11.4 Groupthink

Groupthink leads to concurrence seeking and consequently to low-quality decision-making. Boards of companies may suffer from groupthink and it appears that increased levels of independence and measures that are associated with independence can be used to prevent groupthink. Since groupthink and independence are closely-related subjects, this section elaborates on the groupthink theory and the link with independence is described. Janis (1971) was the first to present a theory on groupthink (Esser 1998: 116). Fatal decisions in history were analysed in his research and he concluded that ‘the desperate drive for consensus at any cost that suppresses dissent among the mighty in the corridors of power’ or groupthink was the cause (Janis 1971: 43). The disasters analysed were the Bay of Pigs invasion in Cuba, the Cuban Missile Crisis, the North Korea war, Pearl Harbour, the Vietnam War and the Marshall Plan. They all have the characteristics of groupthink. The members of these groups – the ingroups – ‘tend to involve informal norms to preserve friendly intragroup relations and these become part of the hidden agenda at their meetings’ (Janis 1982: 7).

Definitions of groupthink range from ‘concurrence seeking’ to ‘a mode of thinking that people engage in when they are deeply involved in a cohesive ingroup, when the members’ strivings for unanimity override their motivation to realistically appraise alternative courses of action’ (Janis 1982: 9, 244; McCauley 1989: 250-251). The result of groupthink is expected to be a low probability of a successful outcome of a decision. However, the theory receives criticism due to a lack of support in empirical research. ‘There is little support for the full groupthink model; in fact, in no study have all results been consistent with the model. In addition, Janis made no changes in, or additions to, the groupthink model despite evidence of the relevance of many additional variables, including group norms, the nature of the task, the degree of leader power, and stage of group development’ (Fuller and Aldag 1998: 167). Esser criticises groupthink theory as well, but blames research in this field for its quality and quantity (1998: 138-139). The same cases are analysed over and over again and laboratory tests use antecedents that are difficult to operationalise, such as group cohesiveness. Further research is therefore required to obtain a better understanding of and to validate groupthink theory, according to Esser. To the best knowledge of the author of this study, this further research is scarce. Despite criticism, groupthink theory is accepted, but acceptance is based on intuition rather than evidence (Aldag and Fuller 1993: 547).

Groupthink relies heavily on the theory of Janis, which is the reason why Janis’ research is primarily used to describe groupthink in this study. Although research in this field seems to be outdated, the problem is still relevant. Research on the performance of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) prior to the financial crisis in 2008 concluded that the ‘IMF’s ability to correctly identify the mounting risks was hindered by a high degree of groupthink…’ (Independent Evaluation Office of the International Monetary Fund 2011: 17). The board of Enron suffered from groupthink as well (O’Connor 2003). Groupthink therefore remains a problem within groups of decision makers. This section proceeds as follows. First the symptoms of groupthink are described in order to understand the idea of groupthink, second the consequences are touched upon, third the antecedents are described, fourth the measures to prevent groupthink are described and finally a conclusion is given.