris Assessment Team (DAT): engineers requested additional
data or imagery to assess damage from the foam strike
▪ DAT had no clear lines of authority or reporting relationships
▪ Request denied by the senior management
• Self-censorship
o Members who have doubts or hold differing points of view keep silent
about their misgivings
o Columbia disaster:
▪ Rocha wrote a scathing email to fellow engineers in response to
upper management’s cancellation of the DAT’s imagery request but
he never sent the email to the Mission Management team because
he felt distanced by the organizational structure
• Illusion of unanimity
o The absence of dissent or silence of the doubters is perceived as a “yes”
vote
o Columbia disaster:
▪ Linda Ham, the head of the Mission Management team stated her
opinion in an early meeting that the foam strike was not a problem
▪ Ham did not engage her team in the process of collective, open-
ended inquiry
• Stereotyped views of outgroups
o Outgroup members are perceived in a negative light
• Self-appointed mind-guards
o Members protect the leader and fellow members from adverse
information that might question the effectiveness and morality of past
decisions
The Groupthink Process
Counter-acting Groupthink
• Limit the group size to be no more than 10 individuals
• Leaders should avoid stating preferences and adopt an impartial stance
o Leaders actively seek input from all members by encouraging open-
minded inquiry and dissent
• Expression of dissenting opinions causes groups to…
o Explore more alternatives prior to making a decision
o Consider alternatives on both sides of the issue
o Useful even when the dissenter is wrong
• When discussing alternatives, at least 1 person should be assigned the “devil’s
advocate” role to fully evaluate options
Initial Conditions
•high cohesiveness
•insilation of team from
outsiders
•lack of methodical
procedures for search and
appraisal
•directive leadership
•high stresswith low hope
for finding a better
solution than one
favoured by the leader or
other influential person
•complex/changing
environment
Conformity-
Seeking
Tendency of
Group
Symptoms of Grouthink
•illusions of invulnerability
•collective rantionalization
•belief in the inherent
morality of the team
•stereotypes of other
groups
•direct pressure on
dissenters
•self-censorship
•illusion of unanimity
•self-appointed "mind-
guards"
Groupthink Leads
to Defective
Decision Making in
Terms of:
•incomplete survey of
alternatives and goals
•failure to examine risks of
preffered choice
•selective bia in processing
information at hand
•failure to reappraise
alternatives
•failure to work out
contingency plans
